Well Dan,

You're from Santa Cruz, as I, and let's just face it, the church, by its very nature, is odd no matter how you slice it.
Hard to believe, isn't it that anybody ever got saved sitting in pews...but alas, they did, isn't God good?!
I guess the most "damaging" things about pews, and any church structure for that matter, is that the church runs the risk of becoming "homebound." Rather than being the incarnation of Jesus going and making disciples of all nations, we have created a home or a hostel or a hotel (pick your structure type)and expect most to come to us. The fact that Vintage Faith has a building with offices et al, speaks volumes about the nature of the local church.
I know, I shouldn't throwing stones, and in reality I am not, heck, I've been ministering in a church with pews for so long we call them "phews." We got a couple of extra if ya need them...

I do think that pews are strange as well, although I'm not quite ready to move forward towards movie theater seats with cup holders. The underlying message could be that church is all about entertainment and less about community and challenging one another in our faith. I like the reference to the last supper and the absurdity of sitting in pews- and how the arrangement doesn't necessarily foster fellowship or communal worship. I do think we are at a point where we are able to move on from the pews and investigate other arrangements, but when Jesus taught he spoke was the focal point of the crowds. Granted, the crowds were probably seated in the ground in groups, but they probably all faced Jesus while he spoke from a rock or a grassy knoll or something, sans pulpit. In terms of comfort, however, have you ever sat at a table but had to twist sideways to see the speaker at an event. Very uncomfortable. I went to a conference recently where all the chairs were positioned in a half circle, so no one had to twist around to look up front, but we were still able to sit together in a more personal, intimate setting.

I'm not sure I would characterize wooden pews as "uncomfortable." Well-made wooden pews can be just as comfortable as well-made wooden chairs. Older movie theaters or concert halls also seem "cramped" compared to current standards - probably because people were just plain smaller in the past.

It seems that we are getting confused regarding worship vs. fellowship. If we are gathered to worship God, then we are to be focused on Him, not each other. There is a time to fellowship with the body, to discuss, talk, pray and eat together, but that is different from communal focusing on God through Word, prayer & sacrament, which is also different from private devotion. An environment can't encourage us to focus on God and focus on each other at the same time. What is your worship environment encouraging?

Good article. Some good points, some that I may not necessarily agree on, but good overall to stir the neurons to think.

But one question that I have that I want to bring up to get some others thougts on is: how does the pews in our churches relate to the Old Testmant temple? In the broader sense one could ask the relationship between the worshipping of God in the OT and then today, mind you that God has not changed, only we have.

I guess what I am asking, or saying, is this: is it necessarily wrong to have the focus on the altar when the Temple was designed to have the worshipper focused on the "alter" the Holies of Holy, just as we have the focus on the "altar" in our churches?

I see where one could make the argument for stations, as Dan does in his article, in that the Temple had the table of shewbread, the candlesticks, and the wash basins, but all those were to facilitate the focus of the worshipper to the Ark, the physical dwelling place of God Himself among His people.

So, should we model the Temple as it was, and since God does not change, or should we remove the pews? Could we have those elements, or things similar to those elements, in the Temple as long as they draw the focus to the throne of God? Can pews facilitate that worship? I think they can and I for one like them. When I am in a church with pews all facing the front and we are in worship, I get the sense that we are all focused on one thing. By physically facing one direction we are less apt to be distracted in our worship and we are also together in FELLOWSHIP by worshipping the same way. I get a stronger sense of community when we all have our gaze off each other and towards one common purpose, the worship of God.

Any thoughts?

Blessings,

"An environment can't encourage us to focus on God and focus on each other at the same time. What is your worship environment encouraging?"

Hope this doesn't come off as argumentative--you raise an excellent point (worship versus fellowship). But I have to disagree with the statement above. I think this is what we need to be trying to find "spaces" or "contexts" for; the vertical and horizontal at once. It is not just the "I" that worships, but the "We." What kind of a space enables people to worship together as one to The One? I think people may understand how to "focus" on God in worship individually (and a physical space may promote this individualism), but may not know how to do this communally. And the question is, does the environment support the individual act of worship or the communal act, which requires that we stand in relation to one another.

And this is not just a question of the physical space, but also a question of the cultural or social space. Do we have a culture of a communally worshipping congregation, and then do we seek to find or create a physical environment that helps support and deepen that culture?

I think Kimball raises an excellent point that we need to keep working on this--we haven't arrived at anything better than floors or hillsides over the past 2000 years, whether it be wooden pews or cushy theater seats with cupholders.

Isn't everything you said about pews also true of rows of chairs?

Haven't there been theaters for centuries as well that had rows of people? I don't think they were looking at the backs of heads, though, they were probably looking at the action on stage.

While your description of nap time in the meeting may be relaxing to some, I would find that most unrelaxing at a meeting--whether I were the one laying down or watching others do that. That added level of interaction is neither safe nor relaxing. It may, however, be more like the early church with face-to-face interactions (except for the lying down part).

You traced the format of church meetings back through the early church, but what about before that? Didn't a lot of our church format come from the Old Testament--Nehemiah, I think? With the teacher up front and all that.

Tim
10,736 days

Randy,

I am not suggesting we all go home-bound, as larger all-together corporate worship and meeting together is a good thing and I knw in our church, something that is important in the eekly life of our church. We hope to just shift the inflexibility of how people sit for these larger meetings, as it limits the sense of community and also freedom to pray and get on your knees easily (or lay down on your face to pray) or go to prayer stations - you just have to sit as the pews are too small to be able to do anything else.

John -

I would agree and disagree, as you are saying that in a room where everyone faces the front which helps focus on "Him", isn't the focus by default on the pastor/preacher and worship leader?

Everything then is focused on that person(s). I believe the focus is the risen Jesus and of course when there is teaching you need to see the person. But the Spirit is in all believers, and having some more sense of "family" in a worship gathering is very limiting by rows and rows of pews. The way we in most churches today worship weekly today did not develop in the 1500's for the most part. So it is very different than the church practised originally. I am not saying we need to go back to all house churches - but I am going through the experience of being in a building where everyone is forced to sit in pews and not be able to get up and kneel down or go to a prayer station or see each other's faces is so different than we were used to before this move.

The larger the church, the harder it will be to not have rows of seats, whether pews or chairs. But I can say from experiencing pews for the first time, it does change the whole vibe and feel of a worship meeting. Worship is in the heart I know, but how we set up the family room does reflect our values and wht we believe "church" is about when we meet.

Our worship time. If we are honest to what it is commonly called it is corporate worship. Worshiping together as a church, yet herein lies the problem. Often we think about this as a personal time. A time alone. The nice thing about pews is that they offer less personal space unless you have your own pew of course. With less personal space you must realize more about the people around you. Theater seating with armrests and coffee holders allows us to try an compartmentalize ourselves away from the congregation. Worship becomes me and God. What about everyone else?

I feel it is important to know not just what the message is but how people are responding. It is important to sing praise to God, but also to let that praise spill into the person next to you. Moreover, that person can spill into your space as well. Worship should be a messy thing. A time together, yes fellowship is different but corporate worship needs to be corporate. We need to be involved as a group, not a singer(s) and however many separate people. Worship is about God and God's community, this means pew to pew as well as pew to pulpit.

Yes, I do believe that private worship can happen. So do it privately. Personally a good sunset can be a private time of worship. My devotions can lead to a private time of worship. But never confuse corporate and private worship that I fear is where we are heading as a church culture.

This is the ultimate in feel-good religion. Worship has become man-centered and not God-centered.

Maybe if pews were ergonomically designed, with decent lumbar support...

Nah.

Ahh, John, I'll have to take exception. Because if worship is about taking the focus off the people, then we could just as well stay home and worship in solitude where there is NOBODY to distract us.

We come together to worship God because God meets us when we gather together. The presence of God is real in the gathering of saints, so focusing on God and focusing on the gathered are not two different things.

Besides, how is facing the preacher (looking at one person) better than facing each other (looking at many people)? Is the preacher more like God?

The real issue raised here is not pews vs. chairs, since most churches I've seen that have chairs still put them in rows and face the front. One could argue that pews have advantages: they require the interaction of getting in and out and they are inherently communal (since there are no individual seats). The issue is what our spaces of worship say about what we think about and value in worship.

Round tables promote more small group interaction, for conversation and prayer, while rows of seats or pews make this more difficult. Convesely, rows of seats all facing toward the center express a unity of purpose for the entire congregation, while tables make this awkward.

Maybe this is what you meant, John, and I'm just coming around to it. Perhaps there's some arrangement that promotes the freedom to interact with others and also promotes the joining together of the entire congregation. Because I'd like to see both of these in our gatherings, not just one or the other.

Pews are actually a very efficient way to get a lot of people to sit in a set area comfortably.

Theater seats don't account for varying hind widths. People start putting purses an objects into empty seats so they don't need to share an arm rest with a stranger. If the seats tilt back like the ones in movie theaters then people start looseing purses, Bibles, pens, and small children to the seat monster.

We discussed seating for our new building 7 years ago and found that pews break down borders between people sitting near each other. They allow families to really sit together more effectively. They are like long awkward couches.

They are good for the purpose of instruction and corporate worship. They are lousy for hanging out or sipping your mocha latte. That is what our fellowship areas are for.

Here is something to think about with narrowly spaced pews. The churches I have been in with that problem had it for a reason. They needed to fit in more people. If you add another row to the back you need to take an inch from all the rest. I have honestly felt sad in churches with lots of leg room. It told me that there were empty pews sitting in storage because they were not needed for people.

I suppose that this matter comes down to the issue of what one wants to get out of worship. Unfortunately, Kimball's analysis here is less than inspiring as he tries to produce a profound theological insight from wooden seats. While I cannot sign-off on his case, I can affirm that our worship arrangement reflects our worship.

The description of the church atmosphere Kimball describes is a far cry from the 'orderly' gatherings we are instructed to conduct since there are people up and moving around, lying down, drinking coffee, etc. . . all at the same time! The comments made by John H. are certainly right - this does not seem to inspire thoughts on god.

So, what are we desiring most from worship? To be comfortable? A good brew? Great music? Awesome sermons? A time of warm feelings?

Perhaps we ought to consider the faith of those who have gone before us who saw fit to build pews into their churches. Because they did not value caffienation during church. Because they did not see the need for spending money on the more technically advanced things (cf. individual chairs, padding, etc.) which were beyond their means. And because they interpreted church time as a COMMUNITY gathering where we join together as one body of worshippers. This means standing together, sitting together, praying together, singing together - being the body of Christ which will go out individually to change the world.

I'm sorry, but perhaps Dan has missed the point here.

This reminds me of being in high school (circa 1970) and one of the guys in my SS Class thought we should not only get rid of the chairs, but the speaker should stand behind us. He also insisted we put up psychedelic posters with black lights on the walls to make it 'cool'. The girls all protested and the chairs remained facing front, though those hideous posters remained on the walls. I think that the guys are insisting on remodeling the church since the gals have remodeled the home. Go for it guys and while you're rearranging the sanctuary, I'll paint the whole house pink!

Sometimes we are in the water so long we can't even tell it's there anymore. Many of the responses here seem to assume that the primary purpose of church is to emulate an educational model in which we sit in rows in a classroom with a teacher-expert up front that gives the information us poor schlubs in the pews could never find ourselves. This model has very little to do with the teaching methods of Jesus.

The Hebrew teaching method is question and answer, or better question followed by answer question. Even Jesus, the one who has all the answers, spent most of his time answering questions with questions.

Imagine the difference of standing in a courtyard (if you want to use the temple as a model) with people standing around listening with a model where people sit and the teacher stands on a platform 3 feet above floor level. One environment speaks of a platonic hero that rises above the rest tells the others to shut up, and the other is that of one who is among brothers and sisters and having a conversation with them.

The command for "order" in 1 Corinthians is not a mandate to have only one person speak, it was to have one person speak at a time with everyone contributing something. Certainly there would have been gatherings in the early church where they were reclining or lying on couches.

Thanks, Dan, for pushing us on these thoughts. An architect once said that he could design a house that would cause a couple to divorce in six months. Perhaps we should think even more about what pews do to the church.

Who knew that a discussion on pews could produce so much interaction?! I think that God couldn't care less what we sit on, or for that matter whether we sit, stand, kneel or lie down, whether we face each other or just face forward. It seems to me that God cares about our motives and our heart. (1 Sam. 16:7)If you can worship best in a pew - great. If you worship better while sipping coffee and sitting in a theatre seat - great. If you want to move around to help you bring worth to God - go for it.

My question is, what is worship? It seems like we are defining it as a certain something done while in the sanctuary/auditorium. To me worship is bringing worth and worship to God. Corporate worship is doing it together.

I think we know this: Hebrews 10: 24, 25 tells us not to give up meeting together. Acts 2:42-47 talks about sharing, devotion to the Apostles' teaching, a communal meal, and prayer.

I think this discussion is definitely about Western Christianity. Could you worship in a jungle? In a forest? on a beach? with fellow believers.

Let's not worry about the seats... too much.

So why are they called PEWS? That's the real oddness.

i dunno, maybe i'm just in a grouchy mood this morning... it's topics somewhat like these that have contributed to my lack of posts here recently - probably to the enjoyment of the censorer - er, uh, i mean, *editor* of these comments pages - and other, more "conservative", posters.

this reminds me of similar battles in the past when i was responsible for a transition to worship team from church/organ, to overhead slides from hymnals, and probably, without knowing the distress i caused, from old shag carpet to new, more modern (and easier to clean) floor coverings. of course, i just left a church that believes paul and Jesus used the kjv, so what do i know...

i suppose it's issues like these that have been a part of my disillusionment with church, but are also somewhat why i don't feel i fit in any church anymore. and it causes me true feelings of loss. at some point, i had to start applying some level of reason to the things i had said i believed for four decades - that an infinite God really needed to be praised eternally, and orchestrated all things to accomplish that; that this same God could get a free pass for burning the unfaithful eternally, while we could not fathom a Nazi regime that did this same thing but only for a moment; why we had to literally believe that God felt threatened by a pile of rocks built in Babel, but somehow allowed the Internet to unite men in all corners of the globe; why a spirit God had to have "blood" shed in order to grant forgiveness to his children - children deemed sinners before they even took their first breaths; and why we had to ignore even the most apparent contradiction in the bible and give God the benefit of the doubt that he had given us an "inerrant" bible, instead of seeing the bible as man's journey in search of God.

i dunno - anyone know a church where i might fit in?

i'll even sit on pews.

but i know better than to sit on the aisle in the third row, because that's where mr and mrs johnson have sat for sixty years, and that's *their* seat...

-mr
escroll.blogspot.com

Man, if Jesus came today... Pews... Come on!

People who don't know Christ are dieing!
A child dies from [hunger!] every 3.6 seconds!

And we intellectuals -or- leaders, ... debate pews?

The phrase that comes to mind is Psyco-Babble. Should not our focus be more on the kingdom of God being here and now and less on ascetics? God is what matters. Not seating, not lights, not you, not me. But God and His will.

It's not so much about pews or chairs or stools or how they are arranged, but what draws the faith community into worship. After nearly 50 years as a follower of Christ, I have come to realize that worship begins when God reveals himself to me/us and continues when we respond appropriately to how He has revealed Himself. (See Isaiah 6 and Revelation 1.) But be prepared - God often calls those who worship Him to serve (like Isaiah and John).

I believe that when "Christians" gather we just go through the motions of worship unless we come with prepared hearts desiring, craving, begging God to show Himself to us so we can respond in true worship. Regardless of the seating. Or setting.

I have experienced worship in a small group setting where we just pulled out the old hymnal and sang the old songs of the faith some of us standing, seating, or kneeling as the Spirit moved. I have worshipped alone in my work cubicle, when I opened the Word and God showed me something new about Himself from a passage I had read many times before. And I have worshipped corporately where God used the planned service to reveal Himself to the body.

I have also NOT worshipped in each of those settings when I/we just perfunctorily did what we always do.

I also think corporate worship is both personal and communal as I experience both what God shows me and what He shows those ariound me. I can praise God better when I hear those around me croaking out the songs of the faith, see them raise hands of praise or kneel in submission, and hopefully when we receive a joint revelation of the real God who is living and present and active on our behalf. And maybe I can help others into a true attitude of worship if I come with a prepared heart.

Pews, chairs, stools, big auditorium, small living room, or prayer closet - I don't care: JUST SHOW ME JESUS!

Worthwhile discussion. All the seemingly meaningless things we do as/in church stem from our views of worship, God, the Church, etc... On one hand we can debate the pragmatics of seating on the other we can debate why we're in the building in the first place. Without a doubt some ways are better than others but none of us has THE way. That's ok. We need the debate to be better thinkers, better doers.

BTW, Don, in the time it took you to fire up the computer, open the application, read the post and then comment you could have been handing out tracts or saving children. If you really believe what you said quit wasting time otherwise stop the drive-by guilt bombs. Hopefully Jesus will come today.

Interesting article. Amazing amount of comments. One person above said: I suppose that this matter comes down to the issue of what one wants to "get out of worship."

Wow, that about says it all.

I just think the whole debate stinks. ;)

Well said Mr Kimball. I can't wait for the day my church gets rid of theirs.

Some of the greatest revivals of all time took place with people sitting on pews.

Then again, some of the greatest revivals of all time took place without church buildings or pews or worship teams or Powerpoint, or hymnals or sound systems....

Guess God doesn't need all the things we think he needs, does He? :-) He's awesome!

Darrell

I find this dialogue fascinating. Especially since we are talking about community. What's fascinating is, that the moribund interest of most contemporary churches (seeker, purpose, emergent, whatever), desires to be different, revisionist, ancient, or user friendly, but community still remains. What I particularly find fascinating is that when we speak of community we talk about common conversation, fellowshipping together, and practicing the 'one another's' in a very communal environment, but aren't pews in actuality promoting that, not hindering it? It would appear to be for in theater sitting (or individual chairs, etc.), the idea is individualistic, but in the pew there is conformity and there is an idea of community because we are all close together. It's a non-issue in the end for people will do what they will do and it's not Scriptural. However, in promoting community, passing on tradition (the good kind of tradition) can be communicated by having pews. I see no problem of it taking away from community, but in reality, promoting it.

This is for Chad.
Who can resist a brief history of the word "pew"?

Ahem, let me adopt my most pedantic tone.

According to the superlative Unabridged Oxford English Dictionary (OED), the word descends from the Late Middle English "puwe" (or "pywe" or "pewe") and the Old French "puie."

Originally, the word referred to the raised standing-place where the preacher stood to deliver the sermon. Malory used the word in this sense in Arthur (1470): "He fonde a preest redy at the aulter, And on the ryght syde he sawe a pewe closyd with yron."

In an interesting coup, the laity usurped the word over the course of several hundred years to mean the fixed benches where they sat while they listened to the preacher's sermon. Weever perhaps first used the word in this sense in his fascinating volume Ancient Funerall Monuments (1631): "Dead bodies of the Nobilitie whose funeral trophies are wasted with deuouring time and … seates or Pewes for the Townesmen, made ouer their honorable remaines."

It can also mean
* a pointed stick for handling fish
* the act of fitting up a building with pews
* to cry like a bird.

For more on the system or prevalence of pews in churches, see "Pewdom."

Sounds like novelty for novelty's sake.

And that's just like Jesus. . . . . . .

Would this be a good time to point out that I really miss pews WITH KNEELERS or should we just not go there? ;)

(Sorry,

IMHO, the problem is less with pews than with a proscenium style of church architecture. Pews arranged in a more "theater in the round" sort of style, encircling the altar/pulpit or even in a half circle still fits everyone in in an orderly way and everyone focusing on the same thing at the same time (which I consider important) but has a much more community feel.

Hey Dan, what if sometime when folks are gathered seated on those pews you read them your article and see what people have to say in response? I wonder if anyone will have thoughts similar to mine ... I had actually never thought about it before, but you make a very good point. Pew sitting is probably one of many unconscious factors in the overall shrinking of the church's role in our society.

I have never read a blog before, don't really have time to read all the comments and don't feel it would be fair not to read them all ... probably won't even have time to keep checking to see what somebody might have to say about my comments ... BUT ... I do spend a lot of time thinking, while my hands are doing other things than typing, about the church as I knew it growing up and the church as I knew it working as clergy and the church as I discover it in retirement and wonder how it went from what I thought it was to what it seems to be now. I'm sure pews and clergy and institutions and operating costs and a whole host of other things which in themselves are totally unnecessary to the Great Commission are part of the change in impact Christianity is experiencing.

We need to stop assuming people in our pews are actually understanding the understandings we're trying to convey and actually experiencing the experiences we try to facilitate and start asking them to find out for sure ... which brings me back to my opening muse ... I wonder what people sitting in the pews would have to say about sitting in the pews.

Sue

I found this article very moving...it's moving me to comment, "Who cares?".

It's not surprising to me that when pews are questioned, "quality worship" gets brought in to justify keeping them. In the institutional form of church, the power of tradition so over powers simple revelation. The very verse that says believers should "not forsake gathering" specifies a KIND of meeting that pews are the exact opposite of how you would arrange yourself to accomplish what the verse says believers should do. "Spurring one another on to love and good works" and "encouraging one another" REQUIRE something quite different than pews. When believers actually do what these verses describe, God's Word is PROCLAIMED and PREACHED in all it's majesty, by saints, priests, and members of one another, some of whom are elders/overseers/pastors who are "able to teach", not merely one hired clergyman to dominate the personal expression of God's truth in lecture form. Where is the "one another" in that? Brothers, the scripture specifies "one another" oriented communication that the saints should not "forsake".

Are we worshiping if we aren't doing what the scripture specifically asks for believers to not "forsake"? Jesus told us God is seeking worshipers who will worship Him in spirit and truth, not spirit and tradition.

Is there a risk of developing a deep vein thrombosis from sitting in a cramped pew for a long period? Maybe we ought to be issuing support stockings and encouraging the congregation to drink more water during the sermon?

After reading through the majority of comments, I have to agree that seating in itself does not define community, nor does it necessarily define the worship of those in attendance. Perhaps one of the most discouraging comments I read was something about an architect who claimed he could design a house that would cause a couple to divorce in six months; the implication being that pews lead to church splits and people falling away from God. I think that might have more to do with the color of the carpet. It reminds me of the denominational meeting where the first order of business was voting on whether or not to love another. I thought love was based on a commitment to Christ not church pews or architectural design. If you don't want pews press on but I'm not so sure that we should be making the case that pews or no pews will make or break the church. If that's the case something's already broken.

Back up the blog a bit, Randy wrote:
"but when Jesus taught he spoke was the focal point of the crowds. Granted, the crowds were probably seated in the ground in groups, but they probably all faced Jesus while he spoke from a rock or a grassy knoll or something, sans pulpit."

In June this year I was at an open air, promenade passion play (http://www.jesus-at-dundas.com)The whole day from 10am to 3.30pm crowds of people walked along following Jesus through his life story. One of the most memorable bits of a stunningly memorable day (and it was blazing sunshine all the time, not the more common Scottish liquid sunshine)was when "Jesus" was teaching us, the Sermon on the Mount.

We were in a natural outdoor amphitheatre. People were sitting around in groups in picnic chairs, on blankets, on the grass; shaded unde trees, basking in the sun. Babies and children were doing the things babies and children do; talking; being fed; eating; playing; walking about; sleeping; having a nappy change; being taken for a walk; being taken to the bathroom. Some Big People were also doing some of these things.

And "Jesus" was teaching, with words and action. Not just staying still in the one place. And the "disciples" and others were participating in the teaching and facilitating the participation of all of us others. Teaching was not the only thing that was going on. The other "disciples" and people in the story drew us all into the story with them.

For me,the experience was an unforgettable picture of what "church" might be like.

The fact that there are so many opinions suggests that there is no right answer on the pew question. We have it right today by designing open worship spaces with movable seats so a number of environments can be (and should be) created. When you nail the seats (pews) down, you are stuck with the deadly disease of sameness, which deadens the worshipful life week by week.

I once went to a messianic Jewish service where the teacher taught the large group seated in rows of chairs for forty-five minutes...a very deep study. Then, the chairs were moved out of the way, the congregation formed a circle, and the singing began with various people along the circle leading. Dancing ensued inside. Finally, the circle closed in and we shared communion, passing loaves of bread to each other, with scripture and prayer. It was very cool.

Obviously pews are strange to some, just as theater seating seems irreverent to others. The point of particular gatherings seems to (or I suppose should) affect the arrangement of the seating, if there is any. The church in which I just began serving has worship service first in which everyone is facing forward in rows of chairs. After the service is about a half-hour of fellowship time, where people meet and talk and walk around or sit on benches and talk. This time is followed by small-group study (our Sunday school), which is more intimate than the worship service, and chairs are typically arranged in circles or semi-circles (the children have no chairs, but rugs) and people are free to discuss.

As for going out and doing ministry, we are learning and being taught (and adapting constantly) to take advantage of, and to establish, personal relationship intentionally. Serving the helpless and bringing hope to the hopeless are kept at the forefront. This type of intentional church is new to me, as I have always served in more traditional churches. It's quite refreshing.

"How we sit when we gather reflects what we believe is important in worship."

This is true in theory but not practiced by most. What many churches say they believe is true for worship is not what they practice. I think many places don't have any idea how the layout and setup of the room actually impacts what takes place in worship.

"It seems like an odd thing to invite someone into our church "family", bring them into a room and make them sit for over an hour on benches looking at the back of heads staring at the front of the room."

Very well said. I am sure if you invited someone to look at the back of heads for an hour they wouldn't come. Hopefully more than that happens when people are at church. I think we should do a better job of reflecting what scripture values in our worship and be cognizant of which forms no longer get the job done. But hopefully more is going on for a visitor than looking at someone's bald spot. Hopefully they find some connection or something from scripture that they needed to hear.

While seating arrangement is important changing that will not make stale chips crunchy again.

Having been a member of small churches (less than 75 on a good day) and larger churches (attendance over 500 any given Sunday), I believe that community is important for a church family, but even in a service with 70 people, it is difficult to be intimate with all of them. That's why I firmly believe that mid-week small group studies are really important, and also am intrigued by the amazing growth of home churches. Let's not stop with the pews; let's keep going with the removal of walls, and make church a way of life, not a place to go to.

Instead of spending all that money redecorating and remodeling of the children's rooms, the offices, and turning the fellowship hall into a coffeehouse/art gallery and buying chairs, tables or whatever. Use it to for evangelism or missionary work like feeding the homeless. I know an orphanage in Mexico that the owner has died and the family wants to sell it to a Christian organization. Want to leave the pews in and buy it? And you would actually have to run it also.

An interesting article and a lot of insightful comments. Mr Kimball, I think you've been corrected by most of the add-on writers, at least to the point that there is good reason for church pews. (But often things can be done to make them more comfortable.)

Perhaps the answer you're looking for is not an "either-or" but instead a "both-and." It seems there are appropriate times and arrangements for informal study/fellowship as well as formal, corporate worship together.

If I may I would like to pose a question. What does it say about the American Church that we are so concerned for comfort in the pews? Yet in many other countries where the church is growing like wild fire they are more worried about how they are going to eat the next day, if they will ever see their family, or if they will be imprisoned or beaten that week! I honestly don't believe they are to concerned about if they have a nice seating area or if their coffe pot is working, they are more concerned about giving glory and praise to God because He has provided Life for another day! Is it possible that we have become just as lost as the ones we claim we are trying to reach?

Hi Dan you have reignited "pew wars"!!. The comments here make me smile.

A Thought: another way to look at this is that static seating is unchanging from week to week and lessens the ability for the space ITSELF to be changed to better suit the direction of that week's teaching worship and fellowship.

I favor different seating ( r standing) "configurations" for different weeks and occasions. Tables and chairs, rows, in the round, no seats etc

Pews do lock you into one schematic for a worship gathering. Some folks seem fine with this and maybe should continue without shooting at poor ol Dan for suggesting that pews cause limits for his congragation.

Very good article...I am serving in a traditional church right now and I have to agree that pews do confine the worship space to one type of format. There is also that subconcious thing in those of us raised in church that intimates that certain ways of worship are done in these "traditional" environments. I love the idea of different arrangements for different foci in worship. This kind of article makes us think about everything we do in trying to impact our world for Christ.

I have a cent or two to throw in the ring here (to mix a few metaphors!)

First, is what has been passed down to me as "The Missionary Nurse in Africa Story" - which is one of those stories that is only a story, so far as I know, but which makes a good point. A fable, if you will.

Here's how it goes: "Back in the old days when missionaries boarded ship for the overseas field, a nurse volunteered to go to a mission hospital in Africa. For weeks she was at sea, then docked at the port, and then endured several more weeks of tough overland travel before arriving at her final destination, the hospital.

"After some months, her supervising doctor, another missionary, pulled her aside to see how she was doing.

"'Horrible!' she replied to his question. 'I'm CONVINCED there's a WAR about to start!'

"The experienced doctor was puzzled. He had been 'in country' for years, knew the tribes intimately, and was sure that things had never been more peaceful. 'So what would give you that idea?' he asked innocently.

"'Well, can't you SEE how all the natives are treating each other?!' She was quite exasperated. 'Ever since I arrived at the port, everybody's been shaking their fists at each other! It's awful! They're so angry - I'm sure war is going to break out any moment, and we'll all be killed!'

"A light dawned on the doctor. At last he understood. Indeed, in this part of Africa, people greeted each other as FRIENDS by, yes, shaking their fists at one another! He explained to the poor nurse that the closed fist said, 'May your wife, children and cattle all cling close to you!' It was a blessing! On the other hand, an OPEN hand - which in the West was the sign of friendly greeting, here meant quite the opposite: 'May your wife leave you for another man, may your cattle run away and never be found, and may your children curse you to your face!'"

[Speculation: I would guess that in the West a wave of the open hand meant, "See, I don't have any weapons to hurt you!" and so was taken as a friendly greeting. A closed fist, however, appears as though you are about to be on the receiving end of a beating. NOT friendly!]

I usually like to tell stories and let the listener come to the conclusion on their own. However, at this point I'll be a bit pedantic and apply the moral to this situation: "UrL"'s first post cops to the fact that he has matured in a certain, very pronounced and in its own way rigid, church culture: NO pews. So of course pews seem to him "odd" and even suspect. When he steps into his present, be-pewed sanctuary, he is like the missionary nurse recoiling at all those raised fists!

The reverse is also true, of course. People raised in pew churches - IF it was a largely positive experience for them - will likely feel quite out of place (literally...!) in a pew-less, "contemporary" arrangement. For example, recently, one of my college kids went out of her way to go to a "traditional" church (in terms of pews and architecture) because several closer but more "modern" structures (and implied ways of "doing church") just didn't feel "right" to her.

My first point is, therefore, that this sounds to me like a 1 Corinthians 11, "meat sacrificed to idols" situation. Christian history gives some pretty good evidence that the Holy Spirit is neither bound by nor bound to pews or no pews. The point is: What is the most loving, and most effective, way of bringing changless truth to changing people in changing circumstances? Easier said than done, of course.

Second point - a comment on the history of pews/technology: Back in my seminary days, I earned a few extra bucks by serving as a tour guide for the various individuals and groups who would come by for a visit. One week my group included a prominent local architect. He snorted at our recently-completed Gothic-style chapel. "It's not authentic," he sneered. His problem was that the double row of columns on either side of the main sanctuary were only about 1/4 the thickness of a "real" cathedral. (We had used modern steel I-beams to save space and cost, then covered them with a faux stone façade.) What was I to say? It was my job to be polite, so I just said, "Oh," and moved on.

The next week, a group of Catholic seminarians from across town visited. We hit it off, and when we swung by the chapel, I told them about the architect's criticism. They laughed! "Authentic? AUTHENTIC?! Look, if they would have had steel instead of only stone 600 years ago, then STEEL would have been authentic!"

Moral: People used pews...when they had the material, wealth, and/or technology to install pews (likely). Ditto with hymnals. (Until recently, few churches could afford them, and most books were out of reach of most people, period.) Ditto with..ahem...PowerPoint!

The point is, people tend to attach personal value to their environment and experiences. "There's no place like home" applies to churches as well. The problem is, the world is much wider, and the scope of the Spirit's operation much wider, than our own limited set of experiences.

(I'm not arguing for libertarianism. We need to be accountable to Scripture, for example. But just as Scripture does not clearly mandate no pews, it does not mandate pews specifically, either.)

As an example of someone who forgot about the point about steel I-beams on the "other" side of the liturgical (?) divide, I know of a seminary professor who seriously recommended to his students, "The first thing you need to do when you get to be a missionary in Africa is to import a proper organ!" Obviously, this professor had been touched, repeatedly, at the sound of a really good Bach riff, so much so that he had difficulty imagining worship without it. Poor guy - but what a common attitude.

Last, and shortest, point: If I seem to be coming across like a know-it-all, I apologize. I'm still getting myself unconfused continually, learning that sometimes my image of worship is narrower (needs to be relaxed) than the Bible's on some occasions, and wider (needs to be corrected) on the other.

For example, as a missionary in Japan in the 90's, it irritated me at first to see the way parents let their kids roam in the worship service. It wasn't the way I (that's "I" in bold print and underlined...) had been raised! "I" had been expected to remain in my seat and quiet from an early age. But I relaxed more as I could see that that was a valid, and arguably better, alternative to the church nursery. The parents were no less devout, the kids in time grew more attentive; it was a system that worked for them quite well.

Well, maybe that's 200 cents by now. So I'll stop.

Soli Dei Gloria

What is all this fuss about? Perhaps some of us baby boomers should share our insight into church going as children. Pews served as a reminder you are in a sacred space - they are not meant to satisfy creature comfort - just make it convenient to stay there. Pews also server to corral the kids in. Long before "junior church" was a concept in ministry design we kids were expected to sit through the service with our adults, learn to socialize, and learn to behave. This was never questioned.
So lets get over the discussion and move on.