Tag Archives: church

The Case For Insider-Focused Church Services

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reservedToday let’s talk about the case for church services designed for church members; we’ll look at the other side tomorrow.

In the Old Testament, worship was very much insider focused. Outsiders could participate in some parts of worship, but they had to conform themselves to the norms of the Israelite community. And many parts of Jewish worship were off limits to Gentiles.

So what happened in the early church? From what we could tell, services were open to all. There’s some debate as to the Lord’s Supper, whether it was an open or closed event. One of the oldest extra-biblical sources, the Didache, affirms the closed nature of communion.

But let no one eat or drink of your Eucharist, unless they have been baptized into the name of the Lord; for concerning this also the Lord has said, “Give not that which is holy to the dogs.”

In 1 Corinthians 14, when Paul is talking about spiritual gifts in the assembly, he emphasizes that prophecy is superior to speaking in tongues, for tongues are directed at outsiders while prophecy is for the edification of believers. It would seem that Paul’s priority for the church assembly was the edification of the members, not the evangelizing of outsiders.

In practice, a church with a heavy seeker focus runs the risk of starving the faithful by continually feeding them spiritual baby food. No congregation can thrive with a constant diet of first principles. (This raises the question as to whether or not the assembly should be the principal teaching time for the church… we’ll save that one!)

We should also remember that, to some degree, visitors come to see what church will be like if they are members. They want something accessible to them, but not directed at them. In fact, many visitors feel threatened if they perceive that too much of the service has been tailored for them. It almost makes the church assembly feel like a sales event.

I’ll go ahead and say that I believe an assembly can be too member-focused; in fact, I think that’s a more common problem than the over-emphasis on visitor awareness. But a strong case can be made that the primary focus of our church gatherings should be the community of the faithful and not those who are there as outsiders.

photo from MorgueFile.com

Edification or outreach?

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worshipA worship service is not an evangelistic event. Yet it is a place where the church interacts with outsiders and hopes that they respond favorably.

So what sort of balance should a church strike between ministering to insiders and ministering to outsiders during a worship service? Is it mainly about edification or outreach? Or do the two go together?

I’d love to hear your thoughts.

What are the greatest challenges facing your congregation?

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abandoned churchEvery church is in its own context. We face different challenges, depending on many factors. There are common struggles, like the realities of sin and its effect on our members. There are highly specific problems, ranging from the effort required to begin a new work to the terror of external persecution. Some churches find themselves in communities that are dying, small towns where the younger families move away and the population slowly shrinks. Others find themselves in changing communities, with a new socioeconomic standard or racial/ethnic makeup.

For some churches, the problems are internal. Bad leadership. Rebellious members. Sin that has struck at the very identity of the church.

For others, the problems come from outside. Pressures from neighbors and city officials. Resistance from other religious groups.

For some the problems are about material things, like lack of building space for a growing congregation or lack of funds to support existing structures for an aging congregation.

For some, the problems are deeply spiritual. Ingrained legalism. Unloving attitudes. Disregard for biblical teaching. Factions and divisive spirits.

So what’s going on where you are? What are the things that the church must handle in the next few years? What are foreseen obstacles to new growth or causes of decline?

Dealing with church hoppers

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Go_to_church...This week I’ve been reflecting on a quote from Stanley Hauerwas and combining his thoughts with some things that have been on my mind lately. First off, let’s hear Hauerwas again, in a quote from a recent interview:

But one of the great problems of Evangelical life in America is evangelicals think they have a relationship with God that they go to church to have expressed but church is a secondary phenomenon to their personal relationship and I think that’s to get it exactly backwards: that the Christian faith is meditated faith. It only comes through the witness of others as embodied in the church. So I should never trust my presumption that I know what my relationship with God is separate from how that is expressed through words and sacrament in the church. So evangelicals, I’m afraid, often times, with what appears to be very conservative religious convictions, make the church a secondary phenomenon to their assumed faith and I think that’s making it very hard to maintain disciplined congregations.

This lower-than-my-personal-experience view of the church leads us to a consumer attitude toward the church. We “church shop.” We test drive a church. Over time we continue to evaluate that church, comparing it to our own view of how church should be. Inevitably, most of us become dissatisfied. And a good percentage leave.

I live in Abilene, Texas. Though the city is only about 120,000 in population, we have dozens of Churches of Christ, as well as many, many other churches. In my opinion, this increases the pressure to church shop and church hop. Don’t like what’s going on? Have a problem with someone? Did something that you’re ashamed of? Just go somewhere else.

The churches on the receiving end of this situation often swell with pride. “Look, we’re growing! People want to come here. People want to be a part of what we’re doing.” And we gladly except the church consumer. “Well, it’s better than letting them go to the world. Or worse… to the Baptists!”

In some religious groups, when a person goes to a new church, they need to present a letter from their old church in order to be received as a member in good standing. We’re far too autonomous to have any sort of practice. We’re also very informal about church membership, so much so that in many cases, people never formally place membership.

It’s said that David Lipscomb taught that it was wrong not to attend the congregation nearest to your home. I’m beginning to agree with him.

If I had my druthers, here’s what we’d do when people come to us from another congregation:

  • Ask them pointed questions about why they’re wanting to transfer. I don’t mean that we should be hostile, but we should let them know that this is something we take seriously.
  • Contact leaders at the previous church. Find out if they know their members are wanting to leave. Find out if they know why and if they’ve made an effort to resolve the issue.
  • Tell the prospective member that any unresolved issues with the old church need to be resolved before they can be considered for membership. You don’t want people who are running away from a problem. It’s not good for them and it’s not good for either congregation involved.
  • Encourage people to remain where they are in the majority of cases. There are legitimate reasons why people need a change. They are the exception, not the rule. We need to discourage church hopping except for serious circumstances.

What do you think? Should we make it easy for people to go from place to place within the same city? Do churches have a right to refuse membership or to restrict the movement of believers? How can we better deal with the dissatisfied and disgruntled? Or is the status quo the way things should be?

Disciplined Congregations

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Shepherd and sheepOn Monday, I mentioned some articles by Jay Guin that refer to an interview with Stanley Hauerwas. I included a quote from that interview which fit well with some things I’ve been thinking about. Hauerwas says in that interview:

So evangelicals, I’m afraid, often times, with what appears to be very conservative religious convictions, make the church a secondary phenomenon to their assumed faith and I think that’s making it very hard to maintain disciplined congregations.

Disciplined congregations. That’s definitely something we lack in Churches of Christ. In fact, we often rankle at the thought of submitting ourselves to the leadership of others. Because, as Hauerwas notes, we see our personal faith as more important than our community faith, we hold the community to our standards rather than the other way around. We want the kind of music that we feel is appropriate. We want a preacher who presents God’s Word in a way that suits us. We want our elders to make decisions that line up with our personal beliefs. If not… we’re gone. We’ll find another church that does things the way we want.

That’s not to say that leaders are never wrong or that we can’t have bad leadership in place. But there has to be a trust in the body to be able to deal with such. And we have to be an active part of that body for it to be able to function as it should. It’s only in a church that lacks an active membership that bad leadership can thrive.

I could be wrong. You could be wrong. Our leaders could be wrong. Previous generations could be wrong. God is right. His Word is right.

So we make leadership selection a spiritual process and not a series of business decisions. When choosing our shepherds, we look for just that… shepherds. We seek men who want to minister and serve, not men who want to rule. We seek men with a heart for God and a heart for the flock. Once chosen, we follow. We pray. We support. At times we offer suggestions and advice. But we have to trust.

And yes, that can lead to hardship. It can lead to mistakes. It can lead to discomfort. But it won’t lead to anything that we can’t deal with as a body. That is, we can deal with it if we are functioning together as a body. If we’re just a group of like-minded individuals, then there’s trouble ahead.