I'm Here, Ask Me

I am a young pastor. I have a young family. I am in the target demographic the church is supposedly trying to target, yet I have never been asked by anyone in a higher position of authority what I would like to see the church do/become. Why is that?

I have certainly heard a lot from these people (who are all at least 20 years older than I am) about what I should be doing and what my generation wants, but where are they getting this information?

While I cannot speak for my entire generation, very little of what I hear is actually appealing to me. Most of the "magic bullets" I have heard about from the top will not be effective with me or my friends. So it's little wonder to me that most of these ideas fail at hitting their target.

I routinely hear that we need to have a contemporary service, by which they mean having a praise/rock band. That's certainly not what I want in a service. First of all I have never actually seen a contemporary service that I have thought was done well. I know they are out there, but I haven't seen it yet. Second, if you attend such a service look around at who is there and who seems to be getting the most out of it. In my experience it's 40-year-old white women. While they are just as deserving of receiving the word of God, that is not really the major target audience for most churches. Third, while I do have Led Zeppelin, Pink Floyd and other rock bands in my cd collection and I do listen to them, that is not what I listen to most of the time. Now if you want to do a country service, that I might be interested in attending.

But the real point is that my life is chaotic and noisy outside of church. When I go to church I need to be able to find some quiet space and time. I don't need more noise. Does that mean we don't sing more "contemporary" songs, no we certainly can, but putting a rock band in the chancel is not attractive to me as a worship option.

I attended a conference in January and during the worship service, they of course had their rock bands playing and the music was so loud that I left not full of the Holy Spirit but with a headache. I actually stopped going to the services because I couldn't take it.

So do you know what it takes to attract people of my generation and those with young children? You don't unless you actually take the time to ask them, to truly hear what they have to say and then be prepared to do something about it. So here I am, ask me...