Isolation as a church life strategy

[Roland Hearn]

Many years ago I remember observing a church that was very disconnected from its community. The community was primarily low income blue collar workers. The church, small as it was, was primarily semi-professional white collar workers. It occurred to me that the reason the church was not reaching out to the community was that the people of the church didn’t like relating to that community at church. They did it all through the week in their jobs and at the stores but when they went to church they liked not having to relate to “those people.” It wasn’t something they were doing consciously they just liked the safety of the church and the attitude impacted the way they did church and related to people as they came to church.
As I see the issue the church, for the most part, is comfortable with the way things are. We are use to doing things certain ways. When we go to church it is all familiar to us. We have grown up or were saved in these communities and we have a lot emotionally invested in their existence. We live in a post modern world and everyone, at least those under 50, has spent more time framing their world from a post-modern perspective then they have from a modern one. It is only in the church that the structures of modernism are still rampant. We go to work, we call the boss by his first name, he leads by example giving options and asking for input rather than demanding activities, that is if he is an effective leader. We read newspapers and books and we find many options presented to us as possibilities rather than right and wrong. We are very comfortable with relational activities and experiential truth. Yet when we go to church we flick a switch and we respond to situations in ways that are divergent from the rest of our lives and we like it that way. It causes us to feel safe. Things are in order.
What we have done however is make isolation our policy of church life. We don’t grow because we value the way things were in the rest of the world and the way things are in the church more than we value people. We say we would love people to get saved and come to church but what we mean is we would love people to change and become like us.
I honestly believe that a Christo-centric church life means the example of the cross encourages us to lay down the things that make us comfortable in order that we may demonstrate love to those that are dieing.

[Marsha Lynn]

I think you're right, Roland. I'm living there. And I've discovered that changing the culture of an organization is extremely difficult. I can barely change myself, let alone an entire church. The only way I can go to church without getting angry is to overlook the objectionable focus of the organization and focus on ministering to the individual people who make up that organization, including those who are most at risk of falling by the wayside because they don't quite have what it takes to be one of us.

Do you have suggestions for nurturing cultural change in an existing church?

Marsha

Many years ago I remember observing a church that was very disconnected from its community. The community was primarily low income blue collar workers. The church, small as it was, was primarily semi-professional white collar workers. It occurred to me that the reason the church was not reaching out to the community was that the people of the church didn’t like relating to that community at church. They did it all through the week in their jobs and at the stores but when they went to church they liked not having to relate to “those people.” It wasn’t something they were doing consciously they just liked the safety of the church and the attitude impacted the way they did church and related to people as they came to church.
As I see the issue the church, for the most part, is comfortable with the way things are. We are use to doing things certain ways. When we go to church it is all familiar to us. We have grown up or were saved in these communities and we have a lot emotionally invested in their existence. We live in a post modern world and everyone, at least those under 50, has spent more time framing their world from a post-modern perspective then they have from a modern one. It is only in the church that the structures of modernism are still rampant. We go to work, we call the boss by his first name, he leads by example giving options and asking for input rather than demanding activities, that is if he is an effective leader. We read newspapers and books and we find many options presented to us as possibilities rather than right and wrong. We are very comfortable with relational activities and experiential truth. Yet when we go to church we flick a switch and we respond to situations in ways that are divergent from the rest of our lives and we like it that way. It causes us to feel safe. Things are in order.
What we have done however is make isolation our policy of church life. We don’t grow because we value the way things were in the rest of the world and the way things are in the church more than we value people. We say we would love people to get saved and come to church but what we mean is we would love people to change and become like us.
I honestly believe that a Christo-centric church life means the example of the cross encourages us to lay down the things that make us comfortable in order that we may demonstrate love to those that are dieing.

[Terri Knoll]

Many years ago I remember observing a church that was very disconnected from its community. The community was primarily low income blue collar workers. The church, small as it was, was primarily semi-professional white collar workers. It occurred to me that the reason the church was not reaching out to the community was that the people of the church didn’t like relating to that community at church. They did it all through the week in their jobs and at the stores but when they went to church they liked not having to relate to “those people.” It wasn’t something they were doing consciously they just liked the safety of the church and the attitude impacted the way they did church and related to people as they came to church.
As I see the issue the church, for the most part, is comfortable with the way things are. We are use to doing things certain ways. When we go to church it is all familiar to us. We have grown up or were saved in these communities and we have a lot emotionally invested in their existence. We live in a post modern world and everyone, at least those under 50, has spent more time framing their world from a post-modern perspective then they have from a modern one. It is only in the church that the structures of modernism are still rampant. We go to work, we call the boss by his first name, he leads by example giving options and asking for input rather than demanding activities, that is if he is an effective leader. We read newspapers and books and we find many options presented to us as possibilities rather than right and wrong. We are very comfortable with relational activities and experiential truth. Yet when we go to church we flick a switch and we respond to situations in ways that are divergent from the rest of our lives and we like it that way. It causes us to feel safe. Things are in order.
What we have done however is make isolation our policy of church life. We don’t grow because we value the way things were in the rest of the world and the way things are in the church more than we value people. We say we would love people to get saved and come to church but what we mean is we would love people to change and become like us.
I honestly believe that a Christo-centric church life means the example of the cross encourages us to lay down the things that make us comfortable in order that we may demonstrate love to those that are dieing.

I saw that on a Tshirt a teen was wearing today at the Luis Palau festival, and I was struck by exactly what you just said. There are SEVERAL ways to accomplish that, and I see alot of people truly searching (including myself) to do just that.

Keep talking :basic05

[Roland Hearn]

I think you're right, Roland. I'm living there. And I've discovered that changing the culture of an organization is extremely difficult. I can barely change myself, let alone an entire church. The only way I can go to church without getting angry is to overlook the objectionable focus of the organization and focus on ministering to the individual people who make up that organization, including those who are most at risk of falling by the wayside because they don't quite have what it takes to be one of us.

Do you have suggestions for nurturing cultural change in an existing church?

Marsha
I'm probably far from an expert on the subject becuase part of that struggle is why I'm now a church planter. But the answer is somewhere in the love paradirm. It is in allowing love to transform us as individuals as we love those around us.
I would love to brain storm with you on how that might work in your setting so if you wanted to we could talk on private message or email. If you wanted to talk more generically here I would be up for that as well - given mine is an opinion and you are living in a reality.

[Anne and Dwayne Hood]

Please explain to me exactly what is meant by changing a culture in a church--what they are use to and have been raised in or adding another race, and blending them into the congregation. Now, we have done that part, but please explain, exactly what you are discussing.

[Roland Hearn]

Please explain to me exactly what is meant by changing a culture in a church--what they are use to and have been raised in or adding another race, and blending them into the congregation. Now, we have done that part, but please explain, exactly what you are discussing.

No it isn't primarily a race issue although it may be reflected in the way the church relates to that issue. We are talking primarily about having a church life that is comfortable to us because we are use to it but it is something that is not open to those that are not of our group. The last sentence of my original post pretty much sums up the issue.

[Dennis M. Scott]

I am convinced that the Gospel appropriately and effectively presented will draw all people: that in all segments of society the Lord is preparing the hearts of at least some. We have a long way to go in discovering how to contextualize it to those people groups. A generation ago, in the US, the blue collar population was the most evangelized group. Pretty consistently, the COTN has seen most significant growth among the moderately poor to lower middle class. May God help us broaden our methodologies without throwing the baby out with the bath.

[Marsha Lynn]

I'm probably far from an expert on the subject becuase part of that struggle is why I'm now a church planter. But the answer is somewhere in the love paradirm. It is in allowing love to transform us as individuals as we love those around us.
I would love to brain storm with you on how that might work in your setting so if you wanted to we could talk on private message or email. If you wanted to talk more generically here I would be up for that as well - given mine is an opinion and you are living in a reality.

Roland, I greatly appreciate your offer. Actually, we are already in dialog and have been for years. Your views (and Brad's), as you have presented them on NazNet have influenced mine. I'm still listening.

As to getting more specific, what I most need is someone who can give me an objective view of the local situation through the paradigm you continue to share with us. Unfortunately, I don't think that is really possible with long-distance communication. Everything you know about my situation is necessarily filtered through my eyes. It's sort of like the call to tech support from the customer complaining that her computer screen wouldn't work. It took many questions -- is the monitor on? is the computer on? is the video cable plugged in? is the monitor plugged into the wall? can you try a different outlet? -- before the customer mumbled something about not being able to see to move the plug. When the tech support guy asked why she couldn't see, she explained in a rather exasperated tone, "Because the lights are off! We have no power!"

I fear that we would both expend much time and energy and I would fail to communicate the most basic facts that would allow you to make a diagnosis and recommend treatment.

Having said that, let me share where I am today. You may recognize your own contribution to this.

Yes, the local church has been on a downward slope for years. I have some strong ideas about some of the factors contributing to that decline. There is no line at my door asking me to share those ideas. In fact, people tend to get rather defensive when I suggest we need to try new ways of doing church.

So I'm spending much time in prayer, seeking to allow God to rectify what's wrong in my own heart rather than fixing the people around me. I've finally learned to appreciate the fact that I'm not on any of the boards or committees setting the course for ministry in the church. It leaves me free to find my own place of ministry without having to seek board approval or support any of the official programs.

Jesus taught us that when we run up against irreconciliable differences in the church, after we go through all the process, to treat the offenders as we would prostitutes and tax collectors. The love paradigm you preach says a lot about the way we treat sinners - loving them unconditionally wherever we find them. It seems that the next step (and this is not original with me) is to treat offensive church leaders the same way. I've concluded that I would rather be a friend of the church board than to straighten them out. I would rather be my pastor's friend than point out how he could be a more effective leader. I would rather see the church die than act in unloving ways in an attempt to resuscitate it. (After all, it's God's church, not mine.)

I guess it's a sort of lifestyle evangelism. By choosing love, forgiveness, and acceptance for those at the top of the church structure that mirrors my love, forgiveness, and acceptance for those at the bottom of the church structure, I hope to possibly build bridges for greater unity between all. I consciously spread my own availability between those at all levels of involvement and commitment.

There are a lot of "I's" in this post. I wish it didn't have to be that way because what I'm trying to represent in it is a lifestyle that revolves around loving "you", whether "you" denotes the pastor or "you" denotes the alcoholic who has fried his brains until salvation looks hopeless for him but who brings his granddaughters to church because he wants a better life for them. Each deserves a chunk of my time and resources and a strong dose of unconditional love that says that neither needs to become a better person or minister before I will offer him an unreserved smile of greeting at every encounter.

The cross-centered part in your original post plays a large part here because this lifestyle means giving up on any vision for the church to be healthy and grow. Loving the church leaders trumps that vision. It means being part of a failing enterprise and being part of the failure without pinning blame on anyone. It means leaving things undone in the dying church in order to go out and minister joyfully in a community that doesn't care about the church.

I'm not living up to what I'm presenting here. This is the ideal toward which I aim. It takes much prayer and a lot of falling and getting back up and trying again. But I think that the answer to what you described at the start of this thread lies in here someplace if I can just get there. In the phraseology of Oswald Chambers, my goal is to be broken bread and poured-out wine in my world, and my world happens to include a dying congregation with the label Church of the Nazarene, which is no more nor less in need of sacrifice than the lost world outside its doors.

Marsha

[William Hunter]

I'm in my 10th year here and such a change has been accomplished. It has taken some time and the people who helped us most to do it are newer members and attenders. They come in iwth all kinds of family and friends that do not know Christ. Part of drawing them has to do with them seeing a cong. as active as it can be in their community. The result is that we have gained nurses, teachers, and a bank VP, plus many blue collar workers.

It does not happen overnight, it takes alot of prayer by the pastor so that God can create in his own heart a driving passion the lost and his community. Then it takes some long-term training by the pastor of his lay leaders and cong. It is interesting that a local church is so far removed from the Great Commission that it takes so long to re-awaken it to the needs of the lost in its community, but for some reason it is true. We seem so satisfied to go to DA each year with a little more money raised, a couple more in attendance than last year, and new carpet in the foyer. The church has moved far from the passion of Christ for the lost that caused Him to spill His blood to make it happen. What do we do to make it happen? Not much in most churches. We are too focusd on reaching those already in the church, of seeing the church existing for those in the church, etc., instead of existing to reach the lost (the passion of Christ). But, it can be done. It takes some time and a constant effort by the pastor, but it can be done. I have used every layperson who finally "got it" and formed a team of leaders to take the church forward toward a throbbing passion for lost people. Yes, some have a way to go, but several get it and are involved in making it happen. But, it can happen!!!!

[Roland Hearn]

As to getting more specific, what I most need is someone who can give me an objective view of the local situation through the paradigm you continue to share with us....

Jesus taught us that when we run up against irreconciliable differences in the church, after we go through all the process, to treat the offenders as we would prostitutes and tax collectors. The love paradigm you preach says a lot about the way we treat sinners - loving them unconditionally wherever we find them. It seems that the next step (and this is not original with me) is to treat offensive church leaders the same way. I've concluded that I would rather be a friend of the church board than to straighten them out. I would rather be my pastor's friend than point out how he could be a more effective leader. I would rather see the church die than act in unloving ways in an attempt to resuscitate it. (After all, it's God's church, not mine.)...

The cross-centered part in your original post plays a large part here because this lifestyle means giving up on any vision for the church to be healthy and grow. Loving the church leaders trumps that vision. It means being part of a failing enterprise and being part of the failure without pinning blame on anyone. It means leaving things undone in the dying church in order to go out and minister joyfully in a community that doesn't care about the church.

Yes Marsha that is exactly right. It certainly begins with loving the leadership in exactly the same way as we might desire to be loved or to see the world around us loved. The latter cannot happen without the former. It is in the environment of love that discussions can happen in non confronting ways that may lead to the kind of questions that need to be asked.
It is not possible to "fix" a situation like you find yourself. Trying to "fix" things generally means attempting to control the situation and control is never perceived as love. So the approach you have outlined is precisely right, as frustrating as it may be.
Still I would encourage you to consider finding one person in the group of leaders that you can invest your life in through love, validating that person, encouraging her and ultimately shaping your relationship to the point that that individual is as inspired by love as you are. That will require openness and vulnerability on your part but the result is someone to share with your desire to take love to the next level in the congregation. It becomes a challenge for love to see how far deliberately allowing love to shape relationships can go.

[Roland Hearn]

I am convinced that the Gospel appropriately and effectively presented will draw all people:... I could not agree more with you Dennis. We sometimes take a fall back position that says people are not responding to God these days. I have yet to see someone who is in the least bit emotionally healthy not respond to being loved. To love a person without strings is to live out the gospel. Jesus says He will draw all men. He has not agreed to arguing people, driving people, hounding people or shaming people into the kingdom but loving people. To love someone may mean knowing them for years before the specifics of the gospel story are told but the gospel is being lived out the whole time in the context of actually loving someone. To love someone is not to simply do good things for them, although it may include that. To love someone is to get to know them, to find out about their lives, to be immersed in their world. To love someone is to laugh with them and cry with them. To love someone is to be vulnerable with them and to invite them to be vulnerable back. To love someone is to look past their deepest darkness and see their incredible worth - and then reflect that back to them. To truly do that is to live out the gospel and that will draw them to Christ. As someone once said, "the gospel is loving an individual until they ask why."

[Marsha Lynn]

Please explain to me exactly what is meant by changing a culture in a church--what they are use to and have been raised in or adding another race, and blending them into the congregation. Now, we have done that part, but please explain, exactly what you are discussing.

Anne,

In the study of "organizational behavior" -- how people act within organizations -- there is recognition that organizations of all kinds have unique cultures. Perhaps a simple way to understand this would be to look back over your school years. Maybe Mrs. Jones fostered a culture of open communication. However, the culture of Mr. Smith's room down the hall was one of structure and discipline. Ask any substitute teacher in a small school system and they can describe the culture of both the school as a whole and that of individual teachers' classrooms. How a particular group of students acts on a particular day has much more to do with the ongoing culture of the classroom in which they are gathered than either the students themselves or the person standing in the front of the class that day. The same students will act very differently in Mrs. Jones' class than in Mr. Smith's class, even on days when the teachers are absent. This has nothing to do with their physical surroundings. Each teacher builds a culture around themselves. And each of those cultures has to find its place within the larger culture of the school building.

Organizational culture is highly resistant to change. As an example, when I was a student at Olivet Nazarene College, there were two sides to the cafeteria. They represented two cultures. In my day, as you entered the cafeteria, if you turned right, you would be on the "missionary" side. Food fights were unheard of in that area. Line-cutting was less common so the line moved faster on that side. You would be more likely to find someone with a textbook open on the table as they combined food and study or a group of students engaged in intense conversation.

Over on the other side of the cafeteria was where the party was happening. Those who were looking for light-hearted social interaction during their meals gravitated toward that side. The student "director of spiritual life" sat on the right side. The "director of social life" was on the left.

Thirty years later, there have been how many complete turnovers of Olivet students? The cafeteria now has much more variety and there are four or five lines to various stations rather than simply two lines leading to the same food selection. The right side of the cafeteria is no longer known as the "missionary" side. However, from what I can gather, the cultural divide has not changed. The left side still attracts the socialites and the right side is still the place for more serious tabletalk. Every new group of freshmen that comes in starts out by choosing their seating at random, but eventually find their way to the right side for them. There's no instruction in the matter during freshman orientation. There's no "Unofficial Guide to Olivet Dining". The administration doesn't enforce the divide. It just happens.

Now, I don't know that there is anything wrong with that, but if the powers-that-be at ONU decided to put an end to it, what would it take to do so? How could they change the "culture" of the cafeteria? How much discomfort would it take to change it? If a new cafeteria were built would it automatically disrupt this pattern? Or would it take special effort to make sure the culture could not simply transfer itself to the new setting? Is it possible that the architect of a new cafeteria would inadvertantly create a high level of discomfort for the students by designing the cafeteria in a way that no longer supported the old cultural divide?

Every organization has its own culture. The K-Mart culture is different than the Wal-Mart culture, even though the two chains are similar in many ways. There are forces at many levels that prevent one from looking like the other. However, there may also be a notable difference between the culture of two local manifestations of a nationwide chain driven by the unique management team in each. As new members come in, they either adapt to the local team or sense the mismatch and move on. Changing the local organization without a complete turnover of personnel is a slow and often painful process. (Perhaps the speed of change and the pain involved are related.) There are people who make a career out of facilitating such changes.

I suspect that the application of this to the local church setting is obvious. The culture is not simply methodology but emcompasses a complete worldview. If I join a church where I don't fit in, I must either change in order to fit or I will cause discomfort as the church tries to adjust to the new oddness that I bring with me. They may shove me right back out the door if I decline to adopt their culture and they are dead set against change and can come up with the right tools to eject me, particularly if they confuse their cultural identity with commitment to God and the faith of their fathers (and mothers).

Marsha

[William Hunter]

I do not believe most books on organizational structure/culture, etc., as helpful as some are, really get to the point of the existance of the church. Over these 32 yrs. of ministry I've noticed the culture of the ave. church is all about institutional survival and ministry to the families of its members. I do not see that as the culture Christ intended for His church. He came to this earth with a soul-moving, heart-throbbing passion to reach lost people and disciple them in Him. The average cong. does not have that same passion. The change must start with the pastor and having same Christlike passion pounding in his own heart. It takes some time to retrain a cong. in such things. For too many generations we have not been about the cause of Christ, but into instiutional survival. Yet we live in a day when there is a huge hunger for the spiritual. In that kind of atmosphere why do those who study such things keep telling that only about 1-2% of the church in Amercia and Canada are growing by true convert growth. There is a huge and profound need for a revival of the passion of Christ in the hearts of pastors and laypeople.




Roland, I greatly appreciate your offer. Actually, we are already in dialog and have been for years. Your views (and Brad's), as you have presented them on NazNet have influenced mine. I'm still listening.

As to getting more specific, what I most need is someone who can give me an objective view of the local situation through the paradigm you continue to share with us. Unfortunately, I don't think that is really possible with long-distance communication. Everything you know about my situation is necessarily filtered through my eyes. It's sort of like the call to tech support from the customer complaining that her computer screen wouldn't work. It took many questions -- is the monitor on? is the computer on? is the video cable plugged in? is the monitor plugged into the wall? can you try a different outlet? -- before the customer mumbled something about not being able to see to move the plug. When the tech support guy asked why she couldn't see, she explained in a rather exasperated tone, "Because the lights are off! We have no power!"

I fear that we would both expend much time and energy and I would fail to communicate the most basic facts that would allow you to make a diagnosis and recommend treatment.

Having said that, let me share where I am today. You may recognize your own contribution to this.

Yes, the local church has been on a downward slope for years. I have some strong ideas about some of the factors contributing to that decline. There is no line at my door asking me to share those ideas. In fact, people tend to get rather defensive when I suggest we need to try new ways of doing church.

So I'm spending much time in prayer, seeking to allow God to rectify what's wrong in my own heart rather than fixing the people around me. I've finally learned to appreciate the fact that I'm not on any of the boards or committees setting the course for ministry in the church. It leaves me free to find my own place of ministry without having to seek board approval or support any of the official programs.

Jesus taught us that when we run up against irreconciliable differences in the church, after we go through all the process, to treat the offenders as we would prostitutes and tax collectors. The love paradigm you preach says a lot about the way we treat sinners - loving them unconditionally wherever we find them. It seems that the next step (and this is not original with me) is to treat offensive church leaders the same way. I've concluded that I would rather be a friend of the church board than to straighten them out. I would rather be my pastor's friend than point out how he could be a more effective leader. I would rather see the church die than act in unloving ways in an attempt to resuscitate it. (After all, it's God's church, not mine.)

I guess it's a sort of lifestyle evangelism. By choosing love, forgiveness, and acceptance for those at the top of the church structure that mirrors my love, forgiveness, and acceptance for those at the bottom of the church structure, I hope to possibly build bridges for greater unity between all. I consciously spread my own availability between those at all levels of involvement and commitment.

There are a lot of "I's" in this post. I wish it didn't have to be that way because what I'm trying to represent in it is a lifestyle that revolves around loving "you", whether "you" denotes the pastor or "you" denotes the alcoholic who has fried his brains until salvation looks hopeless for him but who brings his granddaughters to church because he wants a better life for them. Each deserves a chunk of my time and resources and a strong dose of unconditional love that says that neither needs to become a better person or minister before I will offer him an unreserved smile of greeting at every encounter.

The cross-centered part in your original post plays a large part here because this lifestyle means giving up on any vision for the church to be healthy and grow. Loving the church leaders trumps that vision. It means being part of a failing enterprise and being part of the failure without pinning blame on anyone. It means leaving things undone in the dying church in order to go out and minister joyfully in a community that doesn't care about the church.

I'm not living up to what I'm presenting here. This is the ideal toward which I aim. It takes much prayer and a lot of falling and getting back up and trying again. But I think that the answer to what you described at the start of this thread lies in here someplace if I can just get there. In the phraseology of Oswald Chambers, my goal is to be broken bread and poured-out wine in my world, and my world happens to include a dying congregation with the label Church of the Nazarene, which is no more nor less in need of sacrifice than the lost world outside its doors.

Marsha

[Marsha Lynn]

I do not believe most books on organizational structure/culture, etc., as helpful as some are, really get to the point of the existance of the church. Over these 32 yrs. of ministry I've noticed the culture of the ave. church is all about institutional survival and ministry to the families of its members.

I agree. Studying organizational behavior doesn't tell us why the church exists or what the church is all about. However, I would say that the study of organizational behavior gives us words to use to describe what's happening in the church. Perhaps an analogy would be that taking a course on probability and statistics doesn't tell you what's happening numerically in your church, but it gives you tools to analyze the data you gather and to spot trends.

Every church has a culture. It's outside the scope of texts on organizational behavior to judge whether that culture is good or bad, productive or destructive, spiritual or unspiritual, Christlike or totally missing the point. They won't prescribe the ideal culture for a 21st-century church. That discussion has to be based on scripture and the movement of the Holy Spirit in and among us. What the organizational behavior texts tell us is that the culture exists and that it can be changed, but that change is typically difficult and painful.

I do not see that as the culture Christ intended for His church. He came to this earth with a soul-moving, heart-throbbing passion to reach lost people and disciple them in Him. The average cong. does not have that same passion. The change must start with the pastor and having same Christlike passion pounding in his own heart. It takes some time to retrain a cong. in such things. For too many generations we have not been about the cause of Christ, but into instiutional survival. Yet we live in a day when there is a huge hunger for the spiritual. In that kind of atmosphere why do those who study such things keep telling that only about 1-2% of the church in Amercia and Canada are growing by true convert growth. There is a huge and profound need for a revival of the passion of Christ in the hearts of pastors and laypeople.

Agreed. As a pastor, you emphasize the need for it to start with the pastor. And I know that you have experienced great blessing as you have seen the love that wells up in your own heart spread out into your church and community. Even as a visitor last summer in your church, I could sense the profound love you have for your people. However, as a layperson in a different setting, I can either critique my pastor for not being as effective as you have been in his attempts to motivate us to go out and make disciples or I can prayerfully seek my own role in the cultural change that we need while offering love and support to my pastor, who is finding his own way in this brave, new world. If we're both committed to prayer and to finding and doing the will of God, we ought to end up in approximately the same place. That will then make at least two of us who are launching out into the deep. I don't think it would be helpful for me to simply sit around waiting for him to get to where I think he ought to be so he can show me the way.

I appreciate what you're doing there in DeMotte, Bill, and your contribution to this dialogue.

Marsha

[Roland Hearn]

Marsha,
I think your observations in a previous post about institutional culture are precisely right. What ends up happenning is that we defend our culture as if it is a spiritual imperitive like the divinity of Christ and that is where we get into trouble. I agree completely with what you are saying about the process of a lay person wanting to affect change in the local church.
It is obviously best if the pastor is carrying the weight of the issue but if he apparently is not then the only thing that is left is whatyou have described. Complaining or forcing situations is counter productive but prayerfully seeking out what your life and His love through you can do is exactly what is needed as vague as that may be in actual application. Time, in that situation, is an allie not a threat.

[Kevin Rector]

I just wrote a really long post and realized it might sound a bit arrogant, so I've deleted it.

I guess what I really wanted to say is that the best way to grow church or to bring a church to health is to to talk about love, to preach about love, to sing about love, and to model love.

The theme of my ministry is "let's love people and let God change them." This is particularly helpful in a congregation that struggles with legalism or judgementalism. Because when hear this over and over again, and as it sinks in, and as we begin to live it then outcasts will find that they really are welcome in our congregation and the church will have new life breathed into it as "them" becomes "us" and we are all changed for the better.

[Marsha Lynn]

Hi, Kevin. Just for the record, as a subscriber to this thread I received your original post by e-mail and did not find it at all arrogant (nor "really long," but then I may not be a good judge of what constitutes excessive length in NazNet posts :gen02).

Thank you for the advice. Although your suggestions did not go beyond what I've heard before, reinforcement of good counsel is never a bad thing.

:fav18

Marsha

I just wrote a really long post and realized it might sound a bit arrogant, so I've deleted it.

I guess what I really wanted to say is that the best way to grow church or to bring a church to health is to to talk about love, to preach about love, to sing about love, and to model love.

The theme of my ministry is "let's love people and let God change them." This is particularly helpful in a congregation that struggles with legalism or judgementalism. Because when hear this over and over again, and as it sinks in, and as we begin to live it then outcasts will find that they really are welcome in our congregation and the church will have new life breathed into it as "them" becomes "us" and we are all changed for the better.