Who Do You Design Your Worship Service For?

Tony Morgan writes a blog that I read on a regular basis. Tony is one of the pastors at New Spring Church in Greenville, South Carolina. In this particular blog entry he makes an interesting observation. Let me drop in the interesting part:

"Last Sunday at our Greenville campus, we had an older couple, probably in their sixties, accept Christ. That’s worth celebrating. I love to watch life change happen.

Here’s what’s amazing about stories like that. Our services in Greenville aren’t designed for people in their sixties. Our services are designed for a much younger audience. It’s an audience that loves loud music. They are comfortable with video teaching, because video is already a huge part of their lives. They love the coffeehouse atmosphere.

Here’s what we’ve learned. If we design our service experiences for a younger audience, we’re more likely to reach that younger person and we’ll also reach older folks. The reverse is not true. If we designed our service experience for an older audience, the younger crowd would not show up.

Now, here’s the reality. Most churches in America are designed for an older audience. In fact, the more-seasoned folks in those churches are sitting on committees telling the students and young adults how they can and can’t do ministry. The result? Younger people are leaving churches in droves." ~ Tony Morgan (you can read his blog here)

Morgan's observation is true. From my own experience here at IC Church of Christ, that is essentially what we have done. We set a target age of who we are going after, then we created a venue that connected with that group. However, the means to the end is not the coolness of your venue, or the presentation of video, or even the style of the music. The means to the end is still the power of God, the teaching of biblical truth, the leading of the Holy Spirit, and the focus on Jesus.

The growth and change in our church over the last year has come more from a focus on prayer (the church elders and I pray every Tuesday night over the church & the community) and basic biblical teaching and preaching. I think when I first arrived here in Iowa City I worked too hard on being cute, clever, and practical. So while the messages were all right, they never really connected people to the true life change that comes through Jesus Christ. In looking back at some of the messages they almost came off as being nice, "self-help" type of stuff that didn't even require the power of God in people's life. Now, it probably wasn't that bad, it just seems that way looking back. I've always preached Jesus and always will. It's just that I can tell a change in my preaching and how people have responded since I've changed my focus. Anyway, just a few observations I had that I wanted to pass on to you.

Son of Hamas Leader Talks About Converting To Christianity

I came across this interview. Very interesting stuff.

5 Leadership Lessons - Dave Ferguson

Dave Ferguson is the lead pastor at Community Christian Church in the Chicagoland area (they are a multi-site church). He wrote an excellent book a couple years ago called, The Big Idea. It talked about how Community Christian Church focus on one thing each week--and I mean the whole church, from the little ones all the way to the grown ups. So the entire family walks away with the same principles to apply and live out. So to say they are creative and innovative in their ministry is an understatement.

Anyway, I came across this post on his blog and I thought is was very good and very true. Leadership in the church can be very difficult, confusing and maddening and his post points to some basic truths to keep in mind when working and leading Christ's church.

5 Leadership Lessons - Dave Ferguson

Flood Hero - Jerry Anthony

I wanted to introduce you to one of the heroes of the Iowa City flood. He is an outstanding husband, dad, professor at the U of I, elder of our church and a friend of mine. You can read his story here in the ICPC aritcle that featured him and many others.

Jerry is an outstanding part of our church leadership team and is a big reason why my family is ministering in Iowa City with the IC Church of Christ--at after reading the story you can see why!

Book Review: The Shack

I just got done reading, "The Shack" today so I thought I would pass along a few observations. If you haven't heard about the book, it is a fairly popular book written by Christian author, William Young. You can learn more about the book here.

Let me start by saying that this book is not for everyone. There was a part of the story that was really, really hard for me to get through. So if you are faint of heart or disturbing images bother you, this probably isn't the book for you.

Also, if you are new to believing in God or a new Christian this book will probably confuse or frustrate you. Without giving away the story line, the author dwells a lot on the relationship of the Trinity (God the Father, Jesus the Son, and the Holy Spirit). Biblically speaking, the William Young really stretches somethings, but I think he does that primarily to tell the story. I don't think he has an anti-biblical agenda...he's just telling a story and he uses his imagination to fill in some gaps. So if you have heard any negative about the book it has probably been from Christians bashing it because it's not biblical. I think if your well aware of what the Bible says about the Trinity and its relationship with each other, the book provides an opportunity to stretch your imagination into what the relationship looks like between The Father, The Son and the Holy Spirit. That's my take.

So, who should read the book?

• People who enjoy seeing God's Story written through the lives of people. I was constantly reminded throughout the book that God is doing something.
• People who are angry with God. If you are upset about things that have happened in your life and you blame God this book will challenge that thinking.
• People who have had to deal with horrible tragedies in their life.
• People who need to forgive someone. There were two moments that I cried while reading the book and one of those moments was a scene of reconciliation. It was very moving for me.
• People who think God is distant and uninvolved in our lives. This book was a great reminder how personal real God is in our lives.
  

If you have read the book or have observations or questions you are more then welcome to share!