They Don't Care

Lately I have been thinking about the content of the worship services for our new church plant in the Seattle area. I am reminded of all of the books, seminars, and sermons that have addressed the topic of church worship. There are a multitude of opinions on how a worship service should look or feel. Many ideas are directed towards attracting non-Christians to our services. The thought process goes something like this. If we make our church service “cool” and relevant then people will be more likely to come to church. In addition, the reason more people are not coming to our church is because we are not relevant or trendy enough.
However, there is a huge problem with this line of thinking. Most non-Christians don’t care what we do on a Sunday morning. Very few non-Christians wake up on a Sunday and think, “I would go to the church down the street today if they were simply more trendy in their worship and preaching.” So for us to spend so much time and trying to make our worship services more attractive to a person that does not know Christ is silly.

I am not saying that we should not try to be relevant in the way we present the gospel. Nor am I saying that we should not seek to worship God with excellence. I am very passionate about both of these things. However, as I plan a worship service m first priority is to build up the saints for ministry (Ephesians 4). Furthermore, I believe that a room or building full of believers who are truly worshipping Jesus is very “attractive” to a non-Christian. See 1 Corinthians 14:24-25.

The key to growing a body of believers is not in how we do worship. It is how we train believers to share their faith. If we disciple people to be missionaries to their families, friends, and co-workers church growth will automatically take place. We can then make worship about challenging and encouraging people in their walk with Christ. And hopefully many worship services will be able to regain the depth and substance they are lacking.