There are two different ways of being the church community. The first way is by trying to go back to the way things were from about 350 AD to 1950 AD, where the church was the community center. The church was where the people gathered to celebrate and mourn. It was where people were married, buried, and baptized. It was where people went in times of crisis.
However, due to a wide variety of cultural and theological reasons, the church is no longer the center of our communities. Many pastors and church people mourn this fact, and make attempts to resurrect the community center model of church. But it is not working. Why? Because it is not so much that the community has abandoned the church, but that the church has not kept up with the community.
The church used to be the community center because there was not much else in the community. But now, people have a variety of options to pursue when it comes to looking for community — bars, coffee houses, soccer fields, and dance studios.
So rather than try to guilt people who have “left church” to leave their community and come back to church, it might be a good idea to recreate church around the current cultural forms of community.
This is the second way of being the church community. Rather than be a church which has a coffee table, we can become a coffee house that has a church. Rather than be a church that offers Wednesday night aerobics, we can become an aerobic and dance center that has a church.
This is beneficial on multiple levels. For example, the building doesn’t sit empty most of the week, the business helps pay the bills, and the gathering center creates opportunities to make connections with the community.
There are examples of this popping up all over the country in the past fifteen years or so. Let me point out one. Life in Deep Ellum is a Cultural Arts and Community Center in Dallas, TX. They have a coffee shop called Mokah, a state-of-the-art music venue for concerts, and an expansive gallery for art exhibits. The building also houses a film company, a graphic design company, and a life-coaching and counseling service. Oh, and on Sunday, a church meets there too.
You see how that works? The church is not front and center, the community center is. The church is not the focal point of the building. The coffee shop, art gallery, and music venue is.
This type of approach will be one of the primary ways of being the church in the next fifty years or so. I wish I had known about this place when I lived in Dallas. I would have liked to have gotten involved.
