By TJ Gentry PhD, DMin, PhD Candidate | December 16, 2022
Editorial Note: This article is the first of two. In part one, with Matthew 28:19-20 in focus, Dr. TJ Gentry “considers the similarities and differences between the attractional and proclamational approaches to church structure and practice through the lens of authors and pastors Andy Stanley (an advocate of the attractional model) and Jared Wilson (an advocate of the proclamational model).” In part two (to be published Sunday December 18, 2022) Dr. Gentry will present a Biblical rationale for the proclamational model and some concluding thoughts.
Introduction: Attractional or Proclamational?
Prior to His Ascension, Jesus gave His disciples a commission, commanding them to “make disciples of all the nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit, teaching them to observe all things that I have commanded” (Matt 28:19-20, New King James Version). Within the contemporary American context, churches often see the challenge of applying Jesus’ commission as a choice between two options, what will be termed here as the attractional model and the proclamational model.[1] The attractional model seeks to fulfill Jesus’ commission through structures, programs, worship styles, and preaching designed to attract unbelievers. The driving concern in the attractional model is determining what those outside the church find attractive and then doing church accordingly. The proclamational model approaches Jesus’ commission by means of developing church structures, programs, worship styles and preaching around the proclamation of the central themes of the gospel and the discipling of Christians. The proclamational model is not intentionally designed to attract unbelievers to church, though unbelievers are still a concern. Rather, the goal of the proclamational model is to proclaim what God has done, is doing, and will do in Jesus; in that context, Christians are equipped and sent forth as missionaries to the surrounding culture.
So, which is it: attractional or proclamational? Answering this question is the focus of the remainder of this presentation and the thesis that will be put forth. Specifically, the purpose is to consider the similarities and differences between the attractional and proclamational approaches to church structure and practice through the lens of authors and pastors Andy Stanley (an advocate of the attractional model) and Jared Wilson (an advocate of the proclamational model). Stanley’s book, Deep & Wide: Creating Churches Unchurched People Love to Attend, and Wilson’s book, The Prodigal Church: A Gentle Manifesto Against the Status Quo, will be compared before an argument is offered in defense of Wilson’s position.[2] The argument presented defends the thesis that the church of the New Testament does not reflect the attractional model promoted by Stanley but does engender the approach advocated by Wilson, especially as described in its initial expression in Acts 2:42-47.
Deep & Wide and Prodigal Church: A Comparison
Summarizing Stanley and Wilson
Stanley’s purpose in Deep & Wide is made plain in the book’s opening pages:
This is a book about creating churches that unchurched men, women, and children love to attend . . . a book about how to make your church more appealing to the people who are put off by all the shenanigans that give church, big churches in particular, a bad name. . . . And in case you are wondering, yes, I think every church should be a church irreligious people love to attend. . . . There should be something about us that causes them to gather at the periphery and stare.[3]
Stanley sets about making his case by calling for churches to become deep and wide. Deep, according to Stanley, is his church’s “secret sauce . . . a discipleship model. . . . We program with the assumption that growing faith, which translates into obedience, is the catalyst for personal growth. And personal growth will eventually result in personal maturity.”[4] Stanley explains that the wide part of his approach entails “essential ingredients for irresistible environments” because the “environments are the messages before the message.”[5] Three questions frame Stanley’s assessment of whether environments are irresistible: Is the setting appealing? Is the presentation engaging? Is the content helpful?[6] Concerning the attractional approach put forth in Deep & Wide, Stanley states, “We are unapologetically attractional. In our search for common ground with unchurched people, we’ve discovered that, like us, they are consumers. So, we leverage their consumer instincts.”[7]
Wilson takes a different approach in Prodigal Church, critiquing the attractional church model—and, by extension, much of the Western church—as not following the early church’s example because of two problematic ideologies: pragmatism and consumerism. Wilson presents his concern as follows, “I think the evangelical church in the West is particularly susceptible to two primary ideologies that drive many of its ways of doing church today, and I think the attractional model is fundamentally built on these function ideologies. These ideologies are pragmatism and consumerism.”[8] Wilson further elaborates, “Pragmatism is the way of thinking that says, ‘If it works, let’s work it.’”[9] However, “pragmatism is not the same thing as being practical. The Bible is practical. . . . But pragmatism is the kind of thinking that values a thing based entirely on its apparent practicality. Pragmatism judges the usefulness of a particular practice . . . based on results.”[10] Wilson’s critique of the attractional concern for pragmatism and consumerism derives, in large part, from his understanding of the description of the earliest Christian gatherings described in Acts 2:42-47. Here is Wilson’s explanation of what happened in Acts:
The early believers centered on the Word of God and through it on the church itself (v. 42). The resulting communal witness was compelling and powerful (v. 47). They did not, as far as we can tell, design their gatherings around appealing to the unsaved. They did not select music from the culture to help contextualize their witness. And yet they were blessed with many converts.[11]
Based on his understanding of the church’s practice in Acts, Wilson concludes that the focus of the church should not be overtly and intentionally attractional as a matter of first principle. Wilson’s point is not that the church should intentionally make itself unattractive to unbelievers, only that the focus should be on those concerns that reflect gospel-centered priorities. He explains:
None of [the attractional church’s] means of measurement help us gauge the actual value of a church experience, according to the Bible. . . . So these sorts of [attractional concerns] work fine in an attractional church were consumerism and pragmatism are the functional ideologies, but in a church centered on the gospel, things like inspiration and good feelings are seen as byproducts of the experience, not the aim of the experiences.[12]
Wilson’s position may be summarized as the view that the church is primarily a gathering for the people of God around the message of the Bible and the fellowship of those united by faith in Jesus. As such, the church is centered on the proclamation of the gospel, and the church’s relationship to unbelievers is not one of accommodating the church to unbelievers by making it attractive to them but by inviting unbelievers to become part of the distinctively other-worldly new community of believers.
Points of Similarity and Difference
In terms of similarity, Stanley and Wilson both attempt to ground their arguments in theological commitments derived from Scripture, even if their attempts begin with different theological concerns and result in different practical expressions.[13] For example, Stanley “wanted to create a model that would actually facilitate spiritual maturity . . . to focus on building mature followers of Christ.”[14] Thus, Stanley’s team at North Point adopted as their mission statement a commitment “to lead people into a growing relationship with Jesus Christ.”[15] The theological foundation for Stanley’s focus on spiritual formation is certainly consistent with the command of Jesus to “make disciples of all nations . . . teaching them to observe all things that I have commanded you” (Matt 28:19-20, NKJV). Likewise, Wilson’s endorsement of expositional preaching as a key practice of healthy churches draws from a theological commitment borne of his emphasis on the sufficiency of Christ’s finished work in securing redemption for believers. As Wilson explains, “a good proclamational message will emphasize God’s finished work.”[16] Just as Stanley’s concern for spiritual formation derives from Scripture, so Wilson’s emphasis on the finished work of Christ echoes the words of Paul: “I determined not to know anything among you except Jesus Christ and Him crucified.” (1 Cor 2:2, NKJV).
The most pronounced difference between Stanley and Wilson is their emphasis on the types of messages they think should be delivered during a worship service.[17] Stanley identifies practical teaching as his first of five faith catalysts, explaining that “Jesus wasn’t after mental assent to facts. Jesus was after active, living, do-the-right-thing faith. And when he taught, he taught with that in mind.”[18] Stanley’s conviction about this type of teaching comes forth clearly in his claim that “our messages and lesson preparations are not complete until we know what we want our audiences to do with what they are about to hear. To grow our congregants’ faith, we must preach and teach for life change.”[19] Differing significantly from Stanley’s emphasis on practical teaching, Wilson proclaims, “The gospel is not good advice; it is good news. In the attractional church, the messages are predominantly of the ‘life application’ variety, meant to make the Christian walk more practical or relatable, or appealing. In other words, the attractional church is big on advice.”[20] Though not dismissing application in preaching entirely, Wilson’s concern is that while “good proclamational preaching ought to contain application, we nevertheless ought to trend more toward the proclamation. The best preaching contains both proclamation (what God has done) and application (what we should do), but the difference in Christ-centered expository preaching is that the trust for power in application is placed in the context of proclamation.”[21]
About the Author
Dr. Thomas J. Gentry (aka., TJ Gentry) serves as the pastor of First Christian Church of West Frankfort, Illinois, the Assistant Editor of Bellator Christi Ministries, and the former Executive Editor of MoralApologetics.com. Dr. Gentry is a world-class scholar holding 5 doctorate degrees and 6 masters degrees. Additionally, he is a prolific writer as he has published 7 books including Pulpit Apologist, Absent from the Body, Present with the Lord, and You Shall Be My Witnesses: Reflections on Sharing the Gospel. Be on the lookout for two additional books that he will soon publish. In addition to his impressive resume, Dr. Gentry proudly served his country as an officer in the United States Army and serves as a martial arts instructor.
Notes
[1] The definitions of attractional and proclamational draw from the thought of Andy Stanley and Jared Wilson, whose works are identified and discussed below.
[2] Andy Stanley, Deep & Wide: Creating Churches Unchurched People Love to Attend (Grand Rapids, MI: Zondervan, 2016). Jared Wilson, The Prodigal Church: A Gentle Manifesto against the Status Quo (Wheaton, IL: Crossway, 2015).
[3] Stanley, Deep & Wide, 11-12.
[4] Ibid., 16.
[5] Stanley, Deep & Wide, 17, 156.
[6] Ibid., 191.
[7] Ibid., 16.
[8] Ibid., 49.
[9] Wilson, Prodigal Church, 49.
[10] Ibid., 50.
[11] Wilson, The Prodigal Church, 69.
[12] Ibid., 157.
[13] This paragraph is adapted from the author’s original discussion board post in DMIN810-D01 at Liberty University, Fall 2022. See Thomas Gentry, “Discussion Thread: Ministry Approach Analysis,” Discussion Board Post, December 4, 2022, accessed December 11, 2022, https://canvas.liberty.edu/courses/321978/discussion_topics/3271091.
[14] Stanley, Deep & Wide, 104. Emphasis in original.
[15] Ibid. Emphasis in original.
[16] Wilson, The Prodigal Church, 82.
[17] This paragraph is adapted from Gentry, “Discussion Thread.”
[18] Stanley, Deep & Wide, 112.
[19] Ibid., 114. Emphasis in original.
[20] Wilson, The Prodigal Church, 81.
[21] Ibid., 81.
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