In Search of the "Americanized" Worship Service

If we planted a church in Denmark, we'd hold the services in Danish (Denmarkese?).  The sermons illustrations might include Danish cultural references instead of American ones (although my Danish friend tells me that all they watch are American TV shows).  In other words, we would contextualize the Gospel message for them - although we would never change it.

Oddly, the only culture we seem unwilling to contextualize for is our own.  I have read many church leaders complaining that Americans lack the attentional span of Christians just a generation ago.  Officially, Americans' average attention span is now shorter than a goldfish's.  Americans today demand flashy production qualities and a fast-paced service.  They would never sit for a 90 minute service.

If we know all that, why don't we give it to them?

Is there anything super-spiritual about a long, boring worship service?  Do we have to teach people to follow Jesus and sit politely through a painful liturgy? 

As a new church, we are able to experiment with some new solutions to the question of how to contextualize our services to reach the new American.

(What we can't do is topical sermons.  I can only preach from a Scripture text.  Not to be fussy or anything.)

First, we tried to do what every church plant does:  We used flashy lights and dressed-down attire to be cool.  No dice.  I'm just not that cool.

God brought us a lot of empty-nesters, divorcees, seniors and a couple of young families.   So we stopped trying to be cool.  I was tired of dressing like a teenager anyway, and the lights were a lot of work to set up every Sunday.  Looking back, I wasn't actually hip at 23, so I'm not fooling anyone trying to be hip at 43.  The church has grown much more quickly since I returned to being myself.

(Not that being someone you're not isn't biblical.  Read 1 Corinthians 9:19-23.)

Twice we've tried something else:  We have music throughout our service, interspersed with short messages and an even shorter video.

The standard American liturgy is 3 to 5 songs followed by a 30 to 45 minute sermon.  This doesn't match American television cycles.  Small packets might work better.  Less is more.

The first time we tried our "Americanized" format, we had too much going on.  We had 4 mini-messages, plus communion and a video, all packed into one service.  There were songs between each element.  It was too much standing up and sitting down, and it wasn't smooth.

Last Sunday, we tried again.  We opened the service with 2 songs, then had 3 short messages from 2 different speakers with a song between each one.  We then closed with a song.  There was no video and no communion (because we do communion just once a month).

The service was tight, smooth and impactful, I thought.  It helped that our worship team was absolutely killing it.  I haven't gotten a lot of feedback yet, but we're going to keep innovating.

So if you're a church planter, be open to shaking up the ancient singing-preaching-done format.

It's Not My Ministry

If you're planting a church, you know that one of the things that is so hard about church planting is dealing with the disappointment when someone leaves.  Maybe that's why so many church planters had a background in sales before they entered the ministry.  They're used to setbacks.

I don't know if I can say I have a secret to dealing with it.  Fortunately, we've had more people coming than going, but I wish no one would leave.  Honestly, I never expected turnover before we got started.

We pour ourselves into every person who walks through our doors.  I consider every one of them a personal friend.  It never ceases to amaze me how many of them will really open up to Cana and me, enabling us to share their pain and help them in their walk.  We get unimaginably close to a lot of people.  So when anyone decides to leave to go to another church, it hurts.  And yes, it's personal.

I know some really good preachers who aren't easy to get close to.  I've heard someone say about such men, "They like crowds but they don't like people."  I think it's more likely that they've simply been hurt and they've let the pain of friends leaving make them slow to form new relationships. 

I was talking to God recently in my self-pity, asking Him how we could keep from letting our constant stream of setbacks keep us from drawing in.  Lacking any tenderness or gall, He answered, "It's not your ministry."  Such wise words, and just what I needed to hear and understand.

I don't get to decide who comes and who goes, or how long they stay.  This church is where God put me, for as long as He put me here, to serve whoever He wants me to serve.   God gives and God takes away.  It's not about me.  It's not personal.

So we will continue to pour ourselves into whoever comes, and trust in the One who will never leave.

Video Blogging for Church Planters

Video blogging is a lot more work than I thought!

I am not just a first-time church planter.  I am also a first-time senior pastor.  Most church plants fail, and so do most first-time senior pastors.  I don't want to mess this up, so I try to be very intentional about everything I do.

The most important thing to me is maintaining spiritual discipline.  I know that if I don't stay in the Word every single day, I will rot, both spiritually and professionally.  I don't want my church to fail because I'm too lazy to stay attached at the hip to the Holy Spirit.

What better way to immerse myself in Scripture, I thought, than to commit myself to writing a daily devotional?

The first few weeks went well.  It was like having to pray through and research an entire sermon every day.  Very cool.  I close my eyes every night and Scripture pours through my mind.

Then I thought, 'Wouldn't more people see it if it was a video instead of just a written blog?'  On my best day, 43 people read 82 of my posts.  Most days are a fraction of that. Video would have to be better.  My top video has 2,661 views in 2 months. Who wants to read when they can watch?

How hard could it be simply film myself delivering my blogs instead of just typing them?

It turns out that writing, taping, editing and posting a video blog is about 100 times harder than just writing one.  What you'll see below is my very first daily "vlog."  It's not perfect, but it's better than my first version - that one was pitiful.  The serious problem is that it took me two whole days to get to where I'm at.  I'll have to speed up this process or it won't be a daily vlog. 

So here it vlog #2, which I thought was the best in the series:


Philippians 1 27 part 2 of 3 from Rob Selfors on Vimeo.


I'd love some tips for handling the inevitable breaks more smoothly, plus whatever else your video blogging has taught you.