The Current Landscape

As America increasingly becomes more non-religious, and particularly post-Christian in large global cities like New York, there is a growing sub-demographic in the secular population that is searching for a spiritual experience. Up to this point, the church has largely ignored them. Whether it is feeling stressed at work, increasingly dissatisfied with a relationship or money, more and more people in America are seeking a remedy to calm the noise, stress, and fear that is inside of them. The numbers do not lie.

At the end of 2017, the meditation market was then currently a $1.2 billion industry in the U.S., and it’s only growing. Some suggest it is an industry that will be over $2 billion by 2022, and of course much of that industry resides in the global cities of New York and Los Angeles. One conclusion is that the meditation movement is where the yoga movement was in the mid-90s, which means the ceiling for the meditation market is still miles high.

A 2018 study by the CDC confirmed this market trend by citing that meditation is the fastest growing health trend in America. This has spilled over into the workplace. For example, meditation rooms are the hottest new work perk, and CEOs across the country are personally seeking out a practice of meditation in order to become better leaders. This is not only rapidly growing in popular culture, but its acceptance is growing in the military, and for multiple countries at that.

The meditation market in America represents a spectrum of paths that have been shaped by Eastern philosophy be it mindfulness, transcendental meditation, or various forms of Buddhism. Although impossible to summarize this movement as a whole, the goal is to take back control of the mind so that it is present in the moment, appropriately detached to one’s surrounding for a non-judgmental self-acceptance in order to relieve stress and anxiety for an increased awareness and understanding of the self.

Western science has played an important role in America for the increased acceptance of Eastern philosophy and approaches to life. The science has not only validated its benefits on a neuroscience level, but it has given Eastern philosophy credibility to other Westerns. This kind of credibility means that the meditation market will be all the more accessible to people who have historically scoffed at the idea of Eastern practice. As a result, more and more people will seek some kind of spiritual/transcendental/divine experience that their everyday Western world does not have to offer in order to counter their fear, pain, and stress located in their everyday world.

The American church, even in the global cities, is currently caught on their heels and has not given a strong response and or winsome counter-narrative. As a result of the deafening silence from “professional” Christians (e.g. Clergy and parachurch ministries), not only do Christians not know how to respond and interact to the invitation of meditation, nor do they know how to interact with their non-religious friends venturing into the new and exciting world of meditation, but there is a lack of dialogue with seculars in this market.  

Part of the silence from the church comes either from a spiritual warfare position (“That’s not spiritually safe to engage”; “Do not play with fire”), or from a credulous Western worldview (“Science only”; “We can’t take this stuff seriously”).

These responses are of no help. Although acknowledging a respect to any reasonable spiritual fears, the church needs to keep in mind that the New Testament gives snapshots of the early missionaries entering into the surrounding spiritual world and interacting with the people and their leaders (Acts 17:16-34). So although not all Christians and churches need to engage with those in the meditation market, some should. And so far, none really have.

Skeptics, Seekers, and Searchers

The church must acknowledge and respect this growing demographic of Western seculars (bankers, lawyers, doctors, CEOs) searching for a spiritual experience. This demographic isn’t skeptics like the Richard Dawkins of the world who are credulous to spirituality and religion; nor are they seekers, such as people who are on some level actively exploring the Christian faith and dialoguing with other Christians, including going to church or small discussion groups or presentations such as Alpha or Tim Keller’s Questioning Christianity Forum; but rather they are what I’m calling Searchers, seculars searching for a spiritual experience.

Searchers believe that one can have a spiritual experience, which makes them different than skeptics because they take the non-physical-material world seriously. They also believe this experience can happen apart from organized religion, which makes them different from seekers, who are dabbling with the Christian faith. This marks a completely different way to approach the world of spirituality and religion that the West is used to seeing:

Is it true? vs Does it work?

Modernism taught people to find the truth, and the truth will set you free. Therefore people were exhorted to think, use their mind, and then they’ll discover what’s true. What people need most, Modernism says, was to know what was true. But this is the fundamental difference between searchers and everybody else.

It is because searchers link a spiritual experience to a remedy for fear and stress, that what results is searchers are driven by a simple idea: spiritual experience is good because it works. Therefore the first and primary question that drives a searcher is not the Modernism question, “Is something true?”, but rather, “Does it work?”

This is the logical outcome on a practical level to the post-modern mind. When people began to realize that there was no monolithic story for everyone because there is no single experience for everyone (which is what the modern mind was assuming), then the resulting phrase “You do you!” became the mantra for today’s post-modern mind. Hence the increasing public/private divide in western culture: I will not judge what happens in the privacy of your own home, so long as you do not judge what happens in the privacy of mine; you have a unique story, please respect my unique story. As a result, “you do you” is lived out and becomes “what works for me works for me, and what works for you works for you.” Therefore truth is found in something that works.

This is not to say that facts do not matter. But the searcher says, “If something doesn’t give me peace, relieve my stress, give me satisfaction, etc, then it doesn’t work. I really don’t care if it checks all of the right logical boxes.”

Information vs Formation. As a result of wanting something that works, searchers are not initially looking to find truth in a book or a five bullet-proof argument, rather they need to be formed like when clay is molded by another’s hand. They do not want a 200-page book on prayer, instead they would rather be taken to a pray service and shown how to pray. They do not care so much that Jesus taught about helping the poor, instead they would rather go to the local mobile aid home and help sign up people for medical help and talk to them while those in need wait in line.

Knowledge vs Experience. Experience is the sine qua non of the searcher. Therefore, what builds in a searcher and gives him or her momentum is not so much knowledge but experience. The currency at the end of the day isn’t the amount of facts one has but the amount of experiences and feelings that something happened to a person and that he or she was a part of something. This shares the same essence that research says about gifts. If you choose between giving someone for their birthday a gift of experience, such as a necklace or a night out at a nice restaurant, choose the experience every time. There is something about being in the moment that counts, which echoes strands of mindfulness.

The Church and Pursuing Searchers

The church must respect this difference. It means Alpha and Questioning Christianity Forum occupy an important place in the landscape of evangelism and mission, and hopefully they are not going away anytime soon. However, the area they occupy isn’t the full landscape of mission in America and in New York. To put more directly, there is an inability for the current offerings to push into areas that they are not currently occupying by virtue of the questions they are assuming their mission field is asking.

What happens when the people the church is pursuing are not asking “Is it true?” but rather “Does it work?”? We can turn to the Sermon on the Mount, in which Jesus talks about the call for his followers to be salt in Matthew 5.

This call to be salt is not simply an exhortation about being different from culture, nor is it purely talking about the truth of Christianity. Rather, intrinsically in Jesus’ salt metaphor he’s telling his followers that following him works. A grain of salt is not there to simply admire and to look at–but to use! Salt is good because it makes food taste better. Salt is good because it makes food last longer in order to eat in seasons in which nothing grows.

Therefore to be salt means to work. It points to the efficacy of Jesus in a person and in a community. The distinction of a person or a community which is salt means something clear about them.

For example, the salt of a person’s faith is tasted when that person experiences hardship but still has an undercurrent of joy amidst their tears. At that moment, Jesus is working in their life: The Christian faith works! Or, when a person chooses to live out certain natural feelings while denying other natural feelings that goes against what the culture says. At that moment that person is not simply choosing to live a certain way because “it’s what the Bible says I am supposed to do.” That might be true, but the salt of a person’s faith is seen when their life is preserved for holiness because in that holiness there is discovered a deep joy and an experience of God amidst unmet desires. At that moment, Jesus is working in their life: The Christian faith works! And in both of those examples of the Christian faith working, what people discover is that the Christian faith is true.

This is very much like the woman at the well in John 4. Jesus tells her that he can give her water in which she’ll never thirst again. It’s only after that that he goes into her heart to exposes it, and follows it up by a conversation about theological mountains.

But notice the order of things. She is first confronted by the idea that following Jesus works through the claim she’ll never thirst, and then a conversation about theological knowledge follows. In other words, Jesus says to her, “I work, and it’s true,” rather than “It’s true, I work.”

This is not a prosperity gospel: follow Jesus and your life turns around. Far from it. Rather, it’s saying that even if your life doesn’t turn around you, you can still have peace and joy amidst the chaos and unmet expectations, which is exactly one of the promises of meditation: peace in a chaotic life.

But from a searcher ministry perspective, the church has the opportunity to show that the Christian faith is superior to mediation and sitting with yourself Those philosophies and practices can’t go all the way like the Christian faith can.

Meditation comes down to being a form of control. But what people need to understand is that the problem emotion of control is stress. So although meditation might be a quick fix in the middle of the work day for now, it won’t ultimately sail a person through life because it’s a form of control, and therefore it will never get a person out of the vortex of stress. It can’t, because all forms of control produce the problem emotion of stress.

This is why the church needs to introduce searchers to Christian experiences, such as actual prayer. Because prayer requires stillness and silence, something that a searcher is used to doing in their times of meditation. And in that stillness that prayer brings, a person realizes that they are not in control, only God is. And therefore in their prayer, they learn that it is a form of surrender, not control. It is only that posture of surrender that will actually decrease stress and fear, because they are bringing their fears and stresses to the God of the universe…and oh, by the way, the cross and resurrection show us that he is good and we can trust him.

In other words, the searcher category shows us that there are very many educated professionals living in New York who could care less about five arguments for the Christian faith, and instead would be more affected by spending five Wednesday evenings sitting in a candle lit room for 45 minutes being led in silence through a reflective historic Christian prayer, or a lectio divina, or a prayer of examen.

And when they leave that moment, sitting in a room with the Holy Spirit, giving space in their busy day to let him minister on and around them, they will leave knowing that something happened, but not sure exactly what or why. They will walk out feeling more peaceful, and in that experience of peace they will be confronted with the truth that the Christian faith works because the God of the Bible is real, and his reality is felt in their experience of peace.

What that experience will lead them to do is ask questions about the truth of Christianity because they’ve seen the truth of Christianity through their experiencing it. Don’t forget, Christianity was Eastern and has an Eastern path. West and East are just expressions of approaching life with different questions and assumptions.

The Western church ought to use plays from the Eastern church playbook in order to effectively minister to searchers who are being confronted by non-Christian Eastern thinking and philosophy everyday in the culture.

When the church ministers to searchers, it is a ministry which says “come and see that the Lord is good,” and it is through inviting them into small moments of experiences, whether it be Sunday worship or midweek prayer services, both Christians and searchers alike will come to experience Jesus and discover his truth. Searchers show us that the church needs to learn how to bring people to Jesus, just like the woman brought her friends to the well in order for them to experience the living water which she herself had already tasted and experienced.