By Lois Romano
Washington Post Staff Writer
Wednesday, April 27, 2005; A03

TULSA

Ashley Young and 800 other teenagers swarmed through the Church on the Move's youth center as they do every Wednesday night, shooting pool, jabbering over blaring Christian rock music and listening to Scripture.

"I come because I want to be right with God," the 17-year-old high school junior explained matter-of-factly. "Sundays aren't enough."

Just down the hill at an adult service, Donna and Dennis Godsey are on the same page. They traveled 60 miles on a recent Wednesday -- as they do every week -- for prayer and worship at the church and to hear the Rev. Blaine Bartel gently exhort them on how God wants them to piece together the "puzzle" of their lives.

"Sundays, we just do the basics. Wednesday night you hear the Word and you just feel blessed," said Donna Godsey, 59. "When you come on Wednesday, it's like you're a better person. It helps you cope in today's world. I seem to learn a lot more."

Long a tradition in many churches in the South and Midwest, Wednesday worship has for years enjoyed special status for the faithful: Schools often give light homework that day, businesses refrain from keeping employees late, campaigns consider the evening in scheduling candidates, and other community groups rarely schedule events or meetings on a night that has long been earmarked for worship.

Now, Wednesday night services are undergoing an updated revival as churches compete to attract and hold on to congregants with contemporary and practical messages, music and props. In many churches, Wednesdays are a center of activity for congregants who turn to them as the center of community and family life. It is not uncommon to see churches in this part of the country that have come to resemble small towns, offering singles nights, athletic teams, counseling for couples, and even meetings for young professionals.

"Christians understand that church is not an activity -- it's a lifestyle," said Buddy George, a pastor at Saddleback Church in Lake Forest, Calif., home church of Rick Warren, author of the best-selling "The Purpose-Driven Life."

"Being part of the body of Christ is how you live life. It's not something you do once a week. Gathering with other believers more than once a week is healthy for the family of God. It's staying connected."

For Church on the Move, one of the Bible Belt's fastest-growing nondenominational churches, the efforts to attract the next generation of believers comes at a 92,000-square-foot state-of-the-art community entertainment complex called Oneighty -- complete with basketball courts, 20 Apple iPod centers, 20 computers and countless video play stations suspended from the ceiling.

After listening to an hour-long sermon and Christian music performed by a 10-member rock band, students have full run of the place. It is a model that has been adopted by several hundred churches nationwide. "They make church fun," Ramiro Satoe, 13, said as he aggressively worked the race-car arcade game on a recent Wednesday night.

"This place helps you keep your faith up -- lets you know you're not the only Christian around," said Tiffany Stillwell, 16, who sat on a bench with her boyfriend amid all the activity. "My old church treated us like kids and talked to us like adults."

Indeed, gone are long fire-and-brimstone services. Wednesdays now tend to be more casual, social and personal -- a time to study the Bible, but also interact with like-minded worshipers who are often outnumbered on Sundays by what the devout church community calls the drop-in "seekers."

"Wednesdays are really designed for the believers," said John N. Vaughan, founder of Church Growth Today, which tracks church trends and growth. "At some of these mega-churches, they don't consider the thousands who come on Sunday the primary members. Wednesdays attract the core lifeblood of the church."

Scholars trace the midweek services and activities virtually back to the settlers, when some of the era's earliest and most renowned evangelists urged lay people to assemble for prayer during the week, and become involved in the functioning of the churches.

"What the church has always provided is an extended family," said David Edwin Harrell Jr., a history professor at Auburn University in Alabama. "What's new is that many of the churches today are influenced by television and the new media culture. Consequently, their midweek services are more upbeat and better planned."

Bartel of Church on the Move describes Wednesday as "the church family," saying, "The Wednesday people are here all the time, and they don't want to feel rushed." He says the extra time lets him go into the "meat and potatoes" of the study of the Lord, not just song worship and the tightly timed and produced Sunday service.

Bartel -- like most other church officials nationwide -- is working on ways to facilitate church as community -- a concept in which the Wednesday service plays a vital role. In the next few months, Church on the Move, which has 12,000 members, will renovate its lobby areas, putting in a cafe and conservation areas.

"We want to make our halls like Barnes & Noble -- feel at home, get here early, stay late . . . where we can talk about life issues, we can get to know each other," he said.

Other churches are taking similar steps. Cascade United Methodist Church in Atlanta started Wednesday Night Live a few years ago, creating a coffeehouse environment for worship. At Bethlehem Lutheran Church in Aberdeen, S.D., 400 to 500 people attend the church's weekly Wednesday night supper and prayer.

One Baptist church in Louisville found a way to accommodate members who are fans of the University of Louisville Cardinals, who often play on Wednesday nights: After services, games are shown on a big screen. In Baton Rouge, La., the relatively new Healing Place Church found such interest in Wednesday nights that it runs two services -- one dubbed "late nite" and geared to 20- and 30-year-olds.

At Saddleback, Warren made the strategic decision to offer one Wednesday service a month, and encourages congregants to join weekly home groups in their neighborhoods. The church helps the home meetings' organizers by offering video guides, themes for the meetings ("40 Days of Purpose" was a recent one), an online database of members and "coaches" to help people get to the gatherings.

Members say the Wednesday service provides an opportunity -- and a respite -- for them to evaluate how their lives, families and careers are going amid the bustle of the busy week.

"You have to ask yourself, 'Am I satisfied with where my life is headed right now?' " Bartel asked the 1,500 who had come to a recent Wednesday service, as he put together an oversize puzzle on the altar.

After the service, Mike Whitlock called the evening "a great way to get a little shove to get you through the week." A sales representative in his twenties, he drives 30 miles each way to Church on the Move. "I still have a lot of puzzles to figure out in my life. It's worth the drive."

Staff writer Alan Cooperman and research editor Lucy Shackelford contributed to this report from Washington.