If Perception Is Reality
What the Church Reveals to the World
A while back, I wrote down a sermon idea titled "The Interior and the Exterior Church." It was born out of a simple question: If perception is reality, what does the Church reveal about God to the world? Not just the Church in theory—but the visible church, the one with parking signs, livestreams, bulletins, awkward coffee after the service, and the smell of incense (or vanilla candles). That church. Your church.
The message was simple: we must cultivate the ways of God inwardly—through Scripture, prayer, and holiness—and let that interior life give shape to our outward witness. If we invert this, we risk becoming performers of religion rather than practitioners of it.
Joseph Ratzinger, in The Spirit of the Liturgy, says it better than I ever could:
“The land is given to the people to be a place for the worship of the true God. Mere possession of the land, mere national autonomy, would reduce Israel to the level of all the other nations… [but] when it is the place where God reigns… the right kind of human existence [is] developed.”
What makes Israel’s inheritance different is not the land itself, but the presence of God within it. So too the Church. We may possess buildings, gifted preachers, emotionally resonant music, and robust theological statements. But what good is any of it if the Church is not the place where God reigns?
This brings us to Sinai. Ratzinger goes on:
“Sinai gives Israel, so to speak, its interior land without which the exterior one would be a cheerless prospect… When the reality of Sinai is lost, the Land, too, is inwardly lost.”
The same, again, applies to us. Without the interior church—the life lived in hidden obedience—the visible church becomes merely a performance, a projection of values without the vitality to sustain them.
The Glory of God Is a Living Church
Ratzinger draws from St. Irenaeus, reminding us: “The glory of God is the living man, but the life of man is the vision of God.” The Church is most radiant when it is alive in God’s presence—when its worship and its witness come from people who have been transformed by a vision of the Holy One.
It is not enough to know the Bible. If Scripture remains words on a page, we’ve missed the point. But when read in reverence, when encountered in prayer and written upon our hearts by the Spirit (Jeremiah 31:33), it becomes the shape of our lives.
“Teach me your ways so that I may know you,” Moses prays (Exodus 33:13).
“Live such good lives among the Gentiles that... they may see your honorable deeds and glorify God,” Peter exhorts (1 Peter 2:12, NRSV).
To follow Jesus is to let him define the terms. Moses doesn’t ask God to rubber-stamp his leadership; he asks to be taught God’s way. It’s a humility many of us (myself included) must keep returning to.
Our Liturgies Witness
Liturgies—whether traditional or contemporary—form us and witness to others. They teach us, even in silence, what we believe about God. What we emphasize in worship, what we prioritize in practice, is shaping what our people believe Christianity is for.
And sometimes, what we unintentionally communicate is exactly what the world already assumes about religion: that it is performative, individualistic, and hollow. If our churches are indistinguishable from the culture—if we take our cues from Barna stats more than the Beatitudes—then we risk making the Church an accessory to the spirit of the age rather than an agent of its healing.
We must ask:
What do our habits reveal about the God we serve?
What does our Sunday rhythm say to the world?
Do our churches communicate a better way—or just a more entertaining version of the same way?
The Church Is a Witness—Like It or Not
Peter reminds us we are a “chosen race, a royal priesthood, a holy nation… so that [we] may proclaim the mighty acts of him who called [us] out of darkness into his marvelous light” (1 Peter 2:9). Whether we know it or not, the Church is always witnessing. If perception is reality, then our life together is the gospel most people see.
This should not lead us to anxiety but to intention. If we are intentional about what we can control—how we pray, how we repent, how we worship—then even our unintentional habits will begin to take shape.
Because the Church doesn’t just point to God. It participates in His presence. But it can only do so if its people are the temple, if they know Him, if they live by His Word.
The Secret Place Builds the Sanctuary
The Church is large. It is global. But it is also local—and personal. You and I are part of its witness. And we cannot expect our churches to show forth the glory of God if we ourselves are strangers to the secret place. The hidden life is where the holy life begins.
The Church may be the public face of God’s people—but the secret place is the soil from which that face is formed.
So I ask, humbly:
What kind of Church are we building?
What does your church witness?
Is your interior life forming your exterior witness?
And maybe most of all—what might happen if the Church once again became the “realm of obedience, where God’s will is done and the right kind of human existence developed”?
Come, Holy Spirit. Revive your Church—starting with us.