Tuesday, May 29, 2012 at 5:51PM 
Western society has been fascinated with time since complex geared water clocks first appeared in 1st century BC in Athens (primitive water clocks are dated from 4000BC Egypt and older). We've incorporated some of this attention to time into our corporate gatherings as church communities. Some churches handle this with great care and attention, since it is an important part of their culture. Other churches are less concerned with time.
The following very brief 4 questions are just a way to look at how our congregations and leaders approach timeliness in their gatherings. Once you click an answer for the questions (choose your answer and hit submit), be sure to click the link to view the results of the survey once you have answered the questions. Please feel free to comment below, and add to the discussion.
clock, godliness, late, time, timeliness in Church Meeting, Community, Leadership, Music, Sunday Services, Technology, Worship, Worship Teams
Reader Comments (8)
An equally germane question would be: What time does your congregation typically arrive?
5-10 min before the scheduled start time
At the scheduled start time
5 min late
10 min late
More than 10 min late
I would say for my congregation that close to 30% arrive 10 min late and 20% arrive more than 10 min late. Seems like we're halfway through our worship set before we have a significant quorum of worshippers.
That is a good point Steve!
I have been involved in many different churches as either a worship leader or musician/vocalist. I personally feel that most congregants have a "deeper" worship experience when the singing/praying portion is allowed to last at least 20-30 minutes. Our current church is more liturgical and much more concerned with time constraints even though our services only last about an hour 15 min. As the current worship leader I feel a lot of pressure to go through the song list quickly and not sing each song too many times. This grieves me greatly. I believe many folks are just beginning to lose the daily distractions before we have to end it. I have seen the Holy Spirit move mightily in many ways when the singing/worship is allowed to expand to deeper levels of devotion and concentration. Ministry to those hurting in diff parts of their lives has happened as a result of the worship/music portion opening hearts & minds. I am praying that our Pastor & Council will realize this - soon!
Personally, I have noticed the later the worship team is present, or Sunday School teachers are ready, the class or congregation tends to arrive later. Once the pattern has been set, it is difficult to get out of that cycle. If there is activity or "pre-worship" things to prepare the heart, people tend to realize there is something going on and some will arrive sooner. Few people I know desire to get there in order to wait.
I feel the questionnaire could be more specific. Our church's music time is held strictly to 25 min, which is doled out in 5 or 10 min. segments. If anything goes overtime, a song is skipped.
Also, arriving on time, and being prepared are two very different things. Our worship leader arrives on time and then does his prep as we go along in rehearsal or sound check. Some worship team members are prepared, others are not, irrespective of arrival time. Nevertheless, our corporate worship is sweet and the congregation enters in very well.
The observation that time constraints are more important to some than others is interesting and true. While ministering in Hawaii I noticed that it helped if I got rid of my western and suburban concept of time. Conversely, in most of the churches where I have ministered, I need to constantly work on being more conscience of being on a very concrete time schedule.
Thanks for introducing this topic.
If we truly believed that the Great God of the Universe was arriving to our "place of meeting with Him", would we tolerate lateness in ourselves and others?
What would it take for us to realize that we are serving the King of kings Who is on time everytime and Who, according to Yeshua, expects us to be perfect?
What's our excuse in light of Who He is?
I have been in worship ministry for many years now and in those years I have been thru 3 churches. In the church that I'm attending now (its only been 3 months, and no I'm not in ministry yet) I find that the worship is too progammed. They start on time (which is good) but everything is so robottic because I guess they are so concerned on finishing on time. I know that God is a God of order but in my experience with the other churches I attended they were in no rush. Because they had ample time, the flow of the Spirit was awesome. To me worship is so important because it is what prepares our heart for the Word. I'm not satisfy with 20 minutes I definetly need more than that. I really like this church but the part of worship is what has me questioning if I should stay there or not. I wish that the worship leader will see this and make some changes.
My answers, at least to the 1st two questions, need an asterisk beside them! We actually meet Sunday PM for our main Sunday service. We have a fellowship snack/meal beforehand at 6pm, and then the service statts at 6:30. So with all the food, cleanup, etc., we tend to start late....but we're getting better at moving things along! And since our kids need to be up early for shool on Monday morning (not to mention the adults!) we try and get out right at 8pm. We allow for ministry time afterwards if it's needed, but people are free to leave at 8pm if they need to.