There's a Culture For That
Churches are Growing and Why They Shouldn't Be
Is the gospel enough?
A simple question answered with an often-convoluted, sputtered limerick, spinning a tale of sincerity from a well-lit stage. Certainly, mainline Evangelical churches would step up to the mic and belt out a resounding yes to such an antiquated query. Yet this answer is often muffled by a well-stuffed pillow in the echo chamber of modern church culture.
Birthed in suburbia, mega churches cut their teeth in the 70’s & 80’s, attracting the corporate masses fleeing the city life. Enduring the growing pains to become behemoths, these churches morphed into movements whose influence would spread regionally, nationally, and even globally in the mid-nineties through mid-2000’s. Their magnetic appeal drew in thousands of attendance-starved congregational leaders, mimicking their every move, clinging to hope that emerging suburban culture would fill the rural pew.
Cloaked in the leadership style of their chosen emperor, local pastors initiated the cloning process by reading books, watching videos, attending conferences, and inviting sanseis & consultants in for this emergent phenomenon. Retrofitting themselves with pre-assembled strategies, well lubed pipelines, new dialects, U-2/Coldplay music with a Jesus flare, all wrapped in suburban tight jeans with a side of man-bun. Leaders injected this engineered, synthetic cultural serum into their churches, hoping to cure an ever-growing attrition rate.
After twenty-five years of farming this new frontier, fruit must certainly be exploding out of these looms. Mega movements, with their charismatic leaders raking in untold royalties, must be resulting in congregations exploding in new birth. Leaders everywhere in America must be clamoring for capital from their congregants to expand facilities to facilitate this massive growth.
If this is the case, then why are more churches closing than opening in America? Why are these cultural waves unable to coax the spiritually adrift?
We’ve ran the purpose driven bases of Saddleback, sought-the-sensitive of Willow Creek, growth tracked the Highlands, visioned the North Point, and been thoroughly Maxwelled. All these movements, with their finely tuned cultures, have fallen miserably short of moving the needle of spiritual transformation. What they have excelled in, however, is mastering the art of sheep trading. The church with the most seductive stable, attracts the most sheep.
It’s brilliant! Create an enticing culture from ACME. Inc church that lures in bored, disgruntled sheep from other pens, and watch the growth commence! Pivot from pursuing the lost, entertain the churched, mimic the mega, and watch this formula fill your auditoriums. What we call growth, was once labeled proselytizing.
Churches spend thousands, millions, concocting consumer driven cultures, hiring staff to blindly implement them under the guise of loyalty, operating with political savvy, and brilliantly marketing their cultures in this frenetic rhythm of sheep calling.
The great commission was never intended to go into all the other churches, making disciples of your culture. This gospel that changed the world over two thousand years ago, is the same, and only gospel that should be championed on stages today. Any watering down of this message for the sake of amplifying your culture and marketing your brand is an afront to the work Jesus did on the cross. Jesus died for this gospel. His disciples paid the ultimate price for it, not for the coddled to be entertained, but for captives being set free.
We’ve excelled in migration, not transformation. Leaders have worshipped at the altar of Culture while giving the gospel an honorable mention under their logo. Here’s a harsh reality: We’re fixated on creating trend driven cultures tailored for the churched, while the unbeliever remains unaware or unimpressed with our assimilation strategies and LED panels. We celebrate our cultures and its creators, while the lost travel unhindered on the fast track to hell.
Culture often controls and manipulates the gospel to be molded into its brand. Churches can appear wildly successful with no transformation. We’ve placed them on pedestals, doting on their trending ability to suck other churches dry.
Here’s something revolutionary: Nothing will impact the culture of your church like new birth. You don’t need a book for that. You need the Holy Spirit and He’s enough.
