Victory Fellowship was located in the next town. It had an interesting history. The founding pastor was a Pentecostal and had
recently retired. He was replaced by a
younger pastor in his mid-30s. My friends
told me he was a great pastor and good preacher. When the new pastor arrived, the church began
to grow and changed its name to Victory Fellowship form The Pentecostal Church,
Assemblies of God. For Episcopalians who
do not know much about the Assemblies of God, it is one of the three major “old
line Pentecostal Churches of North America.
My friends told me that the Pastor was a former drug
addict who had experienced a miraculous deliverance and sobriety from his
addiction and had eventually gone to seminary.
They also explained that he had introduced small group fellowships (they
led one) and the church had a huge youth ministry with lots of young adults
attending. They were very excited that
on this Sunday a young twenty year old member of their home group was going to
be baptized.
I knew the moment we pulled into the parking lot that I
was in for a lesson on reaching millennials.
Everyone seemed to be in their twenties and thirties with a few of us
older boomers mixed in. Also, as we
parked, a tattooed biker pulled up next to us with his wife riding behind
him. I noticed that there were lots of
motorcycles in the lot.
I was not surprised to see a theater type modern
facility. I also found that it had a
welcome center that served Starbucks Coffee and lots of friendly greeters
including the biker and his wife. The
building had two worship areas and a state of the art nursery and education
section. Parents signed in their
children and were given a pager in case of emergency. The two worship centers were for the adults
and teens. The teen area was already
rocking with contemporary Christian music led by a youth band. We made our way to the main worship center. A music group was playing on the stage which
had only a stool and a large screen behind it.
After an opening announcement, the worship began.
I had been to this type of service before and stood as
the music group led by a twenty something “Worship Pastor” led the opening
music set. It contained at least six songs. I sat down after three songs and noticed that
several of the older folks had joined me.
The service contained special prayers, music, scripture, and announcements
about planned mission work. The Worship
Pastor was commissioned because he was leaving to start a new church in a
nearby community. Then there was a
special song about Faith that led into one of the best teaching sermons I had
heard on the biblical subject of Faith. The
theme was Faith what is it, why we need it, and why faith without works is not
true faith.
The pastor started his sermon sitting on the stool. He was casually dressed and carried an IPad. It was linked to the screen and, as he made
his points, scripture verses and pictures appeared to amplify his message. His sermon ended with a transition through
the offering and offertory music by the band into an introduction to the
baptism.
At the front of the auditorium just below the stage was a
large water tank much like you see on the farms in central Michigan. The young lady was introduced and then the
pastor asked her if it was her desire to be baptized into Jesus Christ. He handed her the microphone and she
proceeded to explain how she had “come to Christ. Now her family, who were not Church Members, watched
all this. Wearing jeans and a top blouse
she climbed into the tank and the pastor baptized her in the name of the
Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. Then after
she emerged from the water and was wrapped in a large white towel he anointed
her with oil and prayed that she would be filled with the Holy Spirit.
The pastor turned to the congregation. “Perhaps there are some of you here today who
want to follow this dear sister and receive baptism too. You too may feel that
you are lost and need a new direction and a new life.” To the family’s surprise, the woman’s younger
sister stepped up and said she wanted to be baptized too. (I found out later that she had never been to
the church.) She explained to the pastor
and to her family and the congregation that she had seen the change in her
sister and wanted this life. Ultimately
three other members of the extended family and two other congregants received
baptism that day.
While all this was going on, I stood looking at the
members of the congregation. So many
were clearly not the kind of people you see in typical Episcopal Churches. Many were Millennials, and remember this was
the older service. It was clear that the
Church was racially and economically diverse. I kept asking myself why we Episcopalians have
so few examples of churches like this. I
knew that many of the clergy in my D. Min. class would be eager to reach such
people. I also knew that few would. I
think that I know part of the reason why we will not.
The Episcopal Church aims at two kinds of people. We aim at the “already churched” and the
“de-churched.” We seldom aim our efforts
or activities at the unchurched, especially the Millennial Unchurched. If we are going to evangelize the unchurched
youth of today, we will need to change, and I don’t mean style. You see behind this church’s efforts lies a
different interpretation of the meaning of Jesus’ death and resurrection, or as
we call it, the Atonement. It is not the
progressive view that Jesus gives us a model of how to live a life of
love. It is not the Evangelical view
that Jesus’ death saved us from our sins.
It is the classical biblical view expressed by Gustaf Aulen’s in “Christus
Victor.”
These young people did not need to know that they are
sinners. Everyone knows that. They needed to know that there is a Savior
who can deliver them from the power of sin, evil, addiction, dysfunctional
families, broken relationships, despair, hatred, and death. The Christ presented at Victory Fellowship is
the one that Paul said “nailed to the Cross the Principalities and Powers of
this world” and won for us the victory of a new life in his Kingdom. Who better understands this than the Pastor
who was delivered from his addition? No
wonder the name of the Fellowship was VICTORY.
Here is my point. The more secular our culture becomes and the
more it moves from its Christian heritage, the more Churches will have to
discover the full Doctrine of the Atonement.
Surely, Jesus is the model of God’s love for us to follow. We also find forgiveness in his Cross and a
new life. But we also have a power in
this new life that is able to deliver us from the Powers of this world. This last expression of Atonement will take
on much more importance in the coming years, and we had better figure this out
as a Church or we will not reach Millennials in any significant way. We can also consider recruiting from such
Millennial Christians those who will plant new congregations. We may not call them “Victory” Churches
because we are after all Anglicans, but we will learn to explain that the
Matthew, Mark, Luke, John, Mary, and other such folks all represent followers
of Jesus who experience the triumph of Christ’s victory over the Principalities
and Powers of this world. The more
secular the culture, the more relevant this message.
