3 minute read
Rethinking Sunday - Part 2: Saturday Innovation
by Jacob Clagg and Pastor Ben Tobias
Indian Head Church of God in Indian Head PA has been faithfully leading a 7 P.M. Saturday service for the last 20 years. The service was created as a way to reach people who, for numerous reasons, just couldn’t make it to a Sunday service, but the pastors at Indian Head realized that the different service time has also created an opportunity to innovate and experiment with this service too. We asked Associate Pastor Ben Tobias about the service, since he was there from the start, and has recently come back to serve Indian Head once again.
How did the Saturday service come about?
I don’t remember the year exactly. It would have been either 2004 or 2005. I came here [to Indian Head Church of God] between 2001 and was here until 2006. It would have been about 2004 that Dennis had the vision to establish a Saturday evening service as an alternative for those who couldn’t be here on Sunday morning.
We had a number of people working at the local Seven Springs Ski Resort. During ski season, people are going to show up in the morning to go skiing, so employees were unable to attend on Sunday morning. Pretty much every morning but especially on weekends. We realized that if we provided another service at another time, they could do it.
Dennis’s idea was that it would be a fairly non-traditional service. It would be the same sermon as Sunday, but primarily contemporary instead of the traditional service on Sunday morning. He asked me to help with guitar. We had video worship that we could project and, at that time there weren’t a lot of churches doing that. It was a cutting-edge thing. We had to mount the screen on the wall and get a projector.
The elders and the church leadership were behind it. I don’t recall any tension or conflict about it at all. So, I don’t think the attendance was ever more than 30 people on a regular basis, but we did see a number of people who started coming that had never come at all. It definitely added to the congregation. It wasn’t explosive but it was there.
What was the impetus for the more contemporary service?
The informality gives people a chance to not feel like they have to dress up. Pastor Dennis, back in the day, wanted to break away from more formal clothing and the Saturday service gave us a way to do that. Twenty years later, we continue to have a different feel, in part because Pastors Doug Nolt and Ed Mikkelsen have helped to carry that on. The vision continues to be to provide an alternative time slot for people who can’t come on Sunday, and a more relaxed service.
Are there other ways Indian Head would like to innovate?
The Saturday service also has more discussion time and a more interactive sermon delivery. The fact that we often come down from the pulpit and speak from the main floor really changes the vibe. We’d like to innovate by adding more elements such as the discussion format, and maybe more extended prayer time. We have the ability to do that in the Saturday service.
