church relevance « daveingland.com

church relevance

tithing…is it relevant today?

Currently having a great conversation via twitter that started with this initial question:

@AaronBird: What do you say Christian leaders: Does supporting a missionary or ministry outside of your church count as your tithe?

How would you answer? Before you do, here are some snippets of additional dialog that you may consider as well:

inworship: @daveingland Gotta be honest. That question from @AaronBird sounds very religious and selfish.

aaronbird: @inworship …worthy ministries also require funds. Conflict of interest? Dunno. Just thinkin’.

daveingland: @aaronbird @inworship i think your tithe/offering should go to those in need. i’m more in line with paul’s teaching on gracious giving.

soverpeck: @daveingland @aaronbird @inworship modern way of doing church is a money pit. in the bible the “10% tithe” was about giving food to the poor

inworship: @AaronBird Biblically, we need to encourage heart giving. Any expectation to the local church/organization, opposes that teaching.

aaronbird: @inworship I don’t disagree. Just wonder what a church leader feels when giving is down & has 2 make cuts but ppl expct more but give less.

daveingland: @soverpeck @inworship @aaronbird in acts 2, they sold what they had & gave to those in need. way more than 10% & definitely money, not food

soverpeck: @daveingland @inworship @aaronbird absolutely. again, not to pay salaries or for cool sound systems and a mac

aaronbird: @soverpeck @daveingland @inworship Do we always have to defer to “the way it used to be”? Why not forge ahead & be relevant to now?

aaronbird: @soverpeck @daveingland @inworship Should we not pay or pastors & other church leaders because that’s how they used to do it in the NT?

So, should one tithe to the church? Is a tithe 10%? Should giving be considered a tithe? Can one–in a biblical sense–give to those in need outside of the church and consider that their tithe…thereby not giving to the church as well? Your thoughts are appreciated.

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3
Jun 10

Attractional church represented on video by North Point

I saw a video that my friend Jon Reid posted on his blog here. It is a parody of the contemporary, attractional church. However, when you watch it, if you didn’t know better, you’d have no idea it’s a parody. Take a look for yourself:

“Sunday’s Coming” Movie Trailer from North Point Media on Vimeo.

“We’re so cool, we call it ‘Contemporvent!’”

“This is the song that everyone knows, this is the song that everyone knows.”

“This is my new song. Nobody knows this song. I want to invite you to buy this song after service.”

Sound familiar? It should! Seriously, this is the message I hear far too frequently in the contemporary, attractional church. In fact, this may be what you hear when you get together to worship on Sunday’s. Is there anything wrong with it? Well, yes…and no.

I don’t want to bash the attractional, megachurch, but in reality it does come across kinda cookie cutter to me. While in seminary we always went out on Sundays and visited 3 different church services to discuss as a group. I’ve seen a lot of various megachurch services and somehow they all seemed the same. Is that a negative? Well, if it works, then not really. However, in trying to reach people outside of the church, I find it can be a negative. It seems like culture is changing. What is relevant isn’t contemporary Christian songs that everyone already knows. Programming songs by length and keeping a sermon to a finite amount of time may not attract newer generations.

The oddest thing about all of this to me is that in the church we still use the terms contemporary and relevant (that’s where the name “Contemporvant” came about in the video) when in fact, this model of church was established back in the late 80′s and early 90′s. Is something 10-15 years really considered contemporary and relevant? For me, it just isn’t.

Personally, I don’t like the idea of mocking church as was displayed in this video from North Point Ministries. We do enough in the church already to build resentment and fueling that with a parody video just doesn’t seem sensible for me. If this were shown to a strictly Christian audience of regular church attenders there could be humor in it, but again, do we really need another thing to point to what the church isn’t doing right?

As all followers of this blog will know, I am not a cookie cutter model person when it comes to ministry or the church. If it works for you, great…doesn’t mean it should work for me. I care more about deeper relationships, encouragement, and acts of service in growing our relationships together in Christ over programs, great worship musicians and commanding speakers trying to be relevant. For me, engaging in conversations–which can be done in the context of preaching–is the way to reach people that are exploring their faith or seeking to grow. Letting them know they matter rather than letting them wander in and out unnoticed is what I want to see. However, some will still be drawn to that contemporary, relevant 90′s model of church as was represented in the North Point video. That’s why I don’t want to speak against that model. It does work and is great at drawing in crowds of people to hear God’s Word. I just think it comes down to connecting with people on a deeper, more-intimate level and have chosen to expend my energies in a different direction. With that said, I still cringe a bit when I watch this video as I sense the humor in it, but don’t look forward to the thoughts it may instill in those currently outside of the church, that will view it.

What are your thoughts? I’d certainly appreciate learning your impressions and feedback once you’ve watched the video.

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6
Feb 10

3 Questions About The Church: Brett Crimmel

Closing out the weeklong series on 3 questions about the church is Brett Crimmel. Brett is the lead pastor of Forefront Church in Lakewood, Colorado and has some great insights to share on being the church and helping those in need. His perspective on the church and its future is an exciting one:

1) How would you define the (local) church?

The local church is a community of people gathered together with a unifying purpose: to Love God (great commandment), to Love Others (golden rule – both inside and outside the church), and to Change the World (great commission). The church has a task to accomplish – namely to help people find their way back to God.

2) Is the church relevant? Why?

Absolutely! The church has more work to do now than ever in the history of the world. People are spiritually hungry and the teachings of Jesus are what they’re looking for. Now, more than ever, we’ve got the answers to the chaos that everyday life and the meaning of life.

Now, there are plenty of churches that have lost sight of the great commission. They are certainly not relevant. They’ve become a hotel for all the perfect people instead of a hospital for all of us jacked up sinners saved by the grace Jesus alone can bring.

3) Do you see the church looking different in the future? Please explain.

Yes. I think we’re moving past the culture of OR and moving into a culture of AND. While mainline denominations are struggling to define why they exist, the walls of separation are being torn down for the greater mission at hand. I’m seeing less division and more inclusion. Voices that are divisive are being marginalized by the social media and the back channel and those willing to work together on the mission are working together in ways never seen before.

But at the same time, the gospel is becoming clearer and clearer. And we’re preaching it with more boldness than ever before. And people are getting saved.Seems like the churches that are “getting it done” are moving from modality (a mode of operation … we’re one big happy family) to sodality (a task to complete … let’s do whatever we have to do to accomplish the task at hand)*. Maybe it’s just the people I’m listening to or maybe it’s reality, but it seems that even the establishment is adjusting to the new world order of multiple voices speaking. Someone has to filter & prioritize the noise. Churches that are about accomplishing a vision seem to be thriving in the new world order.John Ortberg said recently, “You can’t define spiritual maturity in a way that the pharisees win in the end.” Unfortunately, the pharisees have been winning for far too long. And I think the future church redefines that reality. Thank God.

Stay in touch with Brett Crimmel by folowing him on twitter: @brettcrimmel or the happenings at Forefront Church on their website: forefrontchurch.tv

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5
Feb 10

3 Questions About The Church: David Park

David Park‘s twitter bio says it best: I dream about Asian-American culture and the church. David has a great insight into the next generation of church and how Asian-Americans can collectively influence the church culture in America. He hosts the Next Gener.Asian Church blog and is the most eloquent authority on Asian-American ministry. David has a love for–and is a student of–the greater church-at-large and lends a great perspective as he answers the three questions below:

1) How would you define the (local) church?

In an increasingly pluralistic and competitive landscape then, the local church often resorts to diverse expressions and tactics akin to the business world in terms of approaching market segments and developing various products and services. While this might make sense for the survival of organizational entities, it recapitulates the problems we witness in society with perpetuating systemic injustices, tribalism, and consumerism. It is a rare church that can display to the world what reconciliation looks like, or radical generosity, or transformation at the collective level. We take ‘ekkesia’ seriously when we call people out of darkness, but we have difficulty converting this into the ‘apostolic’ dimension of the church in sending people out.

2) Is the church relevant? Why?

Relevance is difficult to achieve at a macro-scale when we tend to create industries and silos to protect ourselves. The world simply is not impressed when we mimic their culture-transforming developments, whether in the arts or in business. The local church has the capacity and potential to be relevant, but many close themselves off from others citing differences in doctrine, in zip code, in politics, in worship style, and a variety of matters that implicitly tell the world that we are not as full of grace as the gospel we proclaim. Choosing our tribe was a luxury in Christendom, but in a web 2.0, globalized, shifting America, we no longer have the space of distancing ourselves from “others”. The Mormon, the Muslim, the Jew, the Hindu, the New Ager, the atheist, and the apathetic are all watching and we simply are playing a game (missiologically speaking) without any sense of gravity to our faith and our witness before the world at our doorstep.

3) Do you see the church looking different in the future? Please explain.

Old habits die hard, but the circumstances and the consequences are dire, so I do hope that churches look different in the future with a greater emphasis on collaboration and reconciliation. The church needs to not gloss over problems of individuals or of the collective, but to invest deeply an embodied doctrine of incarnation. We must recover what it means to be a spectacle, to live a critique against the idols of political power and economic forces, and display healing, hospitality, and care to a greater extent across a wider spectrum of people than before. If the church doesn’t look different in the future, we effectively forfeit our role in shaping and informing the development of Christian witness in the global south and east and their churches.

Learn more of David’s thoughts at his blog: Next Gener.Asian Church or follow him on twitter: @dpark75.

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4
Feb 10

3 Questions About The Church: Tyler Braun

Many of you may know Tyler Braun from his blog Man of Depravity. He’s the wild card in this blog series as he is not the lead pastor of a local church, but he brings the voice of a younger generation and is a seminary student and youth pastor in Portland, Oregon. Here is how this dynamic young man responded to the following three questions:

1) How would you define the (local) church?

A smaller and more specific expression of the church at large (church universal), designed to reach the world through discipleship and evangelism.

2) Is the church relevant? Why?

By “church” here I will move forward with the assumption that church means the combination of all local churches (though I do not think that is necessarily what the word church means, only that is helps frame the question in a way that I can answer). I say yes and no. I say yes because relevant is such an ambigous term that is often used when we think of “cutting edge,” even when cutting edge might not be what is truly relevant. Relevant means something different to each person in their own individuality. The many expressions of Christianity in churches around the world tell me that absolutely the church is relevant. I say no because my own experience says that culture is changing so fast that it is nearly impossible to stay relevant in the forefront of that change. And It isn’t only the church that struggles with this.

3) Do you see the church looking different in the future? Please explain.

Based on my definition of what the church is I would say emphatically no. Granted, I used a pretty broad and basic definition, but even if I was more specific I don’t know that much would change. Even within my lifetime there will be the changes of moving to a more internet-based approach or anything other specific change you see happening even now and churches will change as they deem change is necessary to reach the people around them. But the basic tenets of what a church is and does will stay the same. We will still gather consistently in large and small groups to pray, worship, and hear God’s Word brought in a way that makes sense to us. In that way, I think the church will stay the same.

Tyler Braun lends his insights regularly at his blog: manofdepravity.com and you can follow him on twitter as well at: @tylerbraun.

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