Real Coffee - Real Church

It was like a deja-vu! We might not have bought the T-shirt, but we certainly had been there and done that. Andras and I were standing in the middle of a room, among other people, but still on our own. And yet this was different, very different we soon would find out.

Our mission to find a lively and welcoming church had brought us to a school on the outskirts of Oxford. It was our second service and second church of the day. We were convinced this would be better. Actually it was difficult to imagine it could be worse, but we had been disappointed before and tried not to get our hopes up too high. This church served coffee before the service and so we came early, both so we would get a coffee, but also to make it easy to spot us as visitors and make contact with us.

Within 2 minutes of going through the entrance to the school, we knew this would be different. We were greeted straight away by friendly people, given a simple, but smart welcome folder, and then pointed in the direction of the coffee. As we walked towards the coffee we passed where the service would be held. A typical school gym with a stage. People were getting the hall ready, music was being played, but there were no chairs anywhere. “Oh no” I thought “it's the kind of church where they expect everybody to end up lying on the floor, and so they they don't bother to put up chairs”. We considered turning around to make a quick exit, but were torn between our wish for safety and longing for coffee. The coffee won!

I am convinced you cannot build The Kingdom of God without coffee, but since moving to the UK I have struggled with the question of whether you can build the Kingdom with weak coffee? This church took the Kingdom building seriously, at least judged by the coffee. It was real coffee, you could not see the bottom of the cop through it and it actually tasted of coffee, not just coloured water.

It was then we had our deja-vu. We were standing in a room, with a cup of coffee in our hands. There was people around us, but we were on our own. There was differences. The people around us were younger, there were families and people related well to each other, seemingly enjoying meeting each other, but we were left on our own. We were drawn back to reality as a father with a couple of kids around him said hi and asked whether whether this was our first visit. He was very friendly and relaxed. We did not have a long conversation, as it was time for the service to begin, but he pointed us in the direction of were the service would be, letting us know it was good to see us, before his kids dragged him away – they were obviously eager to get started.

As we walked pass the gym we realised it was the children's venue and a sigh of relief escaped us. We might still end the service standing up! We followed everyone else into another hall. There was a small band of 4 on a small, movable stage, but the pastor, who opened the service, stood down on the floor, same level as everyone else.

We found a couple of seats in the middle and again looked around. Like the morning, there were around 60 people present, but the average age probably could not make it above 30, certainly not above 40. The pastor stood up and said welcome to everyone and explained what was going to happen. “First there will be a time of worship, that is singing, and then, after a small break, we will listen to Joe Blogs (forgot the real name), who is visiting us today and will preach. If you are not used to this God thing and cannot relate to the songs, then you don't have to sing. Just relax and feel at home”

The next 30 minutes was spend in worship led by the band on the stage. It seemed like everyone participated, no one was sitting down and people got involved in the worship in different ways, probably according to what they were comfortable with. We did not know any of the songs, but it was easy to into the flow and just enjoy the worship and the presence of God. The music and the singing from the band was a bit too loud for my liking, I do prefer being able to hear the people around me when worshiping. Andreas did not complain and both the music style and the level of the band probably was very relevant for the majority of the congregation – I was among the oldest 10%.

When the worship finished the Pastor announced that we now would take a 5 minute break. A little bit unusual, we thought, and wondered if there was time to go and get another cup of coffee, since we had nothing else to do in the break. The worship certainly had been better than in the morning, there was little doubt the church was alive, but so far the welcoming bit was not much better than what we had experienced in the first church. We were soon to be proven oh so wrong!

We sat down for the break, and within 30 seconds two men came over to us, one from each side, and started talking talk with us. They were very friendly and open. I had no intention of blowing my cover, I was going to play the normal visitor, who just happened to have found their church. I crumbled after 2 minutes, broke down and admitted I actually was a pastor myself. It was not because he interrogated me, he was just genuine and friendly and very comfortable with his faith. When he asked me “So, are you a believer yourself?” it just came out as a very natural question, and if I had not been, and would have answered no, it would not have been embarrassing.

After 5 minutes the break was over and the two guys returned to their seats. As we sat down we looked at each other and said “So that is why they have a break”! The “tactic” was new to us, but a very effective way of making contact with new people and making you feel welcome.
There was more! This was church that had thought their welcome strategy through. During the announcements the Pastor made us aware of a “contact form”, which was part of the welcome folder. “We would love to stay in contact with you, and to show our gratitude you will receive a worship CD as a gift, when you hand the the form in at the information desk”. Very clever!

It was time for the sermon and the guest preacher was introduced. He preached about persistent prayer, related to the Bible all the time and used different illustrations form his own life. He was dynamic, in a different way than the energetic preacher in the morning. You did not get the feel he was trying to “pull up” the congregation, he was just very engaged in his subject. He obviously did not just believe in persistence in prayer, but also in preaching. He went on for quite a while! From the first “finally” to the end passed 15-20 minutes. He actually managed to end the sermon 3 times, saying “finally” or “before I finish” or whatever, and then continued, as he just had something else he needed to point out.

He finished the sermon with inviting people forward to prayer. Without any real hesitancy app. 10 people came forward, and he started praying for them. It was a bit surprising that he was the only one praying, you would have expected this kind of church to have ministry teams and it did not take long before the Pastor took charge of the service again, explained what was going on and then asked the ministry teams to come forward and help with praying. He apologised that they had gone on longer than usual (the preacher probably should have stopped after the first “finally”!), but at the same time there was no rush in the ministry. There were enough people to pray for all who had come forward at the same time, and they took their time, giving God time to work, which he very visibly did.

While people were still being ministered to the Pastor “officially” ended the service. We sat down for a minute, still in the presence of God, but again we were not left on our own for long. The pastor came down to say hello to us. Again this was not a coincidence, surely one of the two first guys had told him about us. He was not interested in taking with me, as a visiting pastor, although he was very kind. He wanted to talk to Andreas. When he heard Andreas studied and lived in Oxford, he made sure he understood he was very welcome in the church. He also let him know what other churches of a similar style Andreas might find interesting, telling how great they were, but stressed they would be delighted if he should decide to come to them.

As we left we could not help to marvel over the differences in church we just had experienced. If we were to choose between those two, we would not need to think about it. There was really no comparison – whether we talked about the worship, the welcome, the presence of God – and we realised that Church is not just Church. That leads to the question: “When is church Church?” That leads to the question: “How do we make Church Church?” or maybe “Is our church Church?”

You could also ask yourself: Is this blog Blog? But the question most are asking is “Are you finished?” But when is finished Finished? Do you ever finish? Do you ever danish?

Here are some other questions for you:

Both churches visited were part of denominations, can you guess which?

Which church would you have chosen, should you come back a second time?

How does your church welcome visitors?

What can you learn form the two churches we visited?

When is church Church?

With all these questions lingering in your mind, I will bid my faithful readers (all three of them) farewell. Will there be a third or fourth mission trip to churches in Oxford? You will just have to wait and see

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Morse or Clouseau?

Maybe it was because we lingered to long over the cooked English breakfast in the café, maybe it was because we did not know where we were going and decided to use the SatNav while walking, or maybe it was just because we generally are not good at keeping the time. No matter what the reason, we were late when we walked through the doors to the church we had decided to check out first on our mission.

It was a strange entrance, you almost walked into a wall, so narrow was the hall, and only because we could hear singing and therefore could follow the sound, did we find the stairs in the corner leading up to “the upper room”, where the worship service already had been going for 10-15 minutes.

As we walked up we recognised what was being song (These are the days of Elijah). We also recognised the sound of a guitar, which, although slightly out of tune, made us feel encouraged. We had not idea what kind of church would await us when we stepped through the doors, but in our minds we made the equation: Worship song + guitar + 15 minutes into the service = Our kind of church. It was a deduction worthy of Inspector Morse and we boldly stepped through the doors.

We were not prepared for what would meet us. It would be safe to say that our deduction had been more in the class of Inspector Clouseau than Morse. In front, on the stage, was a young guy with what looked like a children size guitar, singing away. Behind him a couple, which apparently were the leaders of the church, in front of him the congregation. Everyone, apart from the young guy with the guitar, was sitting down and no one in the hall were joining in. When he finished singing, the women on the stage jumped out and rather over energetic got the congregation to applaud – we actually think she was his mother!

We soon realised that the two leaders on the stage were energetic in all they did. The women led most of the service and she was all smiles all the time, and no matter what she was saying, she was emphasising it with the use of her hands– right from getting the children to the front and leading them in a song, to the way the Women's World Day of Prayer was announced (and it must take quite an effort to be energised by that thought!).

By now we had found a couple of seats closed to the back and we slowly tried to get an overview of where we had landed. The hall was pretty full, probably around 60-70 people, there were quite a number of young people, very likely students, but the average age could not make it below 60. There was a relaxed and friendly atmosphere, people laughed when they were supposed to, but what really hit you was the energy level of the couple on the stage. It was almost too much, especially when compared to the somewhat lethargic congregation. The leaders were all smiles and big arm movements. It seemed like everything was important and essential and every other sentence had to be emphasised with characteristic moves with hands and arms, it was quite entertaining.

The church had a choir which came forward to sing a couple of times. There were about 15 in the choir, but apparently only one soprano. It was not a problem; the rest of the choir was no match for her! Listening to choir I felt sorry for the man who everyday would be woken up by such a voice. In my mind I travelled back to talks I used to have with a good friend about our future wives, which we had not met yet. We both agreed that one essential quality of our wives would be that they should be altos, so we could have a more calm and relaxed start to the day.

The worship was not amazing, but it was not awful either. The sermon was, not surprisingly, delivered very energetic. The theme was The Church, and the preacher clearly was passionate about this theme and had a lot he wanted to share with the congregation. He had so much he wanted to share that the points he covered could have lasted him for 3-4 sermons. The sermon wasn’t too long (according to my definition of when a sermon is too long at least) but it was just confusing, trying to cover too much ground in one go and therefore only scratching the surface on most points. Behind him a powerpoint presentation illustrated parts of the sermon. At one time he mentioned the devil, and a small clip art devil appeared on the screen, jumping up and down with a fork in his hand. Very entertaining, almost amusing, though we could not tell whether this was the intention.

When the final Amen was said we got ready for what we really wanted to see. We decided not to make it too difficult for anyone to talk to us and make us feel welcome. After the closing prayer the piano played (well, actually a young guy played the piano, but you know what I mean) a little postlude, and instead of walking out, we sat down, pretending to listen, but really just waiting for someone to come over and say hi. When the prelude was over we stood up and took all the time possible to put our jackets on, adjusting our shoelaces and what ever else we could do to make time pass.

After a little while we could find no more to do, and so we reluctantly began to leave the hall, still slowly, showing we had loads of time, if anyone wanted to make contact. Outside the worship hall we were just about to begin our descent of the stairs when we heard a familiar voice behind us: “I just have to say hello to you” someone said and when we turned around we saw the lady, who had led the worship, coming towards us, with a big smile of course. We stopped up and shook hands with her “Really good to see you” she said, and then she turned around and left us at the stairs, on our own again.

During the service all had been invited to coffee downstairs and we were certainly not leaving without our coffee. Down in the small entrance there were two doors, both were closed, and when we tried to go through, we found out the both were locked as well. We looked around. There was nowhere else to go than through one of these doors, or out through the main doors, leaving the church. At this stage it was very tempting just to leave, it was actually a bit embarrassing standing there, like we were desperate for a free cup of coffee, but we were determined to persevere to the very end, so we waited.

It did not take long before someone came and opened one of the doors, and we could walk through a corridor down to the room, where the coffee was served. We got our free coffee and biscuit and then placed our selves in the middle of the room, trying to look as friendly and open as possible. The young guy who had played the piano, stood close to us and he actually talked to us: “Are you visiting?” he asked. I confirmed I was and Andreas answered “No, I live here”. “Are you studying?” was the next question, to which Andreas again answered yes, leaving the door wide open for follow up questions and conversation. Instead the guy told us he was studying to be a teacher, and then he kind of drifted away and we were again left on our own in the middle of the room.

While we finished of our coffee I tried to recall the early morning, when I had left Manchester. Had I remembered to shower and shave? Did I remember to use deodorant and brush my teeth? Why was it no one seemed to want to come close to us? Maybe one of us had stepped in something smelly, but I could not pick up any smell. By now the cup was empty and the biscuit eaten and we just could not find anyway of staying without it becoming embarrassing. We handed our cups back, walked through the corridor and out through the front door. We left the church without anyone making an effort to find out who we were or even invite us to come back.

We agreed that on a scale from 1 to 5 for being open and welcoming this church had scored a -3.
We were tempted to call it a day and forget about the next church, where the service were in a couple of hours, but we could not abandon our mission and so, after a walk around Oxford and having received new strength through a good lunch, we set out to locate the next church on our list, wondering what would meet us there. The first church had not been hostile or unfriendly, just uninterested in us. Maybe it was just us who had to high expectations. Maybe churches just are not welcoming to strangers? Another nagging thought kept appearing: Maybe your church is no better, maybe you are just the same, you just don’t experience it, as you are not usually the stranger?

The “afternoon church” met in a school. As we approached in the car, right from the main road, the church had put out very visible boards with the name of the church and an arrow, showing where to turn to find the school. Our hopes were resurrected, like Phoenix our expectations started to fly again, but at the same time we were cautious of getting to excited – we had been let down before, would it happen again? As a matter of fact, 5 minutes after parking the car we found our selves in the middle of a room, with a cup of coffee in our hands, on our own...

Watch this space to find out what happened next!

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Where Morse and Potter never went

We were on a mission! Andreas and I had not decided to spend the day together in Oxford just to hang out and enjoy ourselves, although that also was part of the plan. We had a higher purpose. We were looking for a church, not a specific church, but a special church. Our mission, and we had chosen to accept it, was to locate a church in Oxford, which was alive, relevant, attractive and especially welcoming. We new our mission would not be an easy one, for some it might sound out right impossible, but we were determined to have a go, and full of faith and hope that we would succeed.

If you do not know where you are going, you will end up somewhere else, and so we had done our research before we set out on our trip. We had searched the Internet and found 4 churches, which appeared to be worth a visit. 4 different denominations or church families. 4 apparently quite different churches. 3 which all seemed to have the potential of fulfilling our search criteria, at least judged by their homepages.

One was different. It didn't really have a homepage, just some pages as part of a larger denominational website and even those pages only gave the basic information: address, name of pastors and time of services. If it was not because we looked for information specifically about this church, we would never have found it, and if it was not because we felt some kind of affiliation and loyalty towards the denomination it belonged to, we probably would never have included it in our search. The lack of “web presence” was of course not necessarily bad news, we tried to convince ourselves. Maybe this church put a much greater emphasis on personal evangelism and loving relationships. Maybe they just did not invest time and energy in a homepage, since their outreach was through the individual members – that could actually be very promising. It would mean it probably would be a warm and welcoming church, a church where you would be drawn into the fellowship and people would meet you with open arms. We would soon become wiser!

Our investigation was hindered by the annoying fact that most churches meet at the same time. There doesn't seem to be a lot of consideration for those who want to do a “church crawl”, going from church to church, getting more and more drunk (in the Spirit of course) as you go along, so we had to choose. Of our 4 churches 2 only met in the morning, one only in the afternoon and one offered services both in the morning and afternoon. As we were committed to our mission, we decided to visit one church in the morning, another in the afternoon and make sure we had a good lunch in between, so we would have the necessary stamina.

We had dressed for the occasion. I down, and Andreas up. I went without, Andreas with. A tie, that is! We appeared as 2 reasonably normal people, nothing to show we were on a mission. Hopefully we would be perceived as just dropping into a service, and would be treated like any other visitors, that just appear out of the blue.

And so, with all the necessary preparation and information we set of. We did not know what to expect, and both felt a bit of unease – it is not easy just to walk into a new setting, among a lot of strangers, but we also felt excited, looking forward to what we would experience.

To be continued

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