Every once and a while an idea pops into my head that I just can't shake. It keeps me up at night. It consumes my waking hours. It turns around and around in my head. It shows up in my dreams. It starts coming up in more and more conversations. I pray that God would just get rid of this idea because I know a lot of church people are not going to like what I have to say.
This doesn't happen to me often. When it does, it's usually because I need to get this out of my head and into the world. Because I always find that I'm never alone. Others have been wrestling with the exact same idea.
I don't put this out to be confrontational or to cause division. I write this as a simple man who loves Jesus, who trusts in the teachings of Scripture, who tries hard to listen to the Holy Spirit for guidance, and who has been pastoring a local church for 14 years.
What Started It
Recently I heard the current COVID-19 pandemic's impact on the Christian Church compared to the Babylonian exile. This was when the people of Isreal were driven from their lands and taken into captivity by Babylon. While far from their home and their Temple, they lamented and cried out to God that they were unable to praise the Lord in this foreign land. Their exile was compared to the church's exile from our buildings and our cries to return to our well-loved ways of worship.
I resonate with this idea of similarity between Israel's exile and what we are experiencing - but not as a cry to return to the way we ran church in February 2020. You see, the people of Israel were sent into exile because of their idolatry. I strongly have to wonder if God has used this pandemic to force to take a good, hard look at our modern-day idolatry - our worship service.
Let me unpack this.
Stuff We Don't Like to Admit
There are some hard truths that we as church leaders are all very well aware of. We've known about this for years. Before COVID this is what consumed so much of our time as leaders:
- In 2019 it was estimated that over 60% of students who grew up regularly attending church stopped attending after high school.
- Since 2015 we have been reading how Millenials are leaving the church in ever-increasing numbers.
- In 2019 it is estimated that 9000 churches closed their doors here in Canada (long before COVID).
- Most churches in North America have either plateaued or are in decline when it comes to regular attendance.
- Most churches in North American haven't seen a single person come to faith in Jesus Christ as Saviour.
- Most churches that have seen growth are growing because more Christians are attending their service.
Now, we can debate the numbers here... but we just gotta be honest as leaders. We all know the heart of this is true. We've been working on this for years trying to figure out what to do about it! It's why we read books on church revitalization. It's why we go to conferences and seminars. It's why we try to improve our preaching. It's why we change the style of music.
COVID forced every single one of our churches to look at our ministry with new eyes and try new ways. Some ideas were better than others. It was an exciting time of learning and growing, and seeking God.
But that didn't last. Just as churches were beginning to see some impact on people outside our regular attenders, we reopened the doors to our churches with a long list of COVID guidelines and regulations.
The energy used to think creatively in a new environment was quickly gobbled up by hand sanitizer, registration lists, seat spacing, and cleaning protocols.
And why did we shift this energy? To return as quickly as possible to our worship services. The exact same ones producing the results mentioned above.
A Look at our Methods
What if God was actually teaching us something? What if God is actually preparing his church for something new? What if God's heart is to see people reached that our ministries just haven't been successful at reaching? What if reformation is happening again, not over theology, but methodology? What if the only way we'd have eyes to see what God was doing was to have God shut our church doors for a good, long while?
What if our love for our worship service has become an idol? What if our rush to return to what we love, desire and will fight the government over, is actually the distraction of what God wants us to see?
Jesus said his mission on earth was to seek and save the lost. Jesus called his followers to be fishers of men. I can't help but wonder if the worship of our worship turns us instead into thinking that the mission is to simply care for the fish we already have by burning ourselves out maintaining the aquarium.
I love the worship services at my church! I love gathering weekly with my church family to praise God together. I love preaching to a room filled with faces I know and care about.
But more than pleasing Christians, more than following the party-line, more than doing ministry in a way that I love, I want God's will to be done here in my city! I want to see God truly do immeasurably more than I can ask or imagine through his power at work in the church.
A Conversation
I realize this is a difficult topic. I know every time I've had to deal with an idol in my heart it has been really hard. Just because it's difficult, doesn't mean we shouldn't have the conversation.
Many churches are seeing incredible harvest results in this season by taking a hard look at their methods of ministry. Online discipleship, smaller gatherings, intentional leadership development.
A mentor of mine once said: "If you want to reach people no one is reaching, you need to do things that one is doing. But to do things that no one is doing, you have to stop doing what everyone is doing."
Easily said. Not easily done.
My hope and my prayer are that we would see a huge amount of people come to faith in Jesus. And this would happen because the church lived out God's plans for her. We smash any idols we may have, return to God,
I may be a lone voice crying out in the wilderness on this. Or maybe, just maybe, you're feeling this too! If so, let's continue the conversation.
Comments
" have we fallen so in love with our whorship that we are guilty of greed??
I hope everyone knows I'm not against big ministries. I'm not against large gatherings. In fact, I love them! I just get very concerned on the energy wasted to return to our formats of worship when God may be preparing us for something new. I'd hate for all our churches to miss out on that blessing of being on the front line of God's Harvest!
Thank you for writing this. I do think it raises some good points and correctives that the church today needs to hear. But you wanted a conversation, so here’s my contribution. We’re friends, and I think that puts us in a good place to have a level-headed, fair discussion of this. So… I think the main thrust of your post is misguided. Essentially, I think it’s a false dichotomy and a criticism over something that shouldn’t necessarily be criticized. But in saying this, I know I have a high chance of being misunderstood, so allow me to explain.
I hear and totally agree with the critique that we should not abandon the creativity or methods that were discovered during the lockdown. I also hear and agree with the concern that we should not necessarily try to “return to the way we ran church in February 2020.” That is, if we’re talking certain methods for the ways we gather and worship. I know as well as anyone that there are plenty of worthy critiques of how most churches “run” worship services. However…
Gathering (and I would not hesitate to say, in-person) is not a method. It is a biblical command. Virtual gathering can imitate certain aspects of worship services, but it is just that—an imitation. It is a substitute that I believe God can absolutely use, but it is still a substitute, and therefore should not be considered our preferred form of gathering. Now, I know that you and I may disagree on the nuance of this. And I think that’s OK if we disagree on this. However…
That doesn’t mean that the desire to re-gather in-person is idolatrous. It’s a very biblical desire to gather together in-person. And the longing to be together is not wrong. On one level, It’s human, and on another, it’s godly. I’d be very careful to label it evil. Can there be idolatrous things about the way we worship? Absolutely. (see this excellent blog post for good examples of this: https://www.thegospelcoalition.org/blogs/jared-c-wilson/worshiping-a-golden-calf-on-sunday-morning-is-deceptively-easy/) But the desire to gather together is not one of them.
There is something to be said for physical presence. And I know there are ways to achieve physical presence outside of Sunday mornings, and I’m all for that as well. If churches are able to creatively gather in smaller groups than usual, awesome. There’s nothing wrong with that (though those in-home gatherings may actually be less legal than in-church gatherings right now!). That’s why I haven’t been dogmatic in saying (like some others), “You NEED to reopen your church buildings.” But we also shouldn’t be quick to abandon or neglect physical presence in order to just keep what’s happening online. (And vice versa: don’t abandon online stuff just because you can be in person!) I do think churches should reopen now that we are able to, but I won’t pass judgment on when or how unless there is literally no goal to eventually gather again.
The fact is: We are not worshipping together the same way we were in February 2020, and we likely won’t be for a long time. And that’s OK. We are still needing to be creative. And gathering, while following guidelines as much as we are able, has, I believe, sent a good message to our community: It’s demonstrated the high importance of worship, while also very publicly demonstrating how we’re seeking to love our neighbours and stay safe. It’s further caused us to evaluate what is actually central and vital in our worship gatherings. Things like prayer, preaching the Word, singing, baptizing, and taking the Lord’s Supper.
(gotta go to part 2, as blogspot cut me off)
Here’s my main plea to you: Don’t swing the pendulum too far, to correct outreach to the detriment of discipleship—of which gathering together plays a huge part. People’s spiritual health (and mental health) tangibly suffers when we do not gather.
I believe the primary reasons for gathering together are to worship the Lord, edify the church, and send each other out for mission. In other words, outreach and worship should not be at odds. No, the saved church should not be our only focus; but neither should the unsaved community. We should care about both. We must care about both. So absolutely, keep the creative juices flowing. Don’t stop doing what you started to do to reach out to people. Keep sharing Jesus with anyone and everyone in any setting, physical or virtual. Keep online ministry going, as that’s where people are today. But don’t pit it against the embodied worship of the saints. That is a false dichotomy. They are not enemies. They are meant to feed into and strengthen each other. The urgency of assembling together is not waning, it is only growing as the Lord’s return draws nearer. “…not neglecting to meet together, as is the habit of some, but encouraging one another, and all the more as you see the Day drawing near.” (Heb. 10:25)
Love you bro.
Matt
Love it!! Thanks so much for your reply!
I've actually been doing some more writing on this (for another blog post soon). I totally agree with you on pretty much all points. I'm all for the biblical command to gather and be together as the family of God.
My fear is fighting for a North American version of it. The world outside our western churches looks so different from our expressions. I worry that the "form" of the worship can be idolatrous, not the desire to gather. My bad if I didn't make that clear. Thanks for pointing that out.
When we say church on the couch will never replace church in the sanctuary (an image I'm seeing passed around all over social media) well, isn't that not accurate? If 10 people gather to worship at someone's home, or 20 people meet in a house church, or all the other ways we make sure we are not neglecting to meet together as Christians around the world. Saying that that "meeting together" is only about Sunday worship in our sanctuaries, honestly, feels way too unbiblical to me. Jesus taught we don't go to the mountain to meet with God. We don't go to a Temple to meet with God. We are the temple. If there is only 4 of us in my basement singing praises, meeting with God, hearing from his Word, and praying, for me, that fulfills Hebrews 10:25 just as well as going to be with 200 people at Greenbelt.
I think my biggest fear is, in the mad dash to get back to a preferred mode of worship (and trust me online at home is not my preferred mode - I'm a mega church guy at heart when it comes to worship! The bigger the better.) we are burning out leaders, pastors, and resources when God wants to teach us something new, but we could miss it.
I so appreciate your comments and friendship!
P.S. I'm probably skewed by my end-time views. I just expect that the world will get darker and darker and more hostile to Christians before Jesus returns... so I'm just trying to prep for pastoring in those days LOL!
So I'd like to probe a bit on some things. I definitely interpreted your critique as a critique of gathering together in person. So yes, that wasn't clear. It'd help if you more explicitly define what "forms" of worship you are critiquing. And just be really careful labelling something idolatrous unless you're sure we're worshipping it (otherwise you'd be in danger of Isaiah 5:20). Are you saying the building is idolatrous? The size is idolatrous? The time of day is idolatrous? It's hard to pin down exactly what you're critiquing.
When you resist the idea of church on a couch vs church in a sanctuary, obviously you CAN worship God as the church gathered with others together on couches in homes. Absolutely agree. So the meme definitely doesn't clarify enough. But I didn't interpret that meme as saying the issue is the couch. I interpreted it that the issue is isolation. The couch is used as a metaphor for worshipping alone, and the sanctuary is a metaphor for worshipping in an assembly of others. Maybe I'm wrong, but that's how I saw it.
I agree that gathering together with others in homes can be just as valid form of obeying Heb. 10:25 as gathering as a mega church. In fact, Acts 2 specifically says the church gathered "in homes"! However, I'd push back on the idea that an individual--or even a family--would qualify as a church gathering. Yes, you can worship together. Yes, you can spur one another on. Yes, it's 2 or 3 that are gathered in Jesus' name. But it's not a church. To be considered a biblically-ordered church, you need elders/deacons, ordinances, outside accountability, etc. I guarantee you that when it says the church gathered in homes in Acts 2 that it wasn't just families worshipping by themselves. I'm confident it was at least 2 or 3 households gathering together.
The other thing I want to push back against is a bit theoretical and anecdotal. See, what nearly burned me out this year wasn't getting everyone back together. What nearly burned me out was being apart! And I personally sense that most pastors who are feeling weary are feeling exactly that. They feel burned out because they are trying to pastor with very few of the usual embodied forms of pastoral care. Back in the spring, we actually devised and considered a "home church" system for our church in the case that we were not able to meet in groups larger than 10-20 in the near future. Was it doable? Sure. But it was also overwhelming. The idea of trying to organize, oversee, and pastor 20 different house gatherings spread across the city was extremely daunting. If I was trying to do that right now, I might've already quit. I'd actually say our regatherings have KEPT me from burning out (And that's saying a lot, coming from a hardcore introvert!). Seeing people masked-face-to-masked-face has been a lifeline. Worshipping as a broader body has been refreshing and wonderful. Following all the protocols can be difficult, but it's been worth it.
Things that have been heavy in this season and threatened burnout are myriad: decision-fatigue, screen-fatigue, marriage troubles (possibly exposed by the lockdown), caring for grieving and suffering people from afar, managing conflict and controversy, and simply NOT seeing people I pastorally love and care about. But not gathering together as a church on Sunday mornings. Maybe I'm the exception, but I don't think I am. I think a lot more pastors are close to burning out because they AREN'T meeting together than those that are. Again, this is kind of theoretical, but it's been the reality for me.
P.S. I share your eschatological views, so I can totally appreciate your motives there haha!