The Casual Christian

“On that day a great persecution broke out against the church at Jerusalem, and all except the Apostles were scattered throughout Judea and Samaria” (Acts 8:1–3).

 The Hartford Institute defines a mega-church as,

“ … a cluster of very large, Protestant congregations that share several distinctive characteristics:

·   2000 or more persons in attendance at weekly worship

·   Charismatic, authoritative senior minister

·   Very active seven-day a week congregational community

·   Multitude of social and outreach ministries

          ·   Complex differentiated organizational structure”

The Hartford Institute places the total number of mega-churches in the U.S. at over twelve hundred. Of these, some twenty-six percent are Baptist or Southern Baptist, thirty-four percent are nondenominational, and the rest are an assortment of Assemblies of God, United Methodist, Calvary Chapel, and other Christian denominations. Seventy five percent are located in the Bible belt where ther is already a very high concentration of churches.  Almost all of them are situated in a suburb of some busy metropolitan area. Most attenders are baby-boomers from the middle class with at least a college education, and most of them are disillusioned defectors from other churches. Folks are drawn to these massive churches by some variant of the message, “We do church better here.” In essence, this means “We put on a better worship performance.” The mega-church offers worship services that are more contemporary, messages that are more interesting, and opportunities for involvement that are more varied in response to demand from a clientele accustomed to a variety of entertainment options.

Mega-Church Characteristics

Like any large organization, mega-churches all have a powerful charismatic leader. They tend to be centralized, concentrating authority at the top. They are the General Motors of the religious world. The founders’ tenures average over fifteen years and there is great dependence on their personalities. These leaders preside over mega-staffs of up to 250 full-time employees.

Church services are highly choreographed and very professional. The caliber of music rivals anything you might hear at a concert venue. The drama compares with the local theatre or playhouse. “Given the congregation’s size, this service cannot be left to ‘the flow of the spirit,’ especially if there are multiple services on a Sunday morning …As a mega-church grows, worship becomes more professional and polished, but also more planned and structured.” The pastor of one mega-church had the following to say about the organizational structure of these mammoth churches, “These are not just churches; they are also corporations.” In fact, the pastors of many of these huge churches consider themselves CEOs.

To support the large number of program offerings, church leaders have built enormous staffs. The number of “directors” has proliferated. A quick check of church websites recently revealed one church that had a “Production Director,” “Director of Production,” “Sound Director,” and “Director of Missions and Prayer.” Not only is there obvious redundancy, but the titles reflect a trend towards ever increasing sophistication of organization and a tendency to direct things that really shouldn’t need directing, like prayer. This church has one hundred staff, forty-three of whom are support personnel! Lay people have no input in decision making in this particular church, so it is not surprising that the leadership has engaged in some pretty remarkable kingdom building.

Market Tested For Mass Appeal

Rick Warren, senior pastor of one of the largest mega-churches in America, wrote one of the best selling Christian titles of all time. It is called The Purpose Driven Life and has sold over 20 million copies and netted $400 million in sales.  If I could sum up the message of his book, I would say it is “realizing your full spiritual potential.” Like so many preachers today, Warren has emphasized the believer’s personal relationship with Christ over spiritual life in the community of believers. There is very little about the holiness of God, the demands of the faith, personal sacrifice, commitment to advancing God’s kingdom, or the hope of Christ’s return in his book.

Warren has openly admitted that there are issues he will not address such as abortion and homosexuality because they are divisive. He has removed the offense from the Scriptures thus broadening their appeal, but at the same time compromising the character of God’s Word. Jesus never compromised His message to avoid giving offense or to draw larger crowds. In fact, He sometimes deliberately discouraged people whose motives were wrong. In John 6, He drove many away with His assertion that He was the bread of life. It was Jesus who said, “But the gate is narrow and the way is difficult that leads to life, and there are few who find it” (Mt 7:14).

Mega-churches have converted their houses of worship to concert halls in an effort to attract members. Preachers are polished and poised, worship leaders have become professional emcees, dress is causal and even chic. The Bible text is brief, and the message is short on exposition and long on illustration. Painful or controversial topics such as abortion, homosexuality, hell and the return of Jesus Christ are avoided. Powerful sermons that denounce sin and call for repentance are rarely if ever heard.

The mega-church has been served up in a package that has been market tested to meet the tastes of a culture accustomed to around the clock entertainment. It lacks zeal for revival, remorse for sin, willingness to sacrifice for Christ and His kingdom, and the powerful prayer life that brings down the Holy Spirit in a flood of conviction, confession and commitment.

In his article entitled, "Abandoning Evangelicalism," Steve Rosentahl describes his experience with the Mega-church this way, "No one ever discipled me. No one ever recommended me for baptism..." When he finally did get baptized because he showed up at a baptism service and went forward, no one took him under their wing to explain what his new commitment meant. After being left to his own resources for months, he finally concluded, "I began to realize that I wasn't being fed, but was kind of a self-feeder who was on my own in this megachurch." When he stopped attending, no one even missed him.

Years later he took his family to a mega-church just for the experience. The preacher was promoting his latest book, the staff was hawking CDs in the back of the sactuary, and announcements were being played on a video screen. When he asked his kids what they thought, they said, "It sorta remeinded me of a movie theater," and "It was loud." Mr. Rosenthal goes on to say, "Later that evening our family discussed the trivialization of God that we witnessed there, the lack of depth, the absence of the sacraments, and the commercialization of worship. More importantly, we noticed an alarming chumminess with which these people approached God. Sin wasn't mentioned nor our need for a mediator. Rather, Jesus ...was there to help us get through life's difficulties and challenges." He refers to this attirude as "moralistic therapeutic deism."

Church Metaphors

The Bible uses several metaphors to describe the church. Among them are “Sheep,” “House of God,” “Body,” and “Bride of Christ.” These images were meant to guide our thinking about the church. Notably absent is the corporation. What could be more impersonal than a corporation? It conjures up a cold, calculated approach to business—no fond affection of a bride for her groom, no sense of mutual dependence of a body, and no unquestioning obedience of sheep. Yet because the mega-churches are so large, most of them have adopted the corporate model of management in the interests of efficiency. In the process, many have become just as impersonal as the corporations that dot our landscape.

 Unlike one mega-church pastor who could find no room for the flow of the Spirit in his church’s worship service, the Apostles allowed the Holy Spirit to flow freely. In Acts 2, the Bible says that the Apostles were all together in one place when the Holy Spirit came upon them like the sound of a howling wind. What were they doing at the time? The Bible says they were just together. They didn’t crank up their programs or actively do anything to draw the Holy Spirit down. He surprised them. Unstructured, unprogrammed time is essential for the Holy Spirit to work. We cannot assume we are doing His will if we do not regularly take time to be quiet in His presence.

In “Seven Paradoxes Regarding America’s Faith,” George Barna describes the modern church’s preoccupation with size and temporal success, “It’s worrisome when there is a strong correlation between church size and self-satisfaction, because that suggests that attendance and budget figures have become our mark of success. It’s troubling when our spiritual leaders cannot articulate where we’re headed and how the Church will fulfill its role as the restorative agent of our society. Maybe the comfort afforded by our buildings and other material possessions has seduced us into thinking we’re farther down the road than we really are."

Mega-churches attract people with their fabulous facilities and their polished, professional programs. They have bred a complacent, self-satisfied brand of Christian convinced of his spirituality by all the trappings of temporal success that surround him. To the amazement of His disciples, Jesus pronounced judgment on the rich whom they assumed had God’s blessing. Modern saints would no doubt find it hard to believe that God might not favor them despite all the riches He has seemingly showered upon them.

Why Many Christians are Leaving the Mega-church

Julia Duin, author of Quitting Church: Why the Faithful Are Fleeing and What to Do About It, says that the biggest reason people are leaving mega-churches is because they're not getting meaningful answers to their questions and are not connecting with a pastor. Further, if they don't show up, no one ever notices. Shane Rosenthal says the reasons include a "lack of transcendence, mystery, or beauty ...of seriousness and depth," and failure "to receive any shpeherding or discipleship with individual attention and care."*Of course, if members were engaging in mutual ministry, it would not be so important to connect with a pastor. After all, pastors cannot connect with everyone. Ministry should never be entrusted entirely to their care, anyway.

* Shane Rosenthal, "Abandoning Evangelicalism, Modern Reformation