Churches Big and Small and Mediocre

My favorite writing about church matters is Keith Drury's "Tuesday Column." I always look forward to what he has to say. He tackles all kinds of topics and inevitably imparts a fresh spin.

Today I read his latest, "In Praise of Mediocrity." He writes, "Mediocrity is the average, the median, the ordinary churches, music, talent, and intelligence. In short I want to say a word of praise for you, and me, and most ordinary people like us." He then praises ordinary churches, ordinary marriages, and people with "ordinary" spiritual passion. It's really great stuff.

About churches, he writes:

I think ordinary churches deserve more praise. I’m talking about churches in the big fat center who don’t have thousands of attendees and sprawling TV ministries. They aren’t famous and nobody ever asks their pastor to teach “How I Did It” seminars. But the pastor and people show up every week and worship and study and serve each other and love their community. Good for you!  I wish more of my students wanted to go to ordinary churches.

After nearly 30 years working for my denomination and being around churchmen from the broader Christian community, I've seen up-close the disdain directed at small churches, especially the little white church on a country road that has never had more than 80 people. Many times over the years, I've heard sentiments like this: "We need to just close a bunch of our little going-nowhere churches and cut our losses." Yes, I've heard that many times over the years.

I disagree with that view (and, I'm afraid, I'm typecast as an apologist for mediocrity). Churches go through ups and downs. I've seen superstar churches crash and burn, tiny churches come alive under the right leadership, and all manner of churches enter a period of funk. But usually, there's still a community of believers and a foothold in that neighborhood, and God still does things there, regardless of how we in Mecca view them. Today's superstar church might be tomorrow's goat, and vice versa. You can't write off (or deify) a church based on what you see today, because God's purposes tend to take a long view.

Not that every church should survive or be kept on life support; some are so dysfunctional that they should be closed, because they only bring disgrace to the cross of Christ. But if there is a community of believers, regardless of size, I see God in their midst and think they deserve some respect. But in a culture that worships the megachurch, I'm in the minority on that.

Posted on January 8, 2007 11:33 AM|

Comments

I agree, Steve. Scoot over. We need some more room on the minority bench.

As the guy, literally from the little white church on a country road that has never had more than 80 people (Were you thinking of me when you wrote that?!), I've felt some disdain from time to time. Yet I realize that it is coming from someone who seeks to judge a congregation without even setting foot in the building. And I pity that person.

Yet I see the same stupid attitude from people in the small church, talking about the large churches which tend to all look the same to us, and I see the same disdain in reverse.

I believe too many people think "church" can only be done one way -- "MY WAY" -- and those who do otherwise are either just a waste of electricity or they're just showing off.

Maybe if we all just worked on becoming disciples, making disciples and bringing glory to God, no matter what we look like doing it, we'd make a whole lot more sense.

Posted by: rev-ed | January 12, 2007 08:30 PM

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