Church

Video Preaching at Church

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Several months ago my wife and I attended Harvest Bible Chapel (James MacDonald) inPalatine, IL.  We tried very hard to make sure we were at the main church on a day MacDonald would be there.  We got there and found out he wasn't there, but Joe Stowell was preaching.  Okay, cool.  Feed me.  Uh, it was Stowell on video from an earlier service. 

Right now I'm ten minutes into Mark Driscoll's sermon "Jesus Took Our Wrath" and he hasn't started the sermon yet.  That's actually not a strange thing for Driscoll, especially since he has about an hour and five minutes left.  He is explaining how Mars Hill has been growing in leaps and bounds.  Faster than they can accommodate.  And they are looking for ways to make space, and space is hard to come by.  Wouldn't we all like to have their problems.  One quick solution that won't last for long is adding a fifth service on Sunday.  As a pastor that sounds like a nightmare for my physical/emotional well being.

So instead of just killing the pastor and staff along the way, they have chosen to make some of the sermons video sermons.  Driscoll will preach the first service, it will be taped and used at a service or two that day.  That takes care of the killing the pastor/staff part, but I'm a bit concerned at the direction of good churches that I highly respect who are turning to this option.  I wonder if this isn't an abuse of the gifts of modernity, rather than using these gifts in a way that truly benefits the church. 

Let me just give a few thoughts as to why I don't like this trend.  I don't mean to pick on Harvest or MHC or MacDonald or Driscoll, but they have triggered my thoughts.

1. There's a dynamic that isn't there when the preacher isn't standing in front of his people.  Every sermon I preach changes because of how the audience responds, how I feel, the sense of "unction" and so on.  I don't think these are repeatable things, and so the dynamic is lost.  If I have the story right, Martyn Lloyd-Jones didn't like his sermons audio recorded (though they were) because he felt like you couldn't replicate the experience so it wouldn't be the same. 

2. Video preaching is, it seems to me, a way of doing an 'end run' around the real need: more preachers/more churches.  We are to pray for workers for the harvest, not for digital machines that can video-photocopy a sermon and reproduce it.  If God's providing the people to join the flock, I want to believe that God is providing enough pastor/preachers who can shepherd the flock.  I know the philosophy at MHC behind why they don't want to share the pulpit, but I'm not sure I fully buy it as the better option.

3. Video preaching seems like the result of personality-driven ministry.  The preacher is so important and so beloved that no one else can fill their shoes well enough to preach in their place.  I hope this isn't the case, but guys like MacDonald and Driscoll are very charismatic and certainly some are coming who would not if they weren't there.

What do you think?

Networking: Tom Nebel

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Tom_nebel_1 I had the opportunity to have lunch with a strategic baptist leader up in my neck of the woods.  Tom Nebel is Great Lakes Baptist Conference (Baptist General Conference) We_plant_churchesAssociate Executive Minister for Church Multiplication, Associate Director of TeAMerica, and is the big cheese at WePlantChurches.com (Great Lakes Church Planting).  I got connected to Tom through some pastors at the Acts29 boot camp a couple of weeks ago.  Tom also brought a church planter named Gene in North Madison to meet with me.

We ate Mediterranean food on State Street in downtown Madison, WI and talked about churches, church health, church planting movements.  He wrote out a diagram explaining how churches and church leaders clash and/or mesh on the issues of pastor and vision and how momentum changes Big_dreams_small_places_1things dramatically.  Very helpful, and if my explanation doesn't make sense, I'm told it can be found in Tom's book Church Planting Landmines.  Tom gave me a copy of another book he wrote, Big Dreams in Small Places: Church Planting in Smaller Communities, obviously understanding my context in a smaller but rapidly growing suburb of Chicago.

The more networking I do with other visionary leaders, the more pumped I get about what God is doing all around us and through us.  Being a part of a church is so different than being a part of a movement of churches planting churches (I've written about this before).  I want to learn from them and encourage more movements and fewer monuments.

Paybacks Are Hell

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Img_1534_300I know what "paybacks are hell" means when someone has done something to you and you are going to "pay them back" for it.  I don't quite get it in the context of a local church sign, as seen in my hometown of Pontiac, IL.

Could it mean that God is like that kid in high school who took something we did very personally, so they give us a beat down later?  Hmmm...

Top 50 Influencial Churches

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The Church Report lists their top 50 most influencial churches. (HT: JT) Here are the ones I think are worth mentioning in categories of my own design.  Meant to be funny guys.  I'd love to hear some of your own categories.

The sarcastic "Oh really? They make the list?" goes to..
1. Saddleback - Rick Warren
2. Willow Creek - Bill Hybels

The "Aren't these guys the same church in different locations?" goes to...
3. Northpointe - Andy Stanley
4. Fellowship - Ed Young, Jr.

The "That's not a "real" church!" goes to...
8. Potter's House - T.D. Jakes
14. Crystal Cathedral - Robert Schuller

The "We'd be better off if their number was a lot higher." goes to...
19. Bethlehem - John Piper
23. Mars Hill - Mark Driscoll
26. Redeemer - Timothy Keller

The "He doesn't look like a pastor." goes to...
5. Joel Osteen - "The new Expedition would look great in your driveway.  Want to take it for a test drive?"

Church and Coffee

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My next door neighbor in our apartment complex in seminary (Louisville, KY - SBTS) was a laid-back, no sugar eating guy who played a guitar and a ukulele, and had a bunch of daughters with hurt-your-eyes blond hair.  Matthew, near the end of seminary, really got passionate about theology, finally started buying some books, and started to feel the pull to plant a church in old Louisville.

Matt_huestedAt first I was skeptical, but he kept talking about it.  That was a few years back.  Today, Matthew is pastoring a missional church called Ekklesia and running an independent coffeehouse called Sunergos Coffee.

The longer I pastor, the more I think the way forward in the missional church is by getting into and investing in the community through "great good places" or "third places."

I have a feeling the topic of "third places" will come up again soon.

Church Isn't About You

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One blogging pastor has resigned from his church.  In a recent post he said many things, but finished with this.  It means more coming from a guy who has been sticking it out for years rather than a seminary student who just learned something.

if you are reading this i'd like to remind you that church isn't aboutyou. it isn't about your needs or your comfort or your musical tastes. sure you need to find a place where you can find a family but it's hard for me to believe that jesus died on the cross so his kids could have the best sunday school in town.

Mother Churches

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As the EC conversation continues to buzz more loudly in the ears of so many evangelicals, I think statements like this must be just as loud.

The unwieldy, old-fashioned church communities we've emerged from are like mothers--some supportive and helpful; others worn out, not well, depressed; all of them carrying a certain amount of history and baggage with them (because that's the price of growing up).  Of course we should grow up and do our generation's thing.  That's what parents want deep down.  But let's remember to be kind to the mother church--without her we wouldn't be here.

Maggi Dawn in Steve Taylor's The Out of Bounds Church?, page 56.

House Churches

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Jim Elliff has been a encouragement in ministry for me in a number of ways.  I have heard him preach and speak.  I have heard his radical ideas on evangelism.  I have read many of his materials.  I have read many articles on his website.  All of it has been helpful in one way or another, even when I haven't fully agreed. 

One of his newest articles has intrigued me.  I haven't fully thought it through yet, or even mulled over all the difficulties and questions in my mind.  But his idea about starting house churches to extend sanctuary-style churches is worth reading.  I think he may be onto something biblical and wonderful and radically simple.

Saturate: A Fresh Start

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I have decided to post the pastoral articles I write on my weblog.  All of the forthcoming articles will be posted here and can be found in the category "Saturate," which is the name of my pastoral writing ministry.  The first article below was read aloud to begin gathered worship on 1.23.2005 at my church. Itinitiated a two week vision emphasis at Calvary. Copies of the article were given to all attenders. I prefaced the article with a note to visitors that they are hearing an conversation between pastor and people, and that I value honesty and transparency enough that I welcomed them listening in.

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When you changed your calendar from 2004 to 2005, did it feel like a fresh start? There's something about changing that last digit from 2004 to 2005 that makes us feel like we get a second chance. We might say, "Maybe this year will be better than the last." "Maybe my relationships will get better this year." "Maybe in 2005 I will finally get out of debt," or "into a new house," or "a new job." We all have regrets, or struggles, or sins that we want to bury in the past and make a fresh start. As the year begins, it’s a good time for Calvary to contemplate a fresh start too.

This isn't easy for me to say as your pastor, but we are not where we need to be as a church. I would love to stroke everyone's ego (including my own) by saying that we are better now than last year and we are headed toward exciting things. But I can't say that. I can't lie to you and put on my happy face and act like everything is okay. It isn't. We are not living as we need to live. We do not love as we need to love. We are not changing our world as the Church has been called out to do. We aren't bringing our friends to hear the truth. We aren't seeing people follow Christ for the first time. We aren't baptizing new believers.

Probably worse than any of the above, there is a lack of excitement to know and worship Jesus. It's easy to get stuck in the week-to-week rut of mouthing the words of songs without passion. It's easy to distance ourselves in our hearts and put on the Christian act. Why don't we expect God to move among us, change us, bring us to tears over sin, bring us to laugh with joy over His blessings, and move us to be awestruck with a new view of the grace of salvation in Christ? I don’t sense anticipation as we gather, believing that God will be with us and fill us with His Spirit and empower us to reach the most hardened sinner with the compassion of Jesus. These are not good signs for us. We desperately need to change. We must have a fresh start. We need a revival brought by God.

I want to be clear. I believe that we are at a crossroads. We have to decide to either be content as a very small, impotent church or passionately pursue the Savior and expect that God will visit Calvary again with mercy, grace, and power.

Friends, 2005 is the year of the Fresh Start at Calvary. We are going to go through a number of changes, from very minor details to huge visionary ideas. We are going to do some things Calvary has never done. We are going to step out in faith in a way that we never have before. We are going to plan to do things that only God can do and then we are going to pray like never before, trusting in God like never before to do them. We are going to take risks, and we will surely make some mistakes. But life is too short to be satisfied with a façade of faithfulness. I want the real thing. I want a loud and risky faith that believes mountains can be moved. And I want you to want that too.

For some of you this sounds scary. I understand. Change is never easy. And even though it's necessary, it's still painful. But the only road out of struggling with complacency is The Calvary Road. It takes us to the Cross where our desires and schedules and church ideas have to die so that the Body of Christ can thrive again at Calvary Baptist Church of Woodstock, Illinois.

Friends, I believe that the best days of Calvary are still to come. I mean that. I believe we are not a church of the past, but a church of the future. For all our problems, the remedy is very close. It's Jesus. Not the Jesus of Baptists or Evangelicals or of your childhood church. But the Jesus of Scripture who loved the unlovable, chose to serve and not to be served, and rejected the way of manmade rules for the freedom that grace provides. Let's put weights and sins aside and run the race together with endurance, believing all along with an astonishing confidence that God not only can, but will do amazing things.

In Pursuit of Christ.

Pastor Steve.

"Now to him who is able to do far more abundantly than all that we ask or think, according to the power at work within us, to him be glory in the church and in Christ Jesus throughout all generations, forever and ever. Amen." Ephesians 3:20-21

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© 2005 Steve McCoy