A student newspaper at Baylor ran a piece this week with a headline that stopped me: Gen Z: Try going to church alone. Not bring a friend. Not find a group first. Just go. By yourself. Park the car, open the door, find a seat, and see what God does.
I have read a lot of advice aimed at young adults and the church. Most of it is aimed at us — the people already inside — telling us what to fix so that they will come. This was aimed at them, and it asked something harder than most of us would dare ask. Because walking into a room full of strangers who all seem to know each other is one of the more quietly courageous things a human being can do.
What it actually costs to walk in alone
Let's not pretend it's a small thing. You don't know where the door is. You don't know if you're dressed right. You don't know when people stand and when they sit, or whether that row is somebody's row. You don't know anyone's name and nobody knows yours, and if you slip out at the last song, no one will notice.
That is true whether you are twenty-two and new to town, or seventy-two and starting over after a move, or somewhere in between and simply out of the habit of church for reasons you'd rather not explain at the coffee table. The fear isn't generational. It's human. And I have watched enough people take that first walk across a parking lot to know that they are usually braver than they look and more nervous than they let on.
God has a particular tenderness for the person with no one
Here is what Scripture says about the one who arrives alone:
"A father of the fatherless, and a judge of the widows, is God in his holy habitation. God setteth the solitary in families" (Psalm 68:5-6).
Read that again slowly. God sets the solitary in families. It is an active verb. He is not waiting to see whether the lonely person can network their way into belonging. He places them. He does the seating. When somebody walks into a sanctuary with no one beside them, they are not walking in unnoticed — they are walking into the very thing God specializes in doing.
Which means the person who comes alone is not a project for the church. They may well be a gift to it. Some of the most alive faith I see comes from people who had no social reason to be in the room at all. They came because something in them was hungry, and hunger is a work of the Holy Spirit before it is ever a decision.
The nudge on our side of the door
There is a moment in Acts 8 where an Ethiopian official is riding home alone, reading Isaiah and understanding none of it. And the Spirit says to Philip, "Go near, and join thyself to this chariot" (Acts 8:29). Philip ran. He didn't schedule a follow-up. He ran, and asked one honest question, and a man went home rejoicing.
I believe the Spirit still gives that nudge, and He gives it in ordinary rooms in West Michigan on ordinary Sunday mornings. That flicker of go say something to her as you're heading for your seat is not your imagination and it is not your personality type. It is God arranging a meeting. Most of us ignore it because we're afraid of being awkward. Be awkward. Awkward and warm beats smooth and absent every time.
And keep it simple. Don't hand a first-time visitor a program and a schedule. Ask their name. Ask if they want to sit with you. Sitting with someone is worth more than any brochure we could print.
If you're the one thinking about going
Go. Go alone if that's the only way you can go. Sit in the back if the back feels safer. Leave early if you need to. You are not required to sing, cry, raise a hand, or have your life in order first. Jesus never once asked a person to be presentable before He was glad to see them.
And if you have prayed for company and it hasn't come yet — if the loneliness has outlasted your patience — hear this without any pressure attached: the God who sets the solitary in families has not forgotten your address. Christ Himself walked the loneliest road there was, and He walked it so that you would never have to be a stranger in His house. You are not a visitor to Him. You are the reason the door is open.
Join us this Sunday at 10:30am — Outpouring Worship Center, Ravenna.