The Rev. Dr.

John Hatcher

Religion Columnist

A fabulous supermarket just opened within a stone's throw of our church. Now it won't be a chore to stop by the store for a gallon of milk on the way home. This new store has everything. You can get your prescription drugs, drop off your laundry, buy some flowers, get some ATM cash, and pick up a few groceries.

A lot of folks have a supermarket mentality when it comes to church. They breeze in, look things over, buy what they want, and breeze out. Churches are constantly challenged to provide what the church customer is itching for. For, if they don't like what they see at ours, they are likely to go to another church market. Do you remember the days in the early '60s when churches started offering a new department in their sales line: a youth ministry? It was the goal of almost every church to have a part-time youth director. We just knew if we had a youth director our sales would blast off. Not! Then, do you remember the days when churches started to realize that a whole lot of the congregation was single and that if they had a singles ministry, everything would be just pinky? Not! Then, do you remember when churches decided that they needed a music ministry? More than a choir. More than a choirmaster. More than an anthem a week. The church wanted Broadway-like musicals, multi-instrumental groups. More than a piano and organ. The music ministry would give the church new life, growth, and solve every other problem. Not!

The church has continued to pile ministries on top of programs on top of ministries in a well-motivated attempt to minister relevantly to the population. In the old days, the people got an hour-long sermon, three hymns, a long prayer, and see you next Sunday. Funny thing: We still had prayer in the schools, abortion was a shame, and kids didn't carry guns to school.

Do I want to go back to yesterday? No. But, I would like a little less of the supermarket mentality that drives the church. We've got to have a preschool ministry. We've got to offer a full-orbited children's ministry. Surely God knows we would be embarrassed without a youth ministry. Our singles need structure too. Oh yes, don't forget the senior adults. Got to have a bus for the seniors and a van for the youth, or vice versa. Don't forget a special women's ministry and men's ministry. If we don't have them, people will think we are in the dark ages. But, there's even more: ministries to the divorced, the abused, the abusers. Even, in recent years, a recreational ministry.

If we don't offer these ministries, we fear, the people will go down to a mega-church that offers all these and more. The church market that offers the widest selection seems to get the most church customers. Does it seem that we need to rethink what church is all about? Is it more about a supermarket or the supernatural?

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