Consuming Church

Every now and then I hear church leaders lament at the fact that people consume church and don't participate enough.

When they say this, I think that they usually mean that people don't participate enough in the Sunday service.  That they're not on a roster, I suppose.

I've been thinking a bit about this and it's easy to just agree, because its true.  There are usually a few people who do a lot in the Sunday service.  In a small church it's probably a higher proportion of the congregation helping out, but the bigger the church gets, the smaller the percentage of people who are doing stuff and the more noticeable it is that the burden of a Sunday service is shouldered by the few.

The last time I heard someone talk about this, I was sitting in a church (not my own) and one of the pastors sat there and lamented at the fact that there are not enough people participating in the Sunday service.  I then looked around at the church and noted that the room can seat about 200-250 people on the pews that are lined up in such a way as to all face the front.  In fact it's in a concave formation so that everyone isn't just facing the front, they're facing the middle of the front.

Of course people consume church; that's the way it's designed.  It's a show.  And we're kidding ourselves when we say it's not.  We can't sit people in rows facing the one or 2 people at the front and then whinge that not enough people are participating.  It's by design that we have a small amount of participation in the church service. 

And then the thing that frustrates me the most is that when these pastors and hard working lay people complain that there isn't enough participation in the church services, what they're really saying is that not enough people participate on their terms.  I don't see church leaders asking for men to get up and tell the congregation what they think about the Bible passage being studied.  That has to be left to a select few.  And not just anyone can lead groups or participate in ministries that see God's Word taught.  Only a select few are knowledgeable enough to do that. 

So what pastors and laymen who complain about this want is more people on rosters to set up chairs, operate the sound, prepare morning tea, and the like.  They don't usually want more people up the front.  What I think is that most people up the front want to keep the front for themselves and they want everyone else to work hard to keep them at the front.

I'm becoming disillusioned by the model of the local church that we follow and am seeing fewer and fewer reasons not to become increasingly so.  From the attitudes of pastors to the effort we place in building ourselves up on a Sunday to the lack of community involvement and ministering to the poor and the needy; it's a far cry from the church we see in the New Testament.

Smacking, rewards, and punishment

I'm going to blog my way through another book. This time it's Unconditional Parenting, by Alfie Kohn.



Lately I've been thinking a bit about rewards and punishment, and especially about smacking. We don't smack our kids. We gave Rose the occassional hit on the hand up until about 18 months, and now deeply regret it. I don't agree with smacking any more. I grew up thinking it was ok, partly because of the oft-quoted "spare the rod, spoil the child", and vague notions of the goodness and severity of God, the discipline of God, the wrath of God, the fear of God, etc.

For the record I am terrified of God. I need to think and pray about my theology of the fear of God as I read this book, together with my ideas about how much we should try to emulate God's fatherhood through our own, and in what way.

Taking "spare the rod, spoil the child" seriously, it seems that a good question to think about to begin with, is what do I gain from any particular form of discipline. Spare the rod is not directly about punishment, but about correction, ie. you'll do your kids a social/behavioural/moral disservice by not punishing wrongdoing. I think this is particularly poignant in these end times, because wrath will be dealt with on the last day, and has clearly been put in the hands of God, not me.

Another thing I want to think through is God's forgiveness. God is extremely long suffering, and forgiving. We like to say that God disciplines his children - where is that again? But then, how much? I sin pretty bad, every day, and how often do I get an Almighty smack? Rarely... Pretty much never. God is kind and merciful.

Well, I'll start the book tonight I hope. If my health holds up...
 

4. Christian Involvement in the Community is Paramount

This is a continuation of my first post on Church here.

It seems to me that our local churches are largely devoid of local community involvement.  I'm not even talking about social justice here and looking after the poor and the needy, just being involved in the community.  I know that there are exceptions, but there don't seem to be too many.

It seems to me that our time, money and resources mostly get put into the Sunday service.  The Sunday service should be a great time of strengthening and encouraging the body.  But it means that what we're really doing is putting our time, money and effort into the body and, then, what are we putting into the community that we say we're trying to reach?

My perception is that we are hesitant to get involved in community events and initiatives that are not run by us for the sole purpose of proclaiming the gospel.  This seems silly.  I know people who recently wanted to get their church involved in Clean Up Australia Day.  The pastor said no to organising it through church because it was on a Sunday and it might discourage people from coming to church that day.  There are so many implications that come from this attitude that it's hard to pick just one.  Is his hold on his parishioners so tenuous?  Is church numero uno when it comes to weekly priorities?  If so, why?

I live in Culburra Beach.  It's sunny here all the time and it's what God used to model Eden.  A couple of weeks ago we had a 'Love Culburra Beach Festival' because, well, who doesn't love Culburra Beach.  Our church didn't have a stall, although I know our pastor would've loved for us to.  I think that one of the main problems was that those of us who would have been willing to run one are already too busy.  This in itself isn't terrible.  Christians should be busy, I think, because proclaiming Jesus and loving others takes time and effort.  But is that what we're really busy at? 

I wish we'd had a strategic presence at the fair so that people who live in Culburra could put a face to Christians in Culburra.  I wish that we'd been there with people wiling to approach people there to ask them about Jesus.  Cold evangelism is tough and not the most effective, but it's not without its merits, particularly when you're trying it on people you're very likely to see around. 

I think that churches should run community activities and they should attend pagan run (like 'Clean Up Australia Day' or the 'Love Culburra Beach Festival') community activities so that we can have as many opportunities as possible to tell men, women and kids about the saving grace of God poured out through His son, Jesus Christ.

I even think we should have geeky shirts that are easily identifiable.  People expect us to look lame. Let's give them what they want. We may just find some people willing to talk to us about Jesus who we might not have otherwise met.

What do you stand behind?

A couple of comments on this blog lately, and things you hear around the place, have made me think about this question. And I'd like to make what I think is an important distinction.

Life seems to be full of circumstances where you must ask this question: Do I die on this hill, or do I relax about this? I hear this often said about

• Predestination
• Total depravity
• The use of money
• Social justice
• Hell

Ie. People think different, contradictory things about these broad issues, and the advice you're often given goes in the direction of "you must decide whether this is central, or peripheral; people can still be faithful Christians and think differently to you about this".

Whether or not I agree with this with regard to any of those issues listed, I think there is an important point I'd like to emphasise:

Partaking in sin is always sinful.

It's a tautology, I know, but sometimes I think we forget this when engaging with particular issues. The two issues I have in mind, are ones which were raised on this blog in recent months

1. Abominable employment/economic/environmental practices overseas are the reason why we can get stuff so cheap. A corollary to this: We get cheap stuff because others pay what is lacking in the price with their health and well-being.
2. The systematic torture of animals is the means by which we get cheap meat.

Firstly, let me emphasise that for theological reasons, I think 1. is far worse than 2.. Nevertheless, in my opinion, these are sinful systems. I think that partaking in these systems is, therefore, sin. I don't think it's an issue of 'Am I willing to die on this hill', or 'Am I willing to put in the effort to eradicate this system from my life, let alone the world'. 

You may disagree that they are sinful systems, and that is a different argument. I'm raising these particular issues because I think they are sinful and they came up recently.

A counter argument I've heard is: 'There are lots of sinful systems, why single out this one'. This is a fallacy. The Christian life involves the eradication of all sins that we are aware of, and the continued awakening to even more sinfulness. We stand on a spectrum of sinfulness and we can only see so far. The call of the Bible, I'm convinced, is to move along that line, leaving sinfulness behind and all the while becoming aware of ever more sinfulness. I am not aware of a single concept in the Bible which promotes the idea that because of the magnitude and multitude of sins I am capable of and continually committing, judgment is withheld from some. This is nonsense.

Now 1. is very hard to eradicate from your life. In some ways I think you need to minimise it for a time as a sort of retrieval ethic. This requires more thought, so that's all I'll say about it for now. 2. is extremely easy: either pay more for meat that you know came from an ethical source, or stop eating meat. This means a chook will cost $25. It's impossible to raise a happy healthy chook for (much) less.

Anyway, I think our separation from, and intellectualising of some issues clouds our thinking about basic sin. If something is clearly sinful, then our partaking of it is as well.

This makes life very complicated. Before large scale transport and industrialisation happened, you sort of knew where everything came from and could, to a much greater extent, control it. Now it's really really hard, but it's about sin, not preferences and optional conviction, plain old sin.

Right?

Young people are the best ministers to young people

In my last post I wrote a little about a training day that I went to.  I was critical of the view that churches should focus on children.  I actually liked most of what the key speaker said.  There was one other thing he said, though, that frustrates me no end.

The argument goes something like this:
Since young adults are best able to relate to teenagers, young people should be the main ones who minister to teenagers.  Young adults are better equipped to minister to teenagers because they speak their language, read their books and listen to their music.  So since the teenagers can relate to them then they will listen to them more.  Conversely, since older people can't relate to teenagers and don't understand their culture, they are ill equipped to be effective ministers to them.
This is ill considered to say the least.

It's wonderful for teenagers to have young adults who are willing to speak into their lives and teach them about Jesus.  They can be immensely helpful and great teachers.  But I don't think that they're the best.

Teenagers need adults of all ages to be interested in them and to look after them.  They don't need people who can relate to them on a worldly, cultural level.  They need people who will love them, genuinely without reserve.

I love now, and have always had tremendous respect and affection for my grandparents.  They have no idea of the world I live in.  They can't relate to me in terms of the books I read, the movies I watch or the music I listen to.  The internet is still a great mystery to them so they'll never read my blog.  But they love me and they greatly desire for me to follow Jesus.  They have spoken greatly into my life and they have had much influence over me. 
For those of us who went to KYC, KYLC and the like, who could forget Dudley and Elizabeth Ford.  They helped many a teenager through difficult times.  Not because they could relate to them in their culture, but because they were willing to love them, to listen to them and to speak into their lives to encourage them to follow Jesus.

I know many great teachers.  I think that the very best teachers are experienced.  When I think back on my own schooling, the best teachers I had were older teachers.  Of course not all older teachers are great, but the best are experienced and older.  My most fun teachers were usually younger teachers, but they weren't necessarily the ones who were best for me.

It seems to me that what teenagers need isn't someone who can talk to them about their favourite band or tv show and relate it, in some way, to faith.  What they need is mature Christians who are willing to love them for who they are, see who they can become and work to mold them into faithful followers of Christ.  This completed work is beyond a young adult who is still not really mature themselves. 

Young adults are great youth group leaders and helpful in ministering to teenagers.  But if we want young adults of faith, maturity, character and substance then I truly believe we need to move beyond the model of the blind leading the blind and move to one where the seasoned veterans do the work of teaching, leading and encouraging our young people in their faith to follow Jesus in this world. 

I increasingly think that teenagers and young twenty-somethings should not be being paid as youth workers in churches.

Youth as a priority

I recently went to a training day for church.  It was interesting.

The main speaker talked about ministering to children.  Basically, his thesis was that children should be a church's priority because Jesus valued children and because 75% of Christians, according to the National Church Life Survey (or whatever it's called) in Australia, were converted as children.  Therefore, he says, it's children's ministry that's effective and it's children's ministry that we should be focusing on.  To say that this argument is preposterous is, I think, pretty fair.

The Bible passages that he used to introduce this were when Jesus says in Matthew 19:14  "Jesus said, 'Let the little children come to me, and do not hinder them, for the kingdom of heaven belongs to such as these.'"  And Matthew 18:3 which says "Truly I tell you, unless you change and become like little children, you will never enter the kingdom of heaven."  


The problem is that these verses aren't saying that we need to believe like children believe.  I've often heard that we can learn from the faith of children.  At this training day the guy speaking basically told us that we can all learn something from my 3 month old daughter (who I was holding as he spoke) and that the way she depends on my wife and I is the way that we should depend on God.  There are ways in which this is true, but to suggest that we should have faith like a child has faith is crazy.  Children don't believe with reason and depth.  Their faith is child like.  It's based on very little, and, quite frankly, it's shaky at best.  It's not based on an understanding of the scripture.  They have little or no concept that they are sinners and deserve God's judgement.  Do we really think that Jesus holds a child up and then says to us 'be more like them.  They are faithful'.  My daughter is rude, selfish and uncaring most of the time.  She only thinks of herself because she only has the capacity to think of herself.  Her faith is immature because she is immature.  I don't strive to be like her in my Christian walk.  I want her to be like me (only better).  Not the other way around. 


When Jesus says 'the Kingdom of heaven belongs to such as these', he's saying that unless we understand that we are as lowly in position as a child, then we haven't understood the gospel.  Unless we know who we are and who God is and that we are better then no one, then we've missed the point.  And so he says that we should treat children with love and compassion.  Why?  Because God loves them.  We should treat each other with love and compassion.  Why?  Because God loves us.  We are child like because we are no better than a child.  We are not above them in and of ourselves.  In Israelite society poor children were the lowest in order and rank.  We have to acknowledge that we are the lowest in order and rank.  That's what Jesus means.  


As for saying that 75% of people are converted as children are converted as children so we should focus on children, that's preposterous.  This is an unqualified statistic.  It tells us what, not why.  And the why is very important.  How many of those kids are really convered by their parents?  Why aren't adults being converted?  Is anyone even telling them about Jesus?


It seems to me that we should model our ministry on the Bible, not the National Church Life Survey.  When the apostles preached, they preached to men, mostly and then women as well.  Men were converted and then they took care of converting their households.  This model makes so much sense that we don't follow it.  Who is missing in our churches?  Men.  Who aren't we reaching?  Men.  Who are we saying we should focus on?  Kids.  


I say let's tell as many kids about Jesus as we can.  Get into schools.  Start kids groups and educational clubs.  Run fun stuff so they can hear about Jesus.  Train our kids to tell their friends.


But let's put just as much effort into our peers.  We must not neglect adults because we think it might be fruitless.  That's crazy.  And we must tell men about Jesus.  And for that to happen then guys like me have to make friends with other guys and tell them about Jesus because that's the model that God has established to grow His church.  Not to help God because He needs our help.  He doesn't.  But because that's one of the ways we love others and Christians are people who love others and God is good to us in letting us be a part of the process of the salvation of others.