the late you have with you always
February 18th, 2008
Long long ago Jesus said to his disciples, “The poor you have with you always…” Today he would just as well have said of the modern church, “…the late you have with you always.” Many churches are plagued with this chronic condition.
Recently I had this idea of arresting impunctuality by locking up the worship hall 15 minutes after the worship service begins. It was a “crossing frontier” idea; a suicidal idea; an incitement sure to cook up a storm and perhaps lead to the first lynching of a local pastor.
Concerts do it. Latecomers curse the management, blame themselves, the traffic and whatever else - but never the artistes -when they are locked out. They know its done out of respect for the performers and the paying customers, but it still rankles them. Somehow you get the feeling that in church it will be different: they will get hot under the collar and raise an uproar with the leadership or just move to another church.
I tested the idea with my colleagues and yes it doesn’t deal with the root problem. Yes some members will get angry, and some will move to other churches. Yes it may be better to educate the people and have a talk with the habitually late.
But I was thinking maybe such a drastic action will jerk the habitual latecomers to some behavioral change.
Are we barking up the wrong tree? Is punctuality such a big deal compared to the seven deadly sins, or the purity of the gospel, and the mission of the church? Is it a “main thing” or just a “peripheral” issue of discipleship and Christian maturity? Or should we just resign to the fact that “the late you have with you always”?
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I fully agree with what you wanna do… I mean, ask these habitual latecomers where do they turn up late for meeting with their boss or client. I am most certain that the answer will be ‘Yes’. Enough said, eh?
It is all a matter of the heart towards God.
COOS started the practice of locking out the latecomers a few years ago… initiallty there were bitching and all, but after awhile it died down… and, nope, Derek Hong did not get lynched by an angry mob (which I think will turn up late if there was gonna be any lynching!).
i think it would be a good idea to lock them out, or maybe use the seats now in the cafeteria as a “spillover”. it isnt really a spillover but more to segregate the late from the rest. but of course spending money to put a screen and speakers in a separate room for latecomers doesnt make sense.
a problem u might face is if people brought newcomers, who are forgivably late, or went to meet the person and is thus, late. it might make the newcomer understandably very uncomfortable to be locked out on his first visit to the church.
Does church service more closely resemble a concert performance or a family gathering? If the latter (and we are the family of God after all), would you lock your late relatives out of your house?
How about..”Better late than never”?
On the other hand, i believe a good worship session can certainly help to minimize some of these problem. Worship leaders can play a very big part to bring people closer to God.
When the believers start to enjoy the worship sessions…they will not be late…infact, they will want to get the best seats in the house.
A church is a place where people feel welcome.. a place where they can draw comfort, strength and love and spiritual food from. Closing doors to late comers is a big No No! It’s like telling them we don’t need you to be in our church if you are late. U can jolly well go find another church! Do we want that to happen ? I believe not. I would think the “How about.. “Better late than never”. like what simon has commented. I used to be late for church most of my sundays…and at times refused to even go into church because of my lateness.. but my loving Pastor always tell me.. it’s ok.. it’s better late than never. I always remember his loving words to me.. U have to come. it’s ok if you are late.. just come. We will miss you if you are not here. With those positive words, I started to grow.
I think it was Philip Yancey who wrote about the church’s response to lateness in his book “What’s so amazing about grace?” - how the church seems to exhibit so little grace to latecomers… shooting judgemental stares and whispering hushed “tsk tsk” to embarassed folks trying to sneak in by the back door. And how the church should instead be rejoicing with loud hallelujahs each time a latecomer arrives in, for there could be a myriad of factors (including judgement from critical pious folks) preventing the poor fella from wanting to come to church, but for the grace of God, he turns up, and his life and the community of Christ is made better with his presence than without.
Maybe our ushers should give latecomers a bigger welcome than early birds? That should be a positive motivating way to encourage church attendance… and possibly punctuality as well.
People should really be encouraged to want to come to church for the right reasons, rather than be obligated to do so for the wrong ones.
I went for a seminar once and this elder of a local church mentioned how they dealt with latecomers …
The elder actually asked some latecomers, “Is there something you are trying to communicate to us by coming late?” (paraphrased)
I guess we have to differentiate between reasons and excuses.
Church discipline - where is its role now?
My thoughts resonate with those of simon, Jan & i.
I dunno if this verse applies but it just came to my mind - “do not be overcome with evil, but overcome evil with good” romans 7:21. it take years & years of God’s grace (good) to transform every bad in us.. certain habits/bads take a longer time while some shorter. but we’re all a work in progress. God’s work.
Heart transformation works better than behaviour modification. We can impose rules & disciplines but it doesn’t transform a person inwardly.
But having said that, I also wanna add that I’m not in leadership position so will not be able to apprehend their frustrations.
Hmm.. what will Jesus do?
what will Jesus do?
His love was both gracious and tough.
Read his approach to the adulterous woman and his cleansing of the temple.
We need to learn from Him.
Tks womb2tomb. Will read those passages & look up commentaries on them again.
Thanks, everyone, for the various opinions. Your contributions have enriched the discussion. Thats why I like blogging: it lets everyone share their word of wisdom. And together we have the mind of Christ.
Dear Kenny,
I did not notice when I was there last. I thought this problem only happened in Sabah. At our 8am service, at most 50 people are present, then the other 300 walked in from after 8 to 8:45. Some even come at 9 am. We never locked the gates or doors. Occasionally I thundered from the pulpit for the latecomers to respect God’s presence and be on time. If God is ever late to help us, we all will be dead!!
You are right that the fear of the Lord has waned and people tend to see the singing of praise as preliminaries and team warm-ups before the real game starts. They’re not convinced that singing of praise is part of offering spiritual sacrifices as a new testament priesthood (hebrews 13). They just want to attend the so called ‘real stuff’: the preaching of the Word.
By the way, in some churches when the pastor thunders from the pulpit, the lightning strikes them in the boardroom.
hmmm… so both approaches work?
1. positive motivations - dynamic worship, friendly greeters, ministering pre-service prayer sessions
AND
2. negative penalties - shutting latecomers out, fining them, admonishments from the pulpit
“fining them”? So we put a signboard up at the church auditorium entrance with a clock showing 10.15am and a diagonal line across, with the words FINE, but erh, how much should we fine them?
sounds like an excellent idea! u can fine them on an incremental basis… of course the tithing 10% would be the baseline, and for habitual late-coming (eg. caught red-handed more than 5 times in a year), the tithing will go up by 0.5% for any additional late-comings. This is fair since it’s relative to individual income, unlike an absolute amount that may hurt some more than others.
of course, this may backfire and people may blatantly come late since they could pay for the right to come late guilt-free.
I don’t think this happen to New Creation Church. Everyone want to be early or they will automatically lock themselves out! It’s full house for every services! Praise our Heavenly Father and glory to Jesus!
Its about supply and demand. The acid test is when every Sunday service there are more seats than worshippers. The need to queue or be early is no longer there; this is the real test.
I doubt NCC or any church can pull it off under such conditions, but I sincerely hope to stand corrected.:)
haha… i don’t want to sound heretical (esp to NCC folks), but maybe it’s really a singaporean thing… that kiasu mentality that is so uniquely singaporean… if it’s free AND if there’s a queue, ppl will jump for it.
for eg - flyers distribution. if the first guy takes the flyer, those following behind will be much inclined to take it as well… if he rejects it, chances are the others will also reject.
Well, if the queuing is only for a week or two…you might say that it is a singaporean thing but if this is happening every week, every month, every year….there could only be one answer….it is God who brings forth the growth.
When I first saw the queue outside the NCC rock auditorium I had the same thinking too. I wonder whether is this just another hype. However, when I saw man and women with tatoos, colored hair, body piercing “models” standing in the queue…waiting for hours to hear the word of God, within me I have this strong conviction that this could only be God.
Infact, many of my friends would be in the queue as early as 6.30am on a sunday morning. This is incredible isn’t it? Seeing is believing….
mercy and mediocrity - is there a balance?