Summary: They're a great example of the modern American "Christian" church.
Note at the start of this: The pastor announced during the service that a family that has been a long time part of the church was involved in a fatal car accident on the way to church. I took that into account for this review and did not comment on the lack of friendliness among members towards me as a guest; I'm sure most were in shock. This review focuses on the things that were obviously set long before this morning's events.
Encounter Church is a prime example of the American church experience that's all about the show and the program and very little about Jesus.
First, it leads off with a worship set where the band is trying to be Hillsong. Let's call them Fauxsong. The opening song by Fauxsong has them singing about how it's not a performance or else they wouldn't be up there.
Um...the lights are choreographed to the songs, the "prayers" or "spoken word" breaks are actually timed to fit in with the choruses of songs and even stage movements appear to be rehearsed. This was nothing less than a straight up performance.
The staging looked like a concert and that was the first thing I noticed as I sat down during the countdown video to the start of the "service." (Again, an obvious sign that the entire event is a pre-packaged program designed for emotional response.)
The part that really just sealed the deal for me was when the main worship leader of the day appeared to be going into a time of prayer but it synced right in to the chorus of the song after a musical interlude. The whole worship felt like a lie at that point because his first song wasn't that it was a performance but there's NO WAY that wasn't rehearsed to perform.
Now, the pastor. He seems like a nice enough guy. The problem is his teaching in his lesson called "Are We There Yet?" seemed to have Jesus and the Scriptures strapped to the luggage rack while they sang Justin Bieber songs in the car.
The times he referred to the Bible and mentioned Scripture it was always to fit a point in his sermon. It felt as if he saw the Scriptures as just there because they needed to be and he threw them in so someone couldn't say his sermon was a self-help seminar and not a sermon. It's not that he doesn't do a decent self-help seminar but it certainly wasn't a Biblically based sermon.
Let's put it this way...when points 4 and 5 of a sermon are the Bible and the Spirit of God instead of points 1 and 2...you're not seeing the Bible and God's spirit as the driving force behind what you have to say.
This pastor spent more time during the sermon talking about people not speaking ill of pastors or church leaders than he did about Scripture or God. An entire section of the sermon...which was couched as "needing to show respect to others" was little more than a scolding of the congregation not to say anything bad about the pastoral team because then if you need them for an incident they won't be seen respectfully by that person's children because you were critical of them. The amount of time he focused on that, the look on his face as he talked about it and the intensity of how spoke about it made me wonder if that church has an issue with it. I can't say for sure they do, but his actions made me wonder.
And then he said something in the sermon that just outright ticked me off. He told the story of his daughter wanting to feed a homeless man. Then he says to the congregation he knows what they're thinking, that they're just con men and he's seen the videos of them getting into their Cadillacs and going to their homes after begging all day.
HE SAID THIS FROM THE PULPIT OF THIS CHURCH.
I highly doubt Jesus would stand in front of a group he was teaching and tell them that homeless folks were con men. Jesus would say if someone was hungry, feed them.
There is no excuse for saying what the pastor said on stage even if he wants to try and claim that he was just joking. Demonizing a group of people in need like that even as a joke is inappropriate in a Sunday morning sermon.
Bottom line: This church is exactly what's wrong with "Americanized" churches. It's all emotional, Scripture is an afterthought, the worship is showtime and it appears to be little more than a Sunday morning social club. But hey, if you want a "church" that's 10 miles wide and a millimeter deep, this is the place for you. read more