{"id":579,"date":"2020-06-23T18:45:48","date_gmt":"2020-06-23T18:45:48","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/pbthomas.com\/thoughts\/?p=579"},"modified":"2020-06-23T18:45:50","modified_gmt":"2020-06-23T18:45:50","slug":"church-life-after-covid19-some-thoughts","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/pbthomas.com\/thoughts\/?p=579","title":{"rendered":"Church Life After Covid19 – Some Thoughts"},"content":{"rendered":"
\n

What\nwill church life be like in the \u201cnew normal\u201d which is emerging as the Covid19\nlockdown is gradually lifted? The new reality is that until a vaccine or an\neffective cure is found, in the same way as offices and factories and shops and\npublic transport and the hospitality industries have changed, church life will\nnot just go back to the way it was before. In what forms might such activities\nas worship, teaching, prayer, fellowship, pastoral care, mission, evangelism, work\nwith children and young people, community involvement and prophetic witness continue?\nHow might the work of ministers need to change?<\/p>\n\n\n\n

There\nare six features of the life of the Early Church listed in Acts 2:42-47. They\nare teaching, fellowship, the breaking of bread, prayers, signs and wonders and\nspectacular growth. I explored each of these in a booklet of sermons which is\nonline at http:\/\/northspringfield.pbthomas.com\/?p=541<\/a>.\nConsidering those six essential elements of church life, this article will discuss\nwhat church might look like after Covid19. Some changes may only be temporary,\nimposed by constraints such as social distancing or reduced finances. Other changes\nmay prove to be desirable and become permanent. Naturally, congregations will differ\nin the ways they go forward, not least depending on the levels of vulnerability\nwithin the memberships. The primary focus here is on Baptist churches and other\nself-governing self-financing congregations, but most of what is said will\napply to churches of all traditions.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Teaching<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Bible\nteaching on core beliefs, ethics and Christian living, has always been at the\nheart of church life. The lockdown has introduced very many Christians to new experiences\nof learning and inspiration using technology such as livestreaming and video\nconferencing. These will surely continue in the post-Covid church to make teaching\naccessible to those who cannot easily leave their homes, not only for health\nreasons but equally e.g. because of childcare needs. Sermons will continue to\nbe presented on YouTube or Facebook, as well as in person. Bible Study Groups can\ncontinue to meet on Zoom or Teams as well as in person. Helping disciples grow one-to-one\nwill become even more important because that can happen easily over the phone\nor face to face even when larger groups cannot meet. Many Christians have\ndiscovered the joys of personal study using books or online resources and some\nhave embraced a variety of patterns of personal devotions. All this is very\ngood.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

There\nare two obvious dangers here.  The first lies\nin the variable quality of the materials available, especially via the internet.\nNot all online teaching is actually Christian and many sites ranking highly on search\nengines come from non-Christian agencies. A preacher\u2019s popularity is a poor guide\nto their reliability. The rise of the health, wealth and prosperity teachers,\nand the cults of celebrity, have already given ample warnings of these risks. Style\nmay triumph over substance, especially in the eyes of new Christians and\nseekers. Then there is the ever-present danger of consumer Christianity, where a\nsmorgasbord of teaching simply reinforces individualism. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Following\nJesus is both personal and corporate. The plural of disciple is church, and\nparticipation in the Christian community is not an optional extra in faith. To serve\nand safeguard their congregations, whenever possible local churches will need\nto continue to offer \u201cvirtual church\u201d. Church leaders will need to assume\nresponsibility for providing their churches with good online content and also for\nguiding them through the maze of very mixed material available. That said, most\nministers have said that their online sermons are shorter than they used to be in\nperson, often with more detailed preparation and less waffle. Online services using\na video conferencing platform where everybody can participate have often included\nmore discussion, or times of open prayer. It will surely be good if these new\npatterns continue.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

 Fellowship<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Asking\nChristians what they have missed most in the time of lockdown, some reply it is\nthe coffee and the cakes after the services. Most would say they have come to a\ngreater appreciation of the importance of fellowship in their lives and to\ntheir faith. The heart of the common life of the church is the relationships\nbetween Christians, \u201cnot meetings but friendships.\u201d Even though people have not\nbeen able to meet face-to-face, friendships have usually been sustained by\nphone, WhatsApp or Messenger. Many churches and Christians have rediscovered\nthe value of newsletters, sent out by email and even by post. In many churches existing\nnetworks for mutual support and encouragement have been strengthened and new\nnetworks have been created. In this time when ministers and pastors have been\nrequired to suspend their usual patterns of pastoral and hospital visiting\n(sometimes because of their own health issues as well as those of their congregations)\nmany church members have stepped up and been providing all kinds of vital practical\npastoral care to their neighbours and their communities. Pastoral care is not \u201cthe\ncare the Pastor gives\u201d but rather the mutual support and encouragement and\npractical help which every Christian gives to fellow-believers and to their\nneighbours. It is to be hoped that all this will continue to be a feature of the\nlife of every church but it will be important to ensure that no members of the\ncongregation are left out in the \u201cnew normal\u201d especially taking care of those\nwith frailty or disability or no access to technology. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

On\nthe other hand, many of the events and activities which churches have customarily\narranged to facilitate fellowship may not be possible for months or years to\ncome due to constraints on meeting together in larger groups in limited spaces.\nThis may include many of the \u201ccrossing places\u201d churches organise to serve the community,\nfrom Toddler Groups and Pre-schools to Caf\u00e9s and Drop-Ins. As well as\nstrengthening the networks of small groups within the congregation, churches\nwill need to be creative in finding new ways to serve and bless and reach out\nto their communities.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Worship and the Breaking of Bread<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

The\npurpose of gathering together is not to escape from the \u201creal world\u201d by a time\nof \u201cworshipping God\u201d but rather to equip and sustain Christians so that we may\nbetter worship and serve God in our daily lives. At their best, \u201cvirtual church\u201d\ngatherings have not attempted simply to reproduce \u201cin the building\u201d experiences\nof church for home consumption. They have often involved much greater\nparticipation by members of the congregation, either in advanced preparation of\nelements in pre-recorded \u201cbroadcast\u201d services or at the time in livestreamed or\nvideo conferencing gatherings. These elements will surely continue in many more\nservices post-Covid. Sung worship has inevitably been different and many\nChristians have been discovering the benefits of less familiar elements such as\nset prayers or liturgies. As with teaching, churches will surely want to use\ntechnology to continue to enable remote participation alongside those who are\ngathering in person. Churches anticipating a congregation larger than their\nbuilding will accommodate with whatever social distancing measures are imposed\nmay need to consider multiple services. We await with trepidation the\nforthcoming guidelines regarding singing and musical instruments which may well\nchange the shape of our collective worship. Some churches may choose to use\ntechnology to weave together singing in the home with a message and prayers\ngathered in person. In particular, churches for whom singing in large packed\ncongregations is a major feature may have to wait longer than most to resume\ntheir former patterns of worship. One exciting  possibility would be for small groups including\nmore than one household (as regulations permit) to gather in homes while socially\ndistancing and participate remotely together while some others gather in the\nbuilding.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Unlike\nsome other traditions, Baptist approaches to the Lord\u2019s Supper have mostly been\nhappy with remembering Christ through Bread and Cup remotely. We all long to\nmeet together to share one loaf and one Cup again, but the pattern of pre-cut\npieces of bread and individual communion cups is likely to become almost universal\nfor non-conformists. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Prayers<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Prayer\nis the heart of the individual believer\u2019s relationship with God and of the life\nof any church. The first Christians were \u201cconstantly in prayer\u201d.<\/em> (Acts\n1:14) Online services have often involved more prayers than some churches had\npreviously included and many Christians will want this to continue. Online\nprayer meetings have allowed some to participate who would not have been able\nto gather physically through frailty or family commitments. Perhaps most significantly,\nmany Christians who had never done so before have valued simply praying with\neach other over the phone. (Matthew 18:19-20) Many have also discovered set\nprayers and patterns of personal devotions sent by email or by post or found\nonline. Most Christians would say that prayer in their everyday lives has increased\nin importance to them during the lockdown and churches will want to nurture all\nthese new contexts for prayer.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Signs and Wonders<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

The\nvitality of the post-Covid church will depend more than anything else on the openness\nof God\u2019s people to His Holy Spirit. During the lockdown Christians have been rediscovering\nthat the church is not the Building, nor the Programme of events or activities,\nbut the church is the People of God. Central to that identity as Christ\u2019s Body,\nthe Household of Faith and God\u2019s Holy Temple is the Presence of God, the activity\nof the Holy Spirit (Ephesians 2:19-22). Along with so many aspects of everyday\nlife, so many parts of the ordinary life of churches were suspended in March. We\nare now trying to discern which parts should begin again (and when), which\nparts need to change for the \u201cnew normal\u201d and which aspects of church life as\nit was we should be ready to relinquish. In all of this, Christians and churches\nshould not be relying on human wisdom but instead we will surely be seeking the\nguidance and empowering of the Holy Spirit. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Spectacular Growth<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

The\nspectacular growth of the Early Church was not due to programmes and projects but\nsimply faithful witness in the face of persecution, not only by the apostles and\nchurch leaders preaching and proclaiming and debating but also by nameless\nindividual believers \u201cgossiping the gospel\u201d wherever they went. In the lockdown\nmost of the mission activities which local churches were running on their\npremises had to stop and many of these will not be able to run again until\nsocial distancing is no longer required. Outreach and evangelism and community\nservice will not be able to be expressed as much in centralised events and\nprojects. The focus will become more on individual Christians and small groups\ncaring for their neighbours and talking about Jesus to people they know. Our\nprincipal witness to the world should be our transformed lives. \u201cEvangelism is\nthe overflow of our joyful faith.\u201d (Lesslie Newbigin) Outreach, like pastoral\ncare, should not just mean organised activities or events. Although these have\ntheir place they may not be possible for a while. Outreach should flow naturally\nfrom the shared spiritual life of the church. So the church\u2019s role will be much\nmore to equip and support Christians in their service and witness in their\nworkplaces, with their neighbours and with their families, by nurturing prayer,\nlove, faith, holiness and discipleship.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The life of Ministers, Pastors and Church Leaders<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

The\nCovid lockdown has led to a drop in income in very many churches, due for example\nto loss of rental income, closure of fund-generating activities like caf\u00e9s and\nPre-schools, and the changed circumstances of some donors. Some of these strands\nof income may not return immediately, and others not at all. Some churches will\nfind that they can no longer afford stipended ministry. It is very likely that\nthere will be a reduction in opportunities for full-time ministers, and\nincreased part-time or bivocational posts. Regularly preaching in \u201cvirtual\nchurch\u201d may have prepared the way (both for ministers and for churches) for more\nministers to lead and serve more than one congregation.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

At\nthe same time difficulties may continue in making pastoral visits to homes, hospitals\nand care homes. School assemblies may become much rarer, limited by social\ndistancing. Ministers are likely to spend less time presenting to large groups\nor attending \u201ccrossing places\u201d or initiating and running projects and events\nand \u201cmeetings\u201d. The tasks of ministry may focus more on making disciples, teaching\nand praying with individuals and small groups and training lay-leaders to do\nthe same. Many of these activities may be undertaken from home through\ntechnology rather than face-to-face. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Probably\ndepending partly on personality type, but also on age, some ministers will\nrelish inventing new expressions of church and new ways of ministering. Others\nare no doubt already grieving the loss of patterns of ministry which they have\nlived for years or decades. Some could well already be feeling completely\nexhausted by all the new things they have had to do in the last few months and be\ndreading the prospect of all the challenging and draining work it will take to\nlead churches into the Post-Covid19 era. It may be difficult for some ministers\nto find ways to guard their own health in the usual activities of ministry, due\nto underlying health conditions or age or disability.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

So Where Next?<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Some\npeople may be thinking all this sounds difficult and scary and much too\nradical. Others will be saying there is nothing new here and it is not nearly\nradical enough. There are some common features in church life which we are accustomed\nto which are not mentioned here at all \u2013 should they resume, or should we\ngratefully let them go? My purpose here is not to provide answers but to raise\nissues which I believe to be important. Each church will need to discuss and\npray to find their own answers. In this we must all put our trust in God for\nthe exciting possibilities which lie before us.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Now to him who is able to do immeasurably more than all we ask or\nimagine, according to his power that is at work within us, to him be glory in\nthe church and in Christ Jesus throughout all generations, for ever and ever!\nAmen. (Ephesians 3:20-21)<\/em><\/em><\/p>\n<\/div><\/div>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

What will church life be like in the \u201cnew normal\u201d which is emerging as the Covid19 lockdown is gradually lifted? The new reality is that…<\/span><\/p>\n

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