Jim & Casper Go to Church

I am always interested in new and creative ways to think about how we do church. As such, the website churchrater.com appealed to me: they went to churches, and then reviewed various aspects of the service. The critiques are often not about theology or liturgy, but about how the church seemed to the unintiated. I frequented the site for a while and participated in the dialogue there.

And so, when I saw the book Jim & Casper Go to Church, I snatched it up. Jim Henderson is the driving force behind Off the Map, an organization rethinking the ideas of behind evangelism and being welcoming churches. Matt Casper is the atheist hired by Henderson to give his "outsider's view" of worship at some of the most influential churches in America.

The concept, I think is a good one. Clergy, evangelism committees, worship committees, and property committees are often all people born and raised in the church. Very rarely are we able to set aside our personal histories and look at what we do on Sunday morning with new eyes. Jim & Casper Go to Church gives us just such an opportunity. Each chapter tells of a church visit - usually in the form of the dialogue between Jim and Casper. The churches they focused on are mostly mega-churches - only one of their visits was to a mainline congregation.

I enjoyed much of the book. It was refreshing to see church in a new way. The visit to Joel Osteen's Lakewood Church in Houston in particular elicited some quite enjoyable feelings of schadenfreude for me, as Casper cut to the heart of the matter when asked by Jim how he could object to Osteen's message:

"Right you are," [said Casper], "It'd be like disliking the taste of water. It's so bland, how can it offend? By the same token, how can it inspire? ... And what does this have to do with God or Jesus, he hasn't even said Jesus' name once! ...I could have gotten the same feel-good, keep-your-chin-up message from Anne Landers."

I mean, it is something to say that an atheist thinks you don't talk about Jesus, or even Scripture.

And yet, something rubbed on me. At each church, Casper objected that there was not a strong enough call to action. The preachers did not do enough to encourage and challenge the congregations to turn their faith into action. And anything that was not explicitly pointed outward - whether the words of the preacher or the style of worship - was seen as a departure from the message of Jesus.

Ok. I get it. It's true: the Church is often too inwardly focused. We often have not done enough to care for our neighbor. Jim and Casper will get no argument from me on that point. Where I will take issue is the idea that the outward focus and the call to action is the only point of Sunday morning. Many people in this world are broken and hurting, and I will not say that it is a mistake to focusing our preaching and worship on bringing them toward wholeness and healing. More importantly, much of what is done on Sunday morning is about bringing us into deeper communion with the Triune God, filling us with the grace and gifts of the Holy Spirit so that we might be able to be more outwardly focused. But we cannot turn toward our neighbor if we have nothing to offer - we must fill ourselves up before we can turn and pour ourselves out for others. This emphasis on the call to action over against feeding the congregation is a constant in the book, and one that made it a less enjoyable read than it would otherwise have been.

One of my other favorite moments is the one visit to a mainline congregation. It seemed to be one of the favorites of Casper, and inspired some of the most interesting dialogue in the book. I only wish they would have spent more time in mainline churches, as that is where the majority of Christians find themselves on Sunday morning.

I had some problems with the book. However, overall it is a good read and worth the purchase. I particularly appreciated the ideas that were sparked by the book, and the dialogue that the book encourages. It is not a handbook or a how-to book, but it is the start of a conversation about how to make our congregations more welcoming to those outside of the flock. And in that sense, despite my disagreements, I would have to say that Jim & Casper Go to Church is a success.