What Healthy and Unhealthy Trends Exist in the American Church Today?

by Q Panel

As the context of our culture changes, so does the way the church chooses to interact, serve and connect with people. At Q, we want to discuss and expose what trends we are observing in the American church that seem very healthy and some not so healthy. We didn't want to just have experts have this discussion, but introduce you to a few of the practitioners; people who are on the ground, in urban and suburban settings, trying to express the Gospel in ways that are effective and meaningful. Everything will be on the table for discussion - from theology to homosexuality, multi-site campuses to missional church embodiment. Our goal is not to get a perfect answer to this question, but to stimulate conversations that make us consider our ecclesiology and the bigger questions the church faces in the coming days.

Comments

Andrew Schaper

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Andrew Schaper

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mZEROq

Great video. Couple thoughts:

- Listening to this video as a layman, I feel that for every panelist, the meaning of "church", and "how we do church", is always in the context of a group meeting in a building. I think to think outside the box, we need to realize that the true meaning of church is "the body of believers", not necessarily the local church that is led by a small number of individuals. I think when we can broaden our horizons about that, and stop returning to the paradigm of a pastor-led congregation of various size, with or without praise bands or jumbo-trons, other ideas of what "doing church" can emerge.

For example: what would happen if there was no building and no paid staff for a church? To many, that would mean that you didn't have a church. What it could mean is that the church, the "local body", instead met together in homes, and instead of paying rent or mortgage and salaries, pool that money to effect good in their communities.

- A couple things I would humbly add to what is unhealthy in the church today are:

1). Lack of spiritual maturity through biblical knowledge. We've been in a culture that deemphasized biblical training and discipleship. This has brought up an entire generation of church goers who are entirely dependent upon church leadership, with no will or courage to step up and be leaders themselves. Or worse yet, that we are turning over the mantle of leadership to those who are not secure in their understanding and so spread false theology.

We need to become people of the book again.

2). A preoccupation with the numbers of salvations, baptisms, and the number of people joining churches. This idea is related to 1) in that we've dumbed down, tried to be more comfortable and less challenging, putting on a show for the unsaved so that hopefully they'll come to church each weak instead of sleeping in...and eventually, hopefully, maybe, accept Christ. More succinctly, the unbalanced effort to "get the gospel message heard" as opposed to fulfilling the Great Commission, which in a word is "discipleship". We are not commanded to make converts, we are commanded to make disciples.

To many, salvation is the first step in discipleship. This is not correct, and oftentimes produces the worst sort of convert: one who doesn't even know the ramifications of beginning a relationship with Jesus. They have not "counted the cost".

To that same many, oftentimes discipleship also ends where it begins. We put all our effort into getting a conversion, then hand them a bible and say, "Here, go read this, come to church, pay your 10%, and find something in the "church" (again, that particular local church with walls) to fulfill." And that's it. The common churchgoer is left to fend for themselves. I call this "swiss-cheese" discipleship. There is no plan, there is no method, there is just whatever the individual happens to pick up from a sermon or a Sunday school quarterly, a faith that is filled with holes.

In my personal and humble opinion, discipleship is the key to real change in the church. To me, lack of it is the reason behind so many issues, including the fall of Christian influence in our very post-Christian world. Why do most of our youth, after graduation, never go back to church? Perhaps they were more confused then when they first started because there is was discipleship happening. Church leadership doesn't think the kids will come if they have to study the bible and so make it as fun as possible. (FYI: Oswald Chambers "My Utmost for His Highest" was originally a collection of Saturday morning bible studies for his churches youth.).

Years ago, people would memorize entire books of the bible and be fluent in discussions of theology. Yet just last night I got a request from a youth who had been going to church for years, asking me to teach him how to pray! Epic fail!!! I taught him how to use the Lord's / Model prayer to pray, 30minutes of study, and he was HUNGRY for it. Our youth want to be challenged, challenge them.

Let's focus on discipleship. Not a better church model that "works" (and how do you qualify and quantify that? By conversion? By the amount of people serving? All can be faked (Ananias and Sephira for examples)). A pastor recently inferred to me that the church is not interested in deepening their understanding of the Bible. As a member of the laity, I challenge all pastors to rethink the capabilities of it's members, and to stop focusing on their personal visions for the church that they are leading, but rather focus on empowering their congregations through good bible teaching and by providing opportunity for real community involvement. It's not all about what happens inside the church walls (which brings me back to my first comment...why do we need a building to have church?).

Thanks for reading, God bless.

mZEROq

Jesse Velarde

Very interesting discussion. I thought the title was the "Healthy and Unhealthy Trends in the Church today" There are very legitiamte issues which should be addressed. However, this discussion was almost all about the bad, and hardly a mention of any of the positive fruit that is being born in a great deal of churches. Of churches engaging community, and serving others, and bringing people to Christ.

Self examination is helpful, but it is easy to become so cynical that you lose sight of what God has done. Sometimes we seem to get sidetracked by methodology and style prefereances which are very exterior issues. If a church is lifting up Jesus, building community and training its people to serve in the body and community, who cares if they have multiple campuses, meet in a coffee shop, or sing hymns with a bango and yeukalely?