Should the hour people are in worship on Sunday morning be the best hour of the week? It is a really interesting question when you stop and think about it. The question isn’t should it be a wonderful hour, or a refreshing or renewing time in God’s presence, the question is whether or not it should be the best hour they experience.
How churches answer that question will tell a lot about how they do ministry and where their focus is. In my continuing reflections on The Monkey and the Fish by Dave Gibbons, he lays out what he sees as the shift from typical Western ways of doing church to a Third Culture life. Here is the list he offers.
Western Third Culture
| Linear | Adaptive/Liquid |
| Orderly Steps | Messy Journey |
| Individual | Community |
| Categorizes | Holistic |
| Teaches | Guides |
| Cookie-Cutter | Customized |
| Western | Easter/Fusion |
| Comfort | Painful |
| Programmed | Artful |
| Homogeneous | Multicultural |
I found the list helpful in understanding the differences between how he perceives the church and how what he believes the church needs to be. The questions are whether or not he is accurate in his list and whether or not the way he is proposing is better. Any thoughts?
January 19, 2010 at 7:11 pm
It may be very helpful for people who claim Christ to remember that all we hear in the NT about what it means to be the church was not shared with an “hour on Sunday” mentality. What are some realistic, practical ways of living out the list descriptive words in the Third Wave column above? We’ve seen column 1 (and don’t want it)…What does column 2 look like?
January 20, 2010 at 10:10 am
I think we can begin by looking at Sunday morning. Our worship will always reflect our ethos as a church. What about allowing worship to be adaptive and messy? I started bringing our children back into worship more and more and trying to get them to worship with their families. A lot of churches won’t do this because it is messy, it is loud and kids might do something to interrupt the service. I don’t care about any of that, I want kids to see their parents worship and to be formed by it.
Also being adaptive. Do people have the freedom to express themselves or to share from their hearts during the service? Do you ever deviate from the script and allow God to speak through you as a pastor, as the Spirit leads? Are their differing forms of worship from across the history and the globe of the church that influence the service? Are your sermons imported from a sermon writing service or are they the best material of some megachurch pastor somewhere?
Amazingly pretty much all of these criteria can be applied straight to just the worship service as an example.
January 20, 2010 at 2:21 pm
Let’s look beyond corporate worship. What does 3rd culture life in Christ look like from day to day…hour by hour? I’d love to read comments from each and every person who visits this site. Please. It would bless us all.
January 20, 2010 at 2:53 pm
Mags,
I think we can take some of these same ideas and look at our own lives. How ordered do we make our lives? Do we allow other people’s messiness into our lives? Do we embrace ideas from other cultures? Are we comfortable and set in our day to day lives? Do we leave room for God to do whatever God please to our life at any moment?
Those are the questions I have been asking myself about day to day living and some of these ideas. Moving beyond corporate identity there is some real value in grabbing these ideas and injecting them into our lives.
January 20, 2010 at 8:53 pm
Who do you identify as 3rd culture people? I haven’t read the book but I’m trying to develop an image of what this way looks like. I am personally trying to live in a way that looks more column number 2. Sometimes it doesn’t seem intentionally, but rather natural as I follow along as God leads. I desparately want to live in a new way. Often it feels like traveling up stream and other times it feels like a natural flow. I’ve got way more to say on this, but I’m really tired tonight. night.
January 21, 2010 at 9:28 am
I think that much of your passion for the church falls in line with what the author describes as Third Culture living. It is really a Spirit filled life that is able to listen to and respond to guidance of the Spirit. The hardest part about trying to live this way or lead a church this way is that institutions by design get in the way of this kind of living.
January 21, 2010 at 11:18 am
Yup, makes sense to me. Your comment reminds me of the beauty that comes when we allow things to be torn down in hope of being rebuilt. This, of course, is God’s work. He makes all things new! Does the author give specific examples of 3rd culture movements in his book? Or where this way of living is happening? Have you read any Jenkins?
Hey, I’m beginning a course through Vineyard Bible Institute next week. The first topic we’ll cover is revival…being revived is surely a reality for the institutional church becoming 3rd culture people.
January 21, 2010 at 11:42 am
He does give some specific examples, especially from his life and his church. I am about 3/4 way through the book, so as I finish up I will add some final thoughts to his notion of being Third Culture