A church that draws thousands

How did 25 high school students and their youth pastor become a church that attracts more than 14,000 people every weekend?

Joe Engelkemier, a freelance writer, has taught religion on the high school and college levels and has written and edited high school religion textbooks. He lives in Berrien Springs, Michigan.

The headline in the Suburban Living section of the May 18, 1988, Chicago Daily Herald asked, "Why Do 12,000 People a Week Flock to Hear What This Man Has to Say?"1 A photo showed Bill Hybels, senior pastor at Willow Creek Community Church, seated alone in an auditorium that holds 4,556 people.

The next day a half-page photo in the same newspaper introduced a second article by showing the same auditorium filled with thousands of people. A subtitle spoke of "old messages" staging "a modern comeback at this unusual church."

Signs of the Times has reported that according to a late-1988 survey 44 percent of adults in America do not belong to a church. The same survey also revealed that 63 percent of these non-attenders believe the Bible to be the inspired Word of God, and 58 percent are open to the idea of belonging to a church.2

If 58 percent of the unchurched are open to belonging to a church, what keeps them away?

The process that put Hybels on the track of an answer to this question began in 1972, when he was youth leader for about 25 high school students. He had tried to get his youth to invite unchurched high school friends to a weekly meeting. They seemed hesitant, and he asked them why.

These youth, he found out, didn't think their sharp high school friends would respond to what they were doing singing--"Pass It On" and "Kumbaya" and taking lengthy treks in the Scriptures. He challenged them to help design a service that would interest nonbelieving friends. The students suggested multimedia, contemporary music, skits, and messages that would help high school students with their daily problems.

They started a Thursday night service that included the things suggested. The core group met Monday nights to study the Bible and pray. "In our Monday night meetings," Hybels said, "students would sometimes spend up to an hour praying for their friends."

In three years attendance increased to more than 1,000 young people!

Having found that they could program so as to interest modern youth, Hybels and several of his young helpers wondered whether they could also discover what would interest unchurched adults. In 1975 they spent a month--eight hours a day, six days a week--conducting a house-to-house survey. Their first question was "Are you active in a local church?" When they got a "Yes," they thanked the person and went to the next house. When they got a "No," they asked, "Would you be willing to tell us why you do not attend?"

"Boy, did we get an earful," Hybels says. "Church is boring, church is irrelevant, church is predictable." And the number one complaint: "The church is always asking for money."

This survey convinced him that traditional and often boring services would never attract the vast majority of nonchurch people. Drawing cues from what they learned from their survey and from their experience with the youth, Hybels and his staff developed a format for adult nonchurch people that now attracts thousands.

Targeting "Unchurched Harry"

Willow Creek's target is the adult male 25 to 50--a man they call "Unchurched Harry." On weekends he watches TV instead of going to church. He may be full of questions about the meaning of life, but has probably been turned off by organized religion.

What brings Harry to Willow Creek?

The reporter who wrote the Daily Herald article suggested that it is important to understand what Hybels does not do. He does not promise to heal the sick, and he does not speak in tongues. He does not preach about hellfire and damnation, and he does not resort to pressure techniques. "Most incredible of all," the Daily Herald reported, "he does not ask for money. At every service, when the collection baskets are passed, program director Nancy Beach makes the same announcement: 'If you're visiting with us, we don't want you to feel any obligation to participate in this part of the service. You are our guest.'"3

Hybels does place a high value on his gift of teaching. He does that teaching calmly and earnestly from a lectern, and discourages the exuberant expressions of faith sought by some televangelists. He is, in fact, turned off by most TV minis tries.

"Our seekers want to be left alone," Hybels asserts. "They don't want to say anything, sing anything, sign anything, or give anything. They want to seek from the shadows. And if we allow that, they'll hang around, and sooner or later they're going to be moved."

I first heard about Willow Creek from my pastor early in 1988, and arranged to attend the last two days of a pastors' conference shortly thereafter.

What I found was creativity, excellence, openness, a spirit of helpfulness, and an intense desire to reach unchurched people.

Because I live less than three hours from Willow Creek, I have been able to attend a half-dozen pastors' conferences and a number of weekend services. While we need to evaluate each technique used and be selective, I have concluded that we as Seventh-day Adventists can learn a lot from Hybels about how to be more effective at reaching the unchurched around us.

There is a second reason that I have tried to learn all I can about the methods and strategies used at Willow Creek. Like the unchurched, many of our own youth have mistakenly thought that Christianity is "musty, outmoded, and far-removed from modern-day problems." From its beginning, Willow Creek has attracted large numbers of young adults. In the words of Guideposts, the founders "were a group of people, mostly young, who were determined to bring vitality into their worship, and to apply the message of Jesus Christ to their daily lives in practical and dynamic ways."4

A two-pronged ministry

To reach the unchurched and at the same time nurture and disciple believers, Hybels has developed a two-phased ministry. The first phase comprises weekend services, one on Saturday night and two on Sunday morning, that are designed to attract the unchurched. These "seeker services" provide a low-key evangelistic environment. Seekers are able to remain anonymous and investigate Christianity at their own pace.

Hybels calls his weekend messages "Christianity 101." These introductory level messages focus on the needs and interests of Unchurched Harry. They come in series--the series taking up such subjects as "Facing Up to Fear," "The Power of Prayer," "How to Pick a Partner," "Fanning the Flames of Marriage," "Taking Care of Business," "Money, Sex, and Power," "Faith Has Its Reasons," and "Negotiating the Maze of Life" (an early 1990 series on decision-making).

The number of messages in a series varies from three to as many as 10. Each message is preceded by a skit that focuses on a real-life problem or need. Contemporary music also plays a key role in preparing hearts and minds for the day's topic. The message then draws truths from God's Word that help the listener see God's solution for the problem or need being examined.

In contrast to the weekend "seeker services," the two identical midweek meetings--the "New Community" services that make up the second phase of Hybels' ministry--are worship experiences for believers. Key elements include a half hour or more of exaltation through song, corporate and private prayer and reflection, occasional media presentations, and 30 to 40 minutes of weighty expository teaching--Hybels' upper-division "Christianity 401."

Nothing superficial

I first attended a New Community service while at Willow Creek for a pastors' conference. Many of the 4,200 people there that evening appeared to be in their 20s and 30s. Two young men seated near me were talking to each other about praying for some friends. (I have found Willow Creek's members to be friendly, helpful, and eager to share.)

That evening the service closed with Willow Creek's favorite song "Amazing Grace." Listening to thou sands of people enthusiastically singing "Amazing Grace" so moved me that I could hardly keep back the tears. At an evangelism seminar a couple days later I mentioned the impact of that experience upon me. One of the two directors of the seminar, Lee Strobel, related that he had come into the auditorium from duties elsewhere just as that song was being sung. He said that as he realized anew what he had found at Willow Creek, he "went to an empty place in the balcony and sat down and cried."

Eight years earlier Strobel had been an atheist. "I thought that the idea of God was ridiculous," he told us. He had a high-paying job and felt no need of religion. But his wife, whom someone had invited to Willow Creek, finally persuaded him to attend at least once "just to hear the music."

The music was great, he conceded, but he was more impressed by Bill Hybels' sermon about salvation as a gift of grace. His curiosity stimulated, Strobel spent months in careful investigation ultimately concluding that God does exist and that the resurrection of Christ is a historical fact. These convictions led to his conversion.

As Lee Strobel's experience illustrates, there is nothing superficial in the ministries carried out at Willow Creek. There are no "happy talk" sermons. The objective is to reach out to people where they are and help them grow into what Hybels calls "fully devoted followers of Christ."

Membership requirements at Willow Creek Community Church are substantial. Along with accepting Christ as Saviour and Lord and being baptized as a believer, to become a member one must: (1) complete one year of regular attendance and consistent participation in the life of the Willow Creek Community Church; (2) go through the membership classes; (3) be interviewed by an elder or another appointed leader; and (4) sign a statement of commitment to the church.

To maintain their membership, members must re-sign this statement of commitment each year. Would a similar practice in our own denomination help our congregations maintain a higher degree of commitment to Christ and His service? Would it also enable us more quickly to discern and help those who are growing lax or indifferent?

If the approach to ministry used at Willow Creek Community Church appeals to you, may I encourage you to at tend one of the pastors' conferences held there each February, May, and October? You'll need to get your application in early; by February of 1990 there was already a waiting list of more than 200 for the May conference. For information, contact Bob Bever or Denise Nelson at (708) 382-6200.

1 By November 1990 the attendance was
14,000.

2 "Update," Signs of the Times, February 1989,
p. 6

3 Tom Valeo, Daily Herald reprint, p. 2.

4 Mary Ann O'Roark, "Applying the Word,"
Guideposts, November 1989, p. 43.

 

 

 

Joe Engelkemier, a freelance writer, has taught religion on the high school and college levels and has written and edited high school religion textbooks. He lives in Berrien Springs, Michigan.

May 1991

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