Chapter 3

3:1-13
What is the “mystery” (3) of which Paul is given “administration” (2, NIV) or “stewardship” (2, ESV) over? (Look where it shows up later in this chapter too.) To whom is this mystery now made known? How long has this been a part of God’s plans?

How did Paul come to know the Gospel? To what extent can we learn the same way? Does this mean we should get rid of commentaries, group discussion, classes or Bible study? Why or why not?

How does Paul describe the Gentiles in verse 6? Why does Paul focus on this theme in this letter? Why might the readers have needed to hear it repeated? What types of people might feel awkward or uncomfortable in church today? How can we break down those barriers?

What is the role of the church in God’s plan (6, 10)?

Paul writes that we have boldness and confidence though faith in Christ (12). What does that result in? Is that always easy? Why or why not? How would you explain the Gospel to someone using verse 12?

What is Paul’s all-consuming desire? How do we know what it is? How would friends describe your all-consuming desire?

3:14-20
What is the biggest thing you can think of? What is the biggest thing in the universe? How would you describe it?

What does Paul pray for the Ephesians? Outline the elements of this prayer.

What does it look like for God to strengthen the “inner man”?

Considering 2:19-22, why does Paul pray the way he does here? Is Christ dwelling in our hearts permanent or temporary? How should that change us?

Have you ever been overwhelmed by God’s love? What does it mean that this love “surpasses knowledge”? What is the result of this in our lives?

Which of the above elements of Paul’s prayer for the Ephesians have you most felt the need for in the past? Which do you need the most right now? Which are your family or friends most in need of?

Paul’s prayer life and ministry might be described here as feasting. Are most believers feasting or fasting on God’s love?

A few pieces of “The Paper” will show up on the blog. Since I had to cut off so much of it to fit the maximum number of pages, you may get the unedited version from time to time.

For now, I’d like to leave everyone with a few thoughts from the Acknowledgments section of the project:

I cannot begin to thank all the people in my community or a part of the church I currently serve or the churches, communities, and ministries I have served in the past. It has been a privilege to serve you as I serve Christ and try to live out the gospel, following Paul’s model of sharing the gospel and my life (1 Thess. 2:8). Thanks for putting up with the drafts of this project. You may not have read them, but you heard them in my preaching, leadership coaching, Bible studies, small group meetings, and countless conversations over coffee.

Most of all, I thank God, who not only created me, giving me the intellect and will to pursue education, but transformed my life. An encounter with the life-giving grace offered through Jesus changed my heart, mind, and career plans. It has been an unmerited privilege to follow and serve Him in ministry while being molded, shaped, and led by the Holy Spirit.

From the beginning of my life as a blogger, I have always sought to share my life and what God is doing in it. Preaching is an enigma to most people. The average person who listens to sermons gets up, goes to church, hears a sermon–and probably has no idea how that sermon came to be. While I can’t speak for others, I can show you how the sermon I preached this morning came to be–and through the convenience of mp3s, you can even listen to the final product.

Stage 1: Reading & Praying
I read the Bible–and I love to study it. It’s the primary way God speaks to me. When I read it, often passages stand out. When they do, I write them in my journal. (I use a journal with removable pages so it’s easy to move things around into different categories–sermons, potential series, thoughts for my small group, etc.) Often I’ll go back through the journal and an entry might make its way into a sermon. In this case, which is typical for me, I wrote down a passage and just couldn’t stop thinking about it for several weeks. I would read it often and jot questions and thoughts in the margin of my journal. At the same time, I began to read Bible Dictionaries, Commentaries and Theological Journals. (Because that’s the way God wired me!)

Stage 2: Outlining
Since the opportunity to speak was coming up, I began to flesh out an outline. As I outline what I’m going to say, I continue to pray for clarity of thought with the passage and insight into what the people who will be there need to hear from God. As I do that, I begin to outline the message and put extra thoughts in the margins. (Please excuse my poor penmanship!)

Stage 3: Finish the Outline
In our church, we hand out outlines for the message. So I type it up and email it to the person who prints them and puts them in the bulletin. I have been intentionally low tech up to this point–except for digital commentaries, etc. I prefer handwritten notes in my journal while praying and developing sermons. Normally I like to type my own outline at this step because it is easier to edit–and I like to see how it lays out on the paper. Since we use an 8.5 x 11″ piece of paper cut in two,there are two pages to the outline.

Stage 4: Organizing my Notes into the Outline
Although I have been thinking and praying about the message for quite a while by now, I have to decide what will make my notes for the sermon. I don’t like to script everything out so that I’m tied to the pulpit. And, of course, when preaching, often God brings things to mind during the sermon.

Stage 5: Pray and Preach!
Nothing is more important than our relationship with God–especially when preaching! So, I just enjoy His presence in my life and continue to pray…and here’s the final product…

IntoTheDeep.mp3

More than two-thirds of churchgoing young adults drop out between the ages of eighteen and twenty-two.² Despite some contemporary practitioners devaluing the sermon as part of the worship experience, ninety percent of unchurched people choose a church based on preaching.³ Additionally, among younger generations, the pastor’s sermon still remains a significant factor in deciding to leave or remain in church as they age. In Essential Church, Thom and Sam Rainer found that only forty-eight percent of young adults who drop out of church found the sermons engaging and forty-two percent found them relevant.⁴ Of those who remain in church, sixty-five percent found the sermons engaging and sixty-three percent found them relevant.  From this data and interviews with the young generation of dropouts, the researchers drew the conclusion that preachers cannot expect teens to “grow into” messages aimed at middle-aged churchgoers. Similarly, the churches that reach young adults gear their message to young adults, whether intentionally or because the preachers are in a similar life stage. Churches must gear their message to the younger demographic of late teens and young adults if they hope to retain those age groups.

Ed Stetzer lists the ten most frequent values of a successful postmodern church: “being unashamedly spiritual, promoting incarnational ministry, engaging in service, valuing experiential praise, preaching narrative expository messages, appreciating and participating in ancient patterns, visualizing worship, connecting with technology, living community, and leading by transparency and team.”⁵ The successful churches above exhibited these values. In regards to preaching, these values were clearly relevant and exhibited by the churches visited.

Despite the claims of some critics, churches that are reaching young adults do not water down the message. The messages are direct, challenging and Biblical. Promoting incarnational ministry means being authentic and transparent. Preachers in these congregations speak with authenticity—not pretentiousness. The preaching often calls for members to serve. The churches studied tended to preach narrative expository messages at least part of the time, offering story more often that just information. Each church focused on living as community. While accomplishing this through small groups, each church preached or mentioned from the pulpit about the significance and necessity of being connected in community. I now firmly believe that while small group ministry is not always young adult ministry, young adult ministry is small group ministry, and small group ministry is at the core of every substantial young adult ministry. Effective ministries also lead with authenticity and as a team. Even Mercy Hill, with a solo pastor who preaches most weeks, obviously has a committed core of volunteers who own and shape the fulfillment of the vision.

In evaluating a worship experience, the authors of the Millennium Matrix ask the question, “How does what you did create an experience of the Gospel for digital culture?”⁶ I expected more visual use of technology during the services. Ironically, even the churches with high technology aptitudes did little to integrate them into the message. Churches tend to be either very high tech within their services or intentionally low tech in a high tech world. While the larger churches make more use of multimedia during their services, it is not clear that this is entirely an issue of resources or capabilities. Whether high tech or low tech, those reaching young adults create an experience of the Gospel. Larger venues produce an exciting, concert-like, exciting experience. The smaller size of come churches produces an intimacy difficult to duplicate in a larger setting. Although different from one another, in both settings an experience of the Gospel is created.

A Ministry in Transition
One ministry (I’m not naming it here intentionally–and please don’t post your guesses!) we visited was one of the most talked about and vibrant ministries reaching young adults in this part of the United States. The founder started the ministry to help retain old High School ministry kids from his youth group. When I first went to the ministry several years ago, there were two services to accommodate the crowd of over 1000 people, including high school and college age young adults. Since I had personally witnessed so many young adults attending during my previous visit to the ministry, we visited with the intention of including it in this project. However, it became apparent that the ministry is in transition. The senior pastor of the sponsoring church went into the mission field and the pastor in charge of the ministry left to plant a church. In the transition time, the church elders re-visioned the ministry. Under their leadership and the church’s new pastor, the ministry changed to an age-specific ministry and expressly expects young adults to attend the regular Sunday services at both the sponsoring church and the young adult ministry.  Seventy five percent of the remaining 400 to 500 attendees left during this transition. Out of this, several other ministries in the area have launched to fill the gap.  A full discussion of this ministry and its struggle within the transition lies outside of the scope of this blog. However, it appears to exhibit the classic church-within-a-church struggle defined and discussed among young adult ministry practitioners. Often, the values and forms of ministry developed by successful ministries targeting young adults conflict with the sponsoring church and ultimately result in tensions or withdrawal of support if not handled carefully.

Women in Ministry Among Younger Generations
Of all the churches that met the criteria for this project, only one woman, Heather Zempel, was a part of the interviews. Heather grew up Southern Baptist. When she came on staff at NCC to develop the small group ministry, Mark Batterson asked her to preach on small groups. She spent two years researching the Scripture to make sure it was OK. Even now, people email or leave when she speaks. While Mark replies that they “don’t know what they’re missing,” Heather understands their quandary. Growing up Southern Baptist, it is part of her background too. Reprogramming an ingrained thought pattern rarely proves easy—even in a postmodern world.

For many, it is surprising that there are so few high profile female pastors among a generation that normally accepts females as equals. When asked why she thinks there aren’t more female preachers, Heather observes that women do better in smaller, intimate settings. Women often do not feel the need for a charismatic platform and thrive in small groups with both men and women, which may account for them finding themselves in a different role of church leadership. As an example, Heather notes that Margaret Feinburg recently spoke at their services. In the smaller venue, Ebenezers, she came across differently than at their larger venue, Union Station. NCC’s popular series, An Elephant in the Church, addresses topics often avoided in the church. At the time of our interview, they were considering the topic of women in the church and ministry, aka “The Pink Elephant”, as part of the series.

Suggestions for More Research
If beginning this project today, I would change several things. First, I would love to travel more in order to evaluate churches outside of our area. A limited travel budget and vacation time restricted us to churches within a five-hour drive. The advantage of staying within close proximity of our area is that the culture is likely to be similar to our current context. However, it would be interesting to explore the commonalities of ministries outside of the area, including international churches. Second, white males primarily led the churches recommended and evaluated. Exploring female led and ethnically diverse churches and how they deal with the same issues is of interest. Third, studying churches that do not retain young adults would be a useful exercise—especially churches within the same geographic area of churches that do reach young adults. Contrasting their approach with that of churches reaching young adults would test some of the assertions in this paper.

Each ministry evaluated could use more in depth research to understand why they are effective in reaching young adults. Doing so is well outside the scope of this project, but would be useful in understanding why young adults are attracted to and remain in churches. Also, research on the attendees would better reveal quantitative data on whether they primarily reach transfers, the unchurched or dechurched (those who have stopped going to church). Another interesting project would be to monitor the anonymous, declining, ministry mentioned earlier in this blog as it navigates its transition with the inherent tensions between generations and how they do ministry.

Preaching to Young Adults
Although the current cultural changes appear significant, every generation partly redefines worship. Len Wilson comments that many of his peers do not do so as purposefully “conducting ministry according to a particular epistemological paradigm.” Rather, a shift in the way ministry is done reflects what people innately know to be true.⁷  Our experience reveals this. While many intentionally target young adults, several churches indicate that who they attract is simply a byproduct of the way they do ministry. Although many older practitioners remain relevant and adapt to a changing culture, those native to the culture producing the current young adult population take the lead and often become successful church planters. As these practitioners age, it may become necessary to become more of a student of culture as they become missionaries to a culture outside their own. Ed Stetzer observes “good missionaries uncover the deeper issues—the underlying values, thought processes, and ideas of a culture or people group. Using this information, they develop a plan to reach them based on these deeper issues.”⁸ Over time, it will be interesting to observe changes and adaptations of the churches led by younger pastors. As they age, will they attract an older crowd and become less effective with younger generations? Or will they continue to adapt to a changing culture? Those of us who are no longer young adults must constantly study emerging generations in order to remain current in our understanding of culture. At this stage, many older leaders are learning from young practitioners. In the future, a reverse mentoring⁹ relationship may become necessary for those younger leaders.

Going into this project, I never expected to find the formula for preaching to and doing church among twenty-somethings. As Stetzer observes, “in a culture that thrives on diversity and disdains uniformity, there is no right way to plant a postmodern church. There is no single answer to reaching postmoderns because there is no one, stereotypical North American postmodern.”¹⁰ While the values of the majority of the culture are similar, younger generations are drawn to different approaches. God uses a variety of churches and methods to reach people. After all the church visits, I asked those who travelled with me, “If you had to choose a new church to go to every week, which one of the churches we visited for the interview project would you choose?” There was no consensus—even as they discussed the order in which they found them to be attractive. Each of the churches appealed to different members of our informal research team.

1. Dan Kimball, They Like Jesus but Not the Church: Insights from Emerging Generations (Grand Rapids: Zondervan, 2007), 214-215.
2. Thom S. Rainer and Eric Geiger, Simple Church: Returning to God’s Process for Making Disciples (Nashville: Broadman Press, 2006), 3.
3. Thom S. Rainer, Surprising Insights from the Unchurched and Proven Ways to Reach Them (Grand Rapids: Zondervan, 2001), 56.
4. Thom S. Rainer and Sam S. Rainer, Essential Church: Reclaiming a Generation of Dropouts (Nashville: Broadman Press, 2006), 130.
5. Ed Stetzer, Planting New Churches in a Postmodern Age (Nashville: Broadman & Holman, 2003), 137.
6. M. Rex Miller, The Millennium Matrix: Reclaiming the Past, Reframing the Future of the Church (San Francisco: Jossey-Bass, 2004), 163.
7. Len Wilson and Jason Moore, Digital Storytellers: The Art of Communicating the Gospel in Worship (Nashville: Abingdon Press, 2002), 26.
8. Ed Stetzer, Planting New Churches in a Postmodern Age, 112
9. Earl G. Creps, Reverse Mentoring: How Young Leaders Can Transform the Church and Why We Should Let Them (San Francisco: Jossey-Bass, 2008).
10. Ed Stetzer, Planting New Churches in a Postmodern Age, 130

Located in Allentown, Pennsylvania, Valley Church originally existed as Christian Life Community Church. Under Eric Miller’s leadership, the church transformed into Valley Church. Eric’s brother Craig served on staff at a large Assemblies of God church near Harrisburg, Pennsylvania. After leaving staff, Craig relocated to Allentown to work alongside his brother at Valley Church. When Craig relocated, a group of young adults decided to move as well. Quitting their jobs, they moved across the state to find new employment and serve as volunteers at Valley Church. While not technically a church plant, this variation of the Team Planting model demonstrates the commitment to community and mission, which affects the nature of the church.  When asked about the change in dynamics, Eric notes that the contingent from Harrisburg brings servanthood and loyalty to the table—but to others it can appear to be Craig’s posse. The addition of Craig to the staff frees Eric from being solo pastor and having to have a hand in everything. Craig’s unstructured and creative nature balances Eric’s structured and academic personality. Their chemistry and complementary relationship creates a unique dynamic that others notice and appreciate.¹

Sermon Evaluation

Content and Delivery
The feel of being a part of a community permeates Valley Church. The sermon continues this feeling of connectedness. As Eric begins to speak, his easy going but intense style captivates the audience and they hang on every spoken word. While using many contemporary examples, such as the Olympics and using Caller ID to screen calls, the text is addressed in depth. During the week we visited, the church was in the middle of the “Red” series, discussing the words and parables of Jesus. While the material was very familiar, the air of passion and creative use of examples maintained interest. Passages were explored in depth. Although the exegetical preparation beforehand was evidenced in the depth of the material, the sermon was delivered in an clear manner using familiar, understandable language. While not overly academic, the sermon engaged the mind as well as the heart. A clear voice, with hints of inflection showing concern and heartfelt emotion helped the sermon feel like one was listening to a friend over coffee.

Application and Effectiveness
The sermon series title, “Red”, successfully captured attention and focused the attention to the words of Jesus. Throughout the sermon, points for application were clear. Although a mostly younger crowd, the message is relevant for multiple audiences. The points were poignant and effective. From a Pentecostal perspective, the sermon appeared anointed and personally affected me.

Authenticity
The content of the message clearly affected the speaker. The heartfelt, passionate delivery served to draw in listeners. An appropriate amount of personal transparency gave the speaker an authentic voice to his congregation.

Multimedia and General Effectiveness
Valley Church primarily relies on images posted on the screen for its multimedia. The use of images enhances the message. While this satisfies visual learners, they provide outlines for people who learn in that way.  The message served as an encouraging reminder to evaluate one’s life and be effective in the Kingdom of God by becoming like Jesus.

Interview Summary

Driving twenty or thirty minutes to attend a church is not a hindrance to the mobile population of the Lehigh Valley. Many people drive across the valley to attend the church. The facility in which Valley Church currently meets is in Catasaqua, an area in transition. As older families move out, younger, first-time buyers move in to Catasaqua. Valley Church’s demographic does not closely parallel the community, but is attracting people from the local community. As Valley Church establishes itself in the area, some younger families from the current neighborhood have become part of the church community.

Valley Church does not specifically target young adults. Rather, young adults are attracted to the church’s style of ministry. Eric and Craig both have a young adult mindset even though neither fits in that demographic any longer. As they and their ministry teams minister from who they are, this authenticity attracts young adults.

As newer young adults have entered into the community at Valley Church, they cite authenticity and vulnerability as reasons they stay. The staff and leaders invite others to journey through life together, making relationships the essential connecting point of the church. The church intentionally avoids a lot of programming, preferring to encourage natural interactions and friendships. Creating an environment in lobby where people are intentional about fostering and initiating relationships helps remove obstacles to community and retains those who crave authentic relationships. These relationships are further developed and maintained through small groups offered throughout the week.

Speakers
Eric preaches most of the time, with Craig preaching about once every two months. Although capable of leading worship, Eric prefers to operate in his stronger gifting, preaching. While Eric and Craig brainstorm ideas together and often “bounce things off one another”, Eric remains the main communicator.

Sermon Topics
When fresh out of Bible College, Eric began pastoring and did not start working on his sermon until Tuesday or Wednesday. Currently, he plans ahead. Most comfortable with expositionally preaching through a book of the Bible, as of late, he favors doing more topical sermons. While being Pentecostal means being led by the Spirit, Eric finds that God uses ideas that might start with an idea from a book, a David Crowder album or directly from the Scriptures. After the initial idea, he immerses himself in the Scriptures. Citing Andy Stanley, Eric attempts to communicate one big idea each week in a relevant manner. Some weeks the message develops easily, other weeks, it takes hard work to develop the message.
Eric advises others trying to reach young adults to be relevant, creative, authentic, honest and vulnerable. These values resonate with young adults weary of an image-obsessed culture. Many of the contemporary systems that reached boomers effectively do not connect with successive generations. Five points that all begin with “A” does not work anymore. The style of the preacher communicates beyond the content. Young adults don’t mind a challenge. However, communicating something that sounds like “I’m better than you” creates unnecessary distance between the preacher and the hearer. All of this must be accomplished while changing things around to keep it fresh and retain interest.

Extension of Ministry through Technology
As is the trend, Valley Church podcasts their messages and includes an easily found link on their website. While Eric, Craig and key volunteers are all on Facebook and have a Valley Church Facebook group, Eric finds the church’s proclamation has been most visibly extended through his blog. Eric’s blog launched from the “text” series by using Psalm 119. With church attendance of 110 people the Sunday the series launched, seventy-five to eighty hits on the blog were recorded on Monday. Hits tapered off during the week, with thee same scenario on the following Monday. The church knew that they were reaching more people by the blog than they were with their Wednesday night service before cancelling the service. People have responded positively to the blog and keep coming back for a complement to the proclamation and as a discipleship resource.

Influences
Eric’s biggest influences as a preacher have changed through the years. In the past, he would have referenced his Bible College professors for their influences and Chuck Swindall for his verse-by-verse expositional style. Today, he lists Andy Stanley and Craig Groeschell as some of his biggest influences. He also appreciates the communication styles of Rob Bell and Erwin McManus.

God Stories
Effective preaching is judged by its results. While attracting some unchurched people making commitments to Jesus, Valley Church is attracting the dechurched people feeling burned by church. They are giving church one last try and finding an authentic expression that resonates with them. People from other traditions remark that they feel new life in their faith at Valley Church. Marriages are coming back together. Addicts are set free. People who had given up on church remark that they feel challenged and are growing in their faith.

1. Ed Stetzer, Planting New Churches in a Postmodern Age (Nashville: Broadman & Holman, 2003), 64-69.

LCBC originally stood for Lancaster County Bible Church. At some point, the meaning behind these letters became Lives Changed by Christ, which better reflects the current vision and reach of the congregation. LCBC broadcasts their sermons live to a multi-site about an hour away. Since each uses a live band, this requires coordination of the timing between services. A high-energy feeling permeates the sanctuary. Broadcast quality lighting, stage décor and professional sounding musicians produce a worship experience equivalent to or better than many concerts.

Sermon Evaluation

Content and Delivery
Keith Walker began by connecting with the song just sung corporately and a summarization of the series. The questions and statements created immediate interest. In the sermon, he dealt directly with Scripture and used effective illustrations such as descriptions of the generational and personal differences between his dad and himself. The stories Keith employed captured the attention of the mind and the emotions of the heart. The obviously well planned sermon used understandable language, smooth transitions and was delivered in a clear voice with good eye contact and engaging gestures.

Application and Effectiveness
The sermon’s point was clear and practical. It would be difficult to not understand his point. The sermon was appealing to different audiences, especially young adults and young parents who are wrestling with the question of what their lives will mean for the future. It would be a challenging message for older people who have not left the impression they might have wanted in life and encouraging to those who have done well to leave the impression they wanted.

Authenticity
By using personal stories and examples of failure, Keith showed himself appropriately transparent and vulnerable. His use of self-deprecating humor and personal stories made the sermon personal but not inappropriately focused on the speaker. His obvious passion and enthusiasm were evident and effective in capturing the audience.

Multimedia and General Effectiveness
LCBC utilizes more multimedia than most churches. The church often makes use of video clips. Additionally, assimilation of professional backdrops that have often been used by performers such as Madonna, the whole service feels like being inside a video clip. Since LCBC seeks to engage popular culture, using a clip from a recent movie, The Bucket List, came as no surprise when we visited. Keith used the clip in a way that supported and drove home the message being preached. The effect was powerful and memorable with clear application. The effectiveness of the message was also enhanced by its title, “Choosing a Legacy”, and use within the series, “Dash.” The speaker explains the message series each week. The image of the dash on a tombstone is easily remembered.

Interview Summary

LCBC is outside of Lancaster, Pennsylvania in what seems to be the middle of nowhere. Considering that LCBC expects to reach a weekly attendance of 10,000 soon, our first question to Keith was obvious: Where is everybody coming from? People drive up to an hour to attend the Lancaster Campus–east from the area surrounding Lancaster and west from the area surrounding Harrisburg. When the church reaches 10,000, a second service will be started in the west wing, complete with its own band. In time, that campus will launch as a multi-site with a video venue. Instead of relocating somewhere far off, LCBC intends to start the new campus within a fifteen-minute drive of the Lancaster campus. In this way, they will launch multi-sites with 1000 in attendance from the start. They feel that twenty-five minutes away is too far to plant 1000 person churches.

LCBC successfully reaches young adults while other churches struggle to attract or retain young adults. This grows from the simple vision of the pastor to create a church where disconnected people can become connected to God. In an obvious nod to Simple Church,¹ this is expressed simply as: Gather, Connect and Serve. Additionally, LCBC strives to do everything in excellence. Exceptional, edgy, recording quality music combined with drama, video clips and songs from pop culture give LCBC a style to which this generation responds.

Speakers
The Senior Pastor, David Ashcraft, brings concepts in need of development to the teaching team. As a team, they take two to three months to develop the messages. Then the music, drama and video teams come in to work on the material as well. After the parameters within which each team member will work are determined, the teaching team members each develop their message independently. Interestingly, the preaching team is comprised of the Senior Pastor, the High School and Middle School Pastors and Keith Walker, the Director of Singles and Men’s Ministries—and self-described “old guy” of the bunch. LCBC never uses Christmas and Easter to preach stand-alone, holiday messages. Rather, the teaching team intentionally begins a new series on these dates in order to intrigue the many visitors in hopes they will return.

Sermon Topics
The preaching at LCBC fits within compact four to eight week units. The whole environment and staging is changed for each series, creating memorable, visual impact. Drama, original video, video clips and music from popular culture are brought together to contextualize and emphasize the message proclaimed. Keith comments that the Senior Pastor, David Ashcraft, possesses a great sense of the surrounding Lancaster County culture and ably leads in deciding what will work in that culture.

For those wishing to reach young adults, Keith describes the philosophy of LCBC: make everybody on your campus about unconnected people. If people put reaching people for Christ above their own needs, a contagious atmosphere emerges. That philosophy influences every decision. Keith points to decisions like not having a choir and says “it’s about connecting the unconnected, not making you comfortable.” To illustrate that this value permeates the congregation, he relates a recent encounter with an older gentleman in the church. When Keith asked the older gentleman if the U2 clip used was too loud, the man remarked, “When you’re my age, and they do something in church that you don’t like, you just remember why we’re here!”

Each week, 100 visitors come to LCBC. Fifty to Seventy percent of those who come for the first time are not connected to God. Knowing that the back door lies within easy reach, LCBC tries to avoid churchy language and rolling in the aisles. The sermons, however, deal directly with serious topics. Many churches develop a young adult ministry service in order to connect with younger generations. LCBC believes this allows many churches to grow old. Instead, they intentionally gear their weekend services to connect with younger generations and allow the older people to either develop an appreciation for it or understand the purpose behind it.

Age Specific Ministry in a Young Adult Church
Mark Ashley serves as the Young Adults Pastor of LCBC. With literally thousands of young adults attracted to the Sunday morning service and a church geared to reach younger generations, he finds himself in a unique position while developing and maintaining a young adult ministry. In order to build community, the young adult ministry created three environments. First, a large group gathering, Saturate, meets on Tuesday nights. Along with worship and teaching, Mark casts vision for the ministry. Second, a midsize gathering called Hydrate meets on Sunday afternoons for discussion and interaction. Third, Life Groups, smaller, more intimate communities, meet throughout the week. This provides opportunity for Bible study, prayer and other social activities. These differently sized young adult groups designed for twenty-somethings help build the community that keeps young adults connected at LCBC.

Extension of Ministry through Technology
LCBC uses podcasts and streaming video for recent messages but wants to be wise in how they use the Internet. Their online resources serve as an introduction to the church or a refresher for those who attend. As for connecting people with the message they preach, they do not plan on an online service. Rather, LCBC prefers to rely on their strength: creating an attractive environment for people who are disconnected.

Influences
As with most seasoned preachers, Keith counts many people as influences on his preaching style. With Rob Bell’s highly successful, influential Nooma series reaching an image rich culture, it is no surprise that Keith cites him as one of his current influences. While many people have influenced Keith through the years, he lists Rob Bell as an influence because he creatively touches lives.

God Stories
As a result of the preaching at LCBC, many people have responded to the Gospel. During their baptism services, the church takes time to celebrate the stories of people whose lives are transformed. Former prostitutes testify to their changed lives. Men who used to be in prison now attend a small group with a guard who watched them in prison. One story comes from a local tattoo artist. Someone getting a tattoo told him about LCBC, so he came to see it for himself. The Gospel transformed his life, and he is directly responsible for bringing over one hundred people to LCBC.

1. Thom S. Rainer and Eric Geiger, Simple Church: Returning to God’s Process for Making Disciples (Nashville: Broadman Press, 2006).

The start of many churches contains unique elements. Mercy Hill’s genesis is perhaps the most unique church in the Penn-Del Conference of the Assemblies of God. In order to reach the population of twenty-somethings not attending State College Assembly of God (SCAG), Mercy Hill began through a staff member of SCAG, Keith Davis. With SCAG’s permission and blessing, Mercy Hill launched as an independent congregation within the same college town as SCAG. While operating independently, the two churches continue ties. In fact, SCAG serves Mercy Hill by brewing and delivering the weekly coffee for Mercy Hill’s services.

Mercy Hill meets in a movie theater in State College. Storefront churches have long been a part of American church planting. High visibility in the midst of where people already congregate allows churches easy access to potential “customers”. This merging of the marketplace and faith is attractive to younger generations, making the movie theater the new storefront.

Sermon Evaluation

Content and Delivery
Attention and interest for the sermon were generated at the very beginning by use of a video clip from a contemporary movie, When Zachary Beaver Came to Town. The clip (View it here.) is a comical look at two preteen boys attempting to baptize Zachary Beaver so he can go to see his mother in Heaven when he dies. Not only is the humor disarming, but also introduces some of the modern preconceptions and misunderstandings of the nature of baptism, enabling Keith  to address these issues.

From the flow of the sermon, Keith’s preparation was evident. While it was a familiar topic to most people in churches, the cultural misunderstandings of many people outside the typical church, and present at Mercy Hill, made the topic fresh even though those of us evaluating the sermon were familiar with the passages employed and the topic addressed.

Keith dealt directly with the Scriptures on baptism–even explaining the ancient Greek use of the word baptizo and employing the account of Nicander pickling beets to explain the meaning of baptism. The message flowed logically while engaging both the heart and the mind as he introduced intellectual elements and connected them to the personal stories experienced in the baptism service of the previous year. The casual nature of the church was matched with the casual delivery style. Movements, gestures and eye contact helped engage the audience.

Application and Effectiveness
The application of this sermon advocating baptism was clear. The sermon addressed both baptism and the way to Salvation, which necessarily precedes it. The delivery, presentation and content made the sermon relevant to its intended audience. Since this is one of the Pentecostal churches evaluated, the issue on anointing must be addressed. In the traditional Pentecostal sense of anointing—loud, exuberant preaching—the sermon would not be considered anointed. If anointing is redefined as God effectively working through it, anointing was clearly evident. Overall, the sermon proved engaging and encouraging. Since the visit, I have often thought about the sermon.

Authenticity
Keith’s use of examples of baptism from within the congregation highlighted both their stories and an obvious personal connection. Since the stories came from his experience and relationships, he appeared personally influenced. At the same time, Keith managed to keep the sermon focused on the topic–not himself.

Multimedia and General Effectiveness
Multimedia use was limited to the previously mentioned video clip. However, the atmosphere of the movie theater contributed to the sense that the experience was media-driven. As a speaker, Keith is a good communicator and knows his audience.  The message’s goal and purpose were clearly communicated. Keith’s use of compelling stories woven through personal relationships communicates the Gospel and the community to which it belongs.

Interview Summary

Mercy Hill intentionally targets young adults in the State College area, which has a population of 145,000 and a median age of 28. While serving as the youth pastor at State College Assembly of God (SCAG), Keith sensed that the church by which he was employed was not effectively retaining the young adult population. In an account eerily familiar to many youth pastors, he noted that as teens graduated high school, they never assimilated into the “regular” church, thereby effectively graduating from high school and their faith. While many churches continue stratifying the church by adding a young adult ministry to the layers of age-targeted ministries, Keith made an unconventional move. With the blessing and support of the Lead Pastor of State College Assembly, Paul Grabill, Keith opened Mercy Hill, intentionally targeting younger generations with its ministry. State College Assembly financially supported Mercy Hill while it launched and tapered its financial support as the church became fully self-supporting.

As demonstrated by their recent travel together to the Penn-Del MinistrieSummit (The annual meeting for Assemblies of God ministers serving in Pennsylvania and Delaware.), the relationship between the churches continues on a personal level even though at this time, State College only supports them by providing the coffee brewed in air pots for Mercy Hill’s coffee time before the service. This symbolic act of service continues and demonstrates the connection between the two churches.

The choice to be an independent church allows Mercy Hill the freedom to develop their own church culture and outreach strategies without resistance from members of the other church. Many of the practices younger generations employ to reach young adults are difficult for older, traditional churches to embrace. In their understanding of Jesus being criticized for being with the wrong people—sinners, tax collectors and prostitutes, Mercy Hill’s members intentionally go to where young adults are, including bars. This is a stumbling block for many congregations even though the members are not getting drunk or participating in the behavior considered sinful.

Speakers
As a church plant with limited staffing, Mercy Hill’s preaching staff is Keith Davis. Keith preaches approximately forty-five of fifty-two Sundays. While open to others preaching, he is concerned that outside speakers might not fully understand or connect with his audience. The wrong person might unintentionally alienate or hurt the people that the church works hard to reach. Many of the typical things that “preach” and get a great response in churches may be unnecessarily offensive.

Many speakers assume a level of Biblical literacy no longer present in our culture. Nothing can be taken for granted in a post-Christian world. Keith relates a time that he mentioned Adam and Eve in a conversation at a small group. When Keith asked a new person in the group if he knew the story, they replied, “Well, I’ve heard the names.” Speakers can no longer assume the presence of background information needed to understand Biblical references.

Sermon Topics
To develop sermon series, Keith explains that he looks to find the questions people are asking instead of answering questions they are not asking. Whether churches specifically title a series in this way or not, two topics many preach on regularly are “how to maintain a marriage” and “how to raise kids in the context of a traditional, nuclear family.” Since Mercy Hill is made up of predominately unmarried adults and those with kids are more likely to be single parents, the topics must be approached differently. Instead of preaching on “How to Maintain Your Marriage,” it would be more appropriate to preach on “How to find a Spouse.” The assumption of many congregations is that the non-target audience will adapt the message to fit them, instead of asking the traditional, nuclear families to adapt the message to themselves. This unintentionally alienates those who do not fit the traditional model.

Extension of Ministry through Technology
When having the website designed, Keith asked for a site that looks more like a rock band than a church so it might be more attractive to non-Christians. Mercy Hill makes its sermons available online, but does not podcast at this time. From Keith’s responsiveness to his congregation, it appears simply a matter of lack of requests. As for social networking sites, such as Facebook and mySpace, Mercy Hill intentionally chooses not to cultivate online interactions among regular attendees. While using the social networking sites to reach out and connect to prospects, they choose direct, face-to-face contact for social interactions among themselves in order to meet the need for real, personal interaction.

Influences
Although Keith does not mention Mark Batterson, both are graduates of Central Bible College in Springfield, Missouri and knew each other there. Similarities in the two styles are evident. When asked about influences, Keith listed Mark Driscoll, Rob Bell, Dan Kimball and Doug Pagitt. While Keith would question the theology of some of these influences, their styles connect. Keith maintains that his biggest influence has been regular guys on the street and their reactions to sermons preached by Keith and others.

Advertising
In a move reminiscent of Rob Bell, who wanted no church sign placed at the church when they launched it, Keith had to be talked into a portable church sign placed on the street outside of the theater in order to direct traffic off the street. Believing that relationships are the key to evangelism, discipleship and church growth, the church purchases no advertising. Instead, Mercy Hill relies on word of mouth advertising and personal invitations to bring people to their meeting place. This personal approach to ministry infuses all aspects of their ministry. Their slogan, and one of their core values, is simply “nobody walks alone”. As ambitious as that is, Mercy Hill can ensure that people do not walk alone. First, God is always with us even before we ask Jesus into our hearts. Second, Mercy Hill intentionally connects people in groups, so the opportunity to walk with others is always available.

God Stories
Keith offers a thirty-day, money back guarantee for the Gospel. He invites people to come, experience the community of believers and test the claims of Jesus for thirty days. If not satisfied after thirty days, they can always go back to the way things were. Recently a grandmother talked her non-churchgoing granddaughter into bringing the coffee from the parent church to Mercy Hill. The granddaughter decided to try the thirty-day challenge. At her baptism, she declared, “OK there’s something to this Jesus thing.” The former coffee courier now runs a small group. And since she already has relationships with people who need Jesus, she effectively pursues others with passion.

“What type of preaching reaches young adults?” is a question I ask myself repeatedly as I attempt to speak and preach about faith in Christ in a way that connects with twenty-somethings.¹  With a variety of styles and values available to a speaker, how and what they choose reflects their own beliefs and values and also influences how the message is heard. The message the majority of American churches preach is not connecting with young adults. Church attendance among the youngest generations continues to decline. Reggie McNeal cites a study by Dawson McAlister, a nationally known youth specialist, on persons actively involved in high school youth groups as teenagers. Ninety percent of those actively participating as teenagers no longer attend church by their sophomore year in college. One third of those never return to church as they mature.² Using statistics by David Barrett, Stephen Lim notes that globally, the number of committed Christians continues to grow two times faster than the world population. In the United States, however, younger generations decreasingly identify themselves as Christians.³ Thom Rainer surveyed 1300 people in each of the four generational groups. Rainer found that sixty-five percent of Builders (born before 1946), thirty-five percent of Boomers (born between 1946 and 1964), fifteen percent of Generation X (born between 1965 and 1976) and only four percent of Generation Y (born between 1976 and 1994) responded to survey questions in such a way as to be identified as born again.⁴  There is an obvious disconnection between the church and younger generations. This series of blogs is about a journey to observe, experience, evaluate and reflect on ministries and churches that are attracting young adults.

Initial Criteria

In order to limit biases in church and ministry selection, several well-respected people in the Penn-Del District Office of the Assemblies of God were emailed. Their recommendations of churches were sought since it is my current District and ministry context. The initial selection criteria for the paper included 1) a recommendation from someone within the District hierarchy since it might be assumed that they would have a greater knowledge of ministries in the region 2) the home church of the one making the recommendation was not considered 3) any recommendations of churches or ministries led by or staffed by family members of those making recommendations were not eligible 4) since the long term effectiveness of proclamation should be the goal of any ministry, ministries must have been in existence and reaching young adults for more than a year. Churches meeting these criteria were selected, reviewed and contacted about the possibility of interviews with a member of the preaching team.

Criteria Changes

On our first trip, we encountered two twenty-something female baristas at a Starbucks before we visited Mercy Hill Church with Keith Davis. Tom, my videographer, asked them if they had heard about the church. We talked about the project and what we were doing. Before leaving for the next interview, we stopped at the same Starbucks and both baristas asked how it went. During the process of talking about the church and the project, one of them asked one of the most profound questions of the trip, “Where do you find churches like that?” Her question haunted me all the way to our next interview. This is a perfect example of a twenty-something who is interested in the kind of spiritual communities we’re visiting, but would have trouble finding one even though she works a few miles from where one meets. At the next interview, I related this story to the interviewee and he offered the same answer we did–it’s a network of people who know other people. While no easy solution to this dilemma exists, it did cause me to rethink my criteria and include Valley Church in Allentown. Although it did not receive a recommendation from any District official surveyed, I personally know the staff and some core volunteers. Since I would recommend the church to a twenty-something, the church was included in the church list.

Methodology

The websites of the selected churches were then used to get a rough idea of how the ministry is done. An interview with either the lead pastor or another member of the preaching team was conducted after an onsite evaluation of a sermon delivered by the person to be interviewed. When possible, the interviews were filmed the day of the sermon. In some cases, it was impossible to schedule an interview on the same day as the sermon. Also, due to scheduling difficulties, one sermon evaluation, Heather Zempel of National Community Church, was performed through a video podcast instead of part of an onsite evaluation.

Roadtrips are more fun when you bring along friends. In each of the onsite interviews, I invited along one twenty-something to be the cameraperson. Additionally, I invited a small group of twenty-somethings along for the journey, asking each to do a sermon evaluation as well. Since I am no longer a twenty-something, this provides another dimension to the evaluation. Citing each person’s evaluation would be a cumbersome task. Therefore, the observations of the twenty-somethings are incorporated into the general sermon evaluation.

More than Preaching

Preaching is not done in isolation from other parts of the church. A church’s philosophy of ministry affects the preaching as well as how they “do church” in other areas. Churches that retain young adults preach a specific way that attracts or retains young adults. But their other structures complement and reinforce the message they proclaim. This interconnection requires that preaching and practice of ministry be discussed together. While the interviews were conducted to discuss the preaching, other aspects of the churches were discussed in order to get a fuller picture of what connects with young adults. This series of blogs will tell their stories as it discusses their preaching.

While there was an initial list of questions posed to the interviewees, they were encouraged to tell their story, not just quickly answer. So as to get a fuller picture of how each church approaches preaching, subsequent questions were posed after their initial answers. Although difficult to quantify, perhaps the greatest measure of the effectiveness of a ministry is the lives it changes. At the conclusion of each interview, we simply asked, “What are some God Stories? What is going on here as a result of the preaching ministry?”

1. Although variously defined, young adult normally refers to people approximately 18-35 years old. This term is often used interchangeably with twenty-somethings. However, for the purpose of this series of blogs, twenty-somethings shall refer to the subset of young adults approximately 18-29.
2. Reggie McNeal, The Present Future: Six Tough Questions for the Church (San Francisco: Jossey-Bass, 2003), 4.
3. Lim, Stephen. “Leading Missional Ministry.” Class notes for Core 2 Course at the Assemblies of God Theological Seminary, Springfield, MO, June 11-14, 2007.
4. Reggie McNeal, The Present Future, 4

I love road-trips to observe and interview people doing ministry among young adults and twenty-somethings. It’s exciting to see the creativity and passion that God has given people as they connect with younger generations. Benson Hines “recently returned from a yearlong road trip researching Christian college ministry around the U.S. After 181 campuses, 44 states, and hundreds of interviews.” I stumbled upon Benson’s Facebook Group a while back and excitedly joined it. Today, he announced through his Facebook Group that his site was live and his free eBook, Reaching the Campus Tribes (An Opening Inquiry), is ready for downloading. If you’re excited about what God’s doing on college campuses, you will want to check it out.

Of all that we discussed, two questions stood out to me:

How do you measure success in small group ministry?

To be frank, it’s hard to get away from measuring attendance and number of small groups. While number measurements don’t necessarily capture the quality of community or life change, quality community often goes hand in hand with numerical growth. Rather than the number of groups, maybe a better indicator would be the percentage of people involved in groups.

If you could magically change one thing about your small groups ministry, what would it be?

One word: Training! I’ve been to too many “leadership training” events that are fun and encouraging, but send me home no more prepared to lead than when I came. Since I find myself spearheading the small groups leadership training at my church, I want to provide training that really helps leaders lead people into community and life change.

As we discussed the second question above, we talked about resources that might be valuable in designing a leadership development program. Good resources make all the difference in the word. Here are a few to check out:

Leading Life Changing Small Groups, by Bill Donahue
Excellent small group leadership translates into more life-change in community from some of the leaders in small group ministry–Willow Creek.

Coaching Life Changing Leaders, by Bill Donahue
Ideally, small group pastors/directors are responsible for coaching leaders to lead and this book teaches leaders to do that.

Creating Community, by Andy Stanley and Bill Willits
A look at how North Point is creating a culture of community and helping people develop meaningful relationships.

I’m currently surveying small groups pastors that I know about which resources they find most helpful in training leaders. My hope is to build a leadership training system that will equip leaders to lead groups effectively–and equip other leaders to come alongside those leaders and coach them to greater success. This small group leadership pipeline will likley consume most of my reading time in the coming months. So, hopefully this list will be more extensive in the near future…