Seth Godin wrote on his blog the other day,
I have deeds. ”Show me your faith without deeds, and I will show you my faith by my deeds. You believe that there is one God. Good! Even the demons believe that—and shudder. You foolish person, do you want evidence that faith without deeds is useless? Was not our father Abraham considered righteous for what he did when he offer ed his son Isaac on the altar? You see that his faith and his actions were working together, and his faith was made complete by what he did. And the scripture was fulfilled that says, “Abraham believed God, and it was credited to him as righteousness,” and he was called God’s friend. You see that a person is considered righteous by what they do and not by faith alone. In the same way, was not even Rahab the prostitute considered righteous for what she did when she gave lodging to the spies and sent them off in a different direction? As the body without the spirit is dead, so faith without deeds is dead.” –James 2:17-26
Abraham and Rahab didn’t just give lip service to faith in God, they allowed that faith to turn their world upside down and challenge them in ways they never thought imaginable. Is your faith all about words? Or are you allowing that faith to turn your world upside down? To paraphrase Seth Godin from a church and Christian perspective, “Let us do more than adopt the words of Jesus, let us adopt the change He has for our lives as well!”
While my overall experience at Saddleback was very positive and the Lord blessed my personal worship experience, there were three things I would change. Two I feel are essential to worship and one is just a personal preference.
Let us start with my personal preference just to get it out of the way: The dress is so casual at Saddleback that if I wore a suit there I would definitely feel “out of place.” Why would I change this? Because I like to wear a suit! Christina (my wife) on the other hand loved being able to dress down, and asked me if I knew how hard it was to try and corral kids in a dress? Dresses aren’t my thing, so I had to admit I do not understand that challenge.
Okay now for the other two items. There was only one prayer in the service. It was Pastor Rick Warren’s closing prayer. I didn’t like this, I believe if we say that prayer is important as believers and even Pastor Rick mentioned the power of prayer in order to change in his sermon, then we have to model it before our people and place great emphasis on it! Maybe they do this at other times, but it is not evident in their worship service. On a side note though, off of their patio (outdoor foyer) they do have a prayer garden and there are people that will pray with individuals and for individuals desiring prayer after the service. I would still like to see a greater emphasis in the worship service.
The other item that I didn’t like is that giving was never even mentioned in the worship service and if I hadn’t seen the plate coming I would not have even known they were collecting offering. Giving is an integral act of worship and again I believe this should be clearly affirmed in a worship service.
Those are the negatives from our time at Saddleback all the rest was great! Including a wonderful message on Biblical change from Romans 12:1-12.
I hope you have enjoyed the Saddleback Observations blogs.
No one that was late had to find their own seat. As I stated in a previous post, there were not very many that were late to the service, but of those that were, not a single one of them had to find their own seat. An usher went down the row and quietly and respectfully asked folks if seats near them were open. If they were, the usher motioned to the individuals and they came forward and sat down. This is a very little thing but think of all the times people have gone into a church, seen a spot that looked open, they walk down to sit in that spot only to see that there are kids on the floor playing or that someone has saved those seats. Then there is that awkward moment where they start scramble either looking for another seat or back to the rear of the sanctuary. I always feel bad for these people. This again is not anything that costs any money, it just takes coordinating and caring. I think we have both of these resources in most our churches.
I believe we can learn sometimes as much by what people don’t do or do wrong as we can from the things folk do well. So tomorrow I am going to share with y’all a few observations that Saddleback Church didn’t do that I hope we WILL do!
When Christina and I walked into Saddleback’s Sanctuary I was amazed at how many people I saw! (I took the picture below about 10 minutes before the service started). The seating capacity of the sanctuary is 3500 so I would estimate there were about 2000 folk in the main sanctuary (there are several other locations on campus that hold worshipers for different styles of worship: praise only, hymns only, hip hop, etc.. I’m not sure if these all go on Sabbath though or only on Sunday), plus folk at ten other campuses around Southern California that the sermon is fed live to.
Here is why the large amount of people at this worship service struck me. I have heard over the course of my ministry career that the reason more people don’t attend Seventh-day Adventist churches, is because they don’t want to go to church on Saturday. I’m thinking this may be an excuse! Because what I saw were a lot of people that were there on a Sabbath to worship. In fact most large churches now have at least one Saturday service. And most people I talk to their big obstacle of attending church is not that we have the worship service on Saturday. Let me throw in a quick caveat: I do understand that the way we teach Sabbath is different, we believe Saturday is the day for worship, rather than just an option, and I recognize this could be a barrier for some. But overall again as I talk to different folk that are guests at our church they aren’t hung-up on attending on Saturday, we think they are, because it gives us an out, but sorry that OUT doesn’t really exist anymore in most areas of this country (especially with folk 50 and under).
So if people aren’t attending Seventh-day Adventist churches and the reason is not because of Sabbath versus Sunday worship? Then why? It is a question we need to be asking ourselves! Yes accepting the Sabbath as a Holy Day may be challenging, but come on folk is it any more challenging than: A baby being born to a virgin and a carpenter growing-up and discovering that He used to be in Heaven and that His real dad isn’t that carpenter but is actually God in Heaven and He wasn’t conceived through intercourse but by the Holy Spirit planting Him in His mothers belly. Then He walked this earth for 3 1/2 years and at the end of those years He was convicted of no crime and yet He was still hung-on a tree, and 3 days later an angel rolled away the stone and folded up His grave clothes. Then He was picked up by some angels and went to Heaven. And what He left behind were about 120 totally sold out followers of His and they were hanging out praying when tongues of fire came out of heaven and into the room they were in and they started speaking in languages so that whoever heard them whatever language they spoke they could be understood…and “about three thousand were added to their number that day” (Acts 2:41) and “And the Lord added to their number daily those who were being saved” (Acts 2:47). I guess the Sabbath doesn’t seem like such an obstacle when I think of that message that Peter and the rest preached.
So what could it be?