Jack Cascione has discovered Latte Lutheran (WELS) in Waunakee, Wisconsin. No one admits reading this blog.
He found some photos that were new to me. They can be better appreciated in the slide show. The empty pulpit is overshadowed by a large projection screen where the absent pastor appears.
Latte Lutheran is a copy of the Mars Hill (non-Lutheran) church and Northpoint Community (Andy Stanley). The idea is to have multiple locations where the sheep view the screen. Think big. Technology works.
And I quote from the official magazine of WELS, FIC:
"We studied our culture: its movement away from church and its movement toward community and the desire to get together at a café or a Starbucks," says Hunter. "Our goal was to recreate that atmosphere and bring the gospel to it."
St. Andrew looked at possibilities for its new satellite location, such as storefronts in area strip malls, but instead was able to acquire an existing church building.
The only problem was the interior didn't match their "casual about church" approach. So the congregation hired a popular coffeehouse designer-coincidentally someone who didn't attend church-and asked him to design the kind of place where he'd feel comfortable coming to hear about Jesus.
Hunter says the result looks and feels like a café, complete with chairs, couches, coffee tables, and coffee machines in the back. In the front of the room is a simple altar and a screen where Hunter's prerecorded sermons are projected.
"After the sermon, the worship leader invites everyone to take a break, refresh their coffee, and get settled down in their chair or couch for a Bible study on the sermon text," says Hunter. "If you think about what it would be like to have some people over to worship Jesus in your living room-that's the atmosphere."
