9Marks Interviews David Wells

I've had this 9Marks interview of David Wells, one of my favorite living authors, on my desktop to read for weeks now, and I'm so glad I waited until now to do so.

I've interviewed many college and young adults' pastors about their ministries with my new job. Time after time all I hear about from them is that I need to make a group where people will connect with each other. Connecting, making friends, fellowship is the most important thing to someone in their 20s or 30s, they say, so this is the main goal of your ministry and the main thing that should fill up your time.

David Wells, thankfully, says

"we have replaced the pulpit not even by a barstool, but by a cup of Starbucks coffee, which speaks of 'human connecting.' And human connecting has become more important to us than our hearing from God."

I felt strange and out of place as I talked with these man because I always saw preaching as the most important aspect of my job (loving people = connecting with them is second), but so many disagreed.

Dr. Wells also says this, which turns conventional ministry "wisdom" upside down too:

"...the results of some important research among formerly unchurched people who then came to church are shocking. When these individuals were asked what they liked about the church, ninety-odd percent said that what was preached was important to them. And almost 90 percent said that they wanted to know what the church believed. They wanted to hear its doctrine. Now that is just the reverse of what the common outreach approach assumes. It assumes people don’t want to know. In actual fact, those who want to come into the church do want to know."

Finally, I loved this line from the interviewer:

"for the local church preacher, 'Show sensitivity to the alienation, the inner angst, the emotional turmoil people feel; yet use all these to segue to the Word of God and the more fundamental measurement of their relationship to him.'"