"This is the church.
This is the steeple.
Open the doors,
and …
... where’s all the people?”
More than six months after churches began closing down for the duration – some at the request of state and local governments, some at their blunt insistence – many pastors are beginning to welcome their parishioners back to the pews. Not a few are finding, like the proverbial man with the cats, that it’s a lot easier letting laity out of the bag than getting them back into it.
In many states and cities, the coronavirus quickly separated those elected officials genuinely concerned with the public welfare from the petty tyrants bent on flexing their newfound authority. (The latter seem to derive some special, visceral pleasure from shutting down a church.) Both types were surprised to find a lot of pastors more than eager to accommodate their edicts. Indeed, some churches found their pastors much more willing to close up shop than the people were.
To be sure, a few pastors put up a fuss. Some were outright defiant, while others became harder-working and even a little creative: more services, more masks and spacing – and the drive-in church service was born.
But not a few members began to notice how quickly and amicably their pastors adapted to the ecclesiastical vacuum. Indeed, with all these long months to think about it, many began to realize that their pastors have been preparing for years to create just such a vacuum.
First, they phased out the visitation programs – no more “confrontational evangelism.” We could still send missionaries to the far side of the world … even into inhospitable places where the Gospel was unwanted and dangerous to speak. That’s “Great Commission” thinking. But encouraging our members to visit their own neighbors – or even return the call of those who’ve visited our churches – that’s a little too aggressive. Smacks of proselytizing.
Then the choirs went away. People lost interest in coming down on another night during the week for rehearsals. Why would young folks want to get lost in those anonymous robes when they can wear faded jeans and re-invent their garage band for Jesus?
Besides, choirs don’t lend themselves to choruses. And choruses trump hymns. True, it’s the hymns people know and can join in on, and the hymns that resonate with the deepest themes of Scripture, and the hymns that breathe across generations to unite hearts of all ages in song …
… but no one comes to church for any of that. Who needs a whole congregation singing, when God’s Garage Band is in the zone?
The older folks protested, but church, we learned, isn’t really for them, anyway. In fact, wouldn’t the senior adults be better off meeting over in the chapel, where they can sing their precious hymns and be led by whatever staff member draws the short straw this week? (They’ll still give their tithes, though, right?)
Come to think of it, pastors realized, a lot of people were crowding those Sunday morning auditoriums who didn’t really need to be there. Shouldn’t the youth have their own services, where they can rock out to some really righteous tunes, hear a thin two-minute devotional, then mingle and play games ‘til the grown-ups get through?
Shouldn’t the children be somewhere else, doing something more befitting their own size and attention-span? Should parents really be having to keep their kids in line, teach them to worship, make this a family thing, for crying out loud? Can’t someone else model Christ for these youngsters? Can’t Mom and Dad catch a break, even at church?
How could we ever expect to become one in sweet fellowship before the throne of God, if we all have to be in the same room together?
Which brought up another point for the pastors: how long do we have to keep doing Bible study? Bible study means teachers, and teachers means people having to commit to be on hand, at the same time and place, virtually every Sunday. Who are we to require such devotion? To ask people to minister God’s love, week-in and week-out, to crying babies, squirming little ones, bored young people, opinionated seniors?
Small groups! That’s it! Now people don’t have to be at church all morning, or come into a room with anyone they don’t want to see. Pastors don’t have to do so much ministering (small groups really should take care of their own), and the church doesn’t have to pay the light bills. And the preacher can stay home.
While we’re at it, why should the pastor have to do more than preach? Must he really preside at the low-profile weddings, the nobodies’ funerals? Does he have time to be crisscrossing the city, navigating hospital parking lots, just because another old timer’s having knee replacements, or another young mother’s got cancer?
Don’t we have other ministers who can take care of that sort of thing?
Now that we think about it, why does a pastor have to preach so many times a week? We’re going to ask parents to drive down all over again on Sunday evenings? Couldn’t that be … oh, maybe, family time … where we all stay home and worship and fellowship together by going to our separate rooms to watch our separate Netflix programs?
Wednesday nights? Seriously? That’s soccer. That’s dance class. That’s late night at the office. How do we expect our members to share Christ in their community if we keep making them trot down here for a fellowship meal and mid-week prayer service? Sunday morning offers plenty of spiritual renewal for one week. It’s time our children learned that.
Plus: if you have Sunday or midweek evening services, you’re just opening the door for business meetings. Nosy people asking busy-body questions that aren't any of their business. The pastors are the ones with the vision. Why can’t the members just shut up and do as they’re told?
Oh, did that sound like a power trip? Fine. We’ll elect elders. Then they can be the ones to tell everyone to just do like the pastor said. The important thing is that the people up front listen to as few of their fellow brothers and sisters as possible. We’re here to lead, not serve.
And you can’t lead people if you keep taking them so seriously.
So, bit by bit, it all went away. Just the way the pastors wanted it to.
They don’t need us to share Christ, to study the Bible, to sing praises together. We don’t have time for the church picnics or the potlucks anymore. We’re just too different to all be in the same room together … just too cool to be caught singing something written before 2010 … just too busy to commit ourselves to the hard work of ministering to our brothers and sisters in Christ.
Ministering, it turns out, takes a lot of time and effort.
So does love.
And so, we’ve been learning, does getting up and getting dressed and getting masked to go down and sit six feet away from a lot of people we don’t really know, who really don’t much care whether we show up or not.
It’s not like the pastors will be disappointed. They learned their lesson a long time ago.
Church can be a wonderful place … if you just get rid of all those people.
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