Church Hopping
This post was inspired by another article from here: http://www.relevantmagazine.com/god/problem-church-hopping.
The article addresses an issue that is more prevalent in the American context: church hopping. Church hopping could be more prevalent due to the number of churches there and also because people are more mobile and move all over the place for their work and studies. But more importantly, one has to consider the consumeristic culture of the American society. The consumer market in USA is huge, really huge and every year, millions and billions of dollars are spent on consumer goods. This is evident by the success of numerous online purchase websites such as Amazon.com, Wayfair, Walmart etc. It reflects the consumer culture in the country and this consumer culture is in turn being reflected in how people tend to hop around the churches.
This made me think about Singapore as well. As a heavily westernised country, I do think that the landscape is not much different, though I must say that Christianity in Singapore is much more conservative than what we see in America and people tend to stick with one church. Yet we do see people hopping around churches, normally for numerous reasons.
One such reason, that I have heard, is that the sermons being preached in the services are not 'deep' enough. Granted that we do expect our pastors and preachers to preach good sermons that satisfy the soul over the weekends, I often wonder the underlying assumptions behind this being the reason why people leave church. Does it reflect a kind of mentality that treats discipleship solely as a weekend thing, that one only goes to church once per week and be fed? Does it reflect the heavy reliance on sermons for spiritual food? Does it reflect that mentality that the pastors and preachers owe us our spiritual food? I grew up spiritually in a church environment where spiritual food and teachings occur mostly outside of service setting and because of this, I take it for granted that we do not depend solely on sermons for our spiritual feeding. Even for sermons, leaders normally have to contextualise it to suit the different groups.
Another reason for leaving, that I have often heard from my environment, is that the church is not in line with their own personal vision(s). Hence, they need to find a church which is already doing what they think God has called them to do. I wonder if there's another way of doing this. Perhaps God is calling this group of people to start something in the church, or God is using them to identify certain blind spots within the church.
But don't get me wrong. There are seasons when one has to decide whether it is time to move church, either because God has shown them the way to another church to meet certain needs, or because the person needs a new environment to experience God in a different way so that his relationship with God can be renewed. It can also be the case that there is a change in geographical location (though not that relevant in Singapore). I have also seen such people. And I do believe that sometimes, it may be better to leave a rotten tree lest it infects you as well than staying and hoping that you can rejuvenate the tree.
Yet, in most cases, consumer mindset is always detected. I suppose, if the starting point is always 'me', then it becomes a suspect that you may be changing church because of a consumer mindset rather than a God-driven reason. However, make no mistake, this is a very grey area, as any reasons can be misconstrued that way and as with many cases, it will take prayers and seeking the face of God, coming clean before Him if one seeks to decide whether to change church or not. After all, we are not called to be frivolous in our church membership.
The article addresses an issue that is more prevalent in the American context: church hopping. Church hopping could be more prevalent due to the number of churches there and also because people are more mobile and move all over the place for their work and studies. But more importantly, one has to consider the consumeristic culture of the American society. The consumer market in USA is huge, really huge and every year, millions and billions of dollars are spent on consumer goods. This is evident by the success of numerous online purchase websites such as Amazon.com, Wayfair, Walmart etc. It reflects the consumer culture in the country and this consumer culture is in turn being reflected in how people tend to hop around the churches.
This made me think about Singapore as well. As a heavily westernised country, I do think that the landscape is not much different, though I must say that Christianity in Singapore is much more conservative than what we see in America and people tend to stick with one church. Yet we do see people hopping around churches, normally for numerous reasons.
One such reason, that I have heard, is that the sermons being preached in the services are not 'deep' enough. Granted that we do expect our pastors and preachers to preach good sermons that satisfy the soul over the weekends, I often wonder the underlying assumptions behind this being the reason why people leave church. Does it reflect a kind of mentality that treats discipleship solely as a weekend thing, that one only goes to church once per week and be fed? Does it reflect the heavy reliance on sermons for spiritual food? Does it reflect that mentality that the pastors and preachers owe us our spiritual food? I grew up spiritually in a church environment where spiritual food and teachings occur mostly outside of service setting and because of this, I take it for granted that we do not depend solely on sermons for our spiritual feeding. Even for sermons, leaders normally have to contextualise it to suit the different groups.
Another reason for leaving, that I have often heard from my environment, is that the church is not in line with their own personal vision(s). Hence, they need to find a church which is already doing what they think God has called them to do. I wonder if there's another way of doing this. Perhaps God is calling this group of people to start something in the church, or God is using them to identify certain blind spots within the church.
But don't get me wrong. There are seasons when one has to decide whether it is time to move church, either because God has shown them the way to another church to meet certain needs, or because the person needs a new environment to experience God in a different way so that his relationship with God can be renewed. It can also be the case that there is a change in geographical location (though not that relevant in Singapore). I have also seen such people. And I do believe that sometimes, it may be better to leave a rotten tree lest it infects you as well than staying and hoping that you can rejuvenate the tree.
Yet, in most cases, consumer mindset is always detected. I suppose, if the starting point is always 'me', then it becomes a suspect that you may be changing church because of a consumer mindset rather than a God-driven reason. However, make no mistake, this is a very grey area, as any reasons can be misconstrued that way and as with many cases, it will take prayers and seeking the face of God, coming clean before Him if one seeks to decide whether to change church or not. After all, we are not called to be frivolous in our church membership.
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