Spring 1989
Reformed Quarterly Volume 8, Issue 1
Don Seltzer is the pastor and founder of North Coast Presbyterian Church in Encinitas, California. In 1979 he planted the Wellington Presbyterian Church in West Palm Beach, Florida, and was pastor there for seven years. Through an extraordinary chain of events, Seltzer became pastor of North Coast Presbyterian Church in 1985 and has watched the Lord increase attendance from 60 to 950 people in only three and a half years. In the following interview, he relates how the church came into existence and some of the strategies behind its phenomenal success.
Q. How did North Coast Presbyterian Church come into being?
A. My family moved to California in the spring of 1985. The second Sunday after we arrived we attended a small independent Bible church with about sixty members. They had been together about 18 years and had gone through close to ten pastors. To everyone’s astonishment, at the end of the service the pastor resigned. After the service, I had a chance to talk with him. When he discovered I was there to plant a church, he asked me to consider pastoring this congregation. I refused, saying that I was very committed to starting a Presbyterian church in that area. “Well,” he said, “maybe this church will join you.”
Two nights later, I met with the officers of the church, who essentially asked, “Why should we join you?” For two hours I could see the Father touching their hearts and minds to ask more and more questions about the very vision which the Father had put upon my heart for the North Coast area.
I preached for the next six or seven Sundays, met with the congregation, and on June 2, 1985, the congregation voted to dissolve their membership, leadership, and incorporated status to become part of the new mission work, North Coast Presbyterian Church. They donated their four and one half acres of land and two buildings, valued at approximately a million dollars.
Q. What is the main focus of NCPC’s ministry?
A. Although we are concerned about worship and edification, our main burden is for the unchurched, since eighty percent of the population in our area falls into that category. We are burdened for the baby boomer –someone in his early 30’s to late 40’s. Why? Because they are disillusioned with the church. Many of them only think about church because of the children; otherwise they don’t need it.
We are trying to meet their needs by thinking of ways we can offer them something that will be worth their investment of time. We’re trying to show them that something contemporary, creative, and practical is happening here.
If they come at all, we don’t have a second chance for a first impression. Our competition is not other churches; it’s the beach, the San Diego Chargers’ game, the restaurant. They are thinking, “If I invest this hour with you, are you going to make it worth my while or will it be boring and irrelevant?”
If we can create a climate for credible Christianity, then, by the grace of God, the Holy Spirit begins to tug on their heart strings. Why? Because these people aren’t expecting the church to be so energetic, to be so pertinent to their lives.
Q. How does North Coast Presbyterian sensitize itself to the unchurched mentality?
A. By contextualization — a missionary term which means communicating the gospel to people in ways they can understand. For example, if you are working with people in Ecuador, you dress like them, speak their language, and eat their foods in order to present the gospel in a meaningful and understandable way.
Now, it’s obvious we should contextualize in Ecuador. The great mistake in America is our failure to contextualize here, too. Although we go to the same restaurants, shop at the same grocery stores, and speak the same language as our unchurched neighbors, they don’t understand our message with our Christianese. Joe Pagan and Jane Cynic don’t understand what it means to be “born again” or what it means to be “saved.” We assume that they do understand and are simply rejecting Christianity. I think this assumption is a potential kiss of death for the American church.
Unfortunately, when a church tries to contextualize, people often think they are trying to water down the message. That isn’t the case at all. John Stott once said, “It’s easy to be contemporary and not be faithful; it’s also easy to be faithful and not contemporary.” Our challenge as a church is to be faithful to the integrity and authority of God’s Word but also to be contemporary to the unchurched person.
The ultimate contextualization is what Jesus Christ did. God the Father, in His infinite wisdom, saw that He needed to communicate with mankind in such a way that they would understand once and for all. What did He do? He sent His Son in the flesh, communicating in a way that we would not miss: He came to be the sacrifice for our sins.
Q. In what ways do you try to make your ministry more meaningful to the unchurched?
A. Our Sunday morning service is our chance to show the unbeliever that we are willing to be different. It is not enough for our church to say we welcome the community; we must show it in action. Most unbelievers perceive the church as a holy huddle, a Christian ghetto. We are trying to show people that we refuse to stay in there. We are coming out to meet their needs.
The morning service is the watershed for the non-believer. It gives him the chance to see if we are trying to be sensitive to his needs. We feel that if our worship service is a credible celebration focusing on the exalted Christ, then the unbeliever — by the work of the Holy Spirit — will have an encounter with the true and living God.
After I started the church in Florida, I realized a very important lesson. I had been trained well in seminary to lead a church, yet I began to feel almost like a dentist who had learned everything about teeth but had never learned how to open a practice. Management, administrative, and marketing skills were missing. I saw that it is so important to earn the right to be heard. And I had to speak in a language the unbeliever could understand. I found that in the worship services in Florida the unchurched appreciated my message but did not like the rest of the service. They did not like the responsive readings, the hymns with the organ. I began recognizing how much the unchurched person listened to soft rock music. Who said we could not use that type of music in the service? And who said there can’t be a visual illustration of the message? Scripture is full of Jesus using all sorts of illustrations. It was the Apostle Paul who said, “To the weak I’ll be weak. To the Jew, I’ll be a Jew.”
Consequently, we try to think out each part of our worship service carefully for maximum benefit to the unchurched person. I preach both expository and topical sermons based squarely on Scripture. Each Sunday we have a drama sketch which illustrates the message in a contemporary fashion. In addition, we use contemporary soft-rock Christian music coordinated by Ken Priddy, a Christian recording artist. We try to think of small details. For example, we print an outline of my sermon on the program with the Scripture on the back because many of these people don’t even own Bibles; even if they did, they might not know where to find the reference.
Q. Do you use any evangelism programs to reach the unchurched?
A. Not technically, in the “program” sense, but much evangelism is done. In fact, it is the whole thrust of our ministry —my total driving force and motivation. Bringing people home to the Father through Christ permeates everything we do at NCPC. Close to one third of our total 251 members have come to Christ through the Father utilizing our ministry.
But, we feel that life-style and relational evangelism works better here. These people really have a need for personal, accepting relationships. They don’t care how much you know; they want to know how much you care. I believe with all my heart that we are the fifth gospel; people are looking at our lives. We believe that people must hear the music of our lives before they want to know the words to the song.
Q. You have other interesting avenues of evangelism. Could you describe some of them?
A. We try to have a lot of special events which are for good causes in the community and are concerns of the unchurched person, such as MADD (Mothers Against Drunk Driving) or Just Say No to Drugs. They are fun-oriented, like a 5k run, a 20-mile bike ride, a family carnival, or a soccer clinic. The Women Connection, headed by my wife, Janie, has been highly successful in having workshops pertinent to people’s needs–marriage communication, drug abuse, child-rearing, and self-esteem are only a few of the topics. Alcoholics Anonymous and Cocaine Anonymous meet here on a weekly basis. Even the City Council regularly uses our facility.
We consider community events such as these “pre-evangelism bridges” to get people interested in the church. Once unchurched people come into contact with NCPC and really enjoy it, they may not accept Christ immediately, but they will bring as many as a dozen friends on their own initiative. Why? Because they are excited; this is a “happening” place. They appreciate the proactive and positive mindset. We want to permeate the society in such a credible way that when people think about going to church, maybe they will go to NCPC.
Q. NCPC revolves around its IMPACT groups. What are they?
A. They are small groups which meet weekly and are geared for Bible study, nurture, community, worship, and missions. The acrostic stands for “Invest in Meeting People and Activate Christianity Today.” The word IMPACT is an important one for us because we feel that is what this church is here to do. In fact, it also stands for the purpose of the church: I stands for innovative, M for a mindset of excellence, P for people-driven, A for an approach that is fresh and contemporary,C for credibility, and T for transitioning people into the Kingdom of God. These groups provide accountability and nurture, a study of God’s Word and encouragement –things that compose the real heartbeat of our church.
Q. Your membership standards are high. Could you discuss them?
A. We require a four-week course in which we study our statement of faith and purpose, the priorities of ministry at NCPC, and in which we ask new members to subscribe to the five P’s. First, of course, they must Profess faith in Jesus Christ as Savior and the first love of their life. Second, we ask for their Participation in terms of time, talent, and treasures. Third, we ask that they seek to further the Peace and unity of the church. Fourth, they must be committed to the Purpose of the church, to owning the vision, to establishing credible relationships with the unchurched and attempting to love them into the kingdom. Fifth, we ask them to be a person of Prayer.
Membership integrity is very high here. At NCPC, membership only lasts for a year; we ask each member to make a recommitment annually.
Q. Can some principles used at NCPC be adapted in starting churches in other areas?
A. Certainly. The first concept is that of determining priorities. In devising a philosophy of ministry, a church first needs to ask itself three questions: who are we trying to reach, how will we reach them, and what is going to happen once we reach them? Most churches, if they really examine themselves closely, would see where their accent mark is. If they say it is on evangelism, my response is, “Okay, what are you doing to listen to the person in your community? How do you sensitize yourself to the soil so that when you plant a seed it will be fruitful and productive?
Another transferable concept is that of persistence. The hardest thing about this approach is that Sunday comes every seven days. Most people think of Easter as the Sunday when the most unchurched people come through the doors; we have that every Sunday. The pressure is relentless.
A third concept is the power of process evangelism. I believe one of the secrets of life-style evangelism is having an event –whether a weekend retreat or a Sunday morning service– that makes an unbeliever think seriously about the claims of Christ. In life-style evangelism, most people’s frustration is, “I’ve got this friendship with an unbeliever, now what do I do with it?” All of a sudden the believer says, “I’ve been your friend for six months, and I need to tell you something.” So he gives that person the gospel all at once.
By contrast, we encourage our members to build bridges to an unbeliever, establish a relationship, then invite him to church. That puts the burden on us. We have shown our membership that we are sensitive to the people they bring. hey realize that 52 Sundays out of the year we’re not going to get weird on them — for example, pound the pulpit for money. They have confidence that any Sunday they may bring an atheist, an agnostic, or the hardest core unchurched person and know that by God’s grace we will try to show them credible Christianity. If we don’t come through, we’ve let that member down, and he won’t bring anyone else.
A final concept is the understanding of “people flow.” At NCPC we rely on word-of-mouth contact, which provides a non-confrontational atmosphere. We create a hothouse for the Holy Spirit to work, and we rely on the sovereignty of God. It’s not passivity; it is prayerfully waiting upon the Holy Spirit to cut through the layers of resistance straight to the hearts of unbelievers.