Years ago, I remember being puzzled when someone called my church a "mega church." Don't people say that mega churches are impersonal and boring? My church was nothing like the stereotypical mega church that people like to criticize, and I began to investigate the mega church trend to see what it was really offering. These days I happily attend a small local church, but I am eager to defend the mega churches so I can show people what they have to offer.
Oh, the Places You'll Go - Do you travel for your business and find yourself on a plane every Sunday morning? Large churches have ministries that help traveling businessmen find fellowship. Want to ride motorcycles with other believers rather than your usual group of Bandido's? Motorcycle fellowships are all the rage!
I've seen it all. The person who wants to find a place to belong can do well by visiting a mega church and finding groups that are filled with their own demographic. I've even seen knitting groups for people who like to knit and want to do so in groups (it's long and lonely job, by one's self). The value of such a large group of people is that fellowship is actually easier to find when the church is well organized.
Did you know that Charles Spurgeon pastored the first mega church? The Metropolitcan Tabernacle is still holding services 150 years later.
Oh, the People You'll Meet - The most common complaint about mega churches is that they are so big that they are not able to provide an intimate setting, but this is not true. In fact, the intimacy of the many groups in mega churches always impresses me.
A church with 5,000 members will have small groups of 100s, which break into smaller groups of 10 or 20. When this model is done correctly, it's fairly easy to navigate these groups and find a place to belong. Intimacy and closeness is not missing in these churches, and I suspect that those who level such charges are simply attending the wrong mega churches (or, more likely, haven't been to one but want to criticize them, anyway).
But it's not just about fitting in and finding people you get along with which brings us to...
Oh, the Things You'll Do - Want to serve meals to sick children? Help build houses? Fix computers for people who can't afford the repair job? Or (here's something that mega church ministers really like to hear), do you have your own idea for a new ministry that you would like to start? Large churches often set up a myriad of ministries like this to help their communities. Soup kitchens and job boards are common, and I've been a part of neighborhood cleanup crews that spent all day turning one terrible looking street into a safer and cleaner place for the local residents.
When a person pokes fun at a mega church, I often want to ask them how much work they are doing for the community. It's hard to think of an organization that directs so much of its manpower and cash to helping the needy as the mega church does. By joining a mega church, you can be a part of helping your community - there's hardly a better way to get involved in local outreach. When people ask me why mega churches need to be so big, I start to describe all of the outreach done by these churches ("Well, there's a food pantry inside, and a clothing drive, a day care, job training for the unemployed...") and the size becomes understandable. When hurricane Katrina hit, my church was able to help people from Louisiana by feeding thousands of them and finding them clothes. That's important, and we should remember to thank these big churches for what they do instead of criticizing them.
So, ease up on the mega church, because those churches are doing a lot of good and intimacy and strong fellowship are easy to find within. Smaller churches are declining, so unless we find ways to revitalize the traditional church model, the mega church might be the church of your grandchildren (and that's OK).
