In this blog post by Dan Reiland, he asks six questions that we use in this episode as guidelines in helping us understand our thinking as we approach the planning of our worship services.
These are the six questions:
Dan Reiland is the Executive Pastor of 12Stone Church in Lawrenceville, GA, with Senior Pastor Kevin Myers. Dan regularly joins us to talk about leadership. Dan has written a great book for small church pastors - Amplified Leadership - 5 Practices to Establish Influence, Build People, and Impact Others for a Lifetime. If you use this book in leadership at your church, you are literally guaranteed to grow in your leadership effectiveness as a pastor! Enjoy this episode! I attended a large church yesterday. It wasn’t a mega church, but it was large, probably around 2,000 people. Is that a mega church?? It might have been twenty years ago, but not today. Anyway, I attended a large church yesterday! There was a large parking lot, greeters at the door, and the next door, and the next door. There was a very spacious “welcome mall” with great signage and helpful volunteers stationed about here and there.
There was helpful literature with great graphics and cool flat panel monitors broadcasting all manner of helpful pictures, video, and promotions. In the auditorium there were well padded seats, a kickin’ sound system, colored stage lights, fog machines, a very cool worship team with awesome music, an amped up well-worded introduction to the morning theme, a series intro video, casually dressed staff and a casually dressed pastor presenting a very dynamic, but down to earth, message. Oh yeah, and he had a very cool bar stool to sit on, with a padded round seat that could really spin! I knew the message would be soft pedaled and light on Scripture. I knew it would be interesting, but not too convicting, funny, but with enough content to make a person think, short, but long enough to validate a pastoral paycheck. I knew it would be church-lite, Bible-lite, and God-lite. Okay, not really. I didn’t really know these things about the message. But, here’s what it was really like… It was unbelievably excellent and effective! The message was from 1 Corinthians 6 and contained about the most straightforward warning against sexual sin one could present. It was Andy Stanleyesque, in the very best sense. The pastor used story, and self-deprecating humor when necessary, to draw the congregation in. He asked the questions out loud that they were thinking silently. He piqued their interest for an answer to the question “Why?!” Why in the world would God demand that people in the 21st century live by an antiquated and prudish notion that sex should be reserved only for marriage?! He politely asked for 30 minutes of their attention and then assured them at the end that if they would commit to living by God’s design for sexuality, they would be so glad they did! The service concluded with a very powerfully played “Forever Reign” which includes the lyrics: Oh, I'm running to Your arms, I'm running to Your arms. The riches of Your love Will always be enough Nothing compares to Your embrace Light of the world forever reign It was one of the most powerful conclusions to a service that I have ever experienced! At this large church, we were given a very powerful, focused, culturally needed biblical message, wrapped in a winsome and gripping delivery, wrapped in a very crowd-appropriate musically dynamic service. It was an amazing experience. I walked out hating my small church and my life as a small church pastor. Wait a minute! No, I didn’t!! I walked out thankful to God for a church like this that will reach a lot of people and connect them to their loving God. I was thankful for the pastor and staff that God has equipped to do their Kingdom work. And, my friends, I walked out so thankful for my 200church! In my church, it’s different. Not better or worse, just different! I am so thankful for the people at my church, and the opportunity we have in our community to reach people, join them to God through the Gospel of Jesus, equip them to serve God and others, and connect them in meaningful and healing relationships with each other. I was challenged and encouraged yesterday morning in a number of ministry areas, areas where I can up my game, and attempt just a little more for the Kingdom in my own 200church. Dan Reiland wrote a Pastor’s Coach article a while ago that talked about the three dangers that large churches face:
This Wednesday on the 200churches Podcast, episode 63, Dan joins us for the entire episode to talk about those three dangers. It’s a great, personal, and free-wheeling episode that is sure to encourage and challenge you, and of course, make you laugh! You should attend a really large church sometime when you are able. It was fun. It really was. And I lived to tell about it! Well, this is an easy one, right?! Just make sure that at some point during your message, three armed police officers interrupt your service to arrest, handcuff, and lead away at least one person in the front row. That’s it, no more boredom! But alas, there is one reason why that can’t happen… no one sits in the front row! Okay, so let me suggest something else. The fear of the majority of pastors is that they will bore their people when they preach or teach God’s word. Why, it’s inevitable at some point. The guy in the third row is sound asleep, people check their watch, or their smartphone. Even you or I get bored once in a great while during a message. But there is hope.
I’ve been preaching and teaching for thirty years now, so let me share a few presuppositions, then a few ideas. Presupposition #1 – God changes hearts with his holy Word. The Holy Spirit of God uses his word, to do the work. He can use what we might think of as the most boring sermon or lesson. Presupposition #2 – We do not use presupposition #1 as an excuse to bore people. Presupposition #3 – The listener must have a pulse. What I mean by that is the listener must have at least an entry level intention and willingness to listen, hear, and be changed. If not, we could explode, and they would still yawn. Presupposition #4 – Boredom is as much in the mind of the listener as in the actions of the speaker. Presupposition #5 – Content should trump presentation style. Content is most important. Without it, the presentation style is meaningless. Presupposition #6 – Presentation style should deliver content, not overshadow or obscure it. Now, here are some ideas for how not to be boring. We will share more in our podcast on Wednesday, Episode 32 – Why You Should Explore Creative Communication Methods In Your 200church, and in our post on Friday. This is “Communication Week” at 200churches! Idea #1 – As the preacher, we MUST be close to God ourselves. Be close to Him through prayer, intimacy with Scripture, and personal heart devotion to our Father, our Savior, and our indwelling Holy Spirit. There is no shortcut to OUR intimacy with God – the source of power in preaching! Yeah, I know this one is not a "silver bullet" that is easy to do - but it's the truth and there is no substitute for it. Idea #2 – Be close to our people. Our love for them, and our knowledge of them, will be both our motivation and our direction in our preaching. We are not preaching or teaching a crowd every week, but our friends, the people we love. While I prepare my messages, I am thinking about the lady who just lost her husband, the student struggling with alcohol and parties, the man addicted to pornography, and the parents whose teenage son shot himself in the head in their family room... and died. Our relationship with our people certainly influences our messages. Idea #3 – Variety! We can change how we deliver the message. Stand, sit, speak, point, loudly, softly, onstage, off stage, video, handout, object lesson, story, list, challenge, action step, lectern, table, whiteboard, pulpit, no pulpit, images, art, music, interview, team preach, personal story, etc. etc. We must use creativity and variety. It is good for our people to wonder what might come next. Idea #4 – Let’s be ourselves, not someone else. You have likely heard it before – God doesn't want another Billy Graham or Francis Chan – he wants YOU. God created us to speak to our people, love our people, and teach our people. We can trust him that he has given us the personal, intellectual, and creative resources we need to get the message across. Let’s just be ourselves. Well, that’s a good start! Wednesday’s podcast will expand on this, get you thinking, and hopefully inspire you to seek that “next level” in your ability to communicate God’s wonderful word. What was the most creative thing you ever successfully pulled off in a sermon? This week we've been talking about the Sunday morning experience. As pastors and church leaders, we have a desire for our gatherings to be special and meaningful, full of impact and energy. But the reality never quite lives up to the fantasy for 200churches, and unfortunately many of us hold ourselves up to standards that truly are impossible based on our facilities, our congregations, and, realistically, our budgets. How much does a fog machine cost?! While Jeff (who wrote Monday's post) was away to visit his daughter, I was taking a group of students on a service trip to Des Moines. While there, we attended my old church which meets in a school, has a very different style of worship than our church, and reaches a very different demographic than our congregation.
And that's the point. Every church is culturally situated. Every congregation, every building or meeting place, every Sunday morning service (or Saturday night, or Friday afternoon, or whatever group meeting time you might have) exists in a particular time and place, and has the ability to reach particular people because of that situation. Jeff's daughter's church is different than ours, but both can be healthy and vibrant communities. Neither is better than the other, each is simply suited better for its environment. So when we set out to create an amazing Sunday morning experience, what model are we using? Are we just trying to import what we saw at the latest conference or live-stream of our favorite mega-church pastor, or are we preparing for Sunday mornings that connect with our people and our specific community? Your church is boring. Probably to the majority of the people in the world. But to the people that God has given you to guide, and the people in your surrounding community, your church can be exactly what they want and need. That looks different for all of us, but it's our responsibility as pastors and leaders to discover what our community needs. No matter what our service looks like, the three areas we talked about Wednesday are still indispensable:
Put these three principles at the center of your Sunday morning experience, and it will have an impact on people. Church isn't meant to be boring, at least not for the people who faithfully attend yours! I did not attend my church today. I am visiting my Daughter and Son-in-law on the East Coast. We went to church with them this morning. On the way out of the parking lot, I remarked that going to their church was like going to the movies. Here’s why:
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