Update: Online Services, Reopening News, and Expressions of the Church
This week, Summit celebrates 18 years since we launched. Every year at this time, we pause to reflect on God’s goodness and to rally around how we continue to live out Summit’s vision in the year ahead.
Last week, our staff leadership team spent two days meeting to pray about, discuss, and make decisions surrounding three things that are important in how we live out the vision both now and in the years ahead.
1. Online Worship Services
We have found that the online worship service has been an amazing way for people to get connected and stay connected at Summit. Every week, we are finding new guests, making new connections, and seeing new opportunities to reach people that would not have been there otherwise.
So, as we work toward re-engaging in more in-person gatherings, I am excited to let you know that the online service is here to stay and will continue to be a means for you to invite your friends, family, neighbors, etc into community at Summit.
2. Reopening Campuses
Though we can hardly see the last several months as a “shutting down” (after all, we have not stopped living out the vision!), there is a valid question of when will we return to in-person, in-building worship gatherings. After prayerful consideration, we are targeting the beginning of Advent (November 29th) for our reopening of on-campus worship services, including Children’s Ministry. Until then, we will be reopening in most other ministry environments of Summit, including in-person worship gatherings at our homes, or house churches.
3. House Churches
A couple of years ago, we began engaging in a series of multi-year strategic priorities that included a continued commitment to multisite but in a way that sees more expressions of Summit begin more like church plants (like Summit did in the early days) instead of establishing more large, resource-heavy campuses. These expressions, or neighborhood churches, would become full expressions of the church—living out the whole vision but in a very local, community-connected context.
In this season, we have the opportunity to build the foundation for that idea at a scale that would otherwise have seemed impossible. And please don't let the adding of a title throw you as to what participating in a house church may entail—if you're already meeting in a home with friends or neighbors to watch the online service together each week, you very well may already be part of a budding house church! If we—you and I—move from feeling stuck doing church at home to participating in a house church with our friends, family, neighbors, Connect group, or whomever, we would have the opportunity to “reopen” in a way the would continue to pay dividends long after mass gathering have returned in full. I am not saying we should all start a church, but I am saying that we should all be the church now—where we are.
A note to those eager to gather: If you were at all disappointed that we are not more immediately reopening, I would encourage you, along with anyone else interested, to take the lead in beginning a house church in your home, yard, clubhouse, or anywhere you can. I agree with you that we should be gathering as we are able, and we need people like you to say early and eagerly that you are willing to move from doing church in isolation to beginning a house church for your community.
If you are interested in learning more about house churches—or maybe you’re ready to say “Yes!”—click on the link below so we can connect with you.
And finally, I have one more upcoming gathering I’d like to invite you into. If you are a Partner here or call Summit home, please join me at the online Partner Gathering on September 22nd at 7:30 p.m. You’ll learn more about upcoming plans and how you can help lead our church in the months ahead. RSVP so we can send you the meeting information here. I hope to see you all there as we talk further about how we can connect together in living out the vision in this unprecedented season.
John Parker is the lead pastor at Summit Church. He enjoys woodworking and boats and dreams of building his own boat in the coming years.