Changing a Church Service: I’ve Got a Little List

The always engaging SirNickDon recently posed an interesting question about church: “If your job was to remove five minutes from your Sunday-morning church service, what would you cut out?” (He voted to remove the “special” music, calculating precisely how many man-hours had been wasted watching someone do sign language to “I Can Only Imagine.” In certain moods I can see his point.) As someone who’s been doing church music and service planning for many years now, I had a thought or two.

Start with the basics. The best statements I’ve ever heard on church service planning come from a person who frankly admitted he had no musical talent at all. He made up for it by being C. S. Lewis. His first statement is, “Nothing should be done or sung or said in church which does not aim directly or indirectly at glorifying God or edifying the people or both.” The second is even better: “The perfect church service would be one we were almost unaware of; our attention would have been on God.”

If we take this view, then the question is, what parts of our service do the best job of pointing to God? What will edify these particular people the most? And what elements just don’t do that?

Obviously, the answer is at least somewhat subjective. Different things may edify different people at different times, and one person’s trite praise chorus may be another person’s moment of deepest spiritual experience. So let’s not be too hasty to judge or to try to make our service all about what I like. That said, if I had a wish list based on these criteria, here’s what I might change:

Things that ought to be cut:

- Announcements. Print it in a bulletin. Send it in an email. Put it on the church website. Project it on a screen. Start a blog. Do anything at all but read it from the pulpit while we’re supposed to be worshiping. One of my music professors once put it with gratifying bluntness: “Announcements. Edify. Nobody.”

- Pass-the-plate style offerings. It’s hardly the worst financial abuse a church can stoop to, but stop for a moment and consider it in the light of Jesus’ stiff words against those who give in public view. Maybe it would be better just to put a box in the back where people who want to can give without their left hands seeing.

- “Everybody turn and greet your neighbor.” As Charlie Brown said about Valentine’s Day, and as my mother once said about this moment in the service, “I know nobody likes me; why do we have to do this to emphasize it?” If your church really has a genuine healthy sense of community, then neighbors have already said Hello to each other. Conversely, if neighbors don’t say Hello to each other without being told, I don’t think this will help very much.

- Accompaniment Tracks. Is this Sunday Morning or Karaoke Friday? Use the musicians you have in your congregation instead of trying to replicate the current Christian radio Top 40. If your musicians aren’t good enough to listen to, get them some training. It’s better to do without music altogether than to send the message, “You have to sound like these professional studio players for your contribution to be worthwhile.”

- Contemporary Service at 8 / Traditional Service at 10. The message: “Jesus unites us and music divides us, and the latter trumps the former.” If the issue of music or style is really causing so much division in your church that people will only go to a service with the kind of music they like, I’d say again it’s better to go without music altogether, at least until you get your priorities settled.

(Aside: When you have a professional musician advocating removing music from church in certain conditions, you can be sure he takes those conditions rather seriously.)

- Clock Idolatry. The meeting went five, ten, or fifteen minutes longer than it should have! Why does anybody care? Are they so bored with what’s happening they can’t stand it to last a minute longer? Do they have another pressing commitment that’s more important (think about that)? Or are they bowing to the arbitrary demands of an electric counting machine?

And on a more positive note, things that ought to be added:

- More Scripture Readings. Not just the five verses the pastor is about to preach on. I like the model in liturgical churches of lengthy passages from the OT, a Psalm, a Gospel, and an epistle. You can cover most of the Bible in a year or two if you follow a good lectionary. This is one of the few things in Scripture we’re expressly told should be part of a church meeting: “Until I come, devote yourself to the public reading of Scripture, to preaching and to teaching” –Paul to Timothy, 1 Timothy 4:13 (NIV).

- More opportunities for the congregation to be involved in edifying. We have “special music” or “offertories” for people whose gift (hopefully) is encouraging us through music. What about people who have different gifts? Without the announcements, you’ll actually have time to include them. Again, straight out of the Book: check out 1 Corinthians 14.

- More testimonies. People in your congregation are likely up to some pretty neat things for Jesus, or having some important spiritual experiences. Add spots for other people to tell us how the Lord helped them throughout the week. I guarantee you that in your congregation this Sunday is somebody who had a remarkable encounter with the Lord this week and somebody else who would benefit tremendously from hearing about it. Keep it real.

- More prayer. Because however much you have in your service, it isn’t enough.

Now, all of that is just one man’s opinion; no more, no less. And understand, I’m not complaining. I’m a bit sarcastic maybe, but really, I’m not complaining. Compared to the spiritual abuses perpetuated by many churches, these things I singled out for change are nothing. (For that matter, compared to what would happen if we had a real revival, the changes I propose here are nothing.) For little things like this, complaining, protesting, and whining just aren’t worth it. Better to relax and be happy.

My point is simply this: As the saying goes, even a broken sign can point the right direction. If you asked me how to fix the sign, I could touch it up here and there. But all we really ask of it is that it gets us where we want to go. If it’s doing that, it’s working just right.

What about you? What would you like to remove, add, or leave the same in your church service if you had the chance, and why? Leave your comments below. Be sure to subscribe or register if you haven’t already!

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