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Messages from Rev. Loren Richmond Jr., M.Div, MBA. at various churches
>> Loren: Good morning.
>> Loren: As the shadows deepen across the american church landscape, a somber hue tinges the.
>> Loren: Once vibrant tapestry of faith.
>> Loren: The decline of church in America casts a pale of desolation over sanctuaries once bustling with congregants. Empty pews stand as a silent witness to a spiritual erosion. Where the residents of hymns fades into the echoes of a bygone era, the sacred halls, once pillars of communal solace.
>> Loren: And moral guidance, now echo with the whispers of abandonment.
>> Loren: Amidst the cacophony of secular distractions and shifting societal paradigms, the church finds itself adrift in a sea of indifference, struggling to navigate the tempest of modernity. With each passing day, the flicker of faith grows dimmer, obscured by the shadows of doubt and disillusionment, leaving a poignant.
>> Loren: Lament of faith that once illuminated the american soul.
>> Loren: Upon this spiritual wasteland, we remaining christians.
>> Loren: Find ourselves walking amidst the remnant of.
>> Loren: Shattered churches and abandoned altars. With each step, we confront the harsh reality of our dwindling numbers and the daunting task of preserving our faith in a world that is increasingly turning its.
>> Loren: Back on even the idea of God.
>> Loren: Here in America, as we mark soon the quarter mark of the 21st century, with empty churches, faltering institutions, and doubt even in the very idea of God, it can be hard to escape the feelings of impending doom, as, uh, collapse, ruin and breakdown seem to be the only visible things on the horizon. What are we as people of faith to do?
>> Loren: Seeking to follow the way of Jesus.
>> Loren: In his book Life after Doom, author Brian McLaren writes about a similar destruction and demise, that of our global ecology due to the threat of global warming and climate change. In his book, he presents four possible scenarios for our collapse avoidance, collapse and rebirth, collapse and survival, or the most.
>> Loren: Foreboding collapse and extinction.
>> Loren: I spoke to Brian in a, uh, podcast on my podcast, future Christian, and talked with him about these four scenarios in relation to the church in America, because in many ways, churches in North America, like this one, are facing the threat of doom, wondering which of these four scenarios will occur in 2020. A landmark survey came out from faith communities today from the Hartford Institute for Religion, and it was a wide ranging survey and study of christian churches and.
>> Loren: Faith communities across the United States.
>> Loren: The data and results from that survey were startling and scary for anyone who cares deeply about church and Christianity in America. Certainly they were for myself. Some of the disheartening facts from the survey from the year 2000, the average, or, excuse me, the median church attendance in America was 137 people. In 2020, the median church attendance was.
>> Loren: 65 50% at least declined, right? I don't do math. Well, someone else tell me what the math is.
>> Loren: Fewer congregations are growing, more churches are smaller. And churches are continually not lining up. With the average demographic in their neighborhood. Churches tend to be older than the demographic of their neighborhood. And the average age of clergy is on the rise. With all this foreboding news, we can understand why so many churches and pastors and congregations.
>> Loren: Have this feeling of doom and forebodingness.
>> Loren: What if I told you this morning that you're not the only ones? We are not the only ones who.
>> Loren: Have ever had such a feeling or threat of doom and gloom.
>> Loren: As Carol read this morning from the story of the Pharisees, they themselves and Judaism in first century Palestine. Were going through a great time of disruption and change. Their culture was drastically changing. As the ROMAN empire came in. And began to implement Roman ideas and ideology, their politics were shifting greatly, as, again, no longer were they allowed to rule themselves, but they had a romantic ruler, Pilate.
>> Loren: When JesUS was crucified, the religion was.
>> Loren: VeRy much in a state of turmoil. As, uh, throughout what scholars call second temple Judaism. Jewish leaders were in conflict about how to practice the ways of Judaism. And m then throughout that first century as well, what arose again and again was revolutionary, revolutionary ideas. Many scholars think that during the time of Jesus youth. In a town not far from his own, the Romans brutally crushed a revolution.
>> Loren: Attempt to overthrow Rome.
>> Loren: We know that in roughly 66 ad.
>> Loren: There was another revolutionary attempt to overthrow Rome, which the Romans, again, brutally crushed.
>> Loren: So, again, in that culture, in that time of Jesus, when the jewish leaders are trying to hold on to their faith. And preserve their way of life and culture and religion, there is so much turmoil, so much change, so much disruption, so much uncertainty. And then if that wasn't enough, if that wasn't enough, this guy named Jesus comes onto the scene and says, hey, guess what?
>> Loren: The Sabbath is made for humans, not humans, for the Sabbath.
>> Loren: And that sounds pretty reasonable to our ears today. Since we've heard the story again and again. Through our scripture reading and through our church attendance. But, uh, if we think about it.
>> Loren: In this way.
>> Loren: The rules and regulations of the Pharisees and the various jewish leaders. Were in many ways helpful for them to preserve their faith, helpful for them to preserve and hang on to their religion, their culture, their way of life, their practices, their culture. When everything around them was swirling and changing and being disrupted, they knew they could hang on to their faith and their traditions and their way of life. By way of their religious practices and rules and regulations.
>> Loren: Does that sound familiar for any of us?
>> Loren: And then this guy Jesus walks in and says, hey, the point of our faith, the point of our religion is not for us to serve as a religion, but for the religion to serve us. I'm going to read it from this half of the passage today. One Sabbath, he was going through the grain fields, and as they made their way, his disciples began to pluck heads of grain.
>> Loren: Again, not supposed to be doing work on the Sabbath.
>> Loren: Uh, the Pharisees said to him, look, why are they doing what is not lawful on the Sabbath?
>> Loren: And he said to them, have you.
>> Loren: Never read what David did when he and his companions were hungry and in need of food? He entered the house of God when Abiathar was high priest and ate the bread of the presence, which is not lawful for any but the priests to eat.
>> Loren: Again, unlawful.
>> Loren: But he gave some also to his companions. Then he said to them, Jesus said to them, the Sabbath was made for humankind, not humankind for the Sabbath. So the son of man is lord.
>> Loren: Even of the Sabbath.
>> Loren: From the HarperCollins study Bible, the notes add, uh, that in this text, in the book of Mark, Jesus claims authority. He claims that the healing work, his healing work in ministry is to take priority over the observance of the Sabbath. To say it differently, Jesus is saying, as I understand it, that the spirit of the law is more important than the letter of the law. Again, Jesus is saying, the point of the law is to serve humanity, not humanity, to serve the law. To say this differently, perhaps in our own context, we might say the healing work of the church must take priority of the upkeep of the institution.
>> Loren: Or.
>> Loren: That helping people connect with God must take priority over the upkeep of the institution. Or, said differently, even worship and prayer must take precedence over how we've, uh, always done it. In Ted Smith's book, the End of Theological Education. Ted Smith is a professor and scholar out of Emory University in Georgia, and he writes about the shifts and change coming in theological education amongst seminaries and religious institutions and colleges and graduate schools. As is facing many churches across the states. So are the same challenges facing seminaries and theological schools as there are less and less people like myself seeking to grow or go to seminary to become a clergy person. In his book, he talks about the rise of what he calls the voluntary association. He marks pre revolutionary war times when churches were often funded by the state. Essentially, the states would tax, and those taxes, some at least, would go to support the institution of the church. As time shifted, partly due to the revolutionary war. Smith notes that the funding model began to shift where it is. Much like, uh, we know today, individuals like yourself give to support the work and ministry and institution of the church. And he defines this kind of setup as what he calls a voluntary association, not unlike other voluntary associations you may or may not be a part of, at least familiar, uh, with, like the Boy Scouts.
>> Loren: Um, the, um. Can't think of them now.
>> Loren: Who's the kiwanis? Right at the pool down the street. Um, VFW. I mean, the list goes on and.
>> Loren: On and on, right?
>> Loren: And as we've all seen in the last 20 or 30 years, these other voluntary associations, like the Boy scouts, like.
>> Loren: The VFW, like the Kiwanis, like the.
>> Loren: Rotary Club, attendance and participation in these.
>> Loren: Associations continues to decline as, uh, shifting cultural norms influence how younger Americans behave and act in culture.
>> Loren: Whereas generations, perhaps, like yourself, certainly my grandparents and parents, felt strongly toward the importance of the institution, generations my age and younger, as you probably are well aware, do not hold such commitment, we'll.
>> Loren: Say, to the importance of institutions like VFW, like Rotary Club, like Boy Scouts, like church.
>> Loren: Ted Smith, in my conversation with him.
>> Loren: On my podcast, talked about his parents.
>> Loren: Lifelong members of a church in Springfield, Missouri. And to them, it was the height of importance to commit to and serve a committee on the church. And he laughs about how someone my age or younger, asking them to serve.
>> Loren: On a property committee is about the last thing they want to do right, to serve a church.
>> Loren: And as these shifting cultural changes happen, the struggle can be for churches to adapt to the cultural changes, but also to realize and not get lost or stuck in the realization that the structure, the institution is one thing and the church is another.
>> Loren: Again, think about the Pharisees. They thought their rules, their regulations, was the religion itself. Jesus was trying to tell them, the religion, the law, is the thing we're trying to preserve, not the rules and regulations of the structure itself. I talked to a pastor just this.
>> Loren: Last week who talked about his church trying to shift the structure and institutions of their church. He has a 33 member board, 33 member board. And he said, we're trying to get young people involved, more on the board. But once you know it, when the young people get involved in the board.
>> Loren: The older folks, no offense, this is the other church. I'm sure you all are never like this. The older folks of that church say, oh, these young people want to come in and change everything.
>> Loren: We, and I use a general we.
>> Loren: To include myself in this.
>> Loren: We can act as if people were.
>> Loren: Made for the church, not church for the people. Let me say that again. We can act as if church. We can act as if people were made for the church, not church for the people.
>> Loren: Much of our efforts, and I use a big hour, Christianity and America's efforts to, since 2000, have been to fix the institution. We think if we can just make church cooler and hipper and more relevant.
>> Loren: Young people will want to be involved.
>> Loren: Theologian and seminary uh, Professor Andrew Root argues that the problem is not decline.
>> Loren: In american churches, in religious institutions.
>> Loren: The problem, he argues, is that.
>> Loren: We have lost our ability to see God and to recognize God's presence among us.
>> Loren: He prescribes, at least as I understand it, a very simple three part fix.
>> Loren: If I can use the word worship, prayer and waiting.
>> Loren: Now, these three things sound completely counter intuitive to our modern cultural context, especially when we think about all the solutions, solutions often prescribed by the big churches.
>> Loren: We see around us, right?
>> Loren: Bands here, music, hipper services, certainly a.
>> Loren: Hip or pasture, not wearing a suit and tie. He says, you worship God, you worship God, you pray. And then you wait for God to show up and to act and to move in your midst.
>> Loren: It's so convoluted and contradictory from everything we might think that.
>> Loren: I think it might actually make sense. It's that different.
>> Loren: So when we think about this in light of the present reality that I described at the beginning, this impending doom that one way or another we're going to face, as much as ecologically, also is coming to our churches, how are we preparing ourselves for this? You know, I was thinking about this.
>> Loren: In light of the context. My father is, uh, he's dealing with Parkinson's. And he's about four years into his diagnosis. Um, two days from today, June 4, he's seeing his physician about deep, uh.
>> Loren: Brain stimulation surgery procedure.
>> Loren: So I ask your prayers for that, as they, uh, consider the viability and positive, uh, nature of whether that would.
>> Loren: Be positive for him. And my wife asked me, as we're lamenting this and they're declining health, one.
>> Loren: Night when we were getting ready for bed, and she said, are we ready for our parents to face death? And I said, no, I'm not. But I realized it's a natural part of life.
>> Loren: Death is a natural part of life. Change and transition is a natural part of life. To say it differently, doom is inevitable. Our only part, I think.
>> Loren: Is to see which of these again, these four scenarios will occur. Collapse avoidance, collapse and extinction. Collapse in survival. Collapse and rebirth.
>> Loren: I think the Pharisees were trying to practice collapse avoidance. Make people conform to our ideas of religion. I think in many ways, in the last 20 or 30 years in America, we've seen churches and church leaders try to practice collapse avoidance. If we could just make church hippler and cooler and more, uh, relevant, if we can get people to prescribe to.
>> Loren: Our rules more firmly, we can have collapse avoidance.
>> Loren: Cynics. We know in our country, we see them.
>> Loren: I don't know how often you all are on social media.
>> Loren: A lot of Facebook or any threads. People, Twitter people, ex people here.
>> Loren: That's all right.
>> Loren: The cynics among us tell us that the church is collapsing and it's Christianity is just a relic of pre enlightenment times. And once people are evolved and educated enough, they will no longer rely on.
>> Loren: These myths, they say, of Christianity.
>> Loren: Sociologists among us will predict a collapse in survival, that most of the institution and churches in America will collapse, but there will be a small remnant that.
>> Loren: Will remain, practicing the faith, a survival. I believe.
>> Loren: I believe that the faithful practice of Christians is to believe in death and resurrection.
>> Loren: That's the core, I believe, of our.
>> Loren: Faith, what we might call collapse and rebirth. That there may be coming a, uh, collapse in Christianity, but from that collapse, from that death, God can bring resurrection. But we cannot control the outcomes. We cannot control what that rebirth might look like.
>> Loren: All, uh, we can do is to worship, to pray, and to wait, to.
>> Loren: Worship God, as you are doing faithfully here. Please do not discount the importance the faithfulness of your worship. Your continued gathering to show up and.
>> Loren: To worship and say that we believe.
>> Loren: In this Jesus crucified and resurrected Jesus.
>> Loren: Do not discount the importance of your gathering to worship.
>> Loren: As you gather to worship, continue to pray and say, God, where are you working? Where are you leading among us? To bring revival and rebirth to our.
>> Loren: Church, to our neighborhood, to our community. And then this is the hardest part, right? The hardest part. At least someone, perhaps like me, to wait. I don't like waiting. But in that waiting, it's not an idle waiting. We're worshiping, we're praying, we're helping people find and connect with God. You know, the good news is, I told you, I told you all that doom and gloom from that faith communities today survey, right? Of declining participation, declining attendance, declining everything, right?
>> Loren: The good news that comes from this.
>> Loren: Survey, again, this is a legit sociological academic survey. The good news that we can take heart in is that they say spiritual flourishing is possible at every size, every size church. No matter how big or how small our congregations might be, we can together worship, pray, and wait for God to.
>> Loren: Show up and trust that God will show up, but it will not be.
>> Loren: Um, on our time, might not be how we want to happen, but it can happen. So may this church be a church for people. May this church be a church for people, helping people find and follow Jesus through encounters with God in worship. Let us pray. God, we thank you for the gift.
>> Loren: Of.
>> Loren: Gathering, um, as we are able to gather together in community, in worship, and in prayer. God, we remember that the scriptures testify that where two or three are gathered, you are in the midst of them. God, we thank you for the testimony of other faithful christians through the years that you have showed up when we commit to gather together. So, God, thank you for the testimony and legacy of this church and of these faithful christians here continuing to show up and worship God, be with them as they continue into the future and discern how you might be moving amongst them. God, uh, thank you for this day. Today we ask this in Jesus name. Amen.