the “right” way to do church…?
Chris and I have been having conversations lately about deprogramming people about their ideas of the “right” way to do church, which I think is SO important. I spent the majority of my teen/high school/college years at an INCREDIBLE “mega church” in the Atlanta area. I honestly can’t sing it’s praises enough. I worked there for several years and saw so many lives radically changed by their ministry, but I noticed in myself that I was always looking at other churches thinking “they aren’t doing it right, they need to do it how we are doing it.” I was so critical of their production and their music because it wasn’t perfect or professional – I just assumed this was the “right” way to do church and everyone needed to jump on the bandwagon.
When Chris and I were dating/engaged he expressed that he wasn’t really connected to that church and we wanted to find a church together that we both loved, so we landed at Cumberland. It was definitely a transition for me. Coming from a 10,000 + person church with a HUGE production budget, professional musicians, and just a lot of amazing things going on, I found myself super critical of how Cumberland did church, it wasn’t the “right” way and didn’t live up to “my standards”…which is hilarious to me that I even felt like I had the right to judge anyone. The production was…interesting, the music was a bunch of volunteers and so one seemed to be in charge…I found pretty much everything “wrong” with it.
Now, after 3+ years at Cumberland I am so thankful the Lord has tamed my critical spirit and really taught me, there is no right way to do church. The right way to do church is to reach the people that the ministry is trying to reach. Does this mean that every church is going to have a gigantic production budget? Nope. But that also probably means that production is not going to be the way to reach the community you are serving. Does that mean it is bad to have a huge production budget? Nope. Does it mean you have to have things laid out like the “big dogs” do? Again, nope, the people you are reaching need something specific that a differnet model may not reach.
I guess what I am trying to say is that I really feel like the goal of every church should be to reach their community in the most effective way possible. Don’t compare yourselves to other churches or try to be like another church because you want to “compete” with them, how stupid is that?
Chris and I are entering a very different stage in churches that neither of us have a lot of experience with…a church plant. Going to church with 10,000+ people is a lot different than 500, and going to church with 500 people is a lot different than 30, but I could not be more excited to see what God has planned for Resonate. The city of Atlanta is desperate for churches that truly care about and are deeply investing in community…which sounds so weird to say about a city that has a church on every block. In the city of Atlanta, 8 out of 10 people do not go to any kind of church or worship gathering…8 out of 10. That is serious business right there. What are we as believers going to do about that number? We must to be entrenched in our community, deeply know our neighbors, open our front doors and our homes even when it’s messy (this one is really hard for me!), and meet the needs of the people around us. Is that something I am comfortable with? Nope, not AT ALL actually. Does it need to happen? More than I can even express.
So here’s my challenge to you…ditch the attitude that there is a right way to do things and invest in a church community that is passionate about reaching your community in a way that you can fully engage and get on board. There is just too much a stake not to.
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