by Andy Perry
Yes, after nearly two years of baited anticipation, waiting, watching, lawsuits, and more waiting, Minot’s Wal-Mart Supercenter officially opened its doors for service last Wednesday morning at 8 am. Did you brave the crowds on that exciting first day? We did, and after 30 minutes in line at the checkout, we began to question the wisdom of our decision. Nevertheless, I am happy about the Supercenter’s arrival, not so much because of the store itself but the renovating effect it is having on the area of town near our church building.
How do you feel about our new Wal-Mart Supercenter? One of my friends from town is not pleased at all. Like many others around the country, he is upset about a company from Arkansas building a commercial megalopolis in Minot, North Dakota which will hurt if not kill small, local businesses which simply cannot compete. Others disagree, claiming that Wal-Mart is the best thing for a town like Minot, providing jobs for many people and serving as a commercial magnet for other businesses which will invariably follow in its wake. I suppose the debate will rage on as long as local businesses continue to fight for survival or until Wal-Mart partners with Microsoft and finally takes over the universe.
Though I have my opinions, at the end of the day I don’t care about Wal-Mart one way or the other. Its positive conveniences very well may outweigh its detriments. What I have grown increasingly concerned about lately, though, is the Supercenter mentality which, bit by bit, has become indelibly ingrained in our cultural psyche and deeply colors how we think about and ‘do’ church. The evil I detect is not Wal-Mart or Supercenters but the consumerism that predates Sam Walton by many years.
Until the industrial revolution began in the late 1700s, most families provided their own food and made much of what they needed for home use. Yes, weekly or monthly trips to the market fair made specialized goods available to them (e.g. books, tinkered pots, pans, basic farm implements, etc.), but these were typically produced by just a handful of local artisans and offered a very limited selection of goods. Additionally, since such items were hand-made, they were often very expensive.
With the advent of mass production in the 19th century, that quickly changed. Suddenly, department stores and catalogs filled with a variety of goods opened the door of consumer opportunity. And, given the time and labor-saving effect of industrial technology, both disposable time and disposable income steadily increased. By 1900 Madison Avenue was ready, using marketing which played on our desire for more time and more ease to convince us we needed and deserved the best products available. Though the Depression made that impossible for most during the ‘30s, the robust economy of the post-WWII era, supported by new, television advertising, catapulted us into a truly consumer culture where one’s identity was expressed by what one purchased and one’s expectations for more, newer, better and less expensive choices became not a luxury but a necessity and assumption. Given the last 200 years of western history, the birth of the Wal-Mart Supercenter was inevitable.
Had such consumerism limited itself to the commercial sector, we might only be in danger of the pervasive materialism we, as Americans, know and love so well. But in the past 60 years an uglier plant has grown, largely undetected, from the seed of consumerism: the ‘ Church-Mart Supercenter.’ Please do not misunderstand, I do not merely mean the megachurch explosion so rife in American suburbia (though there are connections). ‘Church-Mart’ is an individualistic, consumer mentality which has crept into how virtually all Christians in the West ‘do’ church today—including us to our shame.
Though Christ saves us one person at a time, the Bible never addresses us as isolated individual s but as members of an intimately interconnected d family called the church. The worldview the Bible presents knows nothing of individual goals, agendas and opinions . From its perspective individual thoughts, attitudes and actions are mere reflections of the unified thought, attitude and action of the wider Christian community. The individual is shaped by the church; the church is not dictated to or shaped by the individual.
But in our modern culture, nearly everything is formulated in individual terms and the individual’s opinion or perspective, it now believes, holds sovereign power to take from, dictate to or reject the community based upon its own perceived ‘needs.’ This is individualism where the wider community is only relevant in as much as it agrees with and furthers the individual s felt needs and personal agenda. When the community fails to perform these all-important functions, the individual believes he or she has the right to deeply criticize the community for failing to conform to their personal desires. Oftentimes, the individual simply abandons the ‘unsatisfactory’ community in search of another better suited to assist them in pursuing and attaining their private goals.
Examples of this in the church are legion. For instance, recently I received a phone call from a family new to Minot. Their chief concern in locating a local church? Did we have sufficient ministry programs for their children? They are approaching the church as individual consumers—the church exists for the fulfillment of their private desires. Two weeks ago I spoke with a visitor after our Sunday service who explained that, though there were things they liked about Trinity, it just isn’t what they’re looking for. According to the Bible, church is not something we’re ever told to ‘like’ and we’re not given the autonomy to keep searching until we ‘find what we’re looking for.’ This attitude belies ‘Church-Mart’ individualistic consumerism which flies in the face of the lordship of Christ and the biblical nature of the church.
A store exists to sell its products to individual, autonomous consumers who hold sovereign sway over the store’s mission and existence through their purchase power. If they don’t like what they find on the shelves, they reserve the right to go elsewhere. Therefore, stores work hard both to find products consumers will buy and market their products to entice customers into their stores. Stores are focused on meeting the desires of individual consumers. This must never be so of the church. The church must not be interested in people’s opinions or desires but consumed with biblical truth conveyed and God’s desires lived out.
Where does ‘Church-Mart’ lead the people of God? Invariably into conflict, for it pits my opinion vs. your opinion, my pet program vs. your pet program and my favorite music vs. your favorite music. The church was not designed by God to be a place where individuals with competing desires or perspectives divide into factions and put God’s will to a vote. That is the inevitable form of ‘community’ which ‘Church-Mart’ breeds unchecked. But the Bible calls us to be different. It calls us to be a people where unity, not competition, reigns (Ephesians 4:1-6), where we work together for God’s goals to be accomplished rather than that our own agendas might win out (Ephesians 4:11-16) and where sacrificing our own desires for the joy and good of our brothers and sisters colors all our decisions (Philippians 2:1-8).
Minot’s new Wal-Mart Supercenter exists that our private, personal desires might be met. Whether or not you’re happy about our new megalopolis neighbor, its reason for being is clear. Fine—that’s democratic capitalism at its best. But may it never be so with the church. The church is not a ‘Supercenter’ which exists to meet our private needs and conform to our desires when it ceases to please us. The church was not designed to ‘provide goods and services’ at all. Rather, Christ, its Lord, designed it as a family in mutual love for its Savior, obedient to its doctrine, submissive to its leaders, accountable to its people and committed to its mission. That’s the church—not ‘Church-Mart.’