COVID has caused all of us to pause and reflect on priorities. Whether we're involved in education, in business, in church, in the professions—it's been a time to 're-imagine' how we do things.
Sunday worship, for one, has taken a big hit. We're more inclined to 'attend' worship online or to check out worship services where our kids and grandkids attend—often half way around the world.
How different would my church look if its primary orientation was not Sunday, if every aspect of the church including the sermon, the worship, and the building were intentionally focused on the Monday to Friday lives of God's people? Why doesn't every church look like this?
Through the lens of COVID, what does it mean to equip the saints?
Comments
The image on this post is an absolute desecration of the cross. Instead of looking at the church through the 'lens of COVID', we should be looking at COVID through the lens of the sovereignty and lordship of Jesus Christ. Putting a mask on the cross is absolutely disgraceful; I'm shocked that any editor would allow this to be posted.
Thank you, Bethany, for this comment. You are spot on in your assessment and the image has been swapped. The implications that you cited were not the intent of the photo chosen but it's easy to see how it looked that way. Thanks again for pointing this out.
I agree, Bethany. I wrote the piece; I didn't choose the artwork ... but it is in bad taste.
I have been engaged in a number of wonderful, creative discussions over the past two weeks on the 'nature of church' as we emerge from COVID.
What will the church look like organizationally. We have all done things over the past year that we didn’t imagine we could do: virtual services, virtual small group meetings, virtual offerings.
We are being forced to confront our ecclesiology. We have devoted most of the past year 'attending' worship services online. It's frankly been kinda comfortable, worshipping from the couch. My hunch is that church attendance will be way down once we return to full membership participation in a service. Can you be a fully devoted follower of Christ without physically attending a church service?
I know of churches -- admittedly larger ones -- hiring Worship Experience Directors, overseeing the 'delivery' of worship services in physical buildings on Sundays as well as overseeing a plethora of services online, reaching 10s of thousands of people globally.
Then there is a church that has recently hired an Online Pastor, not only delivering the weekly sermon but also overseeing online marriage courses, Alpha, and a 24-hour prayer line with dozens of volunteers.
A church that had planned to launch their fifth church campus a year ago, recently declared that their new Online Church was their fifth campus, reaching many thousands more than they had dared to dream with a physical building in a geographic location.
Any church that is counting on returning to the status quo is either dreaming or it is content to focus internally, preparing for a numeric death.
How do we do mission trips? What does a multi-site church look like?
Let's Discuss
We love your comments! Thank you for helping us uphold the Community Guidelines to make this an encouraging and respectful community for everyone.