Finding a Church

A common criticism of the post-modern ethos goes something like this: “Young people today are unwilling to commit to formal structures and engagements, such as church membership.” And this year, I’ve come to realise I’m one of them.

Not that I’ve stopped believing in church membership. I’m still a member of the Seventh-day Adventist Church, and I’ll probably stay that for at least some years ahead. I’m referring to local church here. Upon moving to the Copenhagen area, we knew that it would be a challenge to decide for or against joining a specific church, but we were not anticipating that we should still be in the void after 7 months.

This may be a negative result of being involved in church planting. For all its faults, Aarhus Café Church was my church – literally, since I was part of it from even before the start. When you join something existing, you have to accept it as it is, living with inconsistencies and imbalances. So how do you find a church family to belong to? Some of our criteria are: we want to be able to make a difference; we are looking for a church that has a clear mission and vision; we want a church that is going somewhere and which has potential.

If we limit the search to Seventh-day Adventist Churches, there are at least 5 within reasonable distance, but our considerations have mainly focused on two of these. There’s the one in which we were married; a large, traditional church which is pleasant but has a built-in inertia that, despite honest efforts, seems difficult to shed. And there’s the one which we attend most regularly; a newer church with lots of young people and a bigger potential, but which seems to be treading water at the moment, lacking the drive and vision of earlier years.

Then there is the radical option: start something new. We had talked about this even before leaving Aarhus, but know from that experience that church planting is a huge undertaking and needs a big commitment. Furthermore, partners are needed for such ventures – we would need to build a vision together with other people, expanding the thoughts we already harbour with the input of others willing to join such a project.

So what path should we take? That has yet to be decided. And while thorough thinking is a blessing, indecision can be a bane. Somehow, somewhere, something needs to happen.

In Real Life

This is a blog post. You read it in “cyberspace”. You may respond, you may not. Either way, it stays online. Unless you choose to hit Print – which is not recommended, for environmental reasons. Does the digital character of this interaction make it less “real” than if you were taking a walk in the park with me? Apparently, many people would think so.

Again and again you hear the thought voiced that meetings online, friendships in social networks, and digitally mediated discussions are just a shadow of the “real world”. Even the common expression IRL (In Real Life), builds on this assumption. Digital media can be good, but they can never replace the “real thing”.

Now I do believe there is a “real thing”, but I don’t believe that the digital world, the Internet, is fake, and but a poor replication of the world as it should be. But here’s the thing: all communication is mediated. Whether it is language, body language, telephone, email, or social networks, there is always something “in between” two minds interacting. Communication is indeed possible, but always mediated.

People are networking through social media. It’s not a game. This is real life. If you’re like me, most of your interactions take place online, and they’re not less real for this fact.

I post this during an Internet Evangelism seminar in England, focusing exactly on helping people to interact with their (digital) network and share the gospel with their friends in non-obtrusive, digitally mediated ways. There is potential in this, but apparently some mind-sets differ here.

Now What?

Sitting in a nice but hot office in the sun with no air-con, I realise it’s been three months since we returned to Denmark. Spring has turned to summer, much has fallen into place, and my life is arguably as stable as never before.

Just a few weeks ago, the combined efforts of ourselves and family and friends resulted in the perfect wedding day. We’re settling into our first house together, and the future looks fairly bright.

Planning the wedding has been an almost year-long endeavour, surpassed only in scale by writing my MA thesis last year. So after pulling off two such projects, what is going to be the next one? Where do I focus my energy from now on? There are several possible answers.

Obviously, building a good home and marriage needs energy and devotion. On the horizon looms writing that first book, but probably not in the very near future. My best guess is that any big projects will be within the scope of my (still) new job.

Also three months now I have been working for the Seventh-day Adventist Church in Denmark, in a newly created position of “concept developer and information officer”. This entails many interesting projects, but also hatching and nurturing a grander strategy for the church’s media work here. Strategy work takes time though, and over the next months I hope to be able to think creatively and listen to the needs and opportunities in, especially, new media. I look forward to this challenge.

Where does that leave this blog? It is evident that it has grown a bit stale recently. Is it worthwhile to resurrect it in its current state? Is a refocus necessary? Is it best to shut it down altogether and launch something more focused, perhaps in Danish? Or has the time of blogging come and gone already? If so, then I should move on to other ventures.

Whatever the outcome, I think that my online presence – especially within the fields of church, communication and media – should grow, not diminish. Finding the right outlet(s) to join the discussion should be a focus in the time to come. Stay tuned.

Speaking in Tongues

Despite the title, I’m not about to embark on a thorough account of the different theologies of spiritual gifts. I do not deny a more supernatural meaning, but I also believe that a spiritual gift can be when God chooses to use a seemingly simple personal skill to the benefit of his church.

In this understanding, I have come to see excelling in translation or understanding different human languages to be an aspect of “the gift of tongues”; the gift of languages. Calling this a gift is not trying to make myself sound better. It is saying that, while I would certainly call myself proficient in English, using it for the glory of God is only possible through his power. As is the case with any type of work for the kingdom.

So yesterday I preached in English for the first time in my life. I accepted the invitation to stand in for someone who wasn’t able to make it, and delivered a sermon in Fox Valley Community Church’s “Opal Room service” (the more traditional-style worship service). From the ensuing remarks, I think it went pretty well – language was never an issue, and more importantly I believe the message was well received. If anybody is interested (which I’m doubting ) they do put recordings of all sermons on the website.

The Pilgrims’ Congress

The Pope is in Sydney, celebrating World Youth Day along with a couple hundred thousand (not all quite so) young Roman Catholics from around the world. It’s a huge event for the city, although much of the attention focuses on road closures and infrastructure challenges while the event lasts. I won’t be going in to watch him. Mainly because it’s not worth the hassle, and of course I’m hardly Catholic either, although I hope that the throngs of Christians have a good time here.

Nothing draws a crowd like a crowd, of course. And several not so pope-friendly people are using the opportunity to point out some of the darker sides of the Catholic Church. One of the more ingenious (and very Aussie) ideas was T-shirts with the inscription “The Pope touched me down under”.

This highlights one of the main battles of the church in recent years: the sex abuse scandals involving Catholic priests. I wouldn’t suggest that the Church actually condones such behaviour, but the handling has probably come short. What struck me today was the news report of the Pope’s meeting with PM Kevin Rudd, and his commending of Australia’s recent apology to the aboriginals: “Thanks to the Australian Government’s courageous decision to acknowledge the injustices committed against the indigenous peoples in the past, concrete steps are now being taken to achieve reconciliation.”

These are bold words from a man who has yet to formally apologise for the sex abuse by Catholic clergy. No, Ratzinger did not to my awareness personally abuse anybody. I’m not saying that he did. But the hierarchical structure of the Catholic Church is such that the pontiff should acknowledge responsibility and offer an unambiguous apology, not just the “regret” he has so far expressed. If nothing else, it would be a wise communication strategy to do so.

Asking Questions, and the Future of the Church

Why are we here? What is our mission as a church? How do we describe God? How should we view other Christian denominations? What is at the core of sanctification? How should a Christian regard the environment? alcohol? sex? politics? abortion? evolution? There are many questions.

Last week I was chatting with a friend about the state of the Adventist Church in Denmark. In that conversation the idea was floated of launching a new church magazine for people my age – people who will soon be growing too old for the youth magazine, but don’t really feel ready to join the mainstream. While there is probably too few resources for such an endeavour (and, as I pointed out, some bloggers try to fill the gap) it highlighted an issue of change. Change in the broader culture and now also in the church.

For years the education system (in Northern Europe, at least) has been teaching everybody how to question the established; not to take truths for granted; how to judge anything and anybody on their merits, not on our own presuppositions. I believe this is good. And while church has been slow to catch on (as it has with many things – music is one), this is now the predominant way of thinking among the educated young and middle-aged, within the church as well as outside it.

The church has been actively, if not explicitly, encouraging this, at least at the youth level. Many years of teen retreats, pathfinder camps, the boarding school Vejlefjord, and other things have somewhat contributed to a new way of thinking: that asking questions is ok; no, that it is good. The church planting projects of the last decade have, despite their very different styles and missions, had this in common: they ask questions. They do not take established truths for granted. They wonder: why don’t we do like this instead?

Once upon a time the Adventist pioneers did exactly the same. They asked questions, they sought answers for themselves, and they didn’t accept the argument: that’s how we’ve always done it. Today much of the Adventist establishment has grown stale. And while older generations may tolerate young people asking questions, many do so with an expectation that eventually they will find the right answers (i.e., theirs).

I don’t think finding the right answer to every question is possible, or even desirable. There are some things people will never fully agree on, and this doesn’t have to be a problem. I believe and hope that the current leadership of the church in Denmark will acknowledge and encourage this. I dream of a church where nobody ever stops asking questions; and nobody ever stubbornly holds that they have the only right answers. Because they never do – only God can claim that right.

A Sign of the Times

I just came back from camp meeting. Seventh-day Adventists from all over Denmark gathered at Himmerlandsgården for the annual 4-day retreat, with meetings and socialising. There are many traditions, and a wide range of people with very differing opinions. As such, it is a good spot to gauge the mood of the church.

At first, I was tempted to title this post “Oh, What a Circus” (cf. Evita). There is still a lot of patting ourselves on the back, maintaining the sub-culture, and spreading fear of the outside world. The selection of books on display included titles such as “Harry Potter, Witchcraft and the Bible” and “Back to the old paths”. Pampering to fear and traditionalism is always a seller.

On further notice, however, the camp showed positive signs. One thing is the new features (a different marquee, a foyer tent with hot drinks, free ice cream on Sabbath, a new campground site for caravans, and other nice touches). But overall, people simply seemed to be having a good time. Now in a church that has had somewhat an identity crisis the last decade, that is encouraging, and not necessarily a given.

The clearest sign of this was the Saturday evening meeting. Usually this is a youth meeting for the whole church, planned by the youth department. And often these meetings have included drama, satire and provocative messages. I am told that in my father’s time as youth director he would often have angry members tell him off the next day for going too far, and the conference president defying the accusations. In recent years, however, the meetings have been gentler, and the theme has often been unity – probably a health precaution, trying to bridge the gap that some people see in the church. Not that those were bad meetings, but last night’s version had more edge than I’ve seen in a long time. It featured a brilliantly casted and well-performed drama which had the guts to make fun of the president’s accent, caricature other executives, and paint stereotypes of how not to be an Adventist. The message was clear and right-on: telling people about Jesus should be simple and easy.

I see that meeting as a symptom of a sea change in the church in Denmark. We laughed a lot and had a great time together. We may finally be shedding the conflicts of late and moving forward together.

Adolescent Views on Church

Yesterday and today I have been in the Bible/Religion classes for first and second year students at Vejlefjordskolen, a Christian high school run by the Adventist Church in Denmark. My friend Niels teaches these classes, and he invited me to tell about Aarhus Café Church. They have been studying church planting, and to add perspective I was to share real-life experiences about starting a new church.

This has been an interesting task – not especially difficult, because it’s been a big part of my life for the past 7 years, and telling the story is just recounting what has happened. But reflecting a bit more on possible mistakes and ideas for the future has also been a fun challenge.

I hope the students had a good experience, of course. But it has also been an interesting one for me. Especially today with the second years I had a good time listening to their questions and trying to provide insightful answers. What struck me especially was a possible insight into the minds of young people of this age.

Adolescence is a time of starting to make up your own mind and considering alternative world views. It is a time of trial and error, of idealism, sometimes of naïveté, and of asking questions but also believing you have a lot of answers made out. It is a time where you slowly discover that perhaps your parents weren’t right about everything; at first you may protest them by doing the exact opposite of what they believe, but over time most of us end up respecting their beliefs and forming our own not all that far from theirs, but still distinctly our own.

Asking questions is healthy. And when it comes to church I hope that all generations will ask questions and have ideals. But equally, we ought to mature into not letting everything be a matter of our elders’ views or the exact opposite. They were right about a lot of things – and wrong about quite a few, too. As we all are. Nothing is either black or white.

Religious But Not Spiritual?

A new Facebook group caught my attention recently. It’s called “I am religious but not spiritual” and its description reads: “The most important thing in life is to have an institutional relationship with God.”

I didn’t join the group, but something about the idea resonated in me. Obviously, it’s a reaction towards the more established, opposite movement; that faith should be all about individual expressions of spirituality, and not about institutions and structures and history.

As postmoderns we are supposed to distrust institutions. Does that make me modern if I find myself actually liking them? Brian McLaren says the divide between conservative and liberal is outdated; now it’s about modern and postmodern. It’s still a divide. What if there’s no divide and never was? (Intensive reading of Bruno Latour the last few weeks has almost persuaded me this might be the case.)

But back to church. A post and published article by Tvesok (in Danish) has some interesting observations about the target group and purpose of new churches. But a comment on this was: what about those people who like and need the security and structure that institutions can give?

It’s all about community, we’re told to believe. And I believe community is important. An institutionalized church without community would not be the same, sure. But is it the most important thing? What about corporate worship? What about the Word? What about the ‘sacraments’ (insert theology here)?

Upon, for instance, moving to a new city, finding a church can be a difficult task. Personally, I’d prefer one that suited me on both religion and community. A church whose activities and institutions inspired and challenged my Christian life – but also one in which I felt a sense of community with the other people. But if you can’t have both, the choice is not that easy.

What is church, anyway?

How to Keep a Church Alive

Last weekend, Århus Café Church was away together on a spiritual retreat for the first—but definitely not last—time in our history as a church. We had lots of fun, enjoyed good music, prayer, inspiring teaching, and just hanging out together.

Regina and Juris Rekis—good friends, and founders of the church plant “Korinta” in Riga—provided awesome inspiration and challenged the group to go out and do something for God and make a difference for Århus. The reaction is overwhelming; a great number of people have indicated willingness to be more committed, and lots of good ideas have surfaced. So the big question now is: how do we as leaders keep this flame burning?

The obvious answer—which a friend gave me today—is that it’s not our responsibility, but God’s. As leaders we are called to do the tasks we are charged with. But so is everybody in the church. We are responsible to God, and committing ourselves to Him as leaders should be our foremost priority.

Even so, it can seem daunting. In the parable of the talents, Jesus says: “Well done, good and faithful servant! You have been faithful with a few things; I will put you in charge of many things. Come and share your master’s happiness!” (Matthew 25:21 NIV) I feel in some ways that God is telling us: “OK, well done so far. Now let’s go to the next level.” Which is going to be fun, but challenging.

Church growth comes from the grass roots, and we have a strong and committed core of people with a passion for turning Århus Café Church into something really big. Our job as leaders will be not to stifle that passion; but to facilitate initiative, ministry, responsibility, and growth in every member. And to inspire them to continue to grow as disciples.

A great responsibility, indeed, if it were ours alone. Fortunately, it is not we as leaders who create growth, but the Holy Spirit. Paul writes: “I planted the seed. Apollos watered it, but God made it grow. So neither he who plants nor he who waters is anything, but only God, who makes things grow.” (1 Corinthians 3:6-7 NIV)