Church and Competition

My post the other day comparing the competitive market of U.S. sports and the current situation of the Church drew a number of helpful responses. But also some misunderstanding. My fault, I think, as words like “competition” can be highly charged among church folk. So I thought I would clarify just what I meant a bit and invite a continued conversation. Let me start, though, by saying what I didn’t mean.

I don’t mean that congregations should try to compete with sports…or theater or television or whatever. I’m not calling for entertainment evangelism or employing flashy gimmicks of any kind. In fact, I was not inviting congregations to imagine that their role is to compete with all the other possibilities for our people’s attention at all.

Rather, I was simply suggesting that whereas a generation or two ago, going to church on Sunday mornings was the preferred, if not assumed, activity among large segments of the U.S. population, that is simply no longer the case. There is no great cultural incentive or expectation about attending church on Sunday morning, stores no longer remain closed until late in the day, and all kinds of other activities – including, notably, youth sports – are now part of our weekend reality.

Which means – and this was really my singular, if meager, point – we can’t just assume people will come. We can’t even assume they know why anyone should go to church, let alone why they should. We need, that is, to recognize that there are a lot of options in the very busy lives of twenty-first century people for how they will spend their time, try to make meaning, and establish their identity. Church is simply no longer an assumption.

Which leads me to think that, far from trying to become more like sporting events or other activities competing for the attention of our people, we need to emphasize what is distinct and valuable about congregation life and – and here’s the key – make it as easy as possible for people to enter our communities and discover the peculiar and distinctive treasure we have to offer:
the good news that in Jesus God pronounces each one of us blessed and beloved children of God deserving of dignity and respect;
that our worth isn’t established by what we’ve accumulated, achieved, or done – or, negatively, by what has been done to us – but by God’s gracious regard alone; and
that we each have gifts that God wants to use to care for the health of this world God loves so much.

But rather than think creatively about how to lift up this message and market it – yes, I’ll use that word – in a world where so many different options compete for the time and attention of our people, we continue to do things pretty much the way we always have. In this vein, I found this video interesting…and fun…along just these lines.

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