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Marco said, "http://www.nytimes.com/2010/02/06/world/asia/06missionary.html?ref=world" in i told u i was hardcore.

Brian said, "The decline of mainline Christians is most intriguing. I'm studying the consequences of churches committing too closely or explicitly to political ideologies, and the impact on their public opinion and attendance. The dr...(read the rest)" in by the numbers.

Jonathan said, "Here is an interesting article on Evangelical's uses of statistics, as well as commentary on recent studies of religious affiliation in America.
(read the rest)" in by the numbers.

jeff ronk said, "dont forget the visual aid: http://bit.ly/TN5BI" in service, 2009.10.11.

jordan said, "where mark 6:6-14? did nursery that week. has?" in service, 2009.10.11.

some thoughts after visiting mars hill church
MHC downtown
so, as part of our little excursion to seattle, laurie and i visited one of the mars hill church campuses today. i wanted to put down some observations and solicit some discussion.

by way of background, mars hill is a megachurch in seattle started by a guy named mark driscoll. it has grown from a bible study to a HUGE multi-campus church in about 10 years. (guessing here: see their site for the real history). as it is now, they have several campuses in addition to the main one in the ballard neighborhood north of downtown seattle. each of the sites has its own pastoral/elder leadership, but the preaching is driscoll piped in. not sure about the nuts and bolts of how that works but he is there on the screen at the campuses.

laurie and i visited the downtown campus (linked above) for a couple of reasons:

  • it was with in walking distance
  • i wanted to see how the campus model functioned in a real life service
  • that location supports our friends over at austin city life, an acts 29 network plant that meets over on 6th st.

we hit the 9:00 service and were pleasantly surprised to see that they also have a hard time starting on time, though not quite as late as we do. the interior had a nice minimalist modern-ish vibe: lots of black, coffee from storyville coffee. the band leading worship was on the bluegrass side of indie; nicely done, not too loud. over all the feel was just comfortable. i liked it.

now for some observations:

  • worship: not overdone; the setting provided a nice atmosphere for reflection/contemplation/meditation of the truths of scripture or songs. it was not emotionally conjured as we sometimes see, it was just nice to have a time to dwell on the passage that was read and projected as the back drop. the music was god focused, biblically based, and well presented. i think that as a church we could tighten this up a bit- work harder to provide an atmosphere that facilitated dwelling or meditation on scripture or our musical expression of worship.
  • as far as the campus model: there does seem to be some legitimate campus pastoral leadership at the sites: i am not sure how this plays out during the rest of the week, or in terms of decision making but it seemed to work. re: piping in driscoll- i am ambivalent here; for one thing it relies on tech- it can be glitchy. we had a rough start this morning. it is less strange to watch the sermon on a screen than i thought it would be, but i worry about the teaching opportunities of the local pastors/elders.
  • they use a lot of house done media- video, print, music, so there is a nice degree of cohesiveness across campuses. to my untrained eye, the quality is pretty good. the video intro to II peter today was quite catchy.

overall it was one of the more pleasant church experiences that i have had: comfortable and unpretentious, well done with out being cheesy. on a downside- they were not overly friendly- same as any church. not unfriendly- just not outgoing to a couple of new faces. of course- laurie and i are not exactly outgoing ourselves so we were happy to just blend in with the scenery.

lets have some questions/comments here. fire away. use this as an opportunity for what we can do to make salina street church more engaging and useful.

i will use this chance to get a little, como se dice, sentimental: i love the church- i love our church; it is my greatest desire to see it built up and strengthened. may god use our efforts to do just that. may we all work together to present every person complete in christ, remembering ii peter 1:1-4 "Simon Peter, a bond-servant and apostle of Jesus Christ,To those who have received a faith of the same kind as ours, by the righteousness of our God and Savior, Jesus Christ: 2 Grace and peace be multiplied to you in the knowledge of God and of Jesus our Lord; 3 seeing that His divine power has granted to us everything pertaining to life and godliness, through the true knowledge of Him who called us by His own glory and excellence. 4 For by these He has granted to us His precious and magnificent promises, so that by them you may become partakers of the divine nature, having escaped the corruption that is in the world by lust." amen.
Entered by jeff ronk on 05.31.2009 at 17:48
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Comments
the hill on mars
So the Sunday before last my wife and I visited the Mars Hill Ballard Campus north of Seattle with my brother and his wife who are regular attendees. This is where Driscoll normally preaches, but he was out that day. We watched him on video. I found the worship to be a little more distracting than you mentioned. It was pretty loud and had a bit of a grunge concert feel as they got started, which was fun, but yea, sort of got in the way at times. …seemed to fit the culture though. The sermon itself was great…. II Pet 2:1-10, encouraging believers to avoid false teachers and heretical doctrine. He struck a great balance in sharply condemning some specific sin (especially in the church) while expressing love and a gracious desire to see people come to Christ and be sanctified. We took communion as well. …sorta Catholic/Lutheran style, where the pastors/deacons serve you up front, which I kinda like. we actually found people pretty friendly. They had an ice cream mixer right after the service and were really pushing community groups. The slight negative for me is just such a heavy focus on Driscoll. While I loved his sermon and love what he’s done, watching a video is just so impersonal, which is how all of the mars hill satellite churches receive teaching weekly. In a church that size, there must be other people capable of teaching. I may be a little skewed by my brother who sort of complains of a lack of opportunity for bible study, mentoring, etc. outside of the service. (Not sure if they’ve tried hard enough though.) It leads me to something I am really thankful about my friends at Salina. Its uplifting to be a round a group of people pursuing Christ likeness earnestly through study, fellowship and spiritual discipline. If the church grows much bigger, I do wonder how much the simple logistics of more people might limit some of the direct shepherding. I would guess that’s sort of what I sense at Mars Hill....a struggle for a lot of churches. I would just pray that the church continue to focus on a balance of knowledge and truth, fellowship, love and service in an effort for each member to become more like Christ.
Posted by Jeremy Carter (jeremy_john_carter@yahoo.com) @ 06.23.2009 17:37
 

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