Worship Continues
As the connection team took up the offering in wicker baskets, a video played on the screen to promote Celebrate Recovery. It featured a man walking along with a balloon in his hand, and tied to the balloon was a large brick. Getting in and out of his car, he fumbled trying to balance the balloon with his papers and his coffee, but he couldn’t simply set it down. He kept a tight grip on it. Walking along the street, a young woman bumped into him, almost causing him to lose his grip on the balloon, and he looked over his shoulder scornfully as she walked away before regaining his composure and continuing on his way. On a walk in the park, he saw others with balloons as well, and then he noticed a group of people without them. He stopped and stared for a moment, unsure of what to do with this knowledge that there are some out there who have no balloons. He noticed a young man walk up to this group and get his own balloon cut free. The young man then dropped the brick that had been in his hand, and the camera zoomed in to show that it had the word “alcohol” written on the bottom. It landed in a pile. “Drugs.” “Pornography.” “Violence.” The man with the balloon turned his own brick over in his hand and looked closely at it. “Anger.” Looking up, he noticed a woman walking toward him with a pair of antique scissors in her outstretched hands. As the film came to a close, the balloon floated away, and the Celebrate Recovery information appeared on the screen.
I would later learn that the video had been made by Mosaic members. As it turns out, many in the congregation have backgrounds in film, so they often get involved in little projects like that.
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| The Celebrate Recovery tent at the 10-Minute After Party |
Another video played advertising a summer sports camp, and after that, there was a short and humorous clip featuring a hyper-patriotic man preparing for his Fourth of July cookout-- it was a promo for Mosaic’s own event, “Drenched,” which would be a water-themed celebration (particularly a celebration of baptism). A young woman came to the stage to make an announcement about the Artist Tribe, which was currently holding auditions for new members. The group would be having a cookout following the service for anyone looking for more information. The band sang one more song, a reprise of the number from earlier in the service:
We will sing, sing, sing . . .
People seemed a little less enthusiastic about the song this time around. Perhaps they were ready to leave for lunch, or maybe the repetition just didn’t fit a lot of people’s tastes. There were still a few people clapping along and a few people singing, but people were starting to head for the door already. I took a few more pictures in the room and made a point of meeting Hank and thanking him for his sermon, after which I headed for the door as well. After all, Mosaic delights in throwing a “10-Minute After Party” after every service that consists of a little meet-and-greet at one of the many tents outside the sanctuary.
Plus, there was free food. My stomach and my wallet both love free food.
The Arts Cookout
After the service, I stuck around for a cookout with the Pasadena campus’s Artist Tribe. Stormy, a leader in the group who had made the announcement about the meeting, filled me in on the group and its purpose. Apparently, every Mosaic campus has an arts group that collaborates on various arts ministries, sometimes painting in worship or having special concerts or having impromptu photo shoots or making short films. There are opportunities for acting and improv, film, music, tech production, set design, spoken word and poetry, visual arts, and if they don’t have an existing ministry for it, they can probably help you create one. I know that other churches have similar programs, but I don’t know that I’ve ever seen as much attention brought to the arts as they do at Mosaic, and I’m sure some of that is the LA influence. I hesitantly decided to stick around, grab a bratwurst, and talk to folks for a while, but I knew that this was a gamble on my part. Arts groups can be really hit or miss; they are usually either the most boring events on earth or the most fascinating, and you usually don’t know which it will be until you get there. Artists have the potential to offer earth-shattering revelations about their work and the state of the world, or they can be the most dull, droning people you will ever encounter-- it is total luck of the draw, and this time, I lucked out.
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| 10-Minute After Party |
Over the course of two hours, I met musicians, filmmakers, and painters, all of them passionate about the work of the church and, strangely, all of them fairly new to Mosaic. I started to suspect that maybe LA is just a somewhat transient area, with a lot of young people being attracted to the film industry and a lot of those young artists and filmmakers attending Mosaic while they’re here. Dustin and Stormy (who help run the group) told me that they were asked to assist after only two weeks of attending. I love seeing churches that put folks to work immediately like that-- fills me with hope for the Church. In addition to Stormy and Dustin, I also met Baldwin, a church planter and hip hop artist who had just moved to LA from Sacramento with his girlfriend (a local talk show host). He told me about a church that he had helped plant up in Sacramento, and he was able to give me a lot of advice based on that experience. While he had initially been part of an inner city, all-Chinese congregation, when that church relocated to the suburbs, they decided to turn their building into a more contemporary multi-ethnic church plant, and Baldwin was one of the members who stuck around to help get the new church off the ground to a stable size of about sixty in regular attendance. He filled me in on a few basics of church planting, particularly having a very strong core group that would hold each other accountable and build the church together. It was a stark contrast to Mark Driscoll’s philosophy of the church and the pastor being a single entity in the early years, and in truth, I liked Baldwin’s take on it a lot better-- felt more humble and more organic. Of course, on that note, I also talked to a girl named Katie who was from Seattle originally and mentioned going to Mars Hill for a while, and when I asked if Mosaic also did the thing of broadcasting sermons to the other campuses, her “no” carried with it a note of slight indignation. “No, we have pastors at the different locations that are all really great speakers. They coordinate with Erwin and Hank and all use the same text and basic message, but they use their own stories and experiences to flesh things out. No, we might have podcasts available, but we wouldn’t ever just project a sermon and expect people to watch it. That would be kind of weird.”
At that point, it occurred to me just how remarkable it was that Erwin had attended the service, provided just a quick welcome, and then stepped aside to let Hank do his thing. That is some remarkable humility on Erwin’s part. Hank wasn’t just pinch-hitting while the big dog was out of town; the senior pastor was there supporting one of the other ministers. Mosaic still had the multisite feel, but this was the polar opposite approach of Mars Hill and Saddleback and Summit and the other simulcasting multisite churches. Like an actual mosaic, the different component campuses were allowed to show their unique colors through different songs, sermons, and settings to create a diverse and intricate larger picture. I had wondered how a multisite church could still have a unified vision without doing the simulcast thing, and Mosaic has shown me that, with a little collaboration between the ministers, it is completely possible. Of course, Katie also mentioned that the Pasadena campus, the Hollywood campus, and the campus in the Mayan typically get the same sermon, but that’s because one pastor (typically Erwin or Hank) preaches at all three locations throughout the day. Dustin added that the sermon will actually change from location to location, as Hank intentionally makes his sermons at the Mayan a little more youth-oriented since that crowd draws so heavily from the college demographic.
I also talked a good bit with a middle aged woman named Marsha, a painter who joined Mosaic primarily because of the arts outlet, and another woman (whose name I never heard) told me a good bit about their involvement in Restore, a ministry of healing prayer that often interacts with the Celebrate Recovery program. I actually picked up a card about Restore, and it reads:
RESTORE is a ministry that helps people listen to God. As a person obediently acts on what God reveals to him/her, we see lives become restored-- returning to the original design for life that God intended for us. Our goal is to help people restore a right relationship with God, others and self. We provide group training as well as individual prayer sessions. Experience life as it should be!
mosaic.org/restore
Yep, in addition to the arts programs, prayer also seems to be a major focus at Mosaic. We talked a bit about church and about my summer and about the arts, but I realized that a couple of hours had ticked by, and I still had quite a bit of writing on my plate. I needed to get back to the Gausmans’ and record my conversations with Erwin and Randy and the Artist Tribe before I forgot it all. Plus, the Gausmans were treating me to a nice dinner at the original El Cholo Mexican restaurant, so I didn’t want to have all the church work still hanging over my head during that time of fellowship.
Closing Thoughts
Mosaic is a truly remarkable church. It is one of the few I’ve seen where the diverse demographics of its neighborhood are almost perfectly mirrored by the demographics of the congregation. While I can’t speak for other campuses, I really felt like the Pasadena campus truly embodied Pasadena, and it sounds like the gathering at the Mayan offers a similar feeling for downtown LA. As far as evangelism and being a true community church, Mosaic is doing some impressive stuff. Not unlike Saddleback and New Life, it seems that a lot of their ministries are run through small groups (community groups, Celebrate Recovery, FORGE men’s group, SHE women’s group, Artist Tribe, etc.), but they also have a program called ServeLA which acts to put individuals and groups in touch with area nonprofits in order to provide volunteers. The Pasadena campus definitely has the feel of a big box contemporary church, and I will admit that I didn’t really notice all that much to distinguish the music from other churches, but it was a great sermon, and the people there were really wonderful and informative. Of course, I’m wondering just how many other secret Southern Baptist churches are lurking in our midst, but if they’re all like Mosaic, maybe that’s not such a bad thing.
Then there’s Erwin McManus. After what I witnessed this morning, I’ve decided that I definitely need to track down some of Erwin’s books; I think the guy may have more of a servant’s heart than any of the other megachurch pastors I’ve met so far (possible exception: Adam Hamilton). That’s not to belittle the other pastors, but sitting in your church and allowing an associate pastor to preach to you from your own pulpit is a remarkable display of humility for a megachurch pastor, and I am yet to see its equal so far this summer. I really like the other pastors a lot, but let’s face it: If Bill Hybels or Rob Bell or Rick Warren or Joel Osteen is in town on a Sunday, he’s going to preach. Hell, Mark Driscoll can even be out of town, and he’ll still find a way to beam himself in before letting someone else take his spotlight. Erwin, on the other hand, doesn’t seem as possessive of his pulpit. He seems to realize that Mosaic is not his church, but rather, he is a part of the team that is working with that community. By allowing others to preach and lead, Erwin is fostering a team of servant-leaders around all of Mosaic’s many campuses, and I was amazed at how he was willing to take a backseat and give someone else control of the wheel for a bit. That’s rare. That’s truly humble. This guy’s got something figured out, and I want to read some of his work so that I can get a better idea about what makes him tick.
Of course, then there’s the effect that the sermon had on me personally. Look, I know that I thrive on approval. This is not news to me. Some of my best job performances and some of my worst job performances have both been the fault of this trait. In a work or church setting, I’m pretty good about reading political situations and delivering answers that --while still being my own opinions-- are wrapped in language that people find more palatable. I seldom argue to win; I look more to compromise and find common ground, offering solutions with which everyone can live. I try to bring people together, and in an argument between church members, I never take one side. All that is good, but there is a dark side to it as well. When necessary, I have appeased a boss, even when I thought he or she was incredibly out of line. I have sat there in stone silence while someone whose approval I sought said things with which I blatantly disagreed. I have tolerated apathy and gossip and bullying and prejudice and boasting. I’m not proud of this. It’s a habit I am working hard to break. Still, I have discovered that, when people get along and like one another, more tends to get accomplished. Ministries and organizations tend to run more smoothly, but how much of that is just hollow civility instead of authentic dialogue? How much of that is holding up a bronze shield to hide from real, messy Christian community and all the loving disagreements it requires to function? In ministry, you really can’t please everyone, and some stands are worth taking, even if it means losing a few people’s approval. This is a tough lesson, and as many times as I relearn it or hear it from the pulpit, it’s still sinking in. Politeness and friendliness and sensitivity and compromise are all very good things, but we have to make sure that we’re not just looking to appease people, especially when God calls on us to deliver a difficult message.
Thankfully, as Hank reminded us so poignantly, “The next step requires two people.” I’ve been truly blessed to have a great group of friends to give me feedback on this project, both positive and negative. I have family members who are praying and talking with me every step of the way. I have generous hosts, old friends and classmates and acquaintances, who are opening their homes and telling me about their communities and churches, giving me valuable insights into the American religious landscape. I have ministers and mentors in my life praying for me and offering words of encouragement and guidance. I have Erin sharing the hardships and the celebrations with me, helping me think through my experiences, and refine my explanations of them (even though she’s three time zones away in King, NC). I have God, who whispers over the tumult and silence alike, driving me onward toward a goal, even when I get a little sleepy and would rather space out in front of a TV for a while. I have been truly blessed with this support system-- with this network of people to hold me accountable.
I’ve been at this for two months now. I still have another month left. For my ordination, I do need the approval of certain people, but that’s not really what this is about. It’s not about winning the approval of classmates by doing something wild with my summer and having a lot of stories to tell when I get back. It’s not about winning the approval of publishers who might see the potential for a book in all this. It’s about God. It’s about watching for how God is working in the world around us. It’s about paying attention to the divine sparks I see in ministers, parishioners, and folks in need of a helping hand. It’s about getting a better understanding of the problems facing Christians in America. It’s about the state of the Church. It’s about the state of my own soul. It’s about taking time to pause and reflect and think about the big leap I’m taking a month from now-- accepting the affirmation of God’s call offered by Second Baptist Church.My research methodology isn’t perfect. I’ve got biases galore. I spend a little too much time talking about myself and my thoughts rather than focusing on data. Still, it’s God’s approval that drives me this summer, and that’s an approval that I hope I never stop seeking.
Peace and Blessings,
Tom
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