A Tale of Two Churches Part 1: Hillsong London

I had the privilege of visiting two churches in the London area this Sunday, Hillsong and Holy Trinity Brompton. Hillsong is a relatively new part of a large church in 3 locations, the original home being in Sydney, Australia. Holy Trinty Brompton is an Anglican church with a nice heritage in London. I found out about each church by their worship. Hillsong United has put out several well known worship albums which have been put to good use at my home church. HTB is home to worship leader Time Hughes, composer of the songs "Here am to Worship" and "Beautiful One" and a leader at the Passion conferences in the States. So I went to Hillsong in the morning with some friends here. We accidentally (I got confused) got there an hour early. So we went around the corner to Starbucks. While we were there I asked the guy at the counter if he knew when Hillsong started. He looked confused, but another guy there overheard me and said, "Were you asking about Hillsong, mate?" I told him I was. The man's name was Jeremy. He was very friendly and excited to tell me about his church. It turned out that about 80% of the people in Starbucks that morning were from Hillsong. Apparently it's the community thing to do, which is quite cool. You could feel the thickness of community among these people. While talking to Jeremy, several people came to ask about his wife, who is due to give birth in 2 weeks. Everyone seemed very excited for him.

Once we got there, everyone was very nice and welcoming. We had several people come and introduce themselves. It felt so natural, not like they were "programmed greaters," but genuine people who loved their church and wanted you to feel at home there. There was an energy and freshness in the air. Even though the church had been there for, I think, 5 or 6 years, it felt as if this was the first Sunday of a very new thing. I excused myself to walk around and look at the displays and information. They meet in the Old Dominion theatre, which houses the musical "We Will Rock You" during the week. There was information about getting involved in the community, with the campaign slogan "Because We Can." I saw several of these t-shirts. At the resource desk I found all of the Hillsong cd's and dvd's. I also saw their pastor's books and sermon series. I only saw one resource that didn't come directly from Hillsong. Prominently displayed was Joel Osteen's Your Best Life Now. Now, I've never personally read the book, so I will refrain from comment. But, this put me on edge a little bit.

I asked a young lady what defined her church, what made Hillsong what it is. She replied, "I think it's the friendships. Everyone is very close. The worship is also great! I love to worship here!" Curious from the book I had seen, I asked, "What's the teaching like?" She sheepishly replied, "Well, it's pretty soft. I guess they want everyone to feel at home, so they don't really push you with the teaching. They expect you to grow in the small groups. I do sometimes wish they would challenge us with the teaching though." After that we were guided down to some seats near the front.

The stage was impressive with amazing rock show lighting and large risers for the instrumentalists. A countdown started on the screen that stood behind where the band would soon be. Some music started playing to a series of phrases that talked about the church being the body of Christ. I do remember the phrase, "The Church is not peripheral to the world, the world is peripheral to the Church." I'm not entirely sure what that means.

The band then came out. It was an army. Two electric guitars, bass, drums, two keyboard players, an acoustic guitar player, a lead male singer, two female leaders, and two more vocalists who stood more back to the side. They were all very energetic. They would dance as they lead, jump up and down and pump their fists. The room was electric; you would almost think they were singing to a Jesus who was actually alive. Fancy that. They debuted some new songs to be on the recently released album, "Savior King." There were a few things that bothered me through the worship. There was very little depth to the words. This was as far from liturgy as you can get. The next problem was that the music often did not match the words. This became very problematic for me on some lyrics. Some words we sang felt awkward to dance to. People would smile and dance to "You died for us!" It just had no dynamics. No quiet reflection. We also only ever sang about what God had done for us; very man-centered worship. Nothing about God being great, just because He's God. I grew tired of singing, "We're you're church" "We'll take it to the streets" "In Your freedom I will live" "I love you" "You've set me free." I just walked away feeling like what made God great was us. Like the thing that made God praiseworthy was that he saved mankind. There was strong excitement about the church and the people in the church, what God is doing there. But, that seemed to be God's only entry point, us. It felt more like a celebration of us, and thank God that he kept this good thing called humanity going. Now, I am probably exaggerating badly; this was my impression. However, the theme of the talk may have justified it.

The pastor got up and started with some staggering statistics about how lost the UK was. After giving the number of lost people in England he said, "Those numbers aren't going to fit in the Old Dominion Theatre, so if they're to hear the gospel, you're going to have to take it to them." He went on to say that it was time for Hillsong to teach on the deeper truths of the gospel for the first time. He said they had to understand why Jesus had to die, not just that he did, if they were going to be equipped to evangelize England. This was my first Sunday at Hillsong, but I got the impression I was witnessing something significant in the life of this church. I applaud this teacher for taking this direction.

He went on to teach Romans 5. He did an exceptional job of making some difficult doctrinal issues relatively simple and approachable. He started by posing the question, "Is it what you do for God, or what God has done for you that matters?" I'll refrain from regurgitating his entire sermon, but he very effectively taught on Christ as the Second Adam and the atonement. He had one memorable analogy involving computers. He said when you get the multi-colored spinning wheel of death (for windows people, it's the sign a mac has locked up, and yes, macs do lock up), you have three options. One is to accept the thing has gone wrong and leave it to deteriorate. The next is to kick the screen in and throw it out the window, destroying it. And finally, you can hit the reset button and start it over, preserving the original computer, but restarting the software without the problem. He said God had these three options when mankind and the world went wrong through one man, Adam. Jesus, he said, is God's reset button for mankind, preserving the people, but offering a new righteousness for them. He concluded that salvation is not our work, but Jesus' in us. He said if we live in worshipful response to this truth, a moral life will be the natural result. Overall, a wonderful word.

I did have one criticism of the teaching. Being on high alert for the prosperity gospel, I definitely sensed it creeping in. He toted a dangerous line at one point, saying "You don't have to work to earn God's love and salvation. He gives them freely. You already have his approval. It's not about us living to make God happy, it's about God..." he stuttered, apparently realizing where he was going. "God wants to give you all you need, just because he loves you" he concluded. Earlier, when praying for the congregation, he prayed, "For those in blessed times, we thank you. For those in trials and challenging times, we pray that those will end and that they will experience your joy." At the start of the talk, he told us to stand and imagine a door. With us on our side were all of our challenges and problems. On the other side was Jesus waiting to receive and free us. He asked us to physically reach out and take hold of the handle and walk through the door. I stood still, a little uncomfortable. The general idea was that the true Christian life was free of trouble and trial, and that was Jesus had to offer for us.

Overall, a good learning experience. Great example of community and passion. A church that is definitely growing and going somewhere. I'll be interested to see where this new line of teaching leads them. Next time, Holy Trinity Brompton.