Organization vs. Organism - How do You View the Church?

I have a great deal of respect and love for all Christian churches because they serve as rallying-points for the saints to worship collectively, receive solid teaching of doctrine, meet other Christ-followers, fund missionary endeavors, organize large-scale community service, and more. Churches as we know them are part of God's plan in mobilizing His people to impact the world.

But there's a problem. At some point these organizations began to define our Christianity rather than the Holy Spirit's activity. The Bible calls us "the Body of Christ." That's an "organism" not an "organization." Organizations are great, but if we miss the inner application that comes from the Holy Spirit, we're nothing more than a moral social club. When it comes down to eternity, Jesus isn't going to ask you what church you attended--He's going to judge you on whether or not you knew Him personally. I should mention, though, that this is not an invitation to go live your own customized brand of faith--fellowship with the "Body of Christ" IS fellowship with Christ, and the Word of God is clear that we need to be with other believers. The problem arises when our definition of "faith" becomes purely horizontal and lacks anything vertical. In other words, it is earth-based rather than heaven-based.

What we're left with is a world who knows Christians as "those people who go to church" rather than "those people who know God." Dr. Bob Roberts, Jr., wrote in his book, Transformation:

The church has been stripped of its influence in the West today, not because it has lost its wealth and position in society--it hasn't--but because the church has lost its credibility. On the whole, we can hardly change ourselves, much less the world. We cannot consistently live the message we herald to the world, but never have we been more effective at religious marketing of products that help us appear as if we are living it. As a result, the growing perception is that the church is religious but not spiritual. It has style but not enough substance.

Unless we make a shift in our mindset from "going to church" to "being the church," we'll just continue to be fake-smiling, suit-wearing, wallet-emptying, song-singing, liturgy-quoting, pie-eating, religious drones who sit in pretty little rows week after week like canned vegetables in the refrigerator--never changing.

Is this what Jesus died for?