A "Seeker Sensitive, Non-Traditional" Church? (Mark 7)
A lot of long-time, often long-winded Christians will look at the kind of church we’re going to start in Vegas and call it things like “seeker sensitive” and “non-traditional.” Now, first of all, I am not a fan of those terms. But, second, these Christians will say them in a derogatory way. Kind of saying, “We’re a Bible based church. You – not so much, because you’re cow-towing to ‘seekers’ and you’ve removed the great traditions of the faith.”
Ummm, hold on there. I’d have to argue that makes us a more Biblical church. Seriously? Yeah, and some of the evidence is in today’s reading, Mark 7.
Mark 7:3-4, One of the things I do when I preach is explain anything and everything that someone might not know. So I’ll pause and say, “That verse mentioned Moses. Moses was a guy…” Or, “Some of you might be like, ‘What is a parable?,’ actually it’s a …” And so the claim is, “You’re dumbing down the message by making it ‘seeker sensitive.'” But isn’t that exactly what Mark does here? He doesn’t assume everyone in his audience knows everything about the Pharisees, so he stops and explains it. And so, if a church is sensitive to “seekers,” doesn’t it make that church more Biblical?
Mark 7:5-19, Another charge could be that we’ve removed traditions. But I can gaurantee you that we would never remove any tradition given to us by God in the Bible. So we don’t do an altar call, don’t wear suits, don’t sing the doxology before the offering. But where did the church get those traditions? Men. Not God. And doesn’t Jesus say here that we don’t have to continue in the traditions of men. In fact, isn’t He implying that it’s dangerous to continue in the traditions of men, because we can easily allow them to supercede the word of God? And so, if a church is “non-traditional” doesn’t it make that church more Biblical?