Church Service a la Carte

Yesterday Dani sent me a link to all the different worship services at Saddleback church (Rick Warren's church in California). Here it is: http://www.saddlebackfamily.com/home/todaystory.asp?id=5700

church service a la carte she called it. Whatever church service to fit your mood, style and demographic (My moods change so frequently that I'd probably go to a different one each week). I'm certainly curious about the Luau themed service.

On the one hand, I love the spirit of the church striving to meet people where they are at. It shows how multi-faceted a church can be, and you can imagine the gifts and talents being used to serve the Lord here. In some ways, it must be quite beautiful. But I also feel this misses something. Before I go on, let me say that I don't want to join the ranks of the anti-_____ church crusaders. I've met people who were very much anti-mega church or anti-traditional church or anti-charismatic church or anti-large church or anti-big church or anti-country church or anti-seeker friendly church. If the good folks at Saddleback Church are serving the Lord with their whole hearts, I applaud them, just as I applaud the smaller, more traditional church I am attending. It's the following of Jesus that counts.

What I would miss at a church like this is the to serve the Lord with all sorts of different people. There's something very beautiful when all the demographics come together in the name of the Lord Jesus. It's also inconvenient. It means that some of us have to deal with styles of worship we don't like, people who make us feel less comfortable, differing political persuasions and skin colors. Church may not always be convenient to my specific emotional or stylistic needs. Yet in these disciplines, rituals, creeds, songs, sermons and sacraments, even on days when I want to move on to Sunday lunch, I develop a discipline that makes me a better person. It helps me, later on that week, to bear with less convenient people. Sometimes the church is God's sneaky tool to help me love others.

Of course, I'm not advocating choosing a church as a masacist would. Even as I write this, I reflect that my own church is meeting my specific needs, and for that matter, the majority of people fit my own demographic (young DC professionals who enjoy foreign beer). It's just that the habit of changing church services every time I change moods is not something I wish to promote in myself.