Vintage Faith

When I'd first heard of the emerging church, vintage faith, and all the buzzwords surrounding it, I was struck with my usual reaction: Oh no, not another movement to take God out of the church so we don't offend anyone!

As usual, my first reaction was a wrong one (ever have that problem?). Unfortunately, Christians have turned into a group of people who are suspicious of any change to way we do church. They've come to a point of near paranoia over any suggestion that our methods are no longer effective when, in fact, the church of the 20th and 21st centuries in no way reflects what the church of the 1st century looked like.

The term "Vintage Faith" is exactly what it sounds like: a return to the old ways. We need to learn how to be a church again, showing love and compassion for those around us, not judgement. How do we get there from here? Good question, one that I can't answer in a single hub. But follow along on my journey. Together we can re-connect with the Spirit of God and reach out to a lost world.

The emerging generation, as it's called, is bringing with it a major shift in attitude and beliefs. In the modern generation, primarily made up of baby boomers, we changed our worship methods to provide a "seeker sensitive" methodology. The modern generation grew up attending church but turned away, feeling disheartened by the overtly religious of their day. So we did all we could to make them (us) feel welcome. High-tech lighting, contemporary bands, comfortable seating, all that came about to bring people "back to church."

But the emerging generation is made of people who have had no spiritual background. They haven't been influenced by the "old ways." But what they do have is a hunger for spirituality. A quick glance at the movies of the day, bookstore shelves, and music will make this apparent. The emerging generation is desperately seeking their spiritual side. And they'll often take it where it is presented in the most sincere fashion.

When an unchurched person decides to discover his or her spiritual side, he or she may walk into a Christian church to see what they've got going on. And what do they see when they get there? In our seeker-sensitive approach of the last several decades, we've turned our places of worship into something that more resembles a lecture hall. Don't get me wrong, there's nothing wrong with the way we've done things for the modern generation, but a new generation is here and they just don't think the same way we did.

Someone seeking a true spiritual experience expects a spiritual setting. Colored stage lights and glass podiums don't exactly scream spiritual. To get to that point, we have to go backwards, so to speak. Not one hundred years backwards. More like two-thousand years backwards. How did the 1st century Christians, many of who stood in the shadow of our Lord while He walked the earth, bring about a spiritual experience?

Let's talk about it more in my next hub.