Fun church

A few interesting exchanges regarding our church culture:

1. A couple of months ago, Cosmic Boy and I attended a local "infant" church, meeting in a local business, with only about 10 people. As a sidenote, I thought the church did a poor job of welcoming us as guests, but that in some ways added to the experience. Cosmic Boy was extremely quiet and in some ways sporting a 'tude during and after the service. When I asked him afterwards how he liked it, he gave the pat adolescent answer "It was alright". However when pressed, we had a good discussion on how a big part of our church is the social, seeing our friends, talking on the patio, laughing, etc.

2. I overheard an exchange with Ms. America's driver and my niece recently (no, I'm not picking on either of u!) He asked if church "X" was fun, and if she had made a lot of friends. She said "Yeah".

3. Yesterday, I was having lunch with a colleague. We were talking about his 13 year old boy. He and his wife don't attend church. He has a Mennonite background, but his parents rejected their religion during his childhood and he in turn really never embraced any religion either. However, he and his wife thought it would be good for their son to have a church experience so they've taken him somewhat regularly to a local church "X". Their son has enjoyed Sunday School and being in the seasonal plays. Recently tho, he isn't finding it "too fun" and "none of his friends go there". My colleague and I had an interesting conversation with me basically saying if he's going for the "fun", he'll soon end up like "you" , with no desire for the attendance. He and I have a good relationship and he laughed in essence saying "True!".

4. Our church has a sub-church, really almost 2 of them, the junior high and high school. One meets down the street in an entirely different building. I'm guessing there's 50-75% that I rarely/never see, they go to their own service with their own worship music and do their own activities.

So what is the point? Sometimes it seems like church is a great club. Good people, good conversation, good music, great activities. The history as I understand it of Matt Redman's "Heart of Worship" song, was that the music was getting in the way of worship at his church, so they took the music away. Certainly the club-like attributes of church are not a bad thing, I wonder at what level though they might need to be taken away for at least some period to get back to the heart of worship? It's something I think about.