Oh when the saints go marching in, Oh when the saints go marching in. Oh how I want to be in that number, when the saints go marching in!

My church growing up would play that song every Sunday as the kids got up to leave for kid’s church. I would walk down the short hallway to my class with a smile on my face and a bounce in my step. 

That’s what church looked like to me at six years old.

What does the church look like today? In particular, I’m referring to the weekly, Sunday gathering. There are certainly a variety of answers to this question, but it appears that for many evangelical churches, a main motivation, from youth ministry to adult services, is to make the weekly service appealing.

For the youth, games, giveaways, prizes and pizza.  For the adults, concert-like worship stages and pulpits with charismatic speakers donning trendy fashions and delivering motivational speeches. Attract and captivate, but to what end?

To be clear, fun is not bad and relevant is not wrong, but since more and more churches seem to be subscribing to a seeker friendly approach, I wonder if it may be time to evaluate our rationale for why we do what we do? Personally, I wonder if this entertainment-driven approach is really more of an ailment than an asset?

Maybe there’s nothing necessarily wrong with these choices, but appeal as a metric requires amusement, comfort and cultural relevance and its success is measured by numerical growth. These are murky waters at best, and at worst, potentially perilous. In fact, they may have caused us to lose our way. It is very possible that in all the effort to make Christianity cool and church comfortable, we have actually lost sight of what this time was meant to be.

The obvious objection at this point is to raise the concern for the unchurched. After all, don’t we want them to attend church services with ease in hopes that they get saved?

This is actually why things get so muddled, so let’s see if we can decontaminate the issue. 

First, how are people saved? Paul answers that question when he writes: “‘Everyone who calls on the name of the Lord will be saved.’ How, then, can they call on the one they have not believed in? And how can they believe in the one of whom they have not heard? And how can they hear without someone preaching to them?” (Romans 10:13-14).

So, do these modern changes increase or decrease the amount of gospel in our services?  I would suggest it’s the latter, and here’s why. 

To create more appealing and efficient services we have shortened our service times. In and out in an hour. Multiple services so that you can church when it’s convenient. But how have we accomplished this? By reducing the amount of time we spend in God’s Word corporately, to the point that many sermons are shorter than an average TV sitcom, and filled with about as many stories. So, if salvation is dependent on the gospel, and we have reduced the gospel content of our Sunday programming, it seems, we might have a problem. In fact, this may explain why so many American, evangelical churches have grown in width, meaning attendance, but not in depth, meaning spiritual health.

I say this because using the Sunday service to target unbelievers, has had consequences on believers as well.

How? To make room for more services we have essentially eliminated the concept of Sunday school. We now have small groups that meet throughout the week, and while there are certainly benefits to these types of communities, they cannot replace Christian education. Sunday school was an instruction time for the whole family. It’s where people learned systematic doctrines and the whole story of the Bible. Most small groups, on the other hand, are facilitated by a variety of well-meaning, but untrained leaders asking the participants what they think the Bible means. It is often the blind leading the blind. This is if the small group is even Bible-study focussed because many orient people around topical themes and common interests.

Again, this isn’t about small groups themselves. They serve an important function in Christian community, but they do not accomplish what they replaced – Biblical literacy, understanding and depth.

Finally, perhaps one of the most appealing aspects of our Sunday service is our worship. It is big and theatrical, and when the music swells so do our emotions. The challenge comes down to what we are singing. I find it interesting that the big churches with the most questionable theology put out the majority of contemporary worship music: Bethel, Hillsong and Elevation Church. Now, I have read the majority of books produced by the pastors of these churches, and it is concerning that they have so much influence. But the music is appealing, sounding strikingly similar to contemporary pop music, thus, we belt out the hits service after service.

So, is this what our church gathering is meant to look like?

To answer that, I think we look to the Biblical example of the early church. When we take a quick and cursory glance in the book of Acts, we see that the weekly gathering occurred when believers came together. Acts 2:42-47, sets a clear pattern for the assembling of the saints: Biblical instruction, fellowship, communion and prayer. The church was a meeting of believers and a time meant for believers. We should always welcome anyone to attend a Sunday morning service, but historically the purpose of the Christian gathering was to edify believers. This is where we have it so confused today.

Church growth is about numbers, Christian growth is about discipleship. 

While the church, holistically speaking, should have outreach ministries and be present in their communities, the primary goal of the Sunday gathering is not to reach the lost, it is to cultivate the Christian. Coming to faith is the first step in discipleship. It is not, however, the only step, and we were commissioned to make disciples (Matt. 28:19), not just converts. 

Thus, the seeker-friendly approach striving to make church cool has been costly. It has confused the identity of the people of God and stunted the maturity of the body of Christ. As a result, many saints are suffering from spiritual malnutrition.

 This might be why, in his final charge to Timothy as a leader in the church, Paul wrote the following verses that are still so fitting for today:

“In the presence of God and of Christ Jesus, who will judge the living and the dead, and in view of his appearing and his kingdom, I give you this charge: Preach the word; be prepared in season and out of season; correct, rebuke and encourage – with great patience and careful instruction. For the time will come when people will not put up with sound doctrine. Instead, to suit their own desires, they will gather around them a great number of teachers to say what their itching ears want to hear” (2 Timothy 4:1-3). 

So Lord, please help us to be people of your Word. Amen