Taking Back the Lord's Day

"On the first day of the week we came together to break bread."

(Acts 20:7a)

There was a time when the local church was the most important organization in most towns and villages in the U.S. The church steeple was likely the tallest man-made structure in these towns. The church bell was the loudest man-made object. The pastor or priest was considered every bit as important as the town physician or political leader. And the church was a preeminent center of community life, especially on Sunday.

I suppose things began to change during the course of the Twentieth Century in these quaint towns. The radio tower became the tallest man-made structure. The work bell became the loudest object in mill communities which dotted the country in those days. The pastor or priest took on a more professional role with most of his time spent in his study in the church buildings and posted office hours for congregants to follow. And the church slowly forfeited its role as the preeminent center of community life, even on Sunday.

The little kid on the block.

Old folks liked to call the first day of the week "The Lord's Day." This isn't some Victorian-era expression of religiosity; this is how the New Testament describes the first day of the week on the other side of the resurrection of Jesus. The earliest Christians were so deeply impacted by the resurrection of Christ that they arranged their weekly calendars by it. Saturday was at one time man's day of rest, but now Sunday would be the Lord's Day of worship and honor. The Sabbath rest provided by the Lord's redemptive work was meant to be enjoyed every day of the week, but Sunday held a special place of privilege as the day set aside primarily for the Lord himself.

Needless to say, these days are long gone. We are now 24/7 people. We expect our favorite TV shows to air when we want them to air. The 9-5 workday is an endangered species, as is the traditional M-F workweek. Sundays in the warmest seasons are quite easily the first or second busiest day at golf courses and lakes, even those virtually surrounded by the sound of church bells. Retailers would sink without Sunday business (though Chick-fil-A seems to be doing ok without it).

And, as with so many other contemporary examples, the church - once the center of community life - is being urged to play by the culture's redefined rules. In a recent blog post, LifeWay CEO Thom Rainer tackled the issue of declining church attendance by arguing, among other things, that churches should "offer more options for worship times." His example was of a friend who told him that he had changed churches because his old church didn't have a corporate worship time to accommodate his business travels. 

Understand, I'm cool with multiple service times. I'd be ok with the New Testament model, which goes way beyond "pick a time, any time." But most churches of our tradition already hold a mid-week service which (in theory) promotes corporate prayer and Bible study. If Thom Rainer's inclination was correct, we wouldn't be seeing the mass exodus that we are on Wednesday nights. And yet most Baptist churches I know of are struggling to maintain a mid-week prayer service amid multiple other mid-week programs in the local church (AWANA/RAs/GAs/CiAs/children's choir/student ministries/etc.) AND the schedules of many of our regular Sunday attendees who simply can't commit to things which fall on a weeknight or during their child's athletic season. Simply put, Sunday morning still remains the best day and time to hold corporate worship in smaller to medium-sized churches.

Perhaps we need more men in more pulpits preaching the truth of the Lord's Day. Perhaps we need more of our Sunday school teachers teaching about the life-altering results of the resurrection, and how that should even impact our culturally-driven schedules. We should promote renewed minds over culturally-conformed schedules. We should remember that Sunday is the day we peek behind the screen into heaven, when we get a weekly foretaste of glory divine. That is far too important for us to compromise away.

Yes, there appears to be little we can do about work schedules, particularly while we believers engage in Sunday trade just like the rest of the world does. In this economy where retail is king, many of our congregants have employment requirements on Sunday. But this fact alone should not deter us from hope and practice. I'm looking specifically at you, Dad and Mom...and I'm looking at you, Mr. Irregular. The more we can reflect the resurrection, the better.

Kids These Days?

Yesterday evening as I commuted home from the study, my radio dial found itself parked on the local sports talk station. Now, I admit that this is potentially dangerous activity, but I tend to flip it over there once in a while through the college football season because there are some tasty morsels among the voluminous tripe of sports talk radio.

My listening began after the host's tirade had already reached the next gear, and I had no idea what the overall context of his ramblings was. All I knew was that the NCAA had treated the Kid poorly. He said it over and over again, emphasizing the victimizer (the NCAA) and the victim (the Kid). Just before I turned the thing off, I discovered that the monologue was about the case of Steven Rhodes, a former Marine who had planned to walk on at Middle Tennessee State University...that is, before the NCAA intervened to inform him that his prior participation in a military recreation football league would render him ineligible from competition for one year. (His ineligibility, incidentally, was more akin to a mandatory redshirt than actual ineligibility, meaning that Rhodes would still have four full years of eligibility after sitting out this season.)

Steven Rhodes: A Man

Pronouncing a Marine ineligible for playing rag-tag football while serving his country? Sounds like tirade material! And, truthfully, the NCAA was wrong...again...by following the letter rather than the spirit of their bylaws. But I was most struck by the host's ongoing description of Steven Rhodes: the Kid.

The Kid is a 24 year old man. He was man enough to serve in our nation's military as one of the few and the proud. He is apparently man enough to walk on and play Div. 1 college football. Until the media intervened, he would have also been man enough to deal with a redshirt year (I get the feeling this is the kind of man who could have handled going to college while awaiting another opportunity to walk on next year). Point being, he's not a kid.

This is more than splitting hairs over terminology; this is another small indicator of a major cultural imbalance: arrested adolescence. As younger adults struggle with their entrance into maturity, older adults are characterizing them more and more as kids. Still living at Mom and Dad's? Must be a kid. Can't figure out what to major in after three years of college courses? Must be a kid. More of a gamer than worker? Well, you get the point.

Another thing I've noticed is that it is almost always younger men who are given this designation. Younger women are sometimes referred to as "girls" by their close acquaintances or those who are quite elderly, but rarely are younger women called "kids." Maybe this is because younger women are less likely to act like kids. Yes, they too are prone to their own kinds of fits of self-aggrandizing immaturity in the YOLO culture, but our society - for perhaps the first time in Western history - expects far more from our younger women than we do their male counterparts. Younger men are expected to fail...expected to bumble through college or get somebody pregnant or fail to launch. Hollywood has taught us this with any movie starring any member of the Frat Pack, right?

We need men these days. I don't mean Skoal-spittin', honky-tonkin', truck-drivin', camo-wearin' dudes; I'm talking about wife-lovin', child-raisin', God-honorin' men. No more gamers. No more kids who can shave. No more guys with their dreams of fantasy football greatness. We need men who understand their role in the Kingdom of God. We need men who have been shaped in part by childhood, but like the Apostle, have left the childish things in the past. We need men who are so acquainted with the mercy and grace of the Lord that they aren't willing to waste the best years of their lives on themselves. We know where the kids are -- where are the men these days?

When We Missed the Writing on the Wall

Church van with characteristic minor fender damage

Since the Rachel Held Evans piece in CNN's Belief Blog last month, there has been a sudden sense of urgency in the church-related blogosphere to add new hands to the joint wringing session. Young adults have left the church and most likely aren't coming back. Blame is being assigned to everything from weak discipleship programs to the unintended consequences of 'cool' youth groups. There are plenty of mourners who are pointing out the problems and tacking on a few tepid (and typically unbiblical) solutions, but I would argue that statistics involving young adults and the local church are similar to other discouraging stats involving Millennials, including things like frighteningly high unemployment rates and general unhappiness with life. These trends are interrelated. We are the most entitled (some might argue spoiled) generation in history, yet we are also deeply unhappy, as best seen in our suicide rates which far eclipse all other forms of injury-related death among young adults today.

I've always wondered when reading these kinds of articles: why aren't the parents on the hook? We blame everything from social media to discipleship for our struggles, but those who were called by God to raise this generation seem to get a pass. We know that the Scriptures are quite clear that parents (most notably fathers) are designed by God to lead their families in areas of spiritual and physical well-being. When this began to falter, that's when the church (as well as the other quantifiable aspects of our society) began its rapid descent. So I don't blame 'cool' worship services nearly as much as I blame 'cool' parents who let their little children decide whether or not they would go to church. To borrow from C.S. Lewis, spiritual malnourishment is often like pride: those who suffer from it are usually the last ones to know. Parents should have been caring for their kids in ways the church never could.

Case in point: we should have seen the writing on the wall a generation ago when van ministries started sweeping the church as a crucial form of children and youth outreach. Every child we picked up was one more child that had to make the very adult decision of whether or not to go to church. It should be no surprise that the vast majority - not all, but most - of those kids have left the church. Van ministries are good and beneficial to the church, but they could never have been an authentic replacement for godly parenting.

That is now the past. We should focus on winning these young adults back as they are waffling through life. Millennials crave love and stability and, I believe, a sense of life discipline. Further, Ms. Held Evans is wrong: Millennials need to listen more than they opine. This is a weakness for the generation, but someone has to tell us to get over it...might as well be the loving Body of Christ. 

Yes, there will be difficulty in integrating new forms of community (e.g., the virtual world) into the traditional congregational experience, but this shouldn't compromise our essential doctrine or core beliefs. We should also focus on ensuring that the remnant Millennials who are true to the Bride make their homes a sanctuary of Christ. The home is where it begins and ends, not the youth room, not even the church sanctuary. Young families don't have to reinvent the wheel. We just have to carefully (but quickly!) rebuild the walls torn down by neglect and outside attack.

Book Review: Why Revival Tarries

Why Revival Tarries
Leonard Ravenhill
$9.99 @ CBD


What can be said about this little classic that hasn't already been said? Ravenhill was the Jeremiah of the Twentieth Century American evangelical church, calling on leaders to reject the allure of modern excess while embracing the scandal of the cross. For this reason alone, Why Revival Tarries is every bit as offensive as it is beneficial, like an overweight person visiting with a personal trainer. There is no target too sacred: itinerant evangelists, theologians, and ordinary pastors are all called to account.

The book definitely has a dated feel to it: a mention of expensive $3 steaks and the recurrent theme of the twin evils of television and Communism help us place it chronologically (first published in 1958). There are some matters that Ravenhill examines which seem almost foreign today, such as the following: "We may have an all-time high in church attendance with a corresponding all-time low in spirituality."

Yet even in reading such a dated sentence, I'm reminded of the real value of this book. Like any true prophet, Ravenhill's warnings are realized today because his message has gone unheeded. The things Ravenhill strongly speaks against characterized the evangelical church in America during the years of economic Cold War prosperity: revival evangelists became wealthy on the foundation of souls saved, pastors built their nest eggs as the spiritual fervor of their congregations declined, and education of the mind continued to replace (rather than complement) the experience of the spirit. Two generations removed from Ravenhill's strong words, where have we landed? You can answer that.

Yes, the book has its theological blind spots (Calvinists will particularly struggle with some parts of the book). Ravenhill also has a confrontational edge to him which will be difficult for many to get past. But what else should we expect from the Jeremiah of the Twentieth Century? The truth is still the truth, and Leonard Ravenhill is a man of the truth.

What Millennials Really Want

      There's been a lot of chatter lately about my generation. 1 out of 3 of us who are over 25 are still living with our parents. Over 50% who have a college education can't find work in our fields of study. We apparently have a strong distaste for convention, but a strong desire to be individualistic. We are Millennials, what will likely be remembered through history as the Forgotten Generation. So, at the risk of painting with a really broad brush, what do Millennials really want? Crack this code and you might be the next Steve Jobs.

-        Unlimited entertainment which is highly personalized (thorough, usually free access to all the songs/movies/programs/books which the individual desires)

-        Educational advancement primarily for the sake of being educated, frequently with no vocation/career-oriented goal in mind. Best if the cost of education is able to be indefinitely deferred or eliminated

-        To be religious, but not preachy

-        Active social justice involvement which costs little besides a small financial burden, typically with an immediate benefit connected to the act of altruism (Things like wine tasting for refugees or TOMS or donating $10 to the Red Cross via text during a crisis concert)

-        Instantaneous communication with others in an easily manipulated virtual world

-        To think church attendance could be beneficial, but not if the church makes them uncomfortable through exclusivistic doctrine, old fashioned biblical interpretation, time requirements, social commitments, or the threat that some kind of lifestyle change might be requested 

-        To be missionaries of non-judgmentalism to those they judge to be too judgmental

-        Forgiveness without change, license which presents itself as love, and the right to blame others without the balance of potential culpability

-        A furnished room at mom and dad’s house, just in case things don’t go according to the plans they haven’t made