A Conversation about The 2030 Church
I’m slipping back into agnosticism and I’m wondering about other agnostics. What journey are they on? Do they really question still, or have they made up their mind? I’ve mentioned Dennis Prager before and how he wonders why agnostics often live like atheists, which I still think is a good question. I’d like to propose one answer and a possible solution for that: Church, it’s becoming a barrier to believing.
When I say “the church,” I literally mean the Sunday morning building and worship I’ve attended for much of my adulthood. You know what I’m talking about: You wake up earlier than you want, you feed and dress the kids who’d rather sleep, you daydream in Sunday School, have the passing period conversations as you head to the sanctuary, do the handshaking and “glad to see you’s,” smile at the first welcome to church, listen to a bad Sunday morning joke, watch an introduction video, mouth the lyrics to worship songs (one might be contemporary and the other more old-timey), sit through the second welcome and agenda by someone different, “sing” another song, stay awake for the sermon, take communion, give your tithe, listen to an invitation, think about lunch during the conclusion, sit through one last song, and then shuffle off to lunch and small talk toward the car.
Your morning church trip could be an hour-long or even close to three hours! It could end early or closer to noon, depending on if you go to the traditional or contemporary service.
This kills me. It’s like an industrial version of church. The script was created decades ago when we all lived in a very different America. It’s a church dedicated to numbers and meeting budgets.
Yes, churches do try to change their approach. It might be with adding contemporary services and music, creating a coffee house vibe, allowing women to make announcements (never the sermon), or inviting families to functions for fellowship. There is nothing wrong with these approaches but rarely do they reignite a church. It’s still primarily a “sit-and-get” formality.
But I think it’s time, in a post-COVID world, to reimagine church whose mission is to teach the members to “do good,” over saving souls. It’s crafted to get the agnostic to live like a Christian, not an atheist. It might also be more Jesus-centered, than church/dogma-centered. Think of it as a service-learning model, not a place to feel emotionally connected to Jesus. That should become a byproduct of what the 2030 Church does try to accomplish.
The 2030 Church
Member Focused: The 2030 church is centered on families, not tradition. The building could be open 5–7 days a week to all the members. You come when you can. When someone comes in on a Tuesday afternoon, it looks more like a business or a school and no one feels like the building is going to collapse because they walked in.
Hybrid Function: This is a church and a business. This is how it earns money, not from tithes and offerings. The church could have a daycare, school, coffee shop, gym, or whatever it thinks the community needs and can make money. Money earned pays for the church employees and profits are invested in the community. The point is, the church’s existence relies on itself, not the members. This also means this church will pay taxes.
Grab and Go: I mentioned how most churches are “sit-and-get.” This church is “Grab and Go.” You come to the church to learn. You will be “spiritually fed,” by learning how to love God and your neighbor, and then doing something about it IN the community. Here how this is accomplished:
- Learning: most of the activities in the church revolve around learning. Most times and space are dedicated to either classroom time or small group time. Classes can be about the Bible, Christianity, or Jesus. But it also may be about the history of the community, lessons on gender, understanding movements like Black Lives Matter. Lessons that can deepen your understanding about the history of the church, faith, or the world around that your faith lives in. Teachers and other spiritual leaders will also need to be trained, educated, and certified. Small groups will operate as they do in most churches and are designed for building relationships with others.
- No Tithing: since the church is self-sufficient, members won’t be asked to tithe. Tithing (giving) goes back to the Old Testament and Abraham with Jesus talking about it in Matthew 23:23. But Matthew 25:40 says, “The King will reply, ‘Truly I tell you, whatever you did for one of the least of these brothers and sisters of mine, you did for me.” The 2030 Church wants people to give, but to give to people which honors God, not to the church. Donating money and time will be stressed. Non-Profits will be invited into the building, they can meet with people, and they can train members for service. So members will tithe, but to the causes they believe in, whether Christian focused or not, not this church.
Worship: this will also be different and look very familiar in the post-COVID world. There will not be weekly, Sunday services or sermons. Again, “Sunday School,” is done during the week when people can fit it into their schedules. Sermons will be a variety of podcasts and video content, all curated for a lifetime of use. Church pastors will create weekly content for members to listen to when they can. There will also be other recorded sermons that members can listen to when they want. This way, they can listen to the content they are interested in anytime, anywhere.
Each quarter, there will be what looks like a traditional Sunday sermon. But this will be more of a panel discussion. Members listen to speakers talk about current events, or “the will of God,” or just about any other subject. Speakers might include Imams, Rabbis, other denominations, Wiccans, or even atheists. Think more on the lines of a TED talk, than a sermon.
There will be a location in the church that holds communion. The Bible doesn’t say communion has to be Sunday mornings, so come and get communion when you want.
Rooms will be set aside for prayer. There will also be a counselor on duty for any help they can provide. You can also ask for prayers on the church website, so when church leadership meets, they will pray for your individual need.
The idea is to give people what they can’t do on their own as much as possible and work within people’s busy lives.
I don’t know if this qualifies as a “church.” But it doesn’t have to be that. Many people want a connection to Jesus without the baggage of church, church history, and Christian dogma. I think we can create a space that allows for people to find Jesus on their terms. Others may think that’s the soft, leftist, unbiblical approach to Jesus, but is the current model really working?
