Space, Place, and Local Church Ministry
Keeping the "Local" in Local Church Worship Ministries, pt. 1
It’s been a minute! As the Spring semester heated up and two of my sons graduated, the newsletter took a back seat. I’m happy to write again.
In this issue of our newsletter (700 words and 4 minutes), we begin to consider LOCAL church worship ministry. Faithful Christian ministry involves both faithful adherence to universal truths and faithful application within local contexts.
Let us begin by making a distinction between two terms for location which we often use interchangeably: “space” and “place.”* In everyday language, people use the words as synonyms, but there is a distinction between the words, though uncommonly understood, which offers significant insights for ministry. Consider
“Space” refers to location where its specific features are disregarded. It’s an abstraction, a consideration of location in a general and conceptual way.
“Place,” on the other hand, considers location within its unique context. No two “places” are the same, unlike space, which lacks any distinguishing characteristics.
Photo by Casey Horner on Unsplash
Examples
Examples should clarify these abstract definitions. Mathematics, natural laws, and universals hold true regardless of location—they occur in “space.” The internet happens in space, so Twitter doesn’t reflect any particular location. Similarly, even though Spotify is headquartered in (do you know?) Stockholm, Sweden, no one can tell. Spotify, like almost all of the internet, is not … Swedish. It’s from space.
Think about radio stations.
In the past, a radio station often reflected a “place,” their unique location. You might remember an old TV show “WKRP in Cincinnati” (if you don’t remember, ask your grandparents). The station’s personality, DJs, and programming mirrored the city’s culture, mood, and preferences. The music played was shaped by Cincinnatians, making it an example of “place.”
Much of contemporary radio, however, operates in “space,” not from a specific location. Think about the music from today’s pop radio stations—101.1 The Beat or Z100 (New York); 102.7 KIIS (in Los Angeles) or Q102 (in Philadelphia). The same music fills radios from Cincinnati to Chicago, Omaha to San Antonio. (Taylor Swift dominates!)
Using our distinction in terms, popular music happens more in “space” than in a particular “place.”
Insights for Our World
With these two terms in mind, consider some insights that we gain from exploring these different perspectives.
Some people operate primarily with the metaphor of “space.” For them, universal realities untethered to specific locations hold the most weight. Issues like justice and laws, values and principles are their main preoccupation.
Others find their primary metaphor in “place.” Their concern lies with those issues shaped, even dictated, by the contextual realities surrounding their circumstances.
A book by David Goodhart, a British conservative writer, titled The Road to Somewhere, distinguishes two groups of people in Britain—somewheres and anywheres. These British groups—likely mirrored elsewhere—we can understand through the lens of place and space. “Somewheres” are grounded in place-based concerns, while “anywheres” are driven by those of space.
Insights for Our Churches
I hope it’s clear that I’m not pitting these groups against each other. I don’t consider one group good and the other bad, one group smart and the other ignorant. Instead, I want to highlight how these perspectives offer mutually beneficial vantage points when considering local church ministry.
In fact, do you see both of the perspectives within the term “local church ministry?”
For a church to truly be a church, it must be catholic. Of course, as a Baptist, I don’t mean Roman Catholic since those terms are an oxymoron (Catholic signifies “across all times and all places,” while “Roman” is specific to the city of Rome). Any true church connects to the broader, universal catholic Church. There are profound, unchanging realities that govern and define the essential nature of Christ’s true Church—eternal, spiritual, and universal. We often call this the “invisible church” or the “spiritual church.”
And simultaneously, there are also profound realities specific to a local church. My suspicion is that many seminary educations emphasize the universal, unchanging principles of faith and ministry. This is highly appropriate and even essential. However, there is a danger lies overemphasizing space (universals) when faithful ministry also requires navigating the complexities of place (specific contexts).
Faithful Christian ministry involves both faithful adherence to eternal, unchanging, and universal truths and faithful application within time-bound, shifting, and local contexts. Faithful ministry involves space and place.
What happens when Christians emphasize the issues of “space” over the issues of “place”? Several dangers occur, perennial risks for Christian ministers which have become particularly sharp in our generation.
Worship ministries are on the front-line.
We will describe and face those dangers in our next newsletter issue.
*This distinction was perhaps first made by philosopher Edward Casey. Dr. Casey’s discussion on place has been considered from a Christian perspective by Craig Bartholomew in his excellent book, Where Mortals Dwell.