Darryl's Blog
Moving beyond church services
My latest column at Christian Week:
Dallas Willard, author of books about Christian spiritual formation, writes, "We must flatly say that one of the greatest contemporary barriers to meaningful spiritual formation in Christlikeness is overconfidence in the spiritual efficacy of 'regular church services,' of whatever kind they may be. Though they are vital, they are not enough. It is that simple."
This drives pastors crazy because we know it's true.
Regular church services are most of what some churches do. Close to half of my week as a pastor is spent preparing for services. Most congregations structure their buildings around space for services. When we say that we're going to church, we're really talking about attending a service. If we cut back what we do as a church, the last thing we'd ever cut is our regular church service.
For a long time, many of us thought that the world needed better church services. We produced services with better music, drama, and practical sermons. We built our entire evangelistic strategies around getting people to come to our church services. It hasn't worked.
We have tried to build better services, but they still haven't come. In 1946, 67 per cent of Canadians regularly attended a place of worship. Today, that number is 20 per cent.
We are even losing evangelicals. In a 2003 survey, 59 per cent of evangelical Christians agreed with the statement, "I don't think you need to go to church to be a good Christian." A British Columbia former pastor defended himself on this blog against charges that he hates church. "I don't hate the church," he wrote. "I happen to think it has some inherent problems and is somewhat sociologically irrelevant. The music is horrible and the ministers speak too long, but I love the church. I do not know if I will ever attend church on a Sunday morning on a regular basis again."
It's not that church services are unimportant. They are, as Willard says, vital. The problem is that we may rely too much on one main service a week, and not on other practices that are at the heart of what it means to be the church. In the process, we are not attracting unbelievers, and are not having the impact that we could even among those who attend services.
I'm still thrilled when unbelievers attend church, but I've stopped making it my goal. "The Come-To-Us stance taken by the attractional church is unbiblical," write Michael Frost and Alan Hirsch in The Shaping of Things to Come. "It's not found in the Gospels or the Epistles. Jesus, Paul, the disciples, the early church leaders all had a Go-To-Them mentality." The church, they argue, should be missional, engaging the community outside the walls of our church building, including those who are never going to join the church.
Some question if we really have to choose between being missional and attractional. There's surely nothing wrong with being attractive to unbelievers. I've come to realize, though, that most people are not staying away from church because of the seating, parking, preaching, or music. We're not even on their radar. Perhaps our efforts will be better spent on equipping ourselves to be salt and light, living the gospel in our schools, homes, and workplaces, rather than hoping people will come to us.
The attractiveness of Christianity is ultimately not found in a church service. It's found in a group of people who are living the gospel. Churches can be more than a service. They can be alternate communities that exemplify the Kingdom of God and its values.
Part of the appeal of the early church must have been the way that slaves and masters, Jews and Gentiles, and men and women overcame social differences and worshiped together. One could only explain this kind of countercultural community of love and forgiveness by the gospel. You can explain good music and preaching lots of other ways, but there's no way to explain people who are living the gospel apart from the gospel.
Many churches are exploring how to move beyond a once-a-week event, and instead live as an alternate community shaped by the gospel. Thank God for that.
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In his book Experiencing God Henry Blackaby talks about people not being attracted to the church because they do not see God at work in the church.
If God is not at work in the church why would that be? If God is not at work in your church or in my church would that have something to do with God or with us? If its got to do with us how do we find out what the problem is?
If God is at work in the church things are happening and people are coming into relationship with God through Jesus Christ. They then want to go out and be salt and light, they want to impact their families and communities with the Good News of the Gospel.
I think the main reason why God is silent in so many churches is because the whole truth isn't being told anymore for fear of offending. Greater fear of man then of God. Also all the compromise with the world, see 1John.
But where the whole truth is being told, God uses that, His word will not return to Him void. New life results, people get transformed and fired up for the things of God and a desire to reach out to others. Read Fresh Wind Fresh Fire again Darryl, a great example of God raising up a church to impact a community and an inner city one at that. How did it happen? It started with their view of God and with prayer. Its not rocket science, its when the people of God get serious about the things that matter to God.
Come visit us sometime Darryl, we have a Saturday night service also. God's at work and people are getting transformed out of darkness into His marvelous light. To be a part of it is an incredible blessing. God is great and Christ is still building His church and the gates of hell will not prevail against it. Doesn't that fire you up?
I have no arguments with you points about spending more time on what it truly means to be salt and light.
The question that has been nagging has to do with who is raising the question of no more church services. Your perspective may be different, but I don't see the church in the two-thirds world or ethnic churches in the west (African-Americans for example) talking about doing away with church services. To many cultures they are still a very transformative event.
Do you have any thoughts on why this might be?
jt
JT:
That's a brilliant question. Unfortunately, I don't have a brilliant answer. I'm unfamiliar with the patterns of church life in the two-thirds world, so I'm not sure I can answer your question well.
Please understand that I'm not advocating that we do away with our church services. I think it's possible to have them and make them more of a communal event rather than something like attending a show if that makes sense.
I'd love to hear any insights you may have on how services are working in places where the church is thriving.
I'm not sure I have any ironclad answers but it seems to me that those not questioning the value of church services (or any sort of church that is larger in nature) are those who have a more communal culture. Those that think "we" before "I." If that is true then I think our first question should not be, "Do we need church services?" but rather, "Why am I even asking the question?" We might discover among the answers that it is Western individualism at work and perhaps in need of redemption.
I say all of that recognizing that you are not among this group.
Great post & fun dicussion.
robert
I think we under rate what Jesus said about Loving one another as he loved us being a sign. Meeting together is important, but if it's just polite disengagement in religious activities we shouldn't be surprised that it's not attractive.
Loving sinners is messy, like wiping shit of people's feet is messy. Neat Sunday mornings don't lend themselves to that sort of love.
- Peace
Great thoughts Darryl, and nicely uncomplicated. Reminds me of Brueggemanns call in some ways in Cadences of Home:
"A new church means reformulating the faith in radical ways in the midstof a community that has to begin again. For Ezra, as for Moses, new
church starts do not aim at strategies for success, but at strategies for survival of an alternative community. What must survive is notsimply the physical community; what must survive is an alternative community.."
Darryl, great post. You might be interested, I have only recently blogged on this very question. See http://www.theforgottenways.org/blog/index.php/2007/03/29/the-attractional-v-missional-debate/
Darryl, thanks for this post. You began with a quote from Dallas Willard...can you tell me where to find that? I'd appreciate it.
Jay
Yes, that quote is from pp. 249-250 of Renovation of the Heart.