What's your Status?

Becka:

What does that question mean, by the way, in its Discovery Church context? Is it asking whether you’re a saint or an infidel? I need to get someone to explain their name to me at some point. Anyway, on to the real blog…

It would be impossible to “get” the entire ethos of a church from one Sunday visit – to understand why they do things the way they do. But before I visited Status I heard people describe one aspect of their service that I thought sounded very interesting. During the singing, the musicians and worship leaders are only back-lit, which means that while there is light on the stage, you cannot see their faces. I’m not sure if they do it every week, but they did the week I was there. It’s actually not too noticeably different so I’m glad I knew beforehand what they were doing and why in order to appreciate it. The reason Status has chosen to do this is so that hopefully the congregation can focus more on God instead of on the people onstage. Whatever there is to be said for the fact that it could be helpful to see the leader’s face to know when to sing, I like the evidence of reasoning behind this choice because it shows the types of issues they’re thinking through.

One other thing that I noticed and liked is that they have communion every week. They don’t “do” communion every week, but they do have it available. Mind you, it was laid out on coffee tables with candles which, coupled with the dark room and stage lighting, seemed more “goth” than “early church,” and therefore a bit creepy. But it was there and I appreciate that. And there’s nothing wrong with a gothic atmosphere anyway.

Kailey:

I was once having a discussion about churches during a bonfire at Alastair and Julia’s house, and we began to talk about Status. One of their friends (who I’d just met that evening) said, “Oh yeah, I love it—but it’s a tight-pants church, for sure.” After I’d finished with my initial outburst of laughter, I was further amused to realize that I had yet to encounter a more felicitous adjective to describe my very own impressions of the Status church community. (I should point out that I use the term “tight-pant church” in NO derogatory sense, whatever. It’s just a super-accurate qualifier. And I have a lot of really awesome tight-pants friends, like JP and Kyle.)

I don’t think there’s anything wrong with having a young, trendy congregation, as long as not all churches everywhere are young and trendy, and your church isn’t throwing people out on the sidewalk who don’t have tastefully weathered chucks and “scene” hair. I think the way your pastor communicates the message of the grace and love of Christ will (by virtue of his or her own natural personality) attract a certain similar range of personalities. Incidentally, Josh Loveless was preaching that night about how we lose the depth and utility of our relationships by denying those around us vulnerable authenticity. His sermon illustration was a story about a man talking on his cell phone in the bathroom stall next to him. Josh thought the man was talking to him, and began to answer—awkwardly. (Then of course he finds out the guy is on a cell phone, ha ha, etc, etc.) The point was that the frequency and speed with which we can communicate nowadays (like, even while relieving yourself) do not necessarily make your relationships more authentic, and can perhaps even be damaging.

I liked his message. There was a lot of wisdom in it. But wise or not, the cell-phone-in-toilet-etiquette illustration may have been lost on anyone, say, over 50. Of course Status is a tight-pants church. That was a tight-pants story, and it garnered much tight-pants laughter.

I don’t have a solid opinion about diversity (or the acute lack of diversity) in a church. At first blush, my gut reaction is “of COURSE there should be diversity in churches! There’s diversity in the body of Christ.” But it’s more complicated in practice than in theory. Should the pastor change the messages he communicates—or the language with which he communicates said messages—in order to expand his target audience? Will securing the presence of a new demographic of church-goers justify the absence of the church-goers who are no longer able to relate to the new language? Somebody has to speak to the people who most easily relate to you. Should you sacrifice tight-pants for tight collars? I don’t know. It’s something for me to wrestle with.

My pastor once said in an interview that you can preach a sermon that helpful without it being biblical, but you can’t preach a sermon that’s biblical without it being helpful. I agree with that. Bottom line—if the pastor is communicating biblical truth in a way that is understandable and relevant to those listening, if the congregants are being inspired to pursue their own personal holiness, if they’re serving, if they’re praying—something right is happening, even if it needs tweaking.

Kailey (on Beck’s thoughts):

I agree Beck. I also really liked the concept of backlighting the worship team. I feel like they’re refusing to sacrifice the excellence of the worship, while simultaneously refusing to focus on the excellence of the worship.