We live in a culture that values “experience.” Americans love to be entertained, wowed, surprised and seeing a well-thought-out show. This fascination has naturally leaked into the church, where we love to have creative experiences, intentional productions, and generally be surrounded by an excellent environment. However, there is a paradox surrounding this word excellence. Our quest for excellence can be a good thing, but, I believe it can easily become the focus of our ministry rather than a tool to be effective. Here are some thoughts or paradoxes to keep you in check.
1. When Excellence is More Important Than Money.
A few years ago I heard a story of a church that sat about two hundred people (and didn't quite run that many people) that decided they wanted to upgrade their sound system. However, they did not want just any sound system, they wanted a very expensive sound system. This particular brand is one of the highest quality sound systems money can buy, and its price tag definitely lets you know how nice it is. This church took out a loan they could not really afford to buy this system and have it installed. They allowed their desire for “The Best” to put their church in a financial bind and kept them from doing ministry the way they had been doing prior to acquiring “The Best.” This was done in the name of excellence. They could have bought something cheaper that was still very high quality, but they were more concerned with having what they perceived as “The Best” that they hurt their church's budget. When excellence becomes more important than the proper allocation of tithes and offerings, then the tool of excellence has become more important than the reason strive for excellence.
2. Excellence for Excellence Sake
Have you ever wondered why we do what we do? Why does excellence matter? I personally believe that creating excellent ministry experiences inspires people, creates less distractions, and allows people to feel more comfortable in service. However, doing things better for the sake of simply “being better” rather than for the sake of the reasons we just listed can become counter productive. When it comes to production, a service can get to the point where there is so much happening that doesn't focus the central theme of the service --- that it can become excellence for excellence sake. So it is important to ask ourselves why we are doing something, not just how can we get it done. Creating environments that shape the experience can be very important, but if we are less worried about what the end result of the service should be and simply focused on making the audio louder, lights moving faster, and more intense video for the sake of it being awesome we have lost the proper focus.
We should always ask ourselves these questions when it comes to production: Does what I am doing help the music or the word better translate the feeling or emotion it is trying to give? In other words, am I being a tool for the cause or am I just being a distraction? Next, does what I am creating fit the experience the leaders envision for the church? In truth, we can create the same emotion 100 different ways using technology, but are we creating the environment that our leaders wants?
Excellence is key to any ministry, it can help your church better articulate what Christ has done for each of us. However, the paradox of excellence can distract us and allow us to make decisions that we would never otherwise make. So, in our quest to continually get better, lets not stray from what we know is the most important thing. Let us use our tools and skills to honor God and inspire people.
