It is a true saying that less is more, but in the context of this blog, I don’t believe it is. We have been out of pastoral ministry in the UK for 6 years and during that time, some things have changed within church life. Three of the main things that I have noticed are these: Communion happens usually once a month – I’ll get to that: a lot of churches only have one service on a Sunday – I’l get to that and many churches don’t have a weekly prayer meeting, guess what? I’ll get to that too!

You may ask, does it matter about any of these things, and maybe it doesn’t for you, but I think that this is a detriment to our churches. So, let me explain further.

Communion

Jesus told us to take communion, the bread and the wine, in remembrance of Him. The horrendous suffering that Jesus endured was for you and I to have life. Communion, I believe is a part of that life. What is the point of Jesus telling us to take and eat if it doesn’t have any affect on our lives? There is more to it than a lot of churches have given it credit for, ask yourself if that’s true.

Many times, it’s a 5 minute add on to our services and, as previously said, happens in a lot of churches just once a month. So, what about the church member who isn’t there on the first Sunday of the month (the usual Sunday) it means they have the potential to go 2 months or more before taking communion! A crucial part of a believer’s life. It’s even worse in Tanzania. In the 20 years that we have been involved in Tanzanian church, we have never once taken communion! Wow!

These next couple of sentences I am pinching from my husband! ‘Communion gives us a chance to Remember – the cost & Jesus’ return; to Remind the enemy that he was totally defeated at Calvary; to Realign, forgive others and be forgiven; Reflect, By His stripes we were healed.’ JB

Just these 4 words have taken communion to a new level for me. Communion is a power. Communion gives life. If we don’t take it seriously there are consequences – read 1 Corinthians 11 if you’re not sure about that. Where communion is concerned, less is not more.

Prayer Meetings

Let me start this section with a very high bar! John 15:7 says this, ‘If you remain in me and my words remain in you, ask whatever you wish and it will be done for you’ I don’t have time to delve into this verse suffice it to say, remaining in Him and the word remaining in you, play a huge part in this verse, it isn’t living how you like and getting whatever you wish, there is much more to it than that, I’m sure you’ll appreciate, but it is scripture which means its true and it is possible! This is our access because we are Christians, yet if you were to ask a lot, not all, of pastors how many people go to their prayer meetings, the answer is usually low or the answer is, we don’t have one! That utterly baffles me! How can a church function without a weekly prayer meeting? The truth is, generally speaking, many don’t really believe God answers prayer and that is reflected by the size of the prayer meeting in your church or by the fact that there isn’t a prayer meeting at all. If you’re a pastor reading this, you may have tried and no-one has turned up. It doesn’t matter, you should do it. Lead by example and the people will come – don’t give up too soon.

To pray together as church is a great exercise. You get to hear the hearts of your people, you get to stand in agreement with one another and you get to pray for things that don’t necessarily affect your life e.g persecuted church, missions, government etc… It’s the engine room. Where prayer meetings are concerned, less is not more.

Sundays

This is the one where you’re probably going to feel the need to do something else right now rather than read on! Haha! Don’t panic, hear me out. I grew up going to church 3 times on a Sunday! Morning, afternoon for Sunday School and then there was an evening meeting! I’m sure many of you were the same. I’m not suggesting we go back to that, but I am throwing out some thoughts about what we may have given up by only having one service. An evening service gives you the chance to help other ministries develop. To encourage preachers, worship leaders etc becomes much more a challenge if you only have one service. An evening service gives those who serve in the morning service e.g Sunday school/youth a chance to go to church. An evening service gives those who have to work on Sunday mornings a chance to go to church! Simple reasons, but nevertheless real. When we were in Porth, we stopped our Sunday evening service but we replaced it with home groups. This worked really well for us as people were already used to going out on a Sunday night! We’re in early days in Newcastle and we are about to trial ‘Autumn Nights’ from September for 3 months. We’ll see how it goes. If you’ve got used to not going out on a Sunday night, it could be harder to get back into it, so, watch this space! A lot of churches function well without a Sunday night and so I don’t think it’s as vital as the other two subjects I’ve talked about it, but it’s worth having a chat about.

Can a church thrive without a Sunday night service, probably. Can a church thrive without regular prayer and communion, I don’t think so.

So, there it is, my thoughts on less is not always more