Yesterday I reviewed What they didn’t teach you in seminary by James Emery White and there was one topic that really got under the skin. Should a church go for excellence as a value? Here’s what White had to say in a chapter on values called ‘hills to die on’:

“Our eighth value is that excellence honours God and inspires people. That’s a value for us for two reasons. The first and foremost is because it’s the only way to live a life that honours God. God deserves our best. Mediocrity does not honour God, nor does it reflect his character.

But there’s a second reason, one that we shouldn’t forget. Excellence sends a message. When somebody comes in and sees typos in the program, sloppy printing or mailing, messy floors or grounds, a poorly performed or rehearsed music or drama, a talk that sounds like it was pulled together the night before, they make a value judgement: ‘This God you talk about must not be that big of a deal. If he was, you wouldn’t do things this way.’

So we’re passionate about excellence not only because we want to honour God with our lives but also because we know that mediocrity could invalidate everything we want to try to communicate to those around us about Christ.”

There are so many things wrong with those three paragraphs, it’s hard to know where to start. But let’s start by being nice. At a cursory glance you’d think what’s to disagree with, we want to honour God, which leader of a church doesn’t? So you have to applaud the sentiment that honouring God is a good thing. Secondly it’s worth noting that not setting out to be completely rubbish is also a good thing. And that I think is about all I could find to agree with here.

The list of disagreements from three short paragraphs is substantially longer.

The first area where I think White gets it wrong is when he argues that excellence is the only way to live a life that honours God. This might be inspiring in White’s can-do world, but what does that say to a single mum of three kids from different fathers who’s struggling to make family work and hold it all together? To me that communicates, you don’t belong here.

Excellence is a cultural value, it doesn’t make any sense in the slums of Bujumbura or the house churches of China. It doesn’t make any sense in the working class neighbourhoods or in the rural parish with 15 members, one of whom is a dog.

Sometimes mediocre is all I can manage. I’d love to be great all the time, I really would. Only sometimes I wake up with a headache and the best I can manage is not being a total disaster. Excellence is great if excellence is what you can achieve but what about the contribution of the deaf kid with poor grades or the elderly who carry with them all the frailties of age or the disabled or the just plain average person who doesn’t really do anything excellently but nothing too badly either, what place and role for them?

So, as you might be able to tell, I have a problem with this and I’m just getting warmed up.

Secondly White argues that God deserves our best. Sure he does, fortunately for me the GOSPEL says ‘He loves me at my worst’, ‘He takes me as I am and sorts me out’, ‘He accepts me when I am everything but excellent’. So what God deserves for loving me when I am the chief of sinners is not my best but my praise, not my excellence but my obedience, not my ability but my faithfulness. This is basic stuff. You don’t preach the gospel and then leave it behind when it comes to writing your values down. If God does love me at my worst and makes me a part of His family, then the church we lead can include all those the world would write off as being not excellent and it be a wonderful, beautiful thing. Paul says this about the church 1 Cor 1:25-31. That sounds more like it to me.

Thirdly, White goes for excellence because mediocrity doesn’t honour God. OK, if you think mediocre is somehow more spiritual then stop being silly. I don’t want to do rubbish, and as long as godly character is in evidence I’d ask my most able and gifted people to make their gifts available and I don’t want tone-deaf singers in front of a microphone or mumblers and grumblers preaching the monotone word of the lord.  But there’s a vast chasm between those two extremes.

Sometimes there are mistakes in the news-sheet and sometimes the drama isn’t as good as it could be and sometimes the talk was prepared the night before. I’m not interested in entertaining a crowd, I’m interested in seeing disciples made and the church be faithful to its calling and see people offer their two loaves, or single copper penny and say simple non-excellent prayers like ‘God forgive me for I have sinned’.

Fourthly, apparently excellence sends a message and so does not being excellent. Not being excellent reflects badly on God. So here’s what I would say to someone who after attending my non-excellent church service and listening to my non-excellent sermon makes the following judgement: ‘This God you talk about must not be that big of a deal. If he was, you wouldn’t do things this way.’ 

I would respond with the following: ‘Stop being a shallow consumer that sees the church and its worship as a product for your entertainment and centred around your needs you narcissistic twit.’

OK, maybe I’d be a little more gracious than that. Perhaps I’d say this, ‘I’m sorry you didn’t think our worship service was excellent in every way but we were never going to get there. We are just ordinary people loving an extraordinary God who loved us when we were his enemies and getting it all wrong. And sometimes we still get it wrong but we’ve found a freedom and a love and a grace that means we don’t have to be excellent to be loved, we don’t have to be excellent to be accepted, we don’t have to be excellent to be a success. So there’s no pressure here and instead we just do our best with what we have been given. And everyone here can play a part.’

That sounds a bit better.