Rethink church?

The United Methodist Church is launching a campaign to rethink church. At the same time my own congregation is in a position where it needs to rethink what our church is called to be. In the process of all this thinking I talked to one of my members who was working at a Bridal Fair over the weekend. In talking with her it occurred to me that part of rethinking church is thinking about where the church is present and where it is not present and if some of that is what needs to change. One of the things that I realized is that places like wedding fairs are somewhere churches really could and arguably should be. We should be there not because weddings are a big business for churches but because a wedding is a time where people should be thinking about church and we do not help them any if we are not present.

Where do people expect the church to be?

Where do people need the church to be?

I read an interesting article which talked about the decline in worship attendance in the US but commented at the same time that church participation is up. Worship is not the end-all-be-all for the church. As we are rethinking church some of the question is not just where, but what. What does the church need to be doing today to continue to meet the spiritual needs of the society AND to continue to serve as a prophetic voice to society. How do find new places to be the church and new ways to do church. Maybe the hardest question of all is how do we do this without creating a disconnect for the people already in church, who are happy with how church already is.