Question -- What's it like to belong to a megachurch?
Posted July 29, 2006
I grew up in a fairly small Protestant church -- tiny enough that if you slept in or went fishing on Sunday, your absence was noted. There wasn't a massive "ministerial staff." The same guy who preached the sermons made the hospital visits, performed the weddings and preached the funerals.
Scott Elliott of Dayton says he had a similar experience growing up as a Catholic.
"Growing up Catholic, one of the great things about a parish was its intimacy. The church deacon also ran the church festival, taught your Sunday school class and maybe even coached your Little League team or was a volunteer fireman in town. Everybody knew each other and many were very involved in each other's lives. I've never been to a megachurch, but with 10,000 people or more every Sunday the scale is just hard for me to imagine and it seems like many of the good things I recall about my parishes growing up would be lost. It seems like a church member would feel more isolated and less connected. But my impression is that the members of megachurches feel just the opposite. Any insight as to why?"
The megachurch members I talk to frequently are part of a "cell group" -- a small circle of fellow believers who gather weekly to pray, study the bible, socialize and help one another. The cell group provides a sense of community. The megachurch itself provides world-class music, top-notch preaching and an incredibly wide range of activities.
Scott, that's my guess, but I'd love to hear from megachurch members who can describe their own experiences. Southland and Southeast Christian members -- what makes your congregations special?
Archived Comments
Thanks for taking on my question. I think I get it, although the terminology you used was a little Al Qaeda-ish. I guess this would make the people who belong to a megachurch but don't get themselves to church on Sunday a "sleeper cell?" :-)
It's interesting -- something of a business-oriented "economies of scale" approach. Concentrating resources makes the big splash Sunday service, and a wide array of other services offered, possible.
I grew up in a small town in the US midwest. All the churches I attended were smaller congregations and even some house churches. Our communities were rather poor, and church was the center of that community.
Our services always opened with the congregation praying. Everyone present was encouraged to join in the prayer, thanking God for His blessings and for our lives. We sang hymns and read scripture. We studied together and a minister preached. What money we collected was usually used to help someone in that community and pay church bills to keep a congregation in the community. I was probably out of high school when I realized that pastors received a salary, because most of the preachers under whom I had served all worked a job or two during the week.
That said, please understand why the concept of cell groupings in a megastructure of a massive institution seems cold and impersonal to me. It's very difficult for me fanthom that great a distance from the shepherd, when for years I lived next door to the man I knew as pastor. I have friends who are members to these churches that host five or six Sunday services, as well as several activities scheduled nearly everyday during the week. Singles ministries. Children's church, Chior and music rehearsals where professionals are not paid to render service. Financial and investment education seminars. Marriage and family seminars. Women's ministries. Men's ministries. So forth and so on, with a niche for every conceivable need. I am just thrown by it all.
I don't feel that I miss anything by attending my smaller local church which is within walking distance to my home. I feel those issues and needs into which megachurches pour hundreds of thousands of dollars anually are met rather sufficiently at my local church. Our choir is directed by the senior high school music teacher on the nights he isn't coaching track or traveling with the school band and chorus. Older women still offer sage experiencial advice to us younger women for free. One lovely ,widowed elder will even bake you an apple spice cake just for your company. Most important to me is that in a smaller more intimate setting, I know everyone and everyone knows me. One of my friends slacked off from church for a year without so much as a phone call from her group leader. If I'm twenty minutes late, my phone has rung four or five times.
I read a nationally published survey which said that the turnover in non-denominational megachurches is 50% over 5 years. It suggested that most of these transitional people "moved on" to smaller churches which had deeper theology, and that megachurches for them served as a gateway introducing them to basic theology after which they found their permanent "niche" in mainline churches.
Several parishoners at my parish (Catholic, "Anglican Use") told of starting as unchurched; then, being members of a mega-church; thence to Baptist or Lutheranism; finally, Episcopalian; & would have stayed Episcopalian, had not the American Episcopalian Churches started ordaining women and saying the homosexual lifestyle wasn't sinful. The only option traditional Episcopalians then had was the choice between Rome and the Orthodox church.
Fortunately, the "Anglican Use" (Pastoral Provision) of the Roman Rite was approved by Pope JP II in the 1980's to allow converted Episcopalians to keep their High Church Anglican culture & traditons (like the RC approved version of of the BCP, called the "Book of Divine Worship", and the 1928 hymnal) and allows married former Episcopalian priests to become Catholic Priests (!)
Most American Catholic Bishops are clueless or else suspicious of the Anglican Use parishes, --but these parishes are "Kosher"--though the best kept-secret in the American Catholic Church. Many in "mixed marriages" find the ambiance and aesthetically beautiful liturgy more appealing than that of the average Catholic Church. (So do many Cradle Catholics weary of the "dumbed down" language of overly informal liturgy.)
I was raised in what I consider a medium-sized church, less than 1K people, which expanded and grew since the early 90s to become almost a "mega" church. I stopped going and cancelled my membership. So, that 50% turnover rate, it isn't just "transitional" people, passing through town. There are those, like me, who missed the intimacy of the smaller church, and dislike the "big box" Wal-mart-style structure of the mega-churches. Sure, you can find everything there. But, you won't recognize the people sitting next to you in the pew, no matter how many Sundays you attend. It's just too nameless/facesless/impersonal. I dropped out, and am unaffiliated currently, but thinking of going to church again, if I can find one small enough to suit me, and of a denomination that hasn't sold out to the right-wingnuts and the Republican party.
I'm part of a megachurch and I absolutely love it! I don't find my "smaller cell" impersonal - it's actually a smaller church within the church and functions how Penny described her church. If I'm late, I hear about it! :)
I do know my senior pastor and his family, and they know me.
As for the 50 percent turnover in a 5 year period, I think it's true of most churches turnover about 10 percent of their congregations each year. For a 100 person congregation, that's 10 people (through death, birth, families moving in and out of the area). On a megachurch scale, that's significantly higher - for Southland, 850 people and Southeast, 1800 people - so it seems like more, when it's actually about the same percentage as most other churches.
I'm not saying I am or I am not a member of a "mega-church", but I find it very disheartening and also very disturbing at some of the critical posts.
I have worshiped in small churches, large churches, house churches with only a few people. I love the organ and hymns, I love David Crowder and loud praise and worship. I also love African-American Gospel Music and I love to hear a group of 3 year olds sing "Jesus Loves Me"!
Worship is not about "me", but about Christ and what glorifies him the best through that worship. I believe God loves all types of worship as long as it comes from the heart and is sincere. For some people that sweet spot of worship is found in small traditional churches with stained glass, organ music, traditional hymns and quiet solitude...yet for others it is found in large auditoriums with thousands of people and loud, upbeat "rock" music. Is one style better than the other? I think not!
Why do we believe that worship has to be the same everywhere? And everything done at the same point in the worship?
One thing I do believe it that it saddens God when we bicker and are critical of one another and think that one group is better or more holy than another.
If we wait around for a church to suit us, how will God ever be glorified? And how many people will miss out on the gift of knowing Christ?
My friend, When it comes to megachurches, To Quote Puff Daddy (P.Diddy), "It's All About The Benjamins Baby".
Megachurches have become an insult to the smaller churches I grew up in that had the sunday school classrooms, the kitchen where donuts and coffee where served when I got older and the preacher telling the kids about the birth and fall of Jesus in the sanctuary where choir sat in the middle of the little Wurlitzer organ and Steinway piano, looking out at the attending members in suits and sunday dresses in the "hard wooden" pews.
You know what, the larger older Catholic Churches with their beautiful Architecture became a welcome site when I attended occasionally, but I never took communion because I'm not Catholic. I know their Doctrines are conservative in writing but not as harsh and twisted and they have more liberal members than consevative ones in the U.S.
The Megachurches, they have become a major base for religious right conservative voters and the Bush administration and have become a major force behind Anti-Gay campaigns. It makes me sick.
I'm not X-Tian anymore and to tell you the truth I don't miss the old days. But thank you Emperor Constantine for converting and making Christianity the state religion. Ergo, giving birth to the religious right and unjustifiably declaring my Pagan ancestors as heretics!
In the state of the world we live in now, the mighty houses will shrink in the future. I can only hope that those who still believe in the true meaning of Christianity, to "Do unto others and let others do unto you" get the power to cleanse the faith of the corrupt political germs that have infested it and corrupted it. Even if this comes to pass or not, I will still remain with The Goddess and The God as a Wiccan with the spirits of my Pagan & Heathen anceastors, wherever their spirits may be.
And I didn't want to say it but, We were here first!
I belong to a megachurch in Dallas with a membership about 16,000.
I love the experience that I do have in my church. It isn't what most people think.
The thing I love about my church is that we are church that is big, but really has a small-atmosphere. We teach the Word of God. We are not focused on money like most people think. We take up offering like every other church.
I think the problem that most people have is that most never thought that the church would grow beyond 1000 members. Of course there are many churches that have always had more than that, but.
We see a lot of churches grow very quickly and most get jealous. You have a church that started in 1970 and in 2006 only has 300 members. Then you have a church that started in 1996 and now has 25,000 members in 2006. Many start to think they are going light on the gospel or using some trickery or deceiving. But it is not, just growth that most can't handle.
My experience in watching my church grow a lot in the past 4 years from about 8,000 to 16,000 is a testament of the lost being saved.
The megachurch is cool and does a good job, just like a smaller church. We are all the Body of Christ, not Fortune 500 companies. We don't have to compete for members. Or at least we shouldn't.
My pastor said it best while at a speaking engagement for another church. He said:
"I am a small man in stature and your pastor is a big man. Even though I am a small man (he's 5'3"), I'm a strong man. Even though you are a small church and I pastor a small church, you don't have to be big to be strong."
Every big church isn't effective. Small churches are doing great things, even better than the big churches they envy.