Adapt, Don't Adopt
Church is broken. It is. You don’t have to take my word for it. Do a Google search for “Church Attendance Statistics” and you’ll find that not only is church attendance declining while the population grows, but that the number of people who identify themselves as Christians is also declining. In addition, there is a steady and disturbing rise in a section of the population who do not identify with any religion at all. It is significant enough that there is even a name for them: The Dones. The Dones are people who used to go to church but have stopped attending. They didn’t leave First Church to attend Community Church. They stopped attending church period.
I don’t want to be the harbinger of doom. But something has got to change. If we keep “doing church” like we are now, we will continue to get the same results. The thing is, I don’t think it’s al that difficult to fix. It just takes a willingness to change. And the guts to stop doing what everybody else is doing in the name of “church”. Like the proverbial frog in the kettle, we have slowly but steadily adopted a model of church that is neither Biblical nor practical. It isn’t working. But we not only continue to develop churches using the same blueprint, we fail to see that the blueprint is the problem.
Adaptation
For a long time, adaptation was the problem. The church failed to adapt to the changing culture around it. So we had churches that refused to have drums or electric guitars because they were “worldly” and had no place in the church. Sadly, there are still churches like that in 2018. But even early adopters of music still had a problem keeping up with cultural changes. I have worked with churches that were still duplicating cassettes of the service in the early 2000’s and even today still duplicate CD’s.
Adaptation has always been a problem for the American church. There was a time when new technology and ideas were generated by the church. Now, it seems, the church has almost become anti-technology. I realize that that is a generalization that is not true for a lot of churches. But it is true for quite a few churches as well. It seems that the church is typically 20 years behind the culture. The contemporary worship movement in the early to mid 80’s ushered in the use of electronic instruments on a wide-scale basis. But kids had been listening to popular music created by these same instruments since the 50’s.
The church as a whole has got to learn to adapt to the culture around it. Even in 2018, there are churches who struggle to communicate through social media, even though Facebook has been around since 2004 and Twitter was started in 2006. The method of communication has changed and the church has to learn to adapt to that method of communication. If we don’t, we will fail to communicate to our culture. Over 80% of people who are looking for a church will check out the church’s website before they visit. But you would probably be surprised at the number of churches who don’t even have a website. And of those who do, the image they project is anything but inviting.
Adoption
But while the church has struggled to adapt to the culture around it, they have done a pretty good job of adopting the culture. Enter any decent-sized church today and you will see what I mean. American culture has thoroughly infiltrated the church. Where we once worshiped, we are now entertained. Flashing LED lights, moving heads, and haze fill the auditorium. This is done for the purpose of “creating an atmosphere of worship.” The problem is, God doesn’t need it, and if we are relying on lighting to “create an atmosphere for worship”, then is what we’re doing really worship at all? I’m not opposed to lighting in worship. But call it what it is. Entertainment.
Church structure is based on the American business model of leadership. The Pastor has become the CEO and other Pastors and leaders have become VP’s, Directors, and Managers. We have abandoned the Biblical model of church leadership and adopted a business model. Pastors are more likely to manage an organization than to “equip God’s people to do his work and build up the church”.
The church has become a consumer-driven organization. We have adopted the consumerist model of American culture. We market our churches to a target audience. Because if we don’t give people what they want, they’ll go to another church. So we create countless programs and systems to try and keep people happy. People attend church to “be fed”. According to Ephesians 4, the role of the Pastor is not to feed the congregation, it is to equip them. But we don’t want to be equipped to to do the work of the ministry. We want the Pastor to do the work – which includes feeding us. After all, that’s what he’s paid to do, right?
We don’t preach anything that may offend someone because we fear they will not come back. We offer up “church your way” in an effort to attract as many people as possible through what our church has to offer. But the one thing that would attract the most people to church is missing: God.
Our worship is consumer-driven as well. Worship has become more about how it makes me feel than how it makes God feel. We come for a “worship experience”. While experiencing the presence of God is an extremely wonderful by-product of worship, we don’t worship for how it makes us feel. We worship God because he deserves our worship. Regardless of how it makes us feel. It’s not about us. It’s about him.
Even our model of success is based on American culture. We base the success of our church on the number of people in attendance, how much money we receive each week in the offering or by the influence we have with the local government. While I am a proponent of growing churches, I certainly don’t believe that a large church is necessarily a successful church or that a small church is an unsuccessful one. Success is based on how well we accomplish the mission given by Jesus and not by how well we accomplish our own mission statement.
The Alternative
So what is to be done? We have adopted an Americanized version of the church but it’s obviously not working. Oh, it may be working for you but it’s not working for millions of others who have called it quits on God’s plan: The Church. How do we begin the process of navigating back to a church that does what it was intended to do? What if we started by not trying to figure it out? What if we begin this journey by asking God what we’re supposed to do? What if, instead of adopting the culture around us, we change that culture? What if businesses started attending church conferences on how to lead well instead of the other way around? What if we start at the beginning?
Paul’s comparison of the church to a human body was not a coincidence. It was a God-inspired view of how God intends the church to function. It works like this:
God places individuals with specific gifts – both naturally and spiritually – into local congregations. Those individuals are not there to be fed but to serve each other. That means that instead of shopping for a church, we should be asking God where he wants us to be. Not where we want to be. Where he wants us to be.
In that local church, those individuals use their gifts to fulfill God’s purpose for that church. Not for their department – but for the church. Eyes don’t function for the purpose of being an eye. They function for the purpose of providing vision for the rest of the body. If any part of your body doesn’t perform its intended function, it’s considered a disability. The same is true for the local church. If each individual fails to perform their function, the local church becomes disabled. If one of your body parts just sits there and gets fed, it becomes fat and useless. The same is true of people who come to church just to be fed. Even Jesus said that he came to serve, not to be served. Attend church with the intention of serving, not being served.
God’s kingdom is not local. It is global. Just as each local church is made up of individual people, geographic regions within God’s kingdom are made up of local churches. Just as individuals perform specific functions within the local church, those local churches perform specific functions within a geographic region. God’s purpose for his kingdom extends beyond the walls of your church. That means that instead of considering the church down the street as competition, we should view it as another part of God’s kingdom that serves a function apart from the one our church has. We’re on the same side! First Church is not competition for Community Church. One is not right and the other wrong. They’re just different. We’re all a part of God’s global kingdom. We should start treating each other as allies, not enemies.
The starting point for this transformation of the church is God. Start by asking God what he wants you to do. If you’re a Pastor, ask God what he wants your church to accomplish. Don’t just adopt a mission statement from the church down the road, or one that seems catchy. Ask God. Then do that. If you’re a church leader, or just a person who attends church, ask God what he wants you to do. Then do that.
Pastors, collaborate with other churches to accomplish God’s purpose for your region. Ask God what he wants your church to do to accomplish that purpose in your community. Then do that. Pray for each other. If one doesn’t exist, start a prayer time where Pastors and church leaders can get together and pray for your community, your city, and your region. If each church knows what it is called to do, and if other churches know what each church is called to do, the spirit of competition will end. We will begin to realize that God’s purpose will not be accomplished without each of us doing our part. It’s bigger than us.
Americanized church isn’t working. Let’s begin a transformation of the church that will give our children and grandchildren something to build on.
Tom Rawlings
Tom Rawlings is an author, speaker, coach, and consultant. He works with churches and church leaders to help them grow healthy churches. To learn more about having Tom help your church or leadership, please click the button below.
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