Video Transcript: Worship Space, Visitors, Sacraments, and Celebrations

This is lecture 21 in the practical ministry skills course. We're talking today about worship, space, visitors, sacraments and celebrations. It's taken from chapter 13 of pastoring the nuts and bolts. Our key verse for today is honor the Lord for the  glory of his name, worship the Lord and the splendor of His Holiness. Worship  

space. Where are you going to be meeting? And this one, as you can gather, is  mainly aimed at churches, people working in churches, but if you're in some  other kind of a ministry, there may be some things you can learn from this as  well. And if not, you can certainly help you in supporting the church that you do  attend. You meet in some kind of a worship space. It might be under a tree, it  might be in a cathedral. It might be in our rented space. It might be in your living  room, as you think about the space, and particularly if you are lucky enough to  have opportunity to have some role in shaping or designing the space, building  a space, or furnishing it, or filling it out, or deciding what space to rent. You want  to think about a number of things. You want to think about function. Think about  what you're going to be doing, what is important in your service, in your tradition, the way you do church. What do you need? Do you need a lot of space for  people to get up and move around and maybe dance? Or do you need cushions for people to kneel in front of the chairs where they sit? Or are you more  comfortable with pews instead of chairs? Or, like in the ancient cathedrals, do  you expect everybody to stand up through the whole service? Are you going to  be using it for other kinds of things, like weddings? And if so, what kinds of  changes might need to be made for that? Think through the functions, all the  different things that you could imagine going on, and try to design the space, or  design the furnishings, or arrange the furnishings to make that work best, given  that there's going to be times when you need to change things around, things  that you perhaps did not anticipate, or a different kind of a thing, and so you  need to have a certain degree of flexibility. Winston Churchill said, We shape our buildings. Thereafter they shape us. We design it, we build it, we put it up. But  once it's put there. It's there. It's hard to change the shape of a building. It's hard to change the size of a building. It's expensive to change the buildings after  they're already there. And therefore, we begin to adapt to the buildings. They  shape us. I went to, I guess the last full time church that I served was in a city  and and the congregation was getting older, and there were some steps that you had to go up to get to the sanctuary from the entrance. And they put in an  elevator. They spent a lot of money putting in this elevator. They there were  quite some renovations, and a lot of thought went into it. And this happened  some years before I got there, maybe three years before I I came. They put in  the elevator. And when I got there, they were telling me the story about it, and  they said we we got this elevator all done, and it was all set, and we thought it  was wonderful. And then the time came for our first funeral, and we discovered  that the elevator was not quite big enough for a casket to fit in. The coffin would  not fit in the elevator, and so luckily, there was a back door, but there were steps

up that back door, and the idea with the elevator is that you could put it on the  rolling cart, and the pallbearers, if they were elderly and frail people that couldn't lift the weight and could just kind of walk along and roll the cart. But with that,  elevator didn't work. So you're never going to be able to anticipate everything.  But we shape our buildings and thereafter they shape us. In this case, the shape was coffins had to come in the back door, but they shape us in different ways as  well. This is a pastor speaking, a woman pastor speaking in a congregation, and they're in a church and there's a stained glass that is Moses angrily breaking the 10 Commandments. And there's another stained glass that's Sodom and  Gomorrah going up in flames. And on the pulpit there's a carving of an avenging  angel with a sword, and the preacher is saying, God is love, a verse apparently  out of fashion the year they designed our sanctuary, the congregations all  looking around, acting kind of scared and nervous because of the decorations.  And that leads us to symbols, the things that you put on the walls, the things that you put if you have a table, an altar table, or a communion table, or other  places. The things that you may have on the front of your pulpit, if you have a  pulpit, the symbols that you have are there because they mean something that's that's the point of a symbol. So if there are important points to your tradition, to  your understanding, to your church, find some way to symbolize them. And you  may want to put something up on the walls that symbolizes that a symbol is  something that doesn't actually depict something. It's not like a picture of the  empty tomb, if you want to symbolize the resurrection, the actually the reason  that Protestant crosses don't have Jesus hanging on them. They're not  crucifixes is because they wanted to symbolize. They wanted to shift the  emphasis. The crucifix symbolizes the the love that Jesus loved this so much  that He died for us, and it symbolizes the death of Jesus in our place, which is a  wonderful and valuable thing. The Protestants tended to want to symbolize the  resurrection, that Jesus was no longer on the cross, that He is no longer dead,  that he's risen and has overcome death. And so they have a cross without Jesus hanging on it. So those are symbols decorations could be pictures of Jesus or  pictures of an empty tomb or something. Speaking of this, pictures of Jesus, I  have been kind of surprised to find and I don't and maybe I shouldn't even be  saying this. I may be stepping out of line, but I've been surprised to see that in  Africa, in India, various places like that, the depiction of Jesus still is the  European white Jesus. I mean, he's not even a Jewish Jesus. If the Europeans  can show a white Jesus, Africans can show a black Jesus, and and Indians can  show a Jesus who looks like them, and other people can show a Jesus who  looks like them. The fact is, Jesus looked like a Middle Eastern man of 2000  years ago. We're not totally sure exactly what that means, but I think it's  important that people not feel like Jesus was so totally different than they are.  Jesus became one of us anyway, my own thought symbols, decorations.  Decorations can be innocuous, but they can be taken to have symbolic 

meaning, and it can be that you put up something that is a decoration that  maybe just from the culture and everything, but then you discover that maybe  there's a symbol, a symbolic meaning of that that seems to reinforce something  that you don't want. So think about that also. You're going to have to deal,  perhaps, with the situation where somebody gives you a gift and says here, this  is a wonderful thing that I painted this picture, and I want you to put it up in the  church as a decoration. And you look at it and it's horrible, and it says all the  wrong things, and it's very poorly done. And you certainly don't want anybody  coming into your church to see that. You're gonna have to figure that one out.  That's that's a tough. One that's a tough one, but some traditions go with very  plain, undecorated, unsymbolic, so that the focus is on the Word and the  preacher. Others have the decorations because they want it to look nice in  honor of God, and because the symbols help people learn. So you need to work with that whatever your tradition, but just take a look at the symbols and the  decorations and the things that people are going to see when they come into  your church. Try to look at it from the eyes of somebody who doesn't know  anything about it has been there for the first time, and see if it does convey what you're trying to convey. You want your space to be comfortable enough that  people can sit and listen. You don't want it to be so comfortable they'll fall asleep while you're preaching. But you also don't want it to be so uncomfortable that  they can't stay there to listen to you. There's a saying that the mind can only  absorb what the seat can endure. So if it's too uncomfortable to remain sitting  and listening, then you need to be careful about that. You want to think about  childcare. Some churches feel that the presence of children distracts the  parents, and the parents can't listen and it takes their focus off, and the parents  need to be relieved from the responsibility of taking care of the children for a  while, so they can focus on worship and focus on the sermon others, and so  they have childcare, and the children up to whatever various different ages the  particular church decides go someplace else. And sometimes it's right at the  beginning. Sometimes the children are there for the worship time, and the part  they can enjoy the singing and so on. And then there may be a special children's sermon where the pastor invites the children to the front and has a special little  lesson for them. The pastor can do it, somebody else can do it. And then they go off for Sunday school or for a children's church. And then there are others who  say, Well, you know what? We're going to count on our parents to keep their  children quiet, and they're going to stay in the church. And we've had some  amazing stories of little children, three and four years old, who you thought were just goofing off and falling asleep and playing with toys, and come back home  and ask mommy Daddy, what did the preacher mean when he said such and so  when she said such and so? So you need to figure that one out. Be aware that if you have childcare, then the adults who are taking care of the children. Are also  missing the sermon and so on, whatever. So you have to take all of that into 

account. Parking. If you're in a situation where people drive to church, make  sure there's enough parking, make sure that it's close enough. They say, the  people who study these things say that if a parking lot is 80% full, then  newcomers will decide that the church is too crowded, and they'll they are likely  to go on to someplace else or to drive past and not come in. So in looking at  whether you need to start an additional service, look at the number of cars in  your parking lot as well, if that's your kind of a situation. If you have a big parking lot, sometimes it's nice to have greeters out in the parking lot to welcome people to come in, if you have a lot of people. And this brings us to visitors. You want to  make your visitors feel welcome. Visitors. Are most times, especially if they are  not with somebody from your church who invited them. Now that's the ideal, is  for your church people to invite friends to come along with them and to meet  them and come in the door with them and sit with them and introduce them to  people and so on. But that doesn't always happen, and so for most people, it's a little bit scary to walk into a church they've never been in before. You don't quite  know what to expect. You want to make them feel comfortable. You want to  make them feel welcome. You want to make them feel like you expect them and  that you are glad you're there, and you want to make them feel comfortable. You don't want people coming up. And these are true stories that I've heard. A visitor  comes in and sits down in church, and somebody comes in afterwords and  walks up to them and says, Excuse me, you're sitting in my pew. And make the  visitor get up and move. Don't let your people do that. Don't let your people do  that to these poor visitors. I had another one where I heard, I don't think this  happened in my church, but where a visitor came into church, and a long time  church person came up to them later and said, We don't wear those kinds of  clothes in this church. Don't do that. Make your visitors feel welcome, make  them feel comfortable. And part of making them feel comfortable is giving them,  making sure that your service is easy to follow. If you're in the kind of a service  where there's at some point where everybody is just expected to stand up, or  everybody's expected to sit down, or everybody's expected to kneel, or  everybody's expected to do something else, make sure that there is some way  that those visitors can know that if you have a written bulletin, make sure it's  written in the bulletin. I used to write the Lord's Prayer out in the bulletin and  print it in the bulletin. Everybody in the church knew the bulletin, knew the Lord's Prayer. It used to be that you could assume that everybody in America knew the  Lord's Prayer. But if we were going to say the Lord's Prayer in church, we came  to realize there were some people who didn't know the Lord's Prayer by heart,  and so just in order not to embarrass them, we would write it out. And as a  matter of fact, not to embarrass me either, because one time I was giving the  Lord's Prayer, and I had been a pastor for 20 years, and I just had done this  every Sunday and said the Lord's Prayer pretty much every day all my life, and I just lost the words while I was leading people. So make make them feel 

comfortable, make sure the service is easy to follow for them, and don't you  want to make them feel welcome, but that doesn't mean you want to make them  feel like everybody's looking at them. You don't want to point them out like  they're an object for everybody to look at the this is a church where when  somebody filled out, the lady says, it's the last time I fill out a visitor's card. And  apparently, when you fill out a visitor's card, when you come in, they give you a  hat that says visitor. So everybody knows, there are a lot of people that come  into church and just kind of want to be anonymous. They don't want to be  noticed at first, until they can scope it out and get more comfortable with it. Make your visitors feel like you care about them, like they're important to you, like  they're more than just some interlopers who are getting in the way that you have to deal with. And also don't let them feel like you're fresh meat. A new somebody else we can put on the committee, somebody else we can get tithes and  offerings from. Make you feel make them feel you care about them. Talk to them, ask them about themselves. Introduce yourself. Keep training your people, how  to introduce yourself to visitors, how to introduce themselves to visitors, and the  kinds of questions to ask and the kinds of questions not to ask, and then the  next Sunday, or the next time they come, try your best to call them by name,  Welcome them by name, and use their name that really makes them believe that you care about them, and makes them feel welcome, and make them glad they  came. Make them glad they came. And you can figure out whatever that means  in the context of your service. But when, when somebody comes to visit your  service, you want them to be glad they came. You want them to come back.  Contact them if you possibly can, if you have the contact information, phone call, visit, whatever it might be within, they say, within the first 48 hours is most  important. So by by Tuesday, if your service is on Sunday, and welcome them  and offer them to if they have any questions to get in touch with you, make them feel like you care about them and make them glad they came. All right, one of  the things that churches do that probably most other ministries don't do,  although I think they can, but something specifically that people expect in  churches, and even often will. Come to churches for even if they often don't,  other to come for other things, sacraments and ordinances and marriages and  funerals and so especially the marriages and funerals, people will come who  don't for weddings and funerals, who don't normally come to church. But let's  talk first about the sacraments or ordinances. Sacraments and ordinances are  two different terms used by different kinds of churches for generally, for the  Lord's communion and for Bapt or the Lord's Supper, which is also called  communion, or the mass or the and now that that word is gone from me, starts  with an E, but anyway, and baptism and and the Lord's Supper are the two that  are Even either called ordinances by the churches that understand them as  things that Jesus, particularly with the Lord's Supper, Jesus told us to do. Jesus  ordained these practices or sacraments, which carries the sense that God's 

presence is actually there, as opposed to just representative or symbolic. That's  a theological issue. We're not going to get into. God obviously works in it, no  matter what you see, how you call it. But let's start first with baptism. There are  churches who only baptize people who are older, and you know that, and  churches that that baptize infants, and the point of that is a recognition of  coming into the church through profession of faith, through recognizing, through  stating that I believe in Jesus, I want to be a Christian, and I want to be baptized so that everybody knows that, and for that reason, if possible, it should be a  public thing. Now I'm not saying if you're in a place where Christians are  persecuted and you could get in trouble for if anybody discovered you're a  Christian, I'm not saying that you have to do it publicly and let everybody know,  but the others in your church still should be a part of that, because it's you're  coming into the family of God, And the family of God should know that they've  got another brother or sister. So the way you do it, I'll leave to your tradition, to  your denomination, or the way that the Lord leads you to do it, the book goes  into a little more of the details about that. Just one thing, practical thing to say,  and I think this is in the book. But if you are doing a baptism by immersion,  where somebody goes all the way under the water, and you bring them back up  out of the water, make sure the clothes that they're wearing and that you are  wearing are going to be as appropriate when they're all wet as they were when  they were dry, the Lord's Supper. Churches do it at different times. There are  some that do it every week. There's some who would like to do it every day, and  some clergy, some pastors, ministers, do take the Lord's supper for themselves  or their family every day. There are others that it's maybe once or twice a year  and takes a whole lot of preparation. Again, that's whatever your tradition, your  denomination, you go with it. I'm just saying different ones do different ways.  churches differ on who is invited, whether it is only for people who are baptized  Christians, who are active members of the church, or whether anybody is open  for it. My I personally, in my my own understanding, first, we baptize babies and  then have a confirmation later and second, and I believe that's biblical, and I can support that, but I'm not going to take time right now and second, we invite  anyone to communion, because I've known people who have gotten saved  because of sensing the presence of God when they received communion. And I  believe, if you look in the Bible, well, won't go into that one either. We'll leave  that for you all in the Lord's Supper, where you put it in the service. Look at the  flow of the service. Explain it to people who are new, explain what it's all about.  To any non Christians, whether you invite them to participate or not, explain  what it's about. And then, if you don't invite them to participate, explain why. But  so at least they'll know what's going on and tell them what they're expected to  do if, if it's going to be served to them in their seats. Tell them that. Tell them how that'll work. If they're expected to get up and come forwards. Tell them how  that's going to work. And in my churches that I served, typically there were two 

bank, banks of pews, long pews, and there was an aisle on each side and an  aisle down the middle. And I would ask people to stand and come down the  middle aisle, and then when you were done, you could go out to the sides to  return down the outside aisle. And sometimes I felt like an airplane flight  attendant doing all of the motions, you know, but people need to know what  they're expected to do, so that even your your regular people, can use the  reminder. But you don't want visitors feeling uncomfortable, feeling embarrassed because they don't know what to do. Be aware if there are any hindrances to  anyone receiving if you have somebody in a wheelchair, can they get up there?  Are there steps that people have to climb to get up to where they're receiving  Communion, things like that, anything that might keep somebody who otherwise should be able to receive it from getting I used to offer that if somebody couldn't  make it up to the front because they had a wheelchair or a walker or something  like that, that I'd be happy to bring it out to them. And so we did that because we served communion, as I mentioned, where it came from the front there are the  traditions where you receiving in your seats, and that's then you don't have that  problem. Allow enough time. You don't want something like this to be rushed.  You don't want get people to have the feeling that this is just something, some  ritual that we have to rush through so we can get out on time. Allow enough time in your service for people to really experience the blessing of Holy Communion  and in Holy Communion, you are sharing the body of Christ. Isaiah 53 says that  healing comes through the wounds that are on the body of Christ. So the body  of Christ has healing power, and whether you see the bread in communion as  only representing the body of Christ, or in some spiritual way, or even in some  real way being the body of Christ. Don't neglect the healing that might be  available in that through that. Okay, quickly weddings, you need to figure out  who you're going to do weddings for. I always offered to do weddings for  anybody, because the pre-wedding counseling was an opportunity to present the gospel. I didn't promise I would do the wedding if in the counseling I felt like they weren't taking it seriously or for some reason, I reserve the right to not go ahead and do the wedding. But you need to figure that out. The pre-wedding  counseling is important. And then, of course, you need to figure out what you're  going to talk about, how it's generally kind of a preventive marriage counseling.  Give them ideas how to get through a wedding, but not just a wedding, but a  lifetime of marriage. But you also need to talk about the wedding too. The pastor is as the bride and groom there and the pastor, they've apparently answered  wrong, because the pastor says the correct response is, I do not. It's worth a try.  You don't want somebody coming into a marriage with the idea that, well, if it  doesn't work. We'll divorce, we'll try, and if we don't like it. I always try to work  the gospel message into the weddings and funerals, not not overbearing, but an  invitation. You do that the way that you feel the Lord is leading you to funerals,  just very quickly. The one thing I would say about that is don't tell people that 

their loved one, who has just died, is going to hell. I have known people who just were totally, completely turned off a church because of more than one person in  different states, in different situations, because the pastor said. This person who  died here that you love but no chance of heaven. They're going to hell. Don't say that. Number one, you don't know if they wanted you, as a Christian pastor or  

minister to preside over the funeral. That means there is at least some kind of a  chance that this dead person heard the gospel someplace and had a chance to  make a deathbed confession and turn to the Lord in their last moments. So don't say that. But second, even if it's true, it's too late for them, but it's not too late for the people that you're talking to. So you can say that the still living people will go 

to hell if they don't come to Jesus. If that's what you feel like God is telling you to say, I probably wouldn't put it that bluntly, but I hear reports out of Africa in  particular, many, many people being saved at funerals. So praise the Lord for  that. But just be careful. Make sure that you are representing God, representing  Jesus in these times when you may have people listening to you who would  never, ever listen to a Christian minister at any other time. Time's up, and we'll  see you next time