It may surprise you to know – despite all the talk of decline – that the tools to get people back into the church have been at our disposal for some time. It really doesn’t take a great deal to get people to engage with us and even come. These are not new tricks or unheard of activities, but things that have the proven track record of getting people in.

If you don’t believe me, just look at this article. Don’t worry, I’ll wait for you to read it and then you can pop back. And that is not the only example of this kind, I can find – indeed, if you Google it, you can find – plenty of other similar examples. Packing people into our churches really isn’t that hard. There are lots and lots of ways we can do it.

You name it, we can put it on. Though our attempts at these things are sometimes less good than the efforts of the world, much of the time we can do things just as well. Stick the right thing on, in the right place, aimed at the right demographic and Bob’s yer uncle, we’ve got them into church. If our goal is to “get them in”, the ability to do it and the tools to make it happen are readily available to us.

The question is, are we just aiming to get them in? I can fill a room with people by putting on all sorts of things. If that is all we’re aiming to do, there is little stopping me putting on all manner of things. If the highest aim is simply to pack in the people, perhaps renting out the church space as a lap dancing club is the way to go. I am pretty sure it would be popular and we’d get decent numbers!

Don’t be silly, you’ll say. That is sinful and wrong. Which is quite right. So, we wouldn’t do that. Of course we wouldn’t. But that rather undercuts our claim that all we’re aiming to do is “just get ’em in”. Apparently we have a higher goal of not using unholy means. So there is minimally a limit on our attempts to pack our churches with people.

But assuming we don’t want to use unholy means, what then? Let’s say – to use the example in the article I shared – we thought silent discos were the answer. There is no question, to the right demographic, we will pull folk in with some success. One can make the argument that there is nothing inherently unholy about a silent discos. But what has our packing them in this way actually achieved?

Let’s just say they come in their droves to the church (like they would to a club) and they dance the night away with gay abandon (like in a club) and then they leave (as they would a club). What has getting them in the church done for them particularly? We may have packed them in, but to what end? For what benefit? Have we accomplished a single evangelistic thing by doing this? What was the value of “getting them in”?

Two lessons, it seems to me, seem worth drawing when we see these things. First, if “getting them in” is our highest goal, there really are no depths to which we will not stoop in order to accomplish our goal. If all the matters is “getting them in” there is nothing we won’t jettison, nothing we won’t adopt, nothing we won’t permit in order to pack out our building. If we think this is what Jesus wants from us – aside from being sorely mistaken – little is going to stop us doing almost anything in pursuit of what we perceive to be fidelity to the glory and honour of Christ. That lap dancing evening may not be so far fetched after all! Even if we are limited by not seeking actively unholy means, there is no stupid or trivial thing we will not entertain if it promises to pull in the punters.

Second, I see no reason to believe we have accomplished anything of evangelistic worth whatsoever when we see these things. Simply “getting them in” is not the same as doing anything for the gospel. Simply “getting them in” does not lead anybody nearer to Christ. In and of itself, “getting them in” doesn’t really achieve anything at all.

This second point is the one that really bites back on us (most of whom I assume are my readers). We aren’t likely to necessarily fall for the absolutely trivial or ungodly in the pursuit of numbers. We’re much better than that! But we do frequently fall for the same nonsense that believes – entirely without warrant – that because we got a packed room, because we pulled people into our (much godlier) means of outreach, because they came into our church building and we engaged with them, we have done something for the gospel.

Sure, it might not be a silent disco (which I’m not convinced is a problem), and it might not be that troubling lap dancing evening (which I am convinced is a problem), it is more likely our very noble efforts to run a food banks, hold mum’s and toddler groups, offer art classes, homework clubs, or any number of other worthy endeavours. All allowing us to get people into the building and, even in some of these cases, engage with them a bit. And we convince ourselves because there were so many bodies in the room, and we were nice to them and offered them tea and biscuits and chatted in a friendly way with them, we have actually done something for the gospel. And the sad truth is, if that is all that we do, in the end we have accomplished nothing more than a silent disco in which there was no interaction whatsoever and everybody went home, having been in the building, and not moved one iota closer to Christ nor given any indication they should.

What is missing in all these things, what matters so far as evangelistic value is concerned, is gospel input. Unless we have actually spoken some actual words that are concerned with the actual gospel message of Jesus we haven’t done anything evangelistic. Inviting people to a thing is not evangelism. Sitting next to someone in a meeting is not evangelism. Pulling people into our building is not evangelism. They may all be a step on the road to doing some evangelism, they may all help in some way, but in the end unless we have actually used words that meaningfully point people to Jesus and help people understand their real and genuine need of him, we have done nothing of evangelistic worth, whether our building was packed out or not.