Breaking it down
We live in a society which is defined by demographics.
I am a white male, in the 25-34 demographic, married, no kids, household income $25000-$50000, rent, etc, etc, etc, etc.....
As someone who has worked in and studied the science of marketing, I have a great appreciation for a person or organization that is able to locate a target market/audience for a message/product and being able to create a message that clicks with that group.
What does that have to do with Church?
For me, it seems the trend over the past 20-30 years or so is to break down the local church into a group of demographics so there is something for everybody. Youth group, empty nesters, children's church, unmarried 20somethings, married 20somethings, college age, and so on and so on. These can be very good things, create avenues for people within the local body to find people "like them" so they are able to connect and click with people they are more likely to share common interests with.
What's so bad about this?
Sometimes we can take this too far and end up compartmentalizing our churches in such a way that we lose that beautiful New Testament concept of fellowship within the whole body. Churches need to keep a balance and realize that keeping one age group from another can end up creating a litney of churches within one church.
If fellowship and community are what we seek to foster, let's look at compartmentalization with trepidation and caution.
Book of the day The Church by Edmund Clowney.
I am a white male, in the 25-34 demographic, married, no kids, household income $25000-$50000, rent, etc, etc, etc, etc.....
As someone who has worked in and studied the science of marketing, I have a great appreciation for a person or organization that is able to locate a target market/audience for a message/product and being able to create a message that clicks with that group.
What does that have to do with Church?
For me, it seems the trend over the past 20-30 years or so is to break down the local church into a group of demographics so there is something for everybody. Youth group, empty nesters, children's church, unmarried 20somethings, married 20somethings, college age, and so on and so on. These can be very good things, create avenues for people within the local body to find people "like them" so they are able to connect and click with people they are more likely to share common interests with.
What's so bad about this?
Sometimes we can take this too far and end up compartmentalizing our churches in such a way that we lose that beautiful New Testament concept of fellowship within the whole body. Churches need to keep a balance and realize that keeping one age group from another can end up creating a litney of churches within one church.
If fellowship and community are what we seek to foster, let's look at compartmentalization with trepidation and caution.
Book of the day The Church by Edmund Clowney.
posted by Bobby's blog at 3:59 PM
2 Comments:
Bobby,
I couldn't agree with you more. In fact, all this compartmentalizing really annoys me more than anything.
At our current church, my wife and I have left the married 20somethings group for the ancient group. It is the best thing we have ever done. We have made some really good friends and learned much from the more experienced and wise couples out there. Whatever happened to the concept of "mentoring"?
Keep up the good blogging.
It is a sad fact in today's culture, even in Christian culture. We have really segregated by age, maybe even moreso than race. And the thing is, no one is really thinking about the long term ramifications of it.
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