This Sunday, there will be a lot of churches around the world that will have put together well-orchestrated performances to attract a larger-than-normal crowd on Easter in hopes that these guests will return the following Sunday when everything will probably be back to normal. Preachers will kick up their “preachiness”, the music will hopefully be better than the normal Sunday, and the welcome team will be more friendly than they are on the typical Sunday. All of this makes sense, right? Shouldn’t people walk out talking about how awesome the preacher is rocking his skinny jeans and how energetic and talented the band is? Many would answer yes, but the preacher, deacon/elder “board” (the board concept is found NOWHERE in the Bible), the band, nor the greeters are the star of the show.
Jesus Christ, the One who died and rose again, is the “superstar”. Because of that, every Sunday should be Easter Sunday. Jesus is just as alive now and will be just as alive after Sunday! Every Sunday should be a celebration! Make a big deal out of every Sunday. Make every sermon the best! Make the music the best every week! Don’t prepare a service to impress a crowd! Create it to bless an Audience of One – the Lord Jesus Christ!
The truth is that people want something real. Skilled performances can leave people empty. Genuine worship that is aimed to please the Lord can change lives and make a lasting impression.
Let’s bring this thing home. Who is the star of your show? Is it you? Do you live a life so that you are happy? It never lasts. God created you to bring Him glory. If you are on the throne of your life, it’s time for a new ruler – the King of kings and Lord of lords!
Matthew Winters (Honest Thoughts from a Pastor) 
And we want only Jesus, not a mixture of your already crucified self and Christ. We do not want pre-planned sermonettes from the head; we want the Holy Spirit overflowing from the heart of one intimate with Him. Our Lord called us out of darkness to be His Bride, co-heirs with Him. He is our first love.
All pastors reading this, please cease with the the 1% milk and give us solid food. Be not conformed to the pattern of the world, but be transformed by the renewing of your minds; BE living epistles; BE conduits of the Word Himself. Thank you.
Sincerely,
The Members of the Blessed Body of Christ.
Right on!
I thank God that you took that this way! In case someone out there did not know, I did not write this regarding Matthew. 😊
Praise God you did not take that personally, dear brother! 😊 Glad you’re serving the Body as you are!
Reblogged this on Talmidimblogging.
Yea. You are right. Jesus is the Superstar of the Easter show. Any focus away from Him is a focus that will lead in the wrong direction.
Matthew, some of greatest moments of worship from the church I attend came when the sound was not working right, a singer forgot the words, and a host of other things went haywire. Why? Because we were worshiping from our heart and not interested in being entertained. Good word!
Amen!
PREACH IT!!! We are a star-stuck society with faces plastered on billboards urging us to attend the next big event to get a fresh helping of manna. Not that I’m against big events or fresh manna, but one does not necessarily follow or even imply the other.
I used to be very black and white on this, but along with my hair, much has become gray. I believe in a very simplistic worship, and I believe that Jesus should be the star of the show, but worship has a bunch of purposes all stuck together. Paul says that there is a missional aspect to worship (the unbeliever is convicted), and there is thanksgiving, celebration, teaching, reflection and repentance.
I’ve struggled over the years with that missional aspect. We want unbelievers to be convicted, but we also want to draw them warmly into a community that is nothing like any other on earth. I wouldn’t say that we should cater to unbelievers in worship, but if a non-believer comes to celebrate Christ’s resurrection the one time a year they attend church, should we not be prepared to warmly greet them and worship with them? I’ve been more convicted of the horizontal aspects. If worship is purely me, God and the preacher, then watching a televangelist should be just fine, but it’s not. It’s important that the church is gathered together.
Entertaining people into the kingdom of God is definitely not going to work, but I don’t think my old church’s practice of attracting people with soulless singing and esoteric theological sermons full of words fit only for a seminary course in systematic theology is the model to aspire to.
So, we need to figure out how to tune worship. We want it to meet the needs of the entire community – from the person walking in for the first time to the retired senior pastor. We want our children not to zone out and we want our elderly to still bear fruit. We trust that much of this happens despite our weaknesses through the work of the Holy Spirit, but we can’t preach formula every week and expect the strong Christians to grow, just as we cannot preach just meat every week and expect the infants to grow.
Besides that, we need to realize that the church isn’t Sunday only. It’s a community of Christians meeting each others’ needs, so if we only get 60-90 minutes of Christianity a week, we’re going to starve. Thus, worship is also a gateway into deeper ministry within the church.
You make several excellent remarks in response to what I said. I appreciate your balanced and biblical approach to this. I look forward to future dialogue.