Church Growth Volume 1: Alternative Worship

Then Jesus came to them and said, "All power in heaven and on earth is given to me. So go and make followers of all people in the world. Baptize them in the name of the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit. Teach them to obey everything that I have taught you, and I will be with you always, even until the end of this age." Matthew 28:18-20 NCV.

Our direction is clear. Those of us who are followers of Jesus have been told to go and make followers of all people in the world. I think a good time to start is now, but how do we do this? I think that most people learn about Jesus in a church setting. The number one way that new folks come into a church is to be invited by a current member. Many of us struggle with inviting people to church. I will write in more detail about why it might be hard to invite folks to First Congo, but first, I want to explore another way to get folks into church.

We could consider adding an alternative worship service. We offer a traditional worship service on Sundays at 10am. We welcome everyone to join us, as long as they come at that one time and one place to do that one thing. Diana Bulter Bass, author of Christianity for the Rest of Us, talks about interviewing the VP of Marketing for Starbucks. The VP told her that people at Starbucks have over 70,000 choices of how to order their drink. This is only 30 years after they had maybe eight choices - Regular, Decaf, with or without cream or sugar. Yet, in a day when folks have 70,000 choices of how to get their coffee, most churches offer one worship service. Is is any wonder that our churches are shrinking? We are not changing with our culture. (Possibly more important, we have not adopted a culture of change. Again, that is another post).

The message of Jesus has withstood changes in culture for over 2000 years, and a proposal for an alternative worship is not a proposal to change the message. It is a proposal to change the medium, to change how the message is presented. Many folks do not relate to the traditional worship format. Many of these folks are younger than our median age. Some of these folks are actually members of First Congo. Whether members or not, there is a very large demographic that we are not even attempting to reach. These folks want a spiritual home. People are searching for spiritual fulfillment as never before. You have heard of New Agers, Wiccans, Druids, Neo Pagans,...the list goes on and on and on. These alternate spiritual paths would not proliferate in a world that doesn't care about spritual fulfillment. People are searching. Let's help them find God by getting them in the doors of First Congo.

Starting an alternative worship from the ground up will be a ton of work. It will cost time and money. And there will be resistance. I have heard some resistance already, during informal talks with members. One point of resistance is that many of our members seem fairly happy or content with our worship. I couldn't agree more. However, we are not trying to reach those who come to our current worship service. We are trying to reach those who don't. That is the whole point. Another point that has been made to me is that some folks who currently attend the traditional worship might start attending the alternative, bringing attendance at the 10am service down, which some people won't like. The way I see it, if we add an alternative worship, and end up with 25 more people in total worshipping each week, then worship attendance has increased by more than 10%. Is there any other way that we can increase worship attendance by 10%? I don't actually know if worship attendance would go up at all, but I suspect that it would increase by more than 25 people per week.

From where I sit, not quite four years into my membership of First Congo, it appears to me that we are an inwardly focused church, at least in regard to spiritual matters. We don't do a lot to get new folks in the doors and into relationship with God. This action, if undertaken, would be an enormous step toward becoming outwardly focused, and toward fulfilling our mission to make followers of all people.

Did Someone Say Tithe?

The subject of a Tithe has come up a few times during discussions of the Stewardship campaign. Usually, folks are a bit wary of saying it too loudly, or too seriously.

Tithing, if you don't already know, is the so-called biblical practice of giving ten percent of one's income to the church. I was not familiar with the biblical support for a tithe, so I did a little light research. There seems to be a lot of gray area about whether a tithe was ever expected or given by anyone in biblical times. Of course, there are currently plenty of people who give 10% or more of their income to the church. You know some of them. There is also a widely held perception of a biblical call for a tithe. You may hear more about it soon.

While I am somewhat skeptical about a biblical mandate, I like the idea of a tithe, as it gets people thinking about giving as a percentage of income. The idea of a percentage of income helps each of us to understand how much or how little we are giving in relation to our total budget. For example, if my family spends 10% of our income each year on entertainment - travel, dining out, shows, movies, etc - and 5% on charitable contributions (mostly to the church), then I am forced to conclude that entertainment is twice as important to us as supporting the church and helping people in need. Ouch! It can be kind of painful to think about it this way! Enough about me.

Let us look at typical pledges at First Congo, and the percentage of income idea. The typical family (pledging unit) at First Congo makes a monthly contribution to the church of $100, or an annual amount of $1200. This is the actual median pledge - half of us contribute more, half less. When considered as a percentage of income, how much is $1200? The median family income in our area is about $80,000 per year. If our church membership is representative of the Madison area, then the median income of our pledging households is close to $80,000. If that is the case, our median pledge amount of $1200 is 1.5% of income. I don't know if the $80,000 figure is valid, but 1.5% seems like a pretty small percentage to me. Visualize Phil Certain standing at the front of the sanctuary at pledge time, and clipping off the top part of a dollar bill for God. I cannot help but think that a 1.5% sliver is going to be pretty hard to see from the pews. Again, there are plenty of folks who give more than this percentage. Thank You! Thank you to everyone who contributes to our church. There would be no church without you! But I repeat, the median pledge at First Congo is probably about 1.5% of income, which is a small percentage.

If and when you hear about a tithe, please use it as an opportunity to think about your pledge as a percentage of income. No one is going to snoop into your tax returns. That is between you and your accountant. Your pledge amount, and how you determine it, is between you and your God.