In some sectors of the church today there’s great momentum, clarity of mission, risk-taking experimentation, courageous leadership, and fresh reliance on the Holy Spirit for direction, empowering, and transformation.
Churches are breaking out of the attractional paradigm and are moving their ministry focus off their facilities and into the community where those who need Christ are. Committed to love and serve people until they ask why, Christians are living the Gospel among the unchurched – and they are responding with surprise, with gratitude, and with saving faith in Jesus.
And, in other sectors, churches, ministers and members are bewildered. Attendance is falling. So is giving. Enthusiasm for church programs is low. Discouragement is high. Anxiety is epidemic.
Denominational systems feel this more intensely. Local churches are less able or willing to send money ‘up the food chain’. Regional and national budgets are being slashed. Programs and staff are being eliminated. Every forecast is more sobering than the last. The Church is aging…more rapidly than ever. Since most giving comes from the more senior members, their mortality portends the same for the systems their generosity built and sustained for decades.
Like a bewildered ball player, thousands of clergy and denominational execs who are “at bat” in this hour stand in the batter’s box…crouched to bunt.
The advantage is if you’re going to bunt, it’s the best stance to be in. The disadvantage: you can’t do anything but bunt from that crouch. And, here’s where many in the Church find themselves today.
Not sure how to stem the receding tide of dollars and attendees, Church leaders cycle from one well-worn, low-risk program to another.
Bunt left.
Bunt right.
Bunt down the middle.
Trouble is, the “score” is so lopsided that laying down bunts won’t move us forward fast enough.
What’s needed is to restore apostolic momentum to the Church.
Apostles are “sent ones”. The apostolic Church was a sent church. In contrast to today’s stogy institutions, the early Church was on the move.
Its message: Jesus.
Its focus: heart transformation.
Its method: personal encounters as the redeemed loved, healed, and shared their stories.
For this to recur, our churches need to mature and mobilize Christians as ministers to those outside.
In May, my CRM team will equip pastors, church planters, and lay leader to do exactly that.
At reFOCUS: ATLANTA we’ll introduce tools we’ve developed working with more than 5,000 pastors and churches. Strengthening pastors to lead, Christians to mature, and churches to engage their cities with the lived-and-proclaimed Gospel.
Join us for these three very important days: http://www.refocusing.org/events/
Batter up!
Coaching distinctions #49.doc
This article reminds me what a huge factor ‘fear of failure’ plays into us prefering a stance of squaring off to bunt. We need to redefine failure as ‘refusing to try’. It seems to me the only way the disciples could have ‘failed’ the Great Commission would be to ‘stay’ rather than ‘go’. We spend much of our time trying to be sucessful as we ‘stay’ in our buildings, committees and potlucks. As we’re stepping out more as a church, we’re not sure of the outcomes or metrics of our missional ministries- we’re trusting God for those results.
Thanks Pastor Darren for your insightful response! It’s funny. When we read the New Testament there’s almost nothing that resembles the pervading emphasis in churches today on staying “in our buildings, committees and potlucks.” Everything we read about required risk, trust, and uncertainty. That, I believe, is central to the lifestyle that the Father intended for those who live in an intimate relationship with the Savior.
Deep trust. Lots of risking for the sake of the Kingdom’s advance in our communities, and the conviction that the Lordship of Christ is central to all we say and do. He is such a good role model.
It seems strange that we in the American Church are so invested in priorities that didn’t even seem to register with the apostles. My prayer is that humble, courageous leaders like you, Darren, will be multiplied in the Church so that she regains the vitality, conviction, power, and influence that we read about throughout the New Testament.