House Rule #1: It's OK To Not Be OK

The order of the house rules matter and this rule is at the top for a reason. If we don’t believe it’s O.K. to not be O.K., our church culture will be marked by spoken and unspoken pressure to improve and grow—and do it in a hurry. Here's the thing: we want that. We do want growth and improvement in every facet of life for God’s glory. But we want the desire for growth to be cultivated in us out of love for Jesus instead of pressure from others. The apostle Paul gives us a great example of this in Philippians 3 when he talks about pressing on toward Christ in his spiritual growth. He wanted to keep growing. He wasn’t yet what he wanted to be. He might even say “It’s OK to not be OK but I don’t want to stay that way.” That’s really different than us scolding one another with “It’s OK for you to not be OK but you better not stay that way.”