Three Ways to Avoid P.E.V.S.

Post-Easter Questions to Help You Make a Good Next Visit Church Choice

by William Cowles

Wow – your Easter visit to a new church was inspiring, uplifting, energizing, and spiritually encouraging. This may be the place for you, and you can’t wait to get back. I pray that you had that experience on Easter, and that you find that high level of euphoria when you return. But, what if your amped up expectations cloud their post-Easter reality?

We call this Post-Easter Visitor Syndrome. It happens every year to unsuspecting first time visitors. But with a little post-experience evaluation, you can avoid it all together.

Because Easter is the Christian church’s highest holiday, it’s not uncommon for churches to ramp up their celebrations to their most creative and expressive levels. Their music offerings may have included trumpets, tympanis, harps, flutes – and maybe even an X Factor soloist or two! The decorations may have been lavish – fresh lilies and silk banners everywhere! The chow line probably was open, too, with an abundant spread of Easter goodies. Very appealing. Very appetizing.

But, can you expect all that when you go back during the regular season? Probably not. They may have shot their music budget on that one day when they knew so many people would be there, and now have nothing left but an electric guitar or an uninspired choir. The flowers may be limited to whoever bought a small arrangement to remember Aunt So-and-So. The pastor might be taking it easy with a soft message based on a familiar Bible passage.  The refreshments are down to a pot of coffee and a few donut holes.

Remember, every church has ingrained cultural conditions that affect its behavior. How a church expresses itself during a high holiday can be very different when the spotlights are off and the music stops.

Don’t get too disappointed by the after-party reality, but do note the differences. While no church can sustain the Easter level of celebration all 52 weeks of the year, you should expect some basic behaviors to carry over into everyday living.

Here's how to inoculate yourself against over exposure to tempting but nutritionally empty Easter treats. Consider our three easy P.E.V.S. test questions before your next post-Easter church visit. Then you’ll be able to spot the signs of an unhealthy environment before you waste another visit or worse, choose a bad church relationship:

1.        Easter Guest or Easter Pest? Did they welcome you? An inwardly-focused group might have been happy to see you arrive, but they didn’t really let you into the celebration. When you visited, how were you invited into the celebration? You should have felt both expected and welcomed from the front door in. You shouldn’t have had to make an extra effort to feel comfortable with what was going on around you; they should have done that for you already. If you kept asking yourself, “Am I invisible?” or, “Am I in the way here?” during your visit, you’ll probably be asking the same question every other Sunday. Don’t bother returning after Easter.

2.        Easter Rituals or Easter Relationships? Did they engage you? Unless you knew the back story leading up to Jesus’ Resurrection, a lot of the religious rituals and language may have seemed a bit strange. Why were people waving plant leaves while singing about someone named Hosanna on Palm Sunday? Why was everyone looking forward to a sad week between Palm Sunday and Easter? What was that all about, and what did I miss on Thursday and Friday? What does “Maundy” mean, anyway? I’m not suggesting you should have exam-crammed the Bible or Christian history before you visited. My point is that healthy, outwardly-focused churches plan to engage people who are not “steeped in Christian tradition” during the Easter season. Did the group make it easy for you to understand and engage in their Easter season traditions? More than likely, if they did a good job of including you during Easter, it’s because they practice it every other Sunday as well.

3.        Easter Families or Easter Followers? Do they want you to come back? When it was time to go – when the grand celebration had concluded – were they more interested in getting to brunch or getting to know you? Were you left standing there as the mad rush to the doors ensued? OK, you church people say, this isn’t fair because Easter is a time when families have gathered and made special plans. OK, I say, read again what Jesus asked of his disciples in the powerful “Follow Me” scripture: “Then Jesus said to his disciples, If any of you wants to be my follower, you must turn from your selfish ways, take up your cross, and follow me.” (Matthew 16:24) You shouldn't have expected everyone you met to invite you to join them, but you shouldn't have been left in the dust either. 

Others before self; it’s the way of Jesus. And not just on Easter, but on every day. Most churches say they believe this – is that the way they behaved toward you? Your choice of a good church is vitally important, and an impression based on the sugar-shock value of an exhilarating Easter service may not be a healthy choice. Do your homework. Practice preventive care. Take these three tests. We can eliminate Post Easter Visitor Syndrome!