If you build it, they will come (or How does the church grow?)
Hespeler, 11
September, 2016 © Scott McAndless
Zechariah
6:9-15, Mark 13:1-8, Psalm 48
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isten, Heldai,
Tobijah, and Jedaiah, we’ve got a problem and we need to talk about it. Our
religion is in trouble. Yes, we have religious freedom and people are able to
worship as they choose, but they just don’t seem to be choosing our religion
anymore, at least not like they once did. Oh, there was a time when people
would come together in places like this and lift up their voices in prayer and
worship. It was the place to be and everyone felt like they were a part of
something that mattered.
But
then the world changed. Now, all of a sudden it seems that people have other
places that they need to be. Their lives are in other places like Babylon and
Persia and they don’t seem to need the old ways of their ancestors anymore.
But
don’t you worry, Heldai, Tobijah and Jedaiah, because we have a plan. We’re
going to get a bunch of supplies together and raise some funds and we’re going
to build us a temple. And it will be the biggest, best and most beautiful
temple that you have ever seen. And then we’re going to set up the best of
worship services, festivals and sacrifices in that holy space. You’ll see, when
we do that, people will come from all over the place to see and to be part of
it.
So,
what do you say, Heldai, Tobijah, Jedaiah, will you give us a donation of, say,
20,000 talents each so that we can build it? If you do, and if we build it,
they will surely come.
That
is essentially the pitch of the prophet Zechariah in our reading from the book
that bears his name this morning. The issue he is dealing with is the same
issue that we are dealing with in the church today: the general decline of traditional
religious institutions.
Some
people don’t see the decline, of course, because there are, always have been
and always will be significant exceptions – specific churches and groups of
churches that see dynamic growth. You can definitely find those churches in
most cities and we ought to study them and learn from them.
They
are not all, by the way, churches that have the same theology. Some of them are
extremely conservative and some extremely liberal with all the shades in
between. The defining characteristic of a growing church is no longer its
theological bent, but there are certainly other factors that do matter.
This
decline is made all the more dramatic because it is part of a generational
shift. The incoming generation, often called the “millennials” and the generation
that is coming up after them (that nobody has named yet) is the least engaged
in religion ever.
I
don’t tell you all of this because I think it is a reason to despair or give up
on the church. I actually feel that, more than anything, these are hopeful
signs and that God is using these sorts of cultural changes to renew his church
so that it will be strong and ready to meet the challenges of the future. But,
in order to find that strength, one thing is necessary. We need to respond to
these challenges in the best ways possible.
What
we read this morning from the Book of Zechariah is one possible response to a
very similar situation. The prophet is concerned because of the decline of the
traditional religion of the people of Israel. The reasons for this decline are
different – have come mostly because of a major disruption of the entire
society and culture by an enforced exile of the people to Babylon. But the
challenge is very similar.
Zechariah’s
response is to say, “We need to build something really impressive here.” He is
trying to rally the people to build a temple. And he encourages them to do so
by making a promise: “Those who are far off shall come and help to build the
temple of the Lord; and you shall know that the Lord of hosts has sent me to
you. This will happen if you diligently obey the voice of the Lord your God.”
The promise is a promise from God through the prophet and the promise is, “If
you build it, they will come.”
And
that seems to be the solution that people most often go to. If the institution
has fallen on hard times, people’s automatic response is to say, “Let’s build
up the institution and make it beautiful and impressive and that is what will
make everyone want to be part of it. And I will admit that there are times when
that kind of approach is the one that works. It seems to have worked (at least
to a certain degree) in Zechariah’s time. People did return and there was a
renewal of the faith of Israel. I suspect that the terrible cultural loss that
was the Babylonian exile left people hungry for the stability that a new temple
institution promised.
Of
course, there were complaints, there always are. “This new temple just isn’t
like the old one.” People got nostalgic for the “good old days.” That is
something that always seems to happen whenever you try that “if you build it”
approach to institutional growth. Nothing ever seems to measure up to the “good
old days.” That is definitely the kind of complaint that we hear all the time
in the church to this very day. But, when the conditions are right, it
certainly can be true that, if you build it, they will come.
I
don’t believe that we are living in such a time, though. In our gospel reading
this morning, we catch Jesus at a very interesting moment. Jesus, we are told
in the first verse of the thirteenth chapter of the Gospel of Mark, has just
left the temple. This will be, by the way, the last time that he ever leaves
the temple in this Gospel. He will never enter it again. And he clearly does
not leave it on the best of terms. He has already effectively shut down the
temple’s revenue stream by stopping the people who are buying and selling and
changing money. And he only just finished expressing his disgust at the
hypocrisy and the favouritism towards the rich that he sees in the place.
His
leaving the temple institution at this moment is not just a matter of stage
direction. It is an act that is full of meaning. In fact, his leaving the
institution of the temple is analogous to the exit from the church of some
people in our own day because they have become disillusioned with the institutional
church due to the failings or hypocrisy that they have seen.
And
the disciples see what Jesus is doing. Of course they do. And it is distressing
to them that this man whom they love and respect should turn his back on the
central institution of Jewish religion and culture. So what do they do? They
try to give him a reason to stay around, just like we try to do when we see
people drifting away from the church.
And
what is the reason they offer? “Look, Teacher,” they say, “what large stones and what large buildings!” Take careful note of
what they are doing here because it is the very same thing that we do all the
time. They think that the way to get Jesus to stay within the institutions of
the Jewish faith is by drawing his attention to what has been built and how impressive
it is. They are saying, “They have built it, you should come.”
Obviously
this approach doesn’t work with Jesus. In fact, it sets him off on a rant that
will go on through the rest of the chapter – a rant in which he basically says,
“Stones? Is that the best you can do? You think that stones will impress me? I’ll
tell you something, in no time there won’t be one stone left on top of another
in this place.” His message is that the “if you build it” approach may even
lead to the fall of the institution and that even more than that will fall
apart.
The
passage in Zechariah does teach us that there are times when you can accomplish
a lot with an “if you build it, they will come” approach. It is a necessary
approach when you are living in times, like Zechariah was, when the basic
cultural infrastructure of a society has been taken apart. But Jesus was not
living in such a time. The issue in his day was that abuse and hypocrisy had
called the institutions themselves into question. This was something that Jesus
specialized in pointing out. In such times, people will not come just because
you build it.
I believe
that we are living in such times today. Certainly many people have the same
reaction to institutions as Jesus did. When they begin to lose their relevance
and luster, the impulse is to leave and to predict that the stones will not
stand for long one on top of the other. One thing that that means for the
church of the present and the near future is that we cannot count on people
coming just because we build it, which is a problem for the church because that
seems to be our biggest growth strategy.
Jesus
didn’t grow the movement around him by building anything. Did you ever think
about that? He built no buildings and didn’t even establish any sort of
formalized structure. He didn’t even establish any rituals or worship liturgies
apart from the two very simple sacraments (the Lord’s Supper and baptism) and
one prayer. He established some leaders but no power structures. All of those
trappings of institutionalism came later as the church struggled to create
institutions out of what Jesus had begun.
But,
while Jesus didn’t have any real “building project,” he still managed to get
people excited about being part of what he was doing and involved in working
towards changing the world. That is why I do not think that we ought to be
worried about the future of the church. Yes, it is true that people will not
come to the church these days just because we have built it, but that does not
mean that they won’t come. We need to approach the invitation more like Jesus
did.
We will
look deeper into the approach that Jesus took next week, but the basic idea is
pretty simple. Jesus could have waited for people to come to him, but he just
didn’t. Do you remember the time when Jesus made a big splash in Capernaum. He
healed a woman in the synagogue, cast out a few demons and by the end of the
day people were lining up at the door of Simon Peter’s house where Jesus was
staying to see him. He could have stayed there and waited for people from all
over Galilee to come to him. Peter’s house could have become the church that he
built. That was even what Peter was expecting him to do and when Jesus
disappeared the next morning he hunted Jesus down and angrily demanded that he
come back and stay.
But
Jesus said no. Jesus said he had to go out to where the people were, he and all
of his disciples. He had to take the kingdom of God to where they were and not
wait for them to come to where he had built some institution of the kingdom of
God. He had to invite them to come and see.
I know
that the other approach sounds so much easier to us. If we could just build it
– you know, maintain this beautiful building and our amazing programs and
activities and people would just come. We wouldn’t have to engage them. We
wouldn’t have to tell people where were were and what we did on Sunday
mornings, those who were so inclined would just come on their own. But we are
not living in a time when it works like that. We are living in an age when some
churches grow but none of them grow just by virtue of being there. We are
living in the age where it falls to all believers to let others know that they
can come and see.
#140CharacterSermon “If you build it, they
will come.” Not how church growth works in an age when people view institutions
with suspicion.
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