Day +1947 : Small church or megachurch?

I am fine today.

I attended the semester closing service this morning. It marks the end of the semester, but the semester is far from over yet, at least for me :-( While many students have completed their work and started to enjoy the holiday, I have three articles to write and many Bible study reports - from the Book of Kings to Esther - to complete. I have to focus and work hard now.

"Given both an opportunity to join a small poor church in the village and a rich megachurch in the city, which one will you choose?" the principal challenged the students in his sermon. If you decided to join a megachurch, you might be labelled as a materialist, but if you chose to serve in a small poor church, you might have to fight for your financial needs. During my one year study in the seminary, I strongly felt that the seminary is in fact promoting a suffering servant, and also a sentiment against megachurch. It is perfectly correct to get the students ready for suffering, but there is no point to over-exaggerate it.

On the other hand, I have a general feeling that, some students and lecturers, through their sermons, portraying megachurch as one that is not healthy or one that doesn't preach the right gospel. However, I have very reason to believe that a small church can be no better than the megachurch in term of its health. The question is, if the small church is so healthy, why doesn't it grows? A healthy small church should grow continuously, and eventually becomes a big church, but unfortunately, this is not always the case. This remind those of us who are from small church not to always suspect that megachurches do not living up to the standard of the Bible, but rather to examine ourself and ask why our church doesn't grow.

Instead of arguing whether a student should join a small or big church upon graduation, the seminary should put more effort in imparting a vision to the students - "Go, and build a megachurch!"

See you next post :-)