The Cultural Shift Your Church May Be Missing

and why it matters

I can’t imagine that anyone reading this is unaware of the current tension challenging workplaces across America. It’s the tension between what several writers have deemed “the Somewheres and the Anywheres.” The Somewheres need to do their work in specific locations. The Anywheres can do their work, or a significant portion of it, from virtually anywhere, and they want the freedom to choose where they will work on any given day. Their employers offer countless reasons for them to be onsite, and the Somewheres resent the Anywheres for even suggesting that they shouldn’t have to “come to work.”

The irony of this workplace tension is that it exists because nearly all Americans, the Anywheres, the Somewheres, their employers, and those they serve live both somewhere and anywhere. We’ve already adapted to living our day-to-day lives in both the physical and virtual realms.

We shop online and in-person.

We communicate online and in-person.

We are entertained online and in-person.

We socialize online and in-person.

We learn online and in-person.

We sell online and in-person.

We bank online and in-person.

Though while we engage so much of life both online and in-person, these engagements are not always interchangeable. The online and in-person engagements are different and while the resulting purchase or purpose may be the same, the appeal of online and in-person is different for each person and type of engagement. Few people are exclusively somewhere or anywhere. We are somewhere AND anywhere every day, and the businesses that learn to offer online and in-person services that compliment one another tend to thrive.

It would be easy to recognize this irony and roll one’s eyes at today’s widespread workplace tension. But what’s more concerning is the church’s failure to recognize the need to engage people both online and in-person through complimentary, rather than simply duplicated, offerings.

Sure, most churches think they’re doing both. Though simply offering online presentations of local services hardly fits the bill. Our in-person services tend to provide one-way communication. We simply project those presentations online. Then we wonder why we get so few people to commit more time to engage in dialogue. We are following the path of shopping malls, expecting people to consistently spend hours onsite for what they perceive they can accomplish online from the comfort of their own living room. And we are getting the same results as shopping malls.

At the heart of living both online and in-person is a resistance to what one considers a waste of time, as well as varying levels of commitment and perceived risks. It takes a lot less preparation to shop online in one’s pajamas than to get dressed, drive to the mall, and walk from store to store. There’s also significantly more risk – from driving to potential health concerns. No doubt, some church members will scoff at my mention of perceived health risks from gathering in crowds. But are we representing Jesus well to those with very real fears if we simply dismiss their concerns?

The culture has shifted.

Merchants, banks, colleges, healthcare providers, government entities… have adjusted to connect and serve both online and in-person. Innovative competitors in every field are pushing the envelope, forcing others to adjust or be left behind.

It’s hard to argue that this cultural shift isn’t well underway. But why aren’t more churches adjusting their approach to meet people where they are – online and in-person? Perhaps it’s because most churches (thankfully) don’t see each other as competitors. Competition drives change in the marketplace. But without such competition, the church tends to lag well behind in our approaches.

So, if we’re not competing, why should we change? Because the people we have been commissioned to reach have changed. They are living like most of us, somewhere and anywhere.

Most long-term churchgoers have failed to even realize that church is one of the only realms that we only do somewhere. Perhaps we so appreciate the in-person aspects of church that we can’t imagine engaging any part of church online. Yet, if we’re honest, we’re baffled by the general public’s disinterest in attending church. We may write them off as lost, immature, or even unreachable while completely missing the fact that we aren’t going where they are but rather waiting for them to come to us.

Perhaps we’re not following Jesus as intently as we think.

Throughout the Gospels, he went to where people were – parties, weddings, funerals, Jewish areas, Gentile territories… He seldom stayed anywhere insisting people came to him.

Jesus is the ultimate Somewhere AND Anywhere!

So, what does it look like for the church to be somewhere and anywhere?

I’m not sure any church has explored this enough to provide a definitive answer. Those in the marketplace are learning that the way to reach people somewhere and anywhere is continuously evolving. Surely the same will be true for churches.

However, I have some ideas:

• We need to raise the perceived value of in-person offerings. If we’re going to ask people, especially unchurched people, to invest the effort and shoulder their perceived risks to participate in church in-person, we could begin combining multiple elements of church within each in-person offering. Instead, of offering a couple of minutes of chit-chat before asking them to sit in rows, sing unfamiliar lyrics to less familiar tunes, listen to a monologue, perhaps have another minute or two of chit-chat and go home, we need to raise the value of personal connections by brainstorming how we could combine elements of fellowship, learning, worship, serving and prayer in ways unique to being in-person. In other words, we need to combine multiple potential points of value to every in-person visit.

  One way we’ve attempted this is having round tables in worship services with coffee/juice, an opportunity to share prayer concerns & praises with the small group at one’s table, and a time within the service for discussion questions… making all of a guest’s visit an opportunity to connect with others. I’m confident there are dozens of other ways to achieve this. But we need to extend this intentional mindset to combine elements of church to every aspect of in-person engagement.

• We must remember that most unchurched people are not looking for church to be their primary social outlet. One of the well-intentioned ways that we tend to repel average people from church ministries is by having retirees and stay-at-home parents, who crave any time with other adults, develop most of our ministry activities without clear agendas, purpose, or boundaries. If we’re going to attract those who are accustomed to online engagements and struggle to find the time for in-person engagements to our in-person events, they want to know that if they put the effort into arriving in-person, there will be a clear purpose, reward, and ending rather than a meandering flow of what may appear to them as trivial or purposeless.

• While I know this will upset some folks, we need to remove parents of young children from the rotating nursery worker responsibilities. It’s way easier and less risky for parents to keep their kids at home while watching online. Again, if they’re going to put forth the effort and bear the risk of coming in-person, we want them to feel that it was worth it.

• Online live interactive Bible studies scheduled around typical workplace hours creates an avenue for involvement when commute time excludes many from in-person Bible studies. The bonds forged in online studies often rival or exceed those shared by people who simply participate in in-person weekly churchwide worship. Though it may also be helpful to offer periodic in-person meet-up opportunities (coffee, lunch…) for participants. This invitation to meet in-person with a small group of people met online may provide a less threatening in-person opportunity than attending a worship service with a large room full of complete strangers. Again, we’re looking to create complimentary online and in-person offerings.

• Leaders could offer monthly online Q & As, and occasional in-person meet-ups at local hangouts…

• Using online and in-person surveys where people could voice ideas, concerns, and personal challenges anonymously, but the cumulative results could be shared through interesting graphics. Several companies like Crowdpurr provide tools to easily do this.

• Host some small groups completely online, especially if they are small groups based on stage of life or affinities rather than proximity (ex: young adults, couples with young or special needs children, pickleball players, business owners…) .

• Host some purposeful online chatroom events. “We’re going to discuss or explore ___________________________ this Sunday from 5:00pm to 6:00pm.”

• Offer some recorded downloadable or on-demand resources, courses, concerts, podcasts… that people can see or hear anytime.

• Host online prayer groups.

• Interactive online gaming is huge in our culture, and competitors often love the opportunity to meet their online competition in-person. There’s an opportunity there for tech savvy churches.

• If we’re going to stream our in-person services, we could provide online hosts available to engage, offer insights before and after services, or answer questions during the service. Nearly every unchurched person has questions during a service. Imagine offering every online and in-person participant a way to message questions to an informed person standing by ready to respond to them during each worship service. You might eliminate the possibility of people tuning out or never returning because they misunderstood, assumed incorrectly, or misheard something.

• What if you offered weekly information - bulletins, announcements, opportunities to sign-up for serving - to everyone who watched an online service, making them feel less like an outsider looking in?

• Invite different groups within the church to take turns hosting your online offerings and social media pages, keeping them fresh with new personalities and posts every few days or weeks.

• Highlight in-person and online groups like Sunday School classes, small groups, ministry teams, Bible studies, pastoral staff online. People are far more apt to transition from online to in-person if they are confident that they will recognize or know people when they arrive.

• Adopt, develop, or white label your own Bible study or ministry app and promote it churchwide.

Those are just a few ideas to get you thinking. I don’t expect the future of church to be only online. But it’s clear that it will not be exclusively in-person either. Churches could learn a lot from sailors. Rather than trying to change their circumstances, sailors adjust & adapt to the ever-changing wind & seas without changing their destination, companions, or means of measuring progress. The wind and seas are changing. People are living both somewhere and anywhere every day. If we’re not adjusting to meet them with complimentary offerings both online and in-person, we’re missing countless opportunities and we’ll be left behind.

THANKS FOR READING,

John