Don't Forget Combined Services

There was a sort of combined worship service tonight at the Whit. I love going to events at other churches because I love to see how other churches do things.

Important note: I almost always walk out being happy that I am at the church I am.

They do these "combined" type events every now and then. The latest iteration is "new hampshire" churches. There were maybe 2,000 people in the arena, and they said about 170 churches were represented.
Pretty cool, especially since the vast majority of churches in our area are in that sub-200 congregation size.
Now there are lots of people who like to advocate for churches "getting together" and I honestly agree. America's church is very fractured, there are denominations inside of denominations, and it keeps me up at night that there are probably 20+ churches in Dover who do not communicate or collaborate or anything together.
HOWEVER, I am convinced that there is a good reason why we don't do combined "worship services" very often.

I walked into the Whit and saw what I was hoping to see: good sized line arrays, a Venue and a grand MA at front of house, and IMAG on a stage that could have been 60'x30'.
The music was familiar but mostly not what i'm used to.

Here are details that rubbed me the wrong way:
1/2 the stage was a choir.
the other 1/2 of the stage contained 3 percussionists, 2 or more acoustic guitarists, 3 keyboards, 2 violins, a bass, an instrument that I can't even identify, a varied smattering of vocalists, and possibly some others. Amongst all that I only ever heard 1 electric guitar at a time. Now there is nothing inherently wrong with 3 percussionists in a band,
But I have a personal vendetta against crowded stages and sloppy instrumentation.
All of those musicians were probably very good.
However I don't think I would have noticed if you had removed 2/3 of the people on the stage.
Another way to say it: You give a church a bigger stage and they figure out how to fill it with more people.
I don't have anything personal against choirs. I think they are pretty neat.
However I do not like my ears being pierced with the sound of 40 amplified voices that are louder than the entire 6-person rhythm section.

I think it all boils down to culture.
My church has gotten away from the culture of hanging flags inside our auditorium and waving streamers around. This event contained more than one middle-aged man waving a streamer and also 2 hand-held flags for the entire music set.
There was a dance element, which is cool except it was during a worship song which just felt weird. There was a kids choir complete with kid solo which always make me feel uncomfortable and weird. There were kids on stage waving streamers/flags/ribbons, which triple-whammeyd the squirmy-kid feeling inside of me.
There was a song in spanish. I have ALWAYS made fun of people who sing worship songs in other languages, because I speak ENGLISH and do not know what spanish words mean, therefore there is no point in having lyrics. I will let this one slide because I'm sure there were hispanics in the room and it was a pretty fun latin song.

The lighting director harshly reminded me of church volunteer techs. I did not appreciate his use of the blinders on the top of his rig, and the rainbow pixel-map across his backlight rig that he aimed at the crowd was just plain silly.

There are more things, tons of little details that I just plain didn't like.

It sounds like I'm being harsh.
And yes, I am.
But I can do that, because these people like what they do.
And I like what I do.
I'm not going to tell you that anything at this service was wrong, because there are very few wrong ways to do anything these days. And THAT is why there are so many different churches.

If there's any big problems in the evangelical or charismatic or non-denominational church in America, the biggest one is an identity problem. So many churches just plain don't know what they're going after.
They don't have a vision for the music, so they let 3 people play percussion: no vision = no reason to say no. But if we are able to define our identity, we can work towards fostering that identity. And different churches develop different cultural identities, which is good.

It just makes combined "multi-church" gatherings really awkward.

Any further conversations I have with people about "combined church" events will be about how we need to ally our ministry and forget about church services.

On Rhetoric

Stumbled into a UNH Cru vision-type meeting tonight. (I was told there would be free food, which makes both of my meals today pot-lucks. hashtag winner.)

They passed out a transcript of a speech that John Mott once gave about "Spiritual Awakening in a University."

Here's a paragraph excerpt:

"Is there not an urgent need for a spiritual awakening in the universities of every land represented in this Conference? ...Let us remember how many Christian students there are who, by inconsistent and sinful lives and practices, are dragging the banner of Christ in the dust. Let us reflect on the intense spirit of the world which in so many places is invading the Church... Let us not forget the terrible consequences which will follow if these students are not reached for Christ - the consequences not only to themselves, but also to the cause of Christ, and even to ourselves if we do not seek to win them. As we ponder all these facts deeply and prayerfully, are we not impressed with the great need of a spiritual awakening? "It is time, O Lord, for you to work."

This one paragraph in particular stuck out to me, because it sounds just like a lot of modern church rhetoric. Students need a revival, and there is an "intense spirit of the world" which is "invading the church"... sounds like a lot of things you hear people talk about in churches.
But what is striking to me is that this speech was given in 1898. 114 years ago.

Here are some things that come to my mind:

-Perhaps the Church has not done a very good job in the past 114 years of being influential in the lives of students.
-Perhaps this speech and its language has influenced 4 generations of christian ministry, and we have just been repeating the same words over and over again.

I don't think the former statement is true. I think that the church has and continues to have a tremendous impact in the world, especially on students.
However, I think that there is danger in the words about the "influence of the world invading the church". As soon as you start to read into that, you start to "see" places where the influence of the world has invaded the church. Modern music and production standards come to mind. There's a movement of people who believe that rock music in the church is satanic and surely a "worldly influence".


Here is what I think:
If the only influence on the church is generations of the church's own influence, then that church is operating in a vacuum and has ceased to serve its purpose.

A church in Dover, NH ought to look like Dover, NH.
It should not look like 14th century Europe.


Now it is very likely that Mr. Mott was not speaking about "worship styles", and was instead talking about "christians" living a worldly life. In that case, maybe his words bear repeating. Either way, his speech doesn't sound 114 years old. I think that the church should think more about its rhetoric.

On Using Soap

There's a strange phenomenon that happens in mens restrooms, specifically after urinal use.
Of the people remaining when you ignore those who don't wash their hands altogether, most of the remaining do this weird little faucet-dance. They turn on the water, stick their hands under it juuuust long enough to get them wet, turn off the water and then dry their hands as if nothing ever happened.

Soap is not frequently used.

I don't understand this.
Soap is provided in restrooms because it helps to remove things such as bacteria from your hands. When you use the sink, you invariably add bacteria to the mix, and getting your hands wet most likely attracts more of the critters.

I have read cases for not using soap, but they all require the use of scrubbing, which is something guys definitely do not do when they wash their hands.

I can think of 2 causes for this behavior.
One is that we are taught early on that we always have to wash our hands. However with no adult supervision, it becomes a routine "reflex" where there is no ambition to actually clean the hands, but the actions are part of muscle memory so the sink is used.
The other is that our society expects us to wash our hands when using the bathroom, and even though most men probably don't pass judgement on others who don't wash their hands after peeing, its seen as an acceptable way to pretend that there really is hand-washing going on.

Here's how I view it:
A complete waste of time.
Rather than accomplishing something practical and useful (Such as cleaning your hands), you are spending effort, time, and resources (water and paper towels) with zero net result. Those resources and that time and effort were destroyed, turned into heat, lost forever to the forces of entropy.

It may be trivial, but we do that same thing with so many other aspects of our lives.

Now, I'm an adamant believer that every christian song written about "going through the motions" is a song too many about "going through the motions", but we do that.
We waste time and energy in situations because we've been trained to think a certain way or are afraid of the societal consequences of being ourselves.