One of the many things that I have been hearing in a variety of church circles the last couple years is the question, “what makes our church welcoming to an outsider?” And I believe this question comes from a good place, because we want to see people encounter Jesus and have their lives transformed. What this has often led to is taking the how we do our church services, and adapt them to what we think will be welcoming. The question that always remains is, “does this actually work”. While I have my own thoughts (which we will get to shortly), a few months ago I stumbled across a Youtube channel that really answers that question; “what does it look like when an atheist visits church?”
Go into Youtube and type in “atheist church audit”, and what will immediately pop up is the channel Heliocentric, where the host Jared, who is an atheist, goes and visits a wide range of churches. He has been to Evangelical, Baptist, Roman Catholic, Orthodox, Pentecostal, and has even made his way into Mormon and Jehovah Witness’ meetings. While his videos do at times use some foul language, the insights that he brings to what it is like to visit these churches is invaluable. While Jared is an atheist, he says very regularly that he may not believe in God, but he loves religion. And here’s where there’s a fascinating turn of events, Jared was at one point a Christian in ministry.
Coming from a charismatic background, Jared was at one point even in ministry through Michael Brown’s Fire School of Ministry. Through several videos, Jared talks about his deconstruction process, and how unhelpful and unhealthy tendencies and practices eventually led to his deconstruction. (I encourage you to watch those videos, they are very eyeopening to help us see those unhealthy things that have led so many people from my generation to deconstruct their faith). And yet, while no longer following Jesus, believing that He is real, Jared still has a love for religion, what it does, both in the positive and negative. And it is this mindset that he brings to every church he visits. He looks at the things that we often don’t think about. What does everything look like to someone who does not believe it? And this is honestly helpful.
What I found most fascinating in Jared’s videos is that, over time, he began to recognize that not all churches feel the same — and that the ones he personally found most meaningful weren’t the big, flashy, “seeker-friendly” services that we often assume outsiders will prefer. Quite the opposite. Time and again, Jared expresses appreciation for smaller, more traditional, even “old-fashioned” services. Why? Because they feel real.
In his reviews, the large, concert-style churches often left him feeling like he had walked into a production; polished, but impersonal. The sermons could sound more like motivational talks than sacred moments. In contrast, when Jared walked into a small liturgical church, or a traditional congregation with a modest sanctuary and a prayerful tone, he consistently described a sense of peace, reverence, and honesty. Even though he doesn’t share the faith, he notices when people believe what they’re doing matters. The authenticity of worship, not the size of the crowd or the quality of the lighting, is what reaches him.
He often notes that in traditional services, there is a sense of “something ancient” happening, a feeling that what’s taking place isn’t merely for the people in the room, but is connected to generations before. When he steps into an Orthodox liturgy, a Catholic Mass, or even a small Anglican or Lutheran parish, he finds himself respecting the intentionality and gravity of the moment. He says things like, “I don’t believe any of this, but I can tell these people do.” That statement might seem small, but it’s incredibly revealing. Authentic faith doesn’t need to be marketed; it needs to be embodied.
What Jared finds helpful, and what many disenchanted seekers might also find, is not entertainment but encounter. When a church service is smaller, slower, and more reverent, it allows room for reflection. It allows the beauty of the prayers, Scripture, and sacraments to speak for themselves. There’s no pressure to “perform,” only to participate. Ironically, the services least designed to impress outsiders often end up being the most welcoming, precisely because they invite people into something deeper than themselves.
Jared’s experience raises a convicting question for us as Christians: Have we tried so hard to make outsiders comfortable that we’ve stripped away the very mystery that might draw them in? Perhaps what truly welcomes someone isn’t familiarity, but sincerity, not entertainment, but the palpable sense that God is among His people.
If we take Jared’s experiences seriously, they should cause us to pause and reevaluate how we think about being “welcoming.” Many churches, often with good intentions, have tried to remove anything that might seem strange or old-fashioned to a first-time visitor. We shorten prayers, simplify rituals, minimize silence, and replace hymns with songs that sound like the radio. We trade mystery for familiarity, hoping that if people feel at home culturally, they’ll be more open spiritually. But as Jared’s perspective shows, the opposite can often be true.
For someone like him, who doesn’t share the faith but is genuinely curious, it’s not the slick presentation or “relatable” atmosphere that stands out. It’s the weight of something sacred. It’s walking into a small chapel where candles are burning, where the Scriptures are read slowly and reverently, where prayers are ancient yet alive, and where people kneel and stand as though what’s happening actually matters. That difference communicates more than any marketing strategy could. It says, “This isn’t just our weekly gathering, this is holy ground.”
This is not to say that contemporary or creative expressions of worship have no place. But what Jared’s “atheist audits” reveal is that authenticity cannot be fabricated. The most powerful thing we can do to welcome outsiders may be to worship God as if He is truly present, because He is. The church’s task is not to mirror the world, but to reveal a Kingdom that is not of this world.
When we worship with reverence, when our liturgies are filled with Scripture and sacrament, when our communities are small enough for names to be known and prayers to be shared, people like Jared, even without belief, can sense that something real is taking place. And for those quietly searching, that sense of reality might just be the first whisper of grace.
Perhaps the best thing we can offer our modern, skeptical neighbors isn’t a show that looks like everything else, but a glimpse of something wholly other, something ancient, beautiful, and true. The very things we fear might push people away might be what draws them home.
For pastors and worship leaders, Jared’s reflections offer a kind of mirror, an unexpected gift from outside the household of faith. They remind us that people are not looking for another version of what the world already offers; they are searching for something real, something that whispers of eternity. Our call is not to compete with entertainment or comfort, but to cultivate holiness and presence.
If the goal of worship is to help people encounter God, then our services should be less about reducing the strangeness of the sacred and more about inviting people into it. The smells of candles, the cadence of Scripture, the rhythm of prayer, the taste of bread and wine, these are not barriers to newcomers, they are bridges. They engage the whole person, body and soul, in the mystery of grace.
So perhaps the question is not, “How do we make church more welcoming?” but rather, “How do we help people recognize that they are being welcomed into something holy?” The small, traditional, reverent service may not impress the crowd, but it might just open a heart.
On another note, Jared’s story of deconstruction, while painful to hear, is also an opportunity for the Church to pause and reflect, not to compromise the Gospel, but to examine how we have lived it. His journey reminds us that many who leave the faith are not rejecting Christ Himself, but distorted or shallow versions of Him that they encountered in unhealthy church cultures. When we listen to stories like his with humility, we are not abandoning conviction; we are allowing the light of the Gospel to expose where our witness has fallen short. Deconstruction, in that sense, can become a refining fire, a moment to return to the simplicity and beauty of the faith “once delivered to the saints,” grounded not in hype or manipulation, but in the person of Jesus Christ, the Truth who still holds out His wounded hands to a weary world.
Because in the end, what transforms people is not style, but substance, not performance, but Presence. And when that Presence is felt, even an atheist can walk away saying, “I don’t believe in this… but I can tell they do.”