Corporate, entertainment, and therapeutic models of church

This post is from the defunct blog “Dying Church”

From the book From Embers to a Flame: How God Can Revitalize Your Church:

Some believe that churches grow primarily through the application of successful business principles. Others take an approach that is reminiscent of Hollywood – entertaining people and calling it worship so that they will "have a good time" and want to come back. And the philosophy of some seems to have been borrowed from the psychiatrist's couch, of all places. Their emphasis is a therapeutic self-help program providing support and solutions for our deepest emotional needs, rather than the transforming power of the gospel of Jesus Christ. Indeed, most churches today seem to have adopted the Wall Street/corporate model, the Hollywood/entertainment model, or the psychiatrist/therapeutic model.

Helpful insights can be gained from each of these modern models, but none of them captures a biblical approach to church revitalization…