Martoia: Obviously when we ask those either/or questions we run the risk of being really reductionistic. I want to be careful to say that life change can happen in any context – big, small, preaching, not preaching, group dynamics, etc.
That said, you know I was a church planter and was in a large church for almost twenty years; I certainly understand the dynamics of that. We really do crave these experiential dimensions, and let’s face it, large churches often can create experiences that small churches simply don’t have. A church of a thousand has a very different sort of budget to yank off a great drama, a great media, a really awesome ambiance that a church of eighty or 200 simply doesn’t have. We aren’t even talking about mega, mega churches. You get into a church of five thousand or ten thousand and the stakes go up even higher.
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Now am I suggesting that everyone is just flocking to churches because of its bigger glitz or bigger Hollywood? That wouldn’t be my conscious suggestion, but there is no doubt you are noting something that is real interesting. The middle seems to be disappearing. We either have a really small church or a really big one.
I think it is interesting to note there is a renaissance of home churches going on, along with some large, large churches. I think small church is that we really want community; we don’t care about the big, huge, overwhelming experience. Or you go to the large church and I will find community within this larger church in a smaller setting. Or smaller community isn’t as valuable to me, I just want the big experience. So can life change happen? I think it can. I am just not at all convinced that the big church is something that we will see last for the long term. I think it is going to end up being much more a product of modernity. A valuable chapter in church history maybe, but not something that has sustained power.
Preaching: As a pastor, you were one of those really creating the model for the multi-sensory experience. Tell me a little about the Encounter service you led.
Martoia: Encounter for us was just an amazing several-year experiment. What we committed to doing with Encounter was to monthly create a venue for anywhere from sixty to ninety minutes that was almost exclusively experiential and interactive. If we had any talking heads during the service itself it might be two to three minutes of instruction of where we were headed next. Almost everything else in the sixty to ninety minutes was done either by questions posed on a screen or video direction; I don’t mean a talking head on a screen, I mean questions posed or experiential opportunities given: poetry, things that enabled people to come in and immerse.