MacNeal, Reggie - Present Future

[Mike Schutz]

Greetings!
I would enjoy hearing opinions about the book Present Future by Reggie MacNeal. Several recent threads led me back to the book, as well as receiving a new copy from my wonderful D.S., who gave copies to every pastor on our district.

To see if anyone is interested, I will start by offering several quotes from the beginning chapter to see where it goes.

" In reality, the church culture in North America is a vestige of the original movement, an institutional expression of religion that is in part a civil religion and in part a club where religious people can hang out with other people whose politics, worldview, and lifestyle match theirs." (p. 1)

"The point is, the world is profoundly different than it was at the middle of the last century, and everybody knows it.... So far the North American church largely has responded with heavy infusions of denial, believing the culture will come to its senses and come back to the church." (p.2)

I invite your response. Even if you haven't read the book, feel free to jump in.:fav18
Grace and peace,
Mike

[Bob Wright]

I think Reggie's book is a must read for every Christian and especially pastors. His video has changed my congregation, and I have found many answers for which I have been searching for years. I think our denomination could learn a lot from his book, and it hits us pretty hard. When he said the church is more secular than the culture, I had to take a second look at that statement. But most of his statements are hard to deny. I gave the DVD to one of my fellow pastors and I think he has preached it to his congregation. I would also like to hear comments from anyone else who has read his book.

[Wilson L. Deaton]

" In reality, the church culture in North America is a vestige of the original movement, an institutional expression of religion that is in part a civil religion and in part a club where religious people can hang out with other people whose politics, worldview, and lifestyle match theirs." (p. 1)


I haven't read it but these quotes make me want to...

On the particular passage I have quoted above, I just read another author expressed this succinctly. He said that what we have called "community" has been nothing more than an affinity group.

Wilson

[Kevin Bowser]

Even if you haven't read the book, feel free to jump in.

I'm going to wait for the movie. I hate to read. :basic03

[Marsha Lynn]

I'm going to wait for the movie. I hate to read. :basic03

As noted by popular products marketed to librarians, one should

Never judge a book by its movie!

:fav18

[Paul Whitaker]

The movie is never better than the book!!

The movies cannot replicate the visions we form in our minds while reading the book.

Those visions draw us into the story.

What books should be made into movies? Your opinion.

Wilbur Smith's "Eagle in the Sky" would make a wonderful movie - if it is done right.

[Marsha Lynn]

Thanks for this post, Mike. I ordered the book. It was on my list of recommendations from Amazon but I hadn't looked into it.

Marsha

[Mike Schutz]

Here are some more quotes from the first chapter:

"The American culture no longer props up the church the way it did, no longer automatically accepts the church as a player at the table of public life, and can be downright hostile to the church's presence. The collapse I am detailing also involves the realization that values of classic Christianity no longer dominate the way Americans believe or behave." (p. 5)

"The postmodern world will demand a new church expression, just as did the rise of the modern world." (p. 5)

"Having retreated into a diminishing corner for several hundreds of years, the North American church culture unfortunately now reflects the materialism and secularism of the modren era. Not only do we not need God to explain the universe, we don't need God to operate the church. Many operate like giant machines, with church leaders serving as machanics. God doesn't have to show up to get done what's being done. The culture does not want the powerless God of the modern church." (p. 6)

[Dave McClung]

Here are some more quotes from the first chapter:

"The American culture no longer props up the church the way it did, no longer automatically accepts the church as a player at the table of public life, and can be downright hostile to the church's presence. The collapse I am detailing also involves the realization that values of classic Christianity no longer dominate the way Americans believe or behave." (p. 5)

"The postmodern world will demand a new church expression, just as did the rise of the modern world." (p. 5)

"Having retreated into a diminishing corner for several hundreds of years, the North American church culture unfortunately now reflects the materialism and secularism of the modren era. Not only do we not need God to explain the universe, we don't need God to operate the church. Many operate like giant machines, with church leaders serving as machanics. God doesn't have to show up to get done what's being done. The culture does not want the powerless God of the modern church." (p. 6)

Mike
I have not read that particular book, but I have read a lot of others which attempt to project the future by extending trends. One thing that I have observed from 63 years of life is that trends don't last as long as they used to. For example, do you remember the projections of real estate values made just two years ago?

Several years ago I read a government report from the mid 1800's. The report declared that based on the then current trends the United States would have a severe crisis because by sometime in the early 1900's there would be too much horse manure for society to deal with.

When I read such books, I pay attention to the observations about current and past events, but don't pay much attention to the predictions about the future.

Dave

[Dennis M. Scott]

I've not yet read this book. Therefore my thoughts are now documented ignorance.

Sociologists have made some similar observations for a long time and sometimes been perceived as some sort of enemy. The church does fulfill some human needs, like what we tend to call community, and the church works contextually. When the church no longer functions to meet human needs, we're in trouble. Granted, when the salt has lost it's savor, we're also in trouble.

It is good that many different church leaders are discovering new methods that work better in many settings than the old ways did or did not work. I have long been of the opinion that the Church has been very effective at reaching a very tiny slice of a broad range of society, while frequently not even being aware that other slices exist. If other groups don't respond, it must be that they are not "responsive". My observation is that many other segments of society are extremely responsive, when engaged in a way that is meaningful for them - which the Church unfortunately doesn't often do.

It is unfortunate, however, when someone who has found a new method or venue that reaches a group the rest of the Church isn't reaching conludes that everyone else is/has been doing it wrong. It may be that everyone else is simply working on a different segment of society. A lot of smart people would say that people won't go to church in horses and buggies anymore. But they would be wrong: there are thousands of people who do that in this country week after week. It's just that those who do aren't the slice of society the "smart people" are striving to reach. Wouldn't it be great if we didn't expect everyone to worship/live just like we do? It might even be that not all good Nazarenes will ge their kicks spending hours every week on Naznet.

[Bob Wright]

This book is unlike any book that I have recently read. You must read it or at least view the DVD to really understand what it has to say. Regardless of the title, it has more to say about the early church and how the church today would identify with the Pharisees than with Jesus, than it does about the future. We will write the future and I hope we heed some of his warnings. It isn't kind to the church growth movement or church health. It talks about Christians as missionaries not just ministers. As the church as having a club mentality and geared for it's members more than following Christ's original purpose for the church, etc. Without reading it and following his logic, you can't grasp fully what he has to say.

[Mike Schutz]

Here are some more:
"An entire industry has been spawned to help churches do whatever it is they decide to do...A spate of program fixes have consistently overpromised and underdelivered." (p.7)

"Church activity is a poor substitute for genuine spirituality." (p. 7)

"The senior pastor of a multiple-hundred-member congregation now must be manager of the corporate culture, headhunter, personnel manager, strategic planner, fundraiser, expert communicator, chief vision developer and caster, ministry entrepreneur, spiritual guru, architectural consultant, plus whatever particular assistance or role the congregation needs at any given time." (p.8)

"Many church members feel they have been sold a bill of goods. They were promised that if they would be a good church member, if they would discover their gifts, or join a small group, sign up for a church ministry, give to the building program, learn to clap or dance in worship, or attend this or that, they would experience a full and meaningful life. Trouble is, we don't have much evidence to support the assumption that all this church activity has produced more mature followers of Jesus. It has produced many tired, burned-out members who find that their lives mimic the lives and dilemmas of people in the culture who don't pay all the church rent."

"The faithful, maybe silently or not so silently, wonder when their ticket is going to be punched, when they are going to experience the changed life they've been promised and expected to experience at church. In North America, these people have been led to believe that their Christian life is all about the church, so this failure of the church not only creates doubt about the church, it also leads them to all kinds of doubt about God and their relationship with him." (p. 8)

Any thoughts?

Grace and peace,
Mike

[Brad Mercer]

I think that is tragically a very common, maybe even the predominant experience of Christians, whether their church is contemporary, traditional evangelical or high church liturgical, whether they attend a church of 30 people or 30,000.

I'm reading a book now called "Connecting", by Larry Crabb that, although it has its Calvinist notes here and there, still seems to be hitting pretty close to what I think is the heart of what we're supposed to be about and what I saw at NewStart-Frisco.

I'll post a review of it in the Book Review forum when I finish reading it.

Brad

Here are some more:
"An entire industry has been spawned to help churches do whatever it is they decide to do...A spate of program fixes have consistently overpromised and underdelivered." (p.7)

"Church activity is a poor substitute for genuine spirituality." (p. 7)

"The senior pastor of a multiple-hundred-member congregation now must be manager of the corporate culture, headhunter, personnel manager, strategic planner, fundraiser, expert communicator, chief vision developer and caster, ministry entrepreneur, spiritual guru, architectural consultant, plus whatever particular assistance or role the congregation needs at any given time." (p.8)

"Many church members feel they have been sold a bill of goods. They were promised that if they would be a good church member, if they would discover their gifts, or join a small group, sign up for a church ministry, give to the building program, learn to clap or dance in worship, or attend this or that, they would experience a full and meaningful life. Trouble is, we don't have much evidence to support the assumption that all this church activity has produced more mature followers of Jesus. It has produced many tired, burned-out members who find that their lives mimic the lives and dilemmas of people in the culture who don't pay all the church rent."

"The faithful, maybe silently or not so silently, wonder when their ticket is going to be punched, when they are going to experience the changed life they've been promised and expected to experience at church. In North America, these people have been led to believe that their Christian life is all about the church, so this failure of the church not only creates doubt about the church, it also leads them to all kinds of doubt about God and their relationship with him." (p. 8)

Any thoughts?

Grace and peace,
Mike

[Jim Franklin]

Some non-church goers believe that a lot more money would be placed in the economy if we all just stayed home and watched the church services on TV and not spend money to build the cathedrals for our corporate worship and activities. But the scripture does say, "forsake not the assembling yourselves together."

[Mike Schutz]

More:

"Many congregations and church leaders, faced with the collapse of the church culture, have responded by adopting a refuge mentality. ... Those with a refuge mentality view the world outside the church as the enemy....Evangelism in this worldview is about churching the unchurched, not connecting people to Jesus." (p. 8-9)

"Some churches go to the opposite extreme. Instead of choosing refuge, their response to the collapse of the church culture is to sell out to the culture." (p. 9)

"The point is, all the effort to fix the church misses the point. You can build the perfect church - and they still won't come. ... Church leaders seem unable to grasp this simple implication of the new world - people outside the church think church is for church people, not for them." (p. 10)

[G R 'Scott' Cundiff]

Did any of you who read "Present Future" happen to watch "7th Heaven" on January 28? The opening scene looked as though it was written to illustrate MacNeal's view of how the church sees itself today.

In that scene, the Reverend is talking to the chair of his church board. The chairman tells him that the deacons are worried that there are too many empty seats in the church. They are unhappy that the sermons aren't "modern" enough and that the result is that there aren't enough young people in the church.

And they want the younger crowd because they have more money to give to support the program of the church, also, they volunteer for church activities and serve on committees. So, the deacons are going to approve what the Reverend preaches and try to move the church in a direction that they think will bring more money into the budget.

In his book MacNeal always calls church members, "club members" and he says the world views the church as another special interest group mostly interested in building buildings, staffing committees, carrying on its programs, and raising money.

I know that 7th Heaven doesn't do a very good job of representing church life -- the Reverend is more of a counselor than he is pastor. So far as I know, he has had one real conversion to Christ through the history of the program.

However, his conflict with his board of deacons in this episode was written by the writers of this program as their view of why the church leaders do much of what they do.

MacNeal probably agrees.

[Marsha Lynn]

Once again, I'm commenting on a book I haven't finished. If that is obvious in my post I apologize. But I'm afraid I'll not get back to this if I wait until I get to the last page.

First off, I love this book! I feel that it presents as intuitively obvious what I have learned in a painstakingly slow process over many years. Almost. I have one caveat.

McNeal urges us to leave the 'club' behind and go out to where lost people hang out rather than waiting for them to come to us. This morning I read a quote he took from an exchange after one of his seminars when a church leader told him that from then on he would always ask, "Who is this for?" Of course, the correct answer in this book is that church ministry should be aimed toward 'pre-Christians'.

Am I reading too much between the lines or do I still see a strong "in" and "out" mentality here? Why are we so insistent in dividing the world into sheep and goats (and either hanging out with the sheep or ministering to the goats)?

I look at my world and I see a lot of different kinds of people:

1. There are Pharisees. They are sure they are sheep but are really blind guides. They need people who will love them deeply and hold them accountable to the truth.

2. There are the dumb sheep, blindly following whatever leadership they find, including the blind Pharisees. They need people who will love them deeply and open up avenues of light for them.

3. There are pilgrims on the path to heaven. They have a map. They need encouragement and companionship, people who will love them deeply even when they stumble along the way.

4. There are spiritually hungry people. They can see that the Pharisees aren't going to make good guides but they can find no one else so they simply stumble along without a map. They need people who will love them deeply and provide them guidance as they are open to it.

5. There are people who are looking everywhere but towards God to fill the empty voids in their life. They need people who will love them deeply and give them space to respond to that love.

As you look at those five types of people (and, of course, my descriptions don't even begin to fit everyone), which ones are inside the church walls and which ones are outside the church walls? Do we neglect the ones who wander in and focus only on those outside? Should everyone on the inside be a minister or are some of those people there to be fed? What about those who are part of other churches? Do we minister to the Pharisees from other traditions when we meet them on the street? Is it all right to invest time walking alongside pilgrims from other traditions? Are seekers off the radar once they find a place on somebody else's responsibility list?

Again, maybe I just haven't read far enough, but I don't think we'll truly arrive until we tear down the church walls entirely and simply minister to individuals where we find them - including inside the church.

As we go through our days we encounter people at all stages spiritually. All of those people -- leaders from my church or from other churches, disciples from my church or from other churches, seekers who come to my church or go to other churches or look outside the church, dormant souls who sleep in church pews or dormant souls in the grocery store, hungry people looking for love in all the wrong places -- all of them need someone to love them deeply and bring hope and encouragement to them as they travel life's path. How can I say who most needs an encouraging word from me: the office secretary from the church down the street whom I see at the 7/11 or the high school dropout loitering outside the door of that establishment with a cigarette in hand? The truth is, we all really do need each other and ministry should see people at all levels and in all places and look as much for receptivity as for need. Is not the best approach to greet both the secretary from the church down the street (who may be lonely and discouraged) and the high school dropout, giving my full attention to each in turn? Must I overlook one in order to focus ministry on the other?

Jesus ate with sinners and tax collectors. He also ate with Pharisees. I understand (and have heard in my own heart) the call to spend more time out where the sinners and tax collectors gather, but there are 24 hours in a day and I'm thinking I might need to hang out with the Pharisees from time to time as well. It turns out that maybe they also need a physician.

Loving the group of high school dropouts standing outside the 7/11 doesn't mean I can't hang out with the fine youth group at church on Sunday morning. Perhaps taking my compassion for the dropout gang to church and simply letting it show while interacting with the youth group is also ministry. And perhaps there's not as much distance between the two groups as it might first appear. If the lifestyle of church people reflects that of the culture at large as closely as reported by the dour statistics we're fed by researchers, why is it again that we have to go outside the church doors before we can start doing ministry?

Yes, there are a bunch of needy peolple outside the church doors. There are also a bunch of needy people inside the church doors, some of whom might have come specifically because they are looking for hope and love and a path to God.

Just some thoughts. I'm still learning.

Marsha

[Jim Monck]

I think Reggie's book is a must read for every Christian and especially pastors. His video has changed my congregation, and I have found many answers for which I have been searching for years. I think our denomination could learn a lot from his book, and it hits us pretty hard. When he said the church is more secular than the culture, I had to take a second look at that statement. But most of his statements are hard to deny. I gave the DVD to one of my fellow pastors and I think he has preached it to his congregation. I would also like to hear comments from anyone else who has read his book.

Bob would you share exactly how it has changed your congregation? What areas are different and how long of a time period are we talking about in regard to implimenting these changes?

[G R 'Scott' Cundiff]

I brought this book up here: http://www.naznet.com/community/showthread.php?t=17002

I thought I would bump this thread in an effort to not hijack the discussion already going on there.

I read this book about a year ago but have been recently reading through it again. Once again, I find it to be quite thought provoking. Here are a few random thoughts I have in response to it:

I think our church folks do more "outside the church" ministry than they think they do. They have spiritual conversations with co-workers and other students and do acts of servanthood without even thinking about it. Since we are so church oriented, a supervisor who has meaningful conversations with people at work doesn't think she is really ministering unless she is teaching a Sunday School class.

I think the church needs to do a better job of recognizing this. I recall how, in my early ministry, bi-vocational pastors were considered to be second class pastors who just couldn't get a big enough church. Somewhere along the way the General Church decided we had to have "tent makers" if we were going to plant new churches. They started describing these people as heroes. In time, it changed the thinking of the denomination. We need to do something similar concerning work-a-day Christians, like school teachers who impact more lives in an hour than the average pastor impacts in a week. Rather than trying to get such people to take more church jobs, we need to recognize (including officially) that they are already doing what Christians are supposed to do.

I want to engage our town's major, some school principals, and other civic leaders to find out what needs there are in the community and then encourage our church folks to plug in to them. Rather than starting a "Nazarene version" I want us to get out there and get involved.

I also want to do more stuff we normally do in the church anywhere but in the church. For instance, I'd like to see some Sunday School classes take place in restaurants.

Finally, I'd like to help our people get more comfortable about having spiritual conversations. Most of them do a wonderful job, but they don't think they do because we have told them that they have to "close the deal" and get the person saved and on the road to church membership. I'd like to give them permission to come up short of that and simply and honestly talk with people about their faith.

Well, that's my agenda for the next 5 or 6 years...and it's just the tip of the iceberg.

[Ian Gentles]

Excellent and well put!