Feeds:
Posts
Comments

Only 10,000 Hours to Go!

January 27, 2012 by Mark Woodward

In the first month of my first semester at Harding, a senior student named Ron McFarland walked up to me in the aisle before chapel and said, “Hey, would you like to go on a mission campaign?”  Completely intimidated and equally ignorant, I replied confidently, “Sure!”

I went to an interview with Owen Olbricht for a spot on the Campaigns Northeast team from Harding for the next summer.  One of the first questions he asked me was why I wanted to go—and I literally had no answer because I had no idea what a missions campaign was!  I was only 17 years old and already felt like I had gone to the moon to leave Texas and go to Arkansas to college.  Clueless!

I was accepted—but was completely unprepared for what I had committed to do—so, of course, I was afraid and tried to drop off the team at least once.   Ignorance, inexperience, fear, and no relationship with anyone else going all were a certain recipe for disaster. The promise of training was my only hope!

 In retrospect, the training I received was minimal. The twelve of us met weekly in a classroom of the Bible building. Sometimes we had mimeographed handouts of information on Mormons, Jehovah Witnesses, and other exotic religious groups we would certainly meet in Pennsylvania. We did go over the Salvation Sheet, which is the outline of scriptures that we used to present the need for salvation to those who agreed to study with us.  Mostly, we listened to stories from people who had gone before.

Six years later, Sherrylee and I left for full-time mission work in Germany. This was shortly before the introduction in our fellowship of mission majors, mission internships, and psychological testing. In fact, our only training for the mission field was our experiences on Campaigns Northeast.  Four summers of knocking on doors, talking with literally hundreds of people of all sorts about salvation, and working with mission churches in the Northeast United States may have been the best training available at the time.

Here’s what I know about training for missions—or equipping, as we prefer to call it now:

  • Everyone who does short-term or long-term missions needs serious preparation! Don’t put your youth group on the bus, don’t let your retiring Boomers on a plane, and don’t send your preacher overseas without their having been equipped and prepared for the foreseen tasks.  This is so obvious, but most short-term workers go ill-prepared!
  • Preparation and training involves more than just providing information! Reading a book on cultural faux pas in China is helpful, but not enough! Telling the youth group not to wander off is a start, but not complete. Some of the poorest works I know about were instigated by academic-type missionaries who knew everything about their field and about missiology—but did not know people.
  • Nothing can replace experiential training! We learn by doing. In my day, that meant we learned by trial and error on the field. Today, supervised internships and mentoring programs offer great opportunities for long-term workers to receive hands-on training.  Short-term mission workers are the ones who often are short-changed here.  In fact, short-term missions are often used as a training event—which is one of the reasons for the distaste for short-term missions among some missions people.
  •  Short-term missions should not be used as a training exercise when they involve real people!  It’s like sending an army recruit to the battlefront for two weeks to teach him how to be a soldier. Or sending a first-year medical student to operate on people for a couple of weeks to give her a taste of what it is like to be a doctor.
  • There is no single perfect path for mission preparations.  A short-term trip to China and a short-term trip to Africa may have some common moments, but MUCH of the experience will require very different skills, therefore, very different preparation.  In fact, mission preparations for sub-Saharan  Africa would be very different from preparations for North Africa.  So why do we think that one curriculum, one missions philosophy, or even one mentor can adequately prepare missionaries for the diversity of the world we live in??
  • A spiritual and theological preparation is foundational to any mission work, either short or long term!  Needless to say, these areas are most often assumed to be in place, and, therefore, skipped over for lack of time or money or personnel, or whatever!  But do you know what those teenagers believe who are going to Honduras?  You may know what they have been taught, but do you know what they believe?  So you have found someone willing to go to China, but what is their picture of church?  If their only reference is American church, they most likely can only operate within that frame.  But that frame doesn’t really work in China today, so now what??

In Outliers, Malcolm Gladwell describes the 10,000 Hour Rule, which he identifies as the 10,000 hours of practice that great success requires.  Abraham Lincoln reportedly said,“ Give me six hours to chop down a tree, and I will spend the first four hours sharpening the axe.”

I wonder if all of our mission workers wouldn’t be much happier and much more effective if we recommended—no, insisted—on more and better preparation—somewhere between four and 10,000 hours!

Posted in Christian Missions | Tagged , , , | Leave a Comment »

Do You Really Support Our Troops!

January 25, 2012 by Mark Woodward

I watched the President’s State of the Union speech last night. Very intentionally, President Obama framed his more controversial and political proposals with non-controversial, military bookends. He started with the removal of troops from Iraq and finished with the elimination of Osama bin Laden.  At every mention of the troops with their sacrifices and victories, both sides of Congress and all visitors stood and applauded.

 If there is one thing upon which Americans generally agree, it is that the country stands behind the troops on the ground!  Even when we disagree over why they are there or how long, no one ever goes on record saying our soldiers did a terrible job!

I couldn’t help but wonder if the American church of Christ feels that same way about its boots on the ground! I’m talking about the foot soldiers we send out to combat the kingdom of darkness all over the world—aka missionaries.

Times were when these soldiers of the cross seemed to be highly respected.  Missionaries like McCaleb, Shewmaker, Benson, and later Gatewood, Hare, and Bixler were well-known names with heroic stature in our churches.  Because of the big splash the Brazil team made in the early sixties and because of their innovative approach, they too continue to enjoy notoriety, especially in older, established churches.

I wonder how many of us can name five missionaries that have entered their field in this millennium—or even the last quarter century?  Unless you are on a mission committee that sent some recent workers or a teacher of missions, or working in a missions organization, I’m afraid of the results!

Our churches are still committed to missions, and we are still sending out new missionaries, so what has changed?  Here is a short list of some of the things I fear have reduced our enthusiasm for the troops:

  • Because it is now more expensive to go abroad than to work at home, churches are choosing more domestic mission projects.
  • Also because of economics, churches are choosing to support national preachers instead of Americans. National preachers are viewed as requiring much less support, no travel funds, and no benefits!  What a deal!
  • Foreign mission work is seen more as a competitor to local work. This sometimes has economic roots and sometimes geo-political.  When the nation is tired of foreign entanglements, the church becomes tired of them as well.
  • Because of fewer services per week, i.e., many churches only meeting Sunday morning for a general assembly, with other meetings done in classes or in homes, fewer are willing to open their pulpits for missionary reporting.  The average member in the pew has very little exposure to the work and sacrifice of current missionaries.
  • Mission work is low on the ladder of ministerial respect.  Fairly or unfairly, one hears the comment that people go to the mission field who can’t make it or who don’t want to fit in at home.   Test yourself: rank in value to the kingdom the following types of ministers:  mega-church preachers, small church preachers, youth ministers, campus ministers, worship ministers, church planters, and foreign missionaries.
  • A nineteenth-century attitude toward foreign missions predominates, which says missionaries should go to third-world countries and live in poverty, working only with people who are physically needy.  Interestingly enough, as Africa has become one of the most Christian continents on the planet, it has become an even greater magnet for American mission work! If there are more Christians in Africa than in the United States, perhaps American missionaries should be choosing to go other places. (I’m not saying that we should not continue to aid African Christians in their work. American Christians still have much more wealth than African Christians.)

This list is certainly not exhaustive, but perhaps will stimulate the conversation about missions among us.

I would love to see the day return when foreign missionaries are greeted with standing ovations, when churches line up to invite them to speak of their work, when mission committees bang on the doors of Christian colleges and missions organizations, looking for good people to send to their mission points.

What can you do to raise the stature of those soldiers of the cross who serve faithfully and sacrificially in the spiritual battlefields of this world?

Posted in Christian Missions | Tagged , , | 4 Comments »

Tear Down Those Walls and Put In Windows and Doors!

January 19, 2012 by Mark Woodward

Apparently I got so excited about blowing up silos that I forgot to address adequately two of the main areas for avoiding silos, that is, transparency and distribution of information. 

Real-life silos exist because different kinds of grains need to be stored and they need to be stored separately.  So the best functioning silos offer secure and appropriate storage to conserve the grains, and they isolate their grain and protect it from contact with any other grain.

Mission committees (or any other committee or subgroup) which protect, conserve, isolate, and/or separate are dangerous to the health of the church!  I hope that message has come through loudly and clearly in all of posts.

Let me offer you some suggestions for opening up your committee or your processes to avoid dangerous isolation.

  • Diversify your committee. I’ve already mentioned the possibility of establishing a rotating pattern of leadership in committees, so that no single person sits in first chair forever. Terms for committee members is also something to think about. The reason most committees don’t like new members is that they bring in new ideas. The reason committees need to add new members is for new  ideas!
  • Include members who will sync you with the whole church. You want to make sure that the mission committee’s goals and actions are in sync with the whole church, so why not invite one of the vision casters to be a part of the group. This might be an elder, a minister, or a member of a special committee.
  • Announce both your meetings and the agenda for the meetings publicly.  I understand that occasionally some delicate matters might need to be discussed privately, but 98% of all the committee meetings I have ever been in were not those kinds of meetings.  Why should they not be open meetings?  (I would challenge elders with the same question!)
  • Provide the most public platforms possible for your missionaries when they are with you! I know there was a time when missionaries reported by showing thousands of slides—but unless you are 55+, you don’t remember those days!  Most missionaries are barely acknowledged publicly in our churches, both when they are there and when they aren’t.  Sherrylee and I were sponsored by a very good church and supported by several other good churches—but even when we were in the states, if we did not ask for a meeting with the elders, if we did not fit the regular schedule of the mission committee, or if we were only able to visit a certain church on a non-church meeting day, then we would not even get a chance to talk to those directly involved with us, much less the other members of that congregation.
  • Publish both the goals of your committee as well as how you are working to meet those goals. At least yearly, the whole church should be included in your committee’s work through published information that they can study or refer back to later.
  • Encourage members to participate in the work at your mission sites! Short-term missions give members firsthand experience with the missions of the congregation.  Especially elders and ministers need that personal experience if they are to participate at home in promoting  missions as part of the vision of the church.

Keeping the members ignorant is a way of controlling them. Silo committees are afraid of new ideas and transparency.  Your mission committee needs to be as open, as transparent, as receptive to input, and as cooperative with all areas of the church as is possible for you!

 

Posted in Christian Missions, Church Leadership | Tagged , , , | Leave a Comment »

Blowing Up Silos In The Church!

January 18, 2012 by Mark Woodward

Blowing up silos is dangerous work! Relationships are threatened, church revenues may be threatened, and serious discontentment among certain subgroups of a congregation may result.  Let’s talk about ways to get rid of silos and try to avoid stepping on any landmines.

If you as a church leader see silos, if you as a member see silos, what can be done?

  • Decide if the fallout is worth it or not. I once heard about a deacon who would not give up the keys to the sound board at church—because he ran the sound board. That was his kingdom.  So is this little kingdom here worth the destruction that comes from blowing it up?  Good question! And there is no single right answer. In this particular case, the worship minister could not practice and the praise team could not rehearse unless it was convenient for this deacon with the keys to the sound board. So, very concretely, the effective worship of the entire congregation was held hostage by the sound board deacon.  The damage to the whole church was greater than the damage of losing this one family, so he was forced to give the keys up! 
  • Don’t destroy without having something better to replace it with.  I know of one congregation where one brother has been in charge of foreign missions for decades! He has done a very good job and served the church well, but his vision has not grown with the congregation, so now he is sometimes out of step with the whole church—but he doesn’t know it.  When someone has enough courage to tell him to give up control, there certainly needs to be a plan and people in place that will serve the church better than the good brother alone was doing! Blowing up silos is not the conclusion of the matter, just the means to a better end.
  • Know the difference between a battle and a war. Leading a rebellion against the elders because you can’t understand why they meet privately and you believe them to have silo mentality might succeed in forcing them out, but the damage done could destroy the whole congregation.  Breaking up the foreign mission committee because they refuse to give up their kingdom  might cost the church a family or two, but probably will not destroy the congregation—especially if there is something better to replace it with.  Destroying the congregation is losing the war; losing a couple of families is painful, but probably only losing a battle.
  • Address the challenges holistically, rather than particularly. Instead of announcing that the foreign missions committee is ruining the whole church because they dominate the church budgeting process, perhaps stepping back and looking at the whole budgeting process and addressing its inadequacies would be more productive.  Instead of painting a bull’s eye on one silo, why not look at the vision of the church as a whole and ask all subgroups to define themselves within that vision. Those that resist or have a hard time will be addressed by all those groups who define themselves or successfully re-defined themselves within the vision of the whole church. 
  • Take a long-term view.  So you think the long-term chair of the missions committee has too much control and not enough accountability. It is reasonable to think that it will not be a quick fix! You are going to have to be patient, working for peace as well as change. God is longsuffering, not willing any should perish but that all chairmen should come to repentance.  You can be longsuffering and patient as well.
  • Relieve fears. We said some people can’t give up control because they are afraid of what they will lose, for instance, like prestige, control, respect, and relationships.  Try alleviating some of those fears as part of the process. Honor people for what they have done. Assure them of relationships and respect. Celebrate the change in status, rather than the demise of the little king.
  • Act in love. If you sense hard feelings or disrespect in yourself towards that person or that subgroup, stop and examine your own heart before you do one more thing.
  • Don’t be afraid.

Christians are called to be peacemakers, so I do believe in living at peace with all people as much as it depends on me. I do know, though, that little kings and little queens of church territories are sitting on little thrones that don’t belong to them and that diminish the ability of the church to function fully and gloriously as the family of God or the body of Christ.

We must never allow other thrones inside the church than the throne of the King of Kings and Lord of Lords! 

Posted in Christian Missions, Church Leadership | Tagged , , , | Leave a Comment »

How To Build A Church Without Silos!

January 16, 2012 by Mark Woodward

Never building silos is easier than removing silos! I have heard preachers who tell about the first two years at their new congregation, all they did was break down the doors to silos and little kingdoms that had grown up over the years in that particular congregation.  My fear is that they are only the surviving preachers, i.e., the ones who can still talk about it;  the others who are not talking were not victorious in their battles with silos.

If you are planting a church, or if you have had a catastrophic event or truly phenomenal leadership that allows your church to reorganize completely, then here are a few suggestions for you to avoid building a missions silo:

  • Work on the mission and vision for the whole church before you start parsing that vision into sub-visions.  Discovering the big picture for a church is the result of lots of people praying together, talking together, praying together, searching the word together—and praying together.  Beware at this stage of the individuals who seem to have a single agenda or a single focus with no real interest in the other areas.  Help them either come back to working as part of the whole body or ask them to wait to speak until the vision for the whole is received.
  • Use a non-corporate metaphor for building your congregation’s organization.  I myself love the family metaphor, but there are others you might choose like the physical body or the tree and branches.  Using a different metaphor opens the conversation to different possibilities.
  • Build rotation into your model.  Nobody gets to be appointed to any position or becomes a member of any committee for life! Everybody understands that they are serving a defined term as elder, chairman, ministry leader, or committee member.  The term is not based on performance. You can’t run for re-election and get another term. Everybody steps down or away for some specified period of time before they can perform those same duties again for another term.
  • Build accountability into your model.  Nobody gets to be anything without being accountable to someone!  The hardest question here is to whom the elders will be accountable, both individually and collectively.  Without too much explanation, let me suggest that individually the elders need to be accountable to one another; collectively, they should be accountable to the flock they serve. 
  • Do budgets as representatives of the whole church, not as representatives of particular subgroups!  Try to remove any sense of competition for funds.
  • Do not idolize efficiency!  God did not call us to efficiency, but to faithfulness.  He is patient and longsuffering.  He tells us to wait on Him. Those are not instructions for efficiency, but rather for following in His steps. That’s where we want to be.
  • Don’t be afraid.  It’s God’s church, not yours! He is very much in control; you are not! Trust Him!

Tomorrow, look for the last post in this series on what to do if you find silos all around you!

Posted in Christian Missions, Church Leadership | Tagged , , , | Leave a Comment »

Who Built That Silo In My Church?

January 10, 2012 by Mark Woodward

Last week, we asked ourselves questions to discover whether or not the mission committee at our church works in a silo—that is, works independently of the main streams of church leadership and other primary activities of the local congregation.  Here’s the link if you missed that post:  Does No One Understand the Mission Committee: There Might Be A Reason

Before we explore remedies, let’s look at possible causes of silo organization.  If we can identify causes, then, I believe, we can do more than just address symptoms! We can cure the disease, not just manage it.

  • Silo organization can result by defaulting rather than strategic thinking. Since many larger corporations are organized by departments/divisions, each with its own budget and budget manager, those brothers who organize the church leadership into separate committees are just imitating what they have done at work.  There are other models to consider, for instance, the model of the physical body or perhaps the family.
  • Silo organization becomes a greater temptation as size of the church grows! The larger the church, the more difficult it becomes to gather input from multiple sources,  or to get diverse groups together, or to include larger numbers of people in decision-making processes, so the “natural” tendency is to opt for efficiency, moving decision-making into smaller, more specialized groups—the genesis of silos for many churches!!
  • Silo organization is often the result of the worship of specialization. I’m actually all for people learning lots about missions and using that experience and information for the good of the kingdom, BUT, I have seen mission committees dominated by the ex-missionary or the missions professor or the member who attended the last missions workshop, all to the detriment of the kingdom because no one knows so much that they can’t learn from someone else! No one’s experience is universal! No one set of mission principles works in every circumstance!
  • Silo organization may occur because of the budgeting process. If your budget is broken down into categories like local ministry, adult education, foreign missions, benevolence, building and grounds, then it is very easy to make two mistakes:  organizing your committees according to budget categories and assigning full responsibility for that portion of the budget to that one committee. 
  • Silo organization can happen with power players who want control of a fiefdom! If one person has to approve all the decisions; if only one person can sign the checks; if the meetings are just rubber stamping what one person wants to do; if one person sets the agenda for every meeting; if even one or two of these things are true, you are probably a member of a little kingdom within the church, no matter how benevolent the dictator is.
  • Silo organization often exists because of fear! While fear apparently is very real in industry because of job security issues, I tend to think that at church fear may be over loss of influence or loss of a sense of purpose, maybe even loss of relationships with certain missionaries. 
  • Silo organization can simply be a church tradition. Oops—the way we have always done it . . . . Surely I don’t even need to comment on that.

All of these First Causes are so common that I’m pretty sure many of you are saying, “Of course we do that. How else could it be done?” 

If you are a church leader and feel like there is always a little tension with the mission committee,

or if you are a mission committee member and feel like church leaders are always sticking their fingers into your business, or that they don’t understand how important this committee is;

If you are a minister and are frustrated by the lack of synergy and/or cohesiveness between the working leadership groups in your congregation, or

If you sense an allegiance anywhere in your congregation to a sub-group over the good of the whole,

look for silos, look for those who love silos—and I’ll finish this thought next time with some suggestions for actions to take to both avoid and remove silos.

Posted in Christian Missions, Church Leadership | Tagged , , , | 2 Comments »

Does No One Understand the Mission Committee? There Might Be A Reason!

January 5, 2012 by Mark Woodward

The term silo effect is pretty popular in business and organizational circles.  You also hear about silo vision and silo thinking.  All of these phrases derive from agricultural storage silos, typically with each individual silo housing a particular kind of grain.

The assumption in anything silo is that each unit is segmented in such a way that there is little to no communication or exchange between the two silos.  When this happens in an organization you might see two departments which are, in fact, interdependent, but which have separate goals and are working in a counterproductive way—but they don’t know it, because they don’t talk to each other.

Your church may be a collection of silos!  Many are!  The elders are one silo, the minister and his staff are another, the benevolence group are another—and the mission committee is almost always its own silo!

Let’s just talk about mission committees.  Let me ask a few leading questions, and you be the judge as to whether your mission committee works in a silo:

  1. Does your committee include and people from other important church areas: elders, ministers, youth, adult education, women’s ministry?
  2. Does your committee make foreign mission decisions as part of the process of making local mission decisions? Local benevolence decisions?  Local youth decisions?
  3. Is your committee invited to participate in the vision-setting meetings of the church leaders? (Budget meetings don’t count! Planning a budget is not the same as setting the vision.)
  4. How many of your missionaries or mission points can the average member of your church name?
  5. How many weeks per year is your mission work mentioned from the pulpit?

So what happens when several different committees of the church work independently of each other? I mean they may have different goals, different processes, different timetables, and different organizational styles!  Is this the picture of a body working in harmony?

Read I Corinthians 12 from The Message and tell me if silos are good for the body of Christ?

 12-13You can easily enough see how this kind of thing works by looking no further than your own body. Your body has many parts—limbs, organs, cells—but no matter how many parts you can name, you’re still one body. It’s exactly the same with Christ. By means of his one Spirit, we all said good-bye to our partial and piecemeal lives. We each used to independently call our own shots, but then we entered into a large and integrated life in which he has the final say in everything.

 14-18I want you to think about how all this makes you more significant, not less. A body isn’t just a single part blown up into something huge. It’s all the different-but-similar parts arranged and functioning together. If Foot said, “I’m not elegant like Hand, embellished with rings; I guess I don’t belong to this body,” would that make it so? If Ear said, “I’m not beautiful like Eye, limpid and expressive; I don’t deserve a place on the head,” would you want to remove it from the body? If the body was all eye, how could it hear? If all ear, how could it smell? As it is, we see that God has carefully placed each part of the body right where he wanted it.

 25-26The way God designed our bodies is a model for understanding our lives together as a church: every part dependent on every other part, the parts we mention and the parts we don’t, the parts we see and the parts we don’t. If one part hurts, every other part is involved in the hurt, and in the healing. If one part flourishes, every other part enters into the exuberance.

 27-31You are Christ’s body—that’s who you are! You must never forget this. Only as you accept your part of that body does your “part” mean anything.

Next I’ll offer you some suggestions for remedying the problem of a silo mission committee.  In the meantime, start making your own list!

Posted in Christian Missions, Church Leadership | Tagged , , , | 1 Comment »

Suggestions for Stretching in 2012

January 3, 2012 by Mark Woodward

Stretching becomes more important the older we get!  It’s pretty natural to stretch. Almost all of us stretch when we wake up in the morning.  When I drive lots of miles, it always feels good to get out of the car and stretch.  Extended periods of inactivity or confinement in tight spaces seem to naturally generate the need to stretch ourselves.

You know that pull in your back and your thighs when you try to touch your toes? Or the mild discomfort in your Achilles tendon when you stretch it? You have to bend a little further, reach further, or move some body part MORE than you usually do, or you have not really stretched anything! That extra is always a little uncomfortable and sometimes mildly painful, but you do it for the benefits.

And what are the benefits of stretching?  You feel better, you move better, and you avoid cramping or even injury by stretching.  No wonder it is one of the first things we do every morning!

I wonder if stretching ourselves spiritually shouldn’t be just as natural as stretching our physical body is?

It’s a new year, so I’d like to challenge us to make 2012 the year to start stretching, if it is not your current habit!

Here are some suggestions for starting your spiritual stretching.  Remember, if it is not a little uncomfortable or mildly painful, then you haven’t stretched at all.

  • Do something kind and thoughtful for someone you do not really like that much.  (Who was the first person that came to mind? That’s probably who you should choose!) And do it anonymously so that you are not worried about who gets the credit or what your motives are.
  • Sit in a very different place at church for several weeks.
  • Do your daily Bible readings out of a new modern version, not the Bible you have been using forever.
  • Give more than you have been.  How long has it been since you adjusted your weekly tithe? Or add a new regular donation to your budget for a needy person or a new mission work.
  • Read and/or research about a topic that has seems hard or uncomfortable to you. Do this long enough until you understand why other people are not uncomfortable with it.For example:
    • Homosexuality
    • Poverty and Welfare
    • Addictions and addictive behaviors
    • Contemporary vs. traditional worship
    • Islam  or Buddhism
    • Emerging Churches
    • Universal salvation vs. eternal punishment for the lost
    • Feminism
    • Non-evangelical branches of Christianity: Roman Catholicism, Orthodox, Calvinism, Charismatics.  And while you are learning, visit their services and get to know people personally who belong to that group.
  • Go on a mission trip instead of a vacation this year!  If you have always done service projects, do a faith-sharing mission trip.  If you have always stayed in the U.S., go out of the country for this one.
  • Make a list of things that are not wrong to do at church—in fact, some Christians do them–, but that you personally would rather not do—then do one of them!  You might try lifting your hands while you pray—at least no one will see you! Or you might kneel to pray—if not at church, then at home! (I remember when it was common to see our preachers kneel on the stage or on the first row when they prayed! But that’s been a long time ago.)

Don’t do all these stretches at once.  Give yourself time to recover from one before you attempt another.

And, don’t forget the benefits:  you feel better (about yourself and about other people), you are more flexible and can move more easily, and you avoid injury. Many Christians have been injured and have injured others because they were inflexible.

May your New Year be not just happy, but happier because you are a healthier Christian, ready to run the race put before you!

Posted in Uncategorized | Tagged , | 1 Comment »

# 1 Post of 2011: 13 Reasons Church Leaders Cannot Recognize That Their Church Is Dying!

January 1, 2012 by Mark Woodward

This choice on your part has taken me completely by surprise!  Another surprise is that it is perhaps the most continually read post I’ve written.  I suspect it is because it is often forwarded to church leaders from members or ministers . . . . Let’s pray that this New Year brings a more positive message about Christ’s churches!

!Years ago, I was a church leader in an ill church, and I really didn’t even know it! Certainly I had my concerns about different issues and challenges that we were facing, and I threw my influence as far as it would go to help enliven the church, but never did I think that the church might be in a death spiral!

Now, many years later, I ask myself why I did not recognize the very obvious signs of terminal decline. As I have searched my own soul, the following seem to me to be some of the reasons why church leaders do not even sniff the rottenness that is corrupting the Body!

1.     Too inexperienced. Few of our church leaders are trained church leaders. They are usually excellent volunteers, but how many would let an excellent hospital volunteer examine and diagnose you?  What if they couldn’t tell a mole from melanoma?

2. Too busy leading the church! The more rapid the decline, the more work there is for those trying to keep it alive! Hard to see imminent danger because of all the people needing your immediate attention.

3.     Too optimistic! Optimism–trust in God’s victory—is a highly desirable quality, but look at how difficult it was for Jesus to convince His closest disciples that He was going to die! Facing reality is also highly desirable.

4.     Too invested! Your family is in this church; your life-long friends are in this church; you grew up in this church! Unfortunately, none of these investments will save a declining church!

5.     Too satisfied. You have a great group! The building is paid for. Sure, you are a little smaller, but it is still alive for you!

6.     Too comfortable. It takes a lot of time and energy to change things. It is MUCH easier to just keep on doing what we have always done—and maybe it will work out!

7.     Too fearful. You can’t even go to the idea that this church might go away—too much pain involved!  Too many unanswerable questions about the unknown future.

8.     Too proud. After all, you are one of the leaders and things don’t fail that you are a part of! Not on your watch!

9.     Too tradition-bound. We’ve always done things this way and we’ve had rough days in the past, so if we just keep on course and not mess with the formula, we’ll be OK!

10.   Too much ownership! Granddaddy was an elder, Dad was an elder, and now I’m an elder. This is my church and my family’s church, and we will never let it fail!

11.    Too influenced by others. We’ve talked it over at the elders’ meeting, and the consensus is that  we are OK.  The members aren’t complaining.

12.    Too short-sighted. Even if it were true, what can anyone do about it. Might as well just ride to the end of the road.

13.    Too power-oriented. I’m one of the leaders. I can’t imagine not being a leader, so I think I’ll just keep on being a leader!

Rarely is leadership blindness the result of just one of the above Such lists are always an oversimplification of complex bundles of ideas and emotions, but no item on the list above allows church leaders to see clearly the plan of God for the people entrusted into their care.

I’ll end by just challenging church leaders to search their hearts and look for symptoms of reality blindness.  It’s not a fatal disease. Leaders can discover their vision and wisdom in time to take responsible action.

“If any of you lacks wisdom, he should ask God, who gives generously to all without finding fault, and it will be given to him. But when he asks, he must believe and not doubt.”   James 1:5-6

Posted in Uncategorized | 1 Comment »

# 2 in 2011: Southlake and The Hills: A Case Study for Church Leaders

December 31, 2011 by Mark Woodward

In January 2011, an amazing transaction took place between these two churches.  This post and the follow-up to it were widely read, probably by both supporters and antagonists. 

Church leaders seem to be the center of lots of controversy and criticism—and not without cause! Today though, I can’t wait to tell you about two groups of leaders who have done things extraordinarily well in a very difficult situation.

Let me just say to start that I am not in either of these groups, nor do I have unusual access to the inner workings of these groups, so I don’t know anything but the public version of the story. I also do not intend to tell the whole story because it is not mine to tell. What I want to do is share with you two instances of great church leadership!

The Southlake church has had a pretty tumultuous history during the last decade or so. We were told that in 1998/99, this church had over 1000 attending services each week.  Then came a series of splits, some involving doctrine, some involving styles, some involving leaders, and all involving personalities.

The congregation found itself in 2010 very diminished—200-250 in attendance—and with no readily apparent means of reversing the decline.  Elders in this kind of situation usually have very limited options.  Southlake leaders certainly considered some, if not all of the following:

  • Continue to function as a large church and continue to overwork and underserve their members.   Prognosis: Rapid decline!
  • Restructure to be a small church: reduce staff, reduce programs,  and be content.  Prognosis: Slower, but continued decline!
  • Disband and sell the property.  Assimilate into other churches. Prognosis: Members and leaders alike see their work for God and His kingdom as failed. The community understands closed doors as failure as well.
  • ?????   Something else!

Praise God – these spiritual leaders at Southlake chose to explore something bold, perhaps controversial, but something that would seem to hold promise for expanding the Kingdom.  They chose to approach The Hills Church of Christ, a large, thriving congregation in the same city about a merger that would be a blessing to both groups.

Here is where I simply want to stop and praise the leadership at Southlake for the following reasons:

  • They put the Kingdom first and their own identity as a congregation second!
  • They put the Kingdom first and did not claim ownership of the church.They did not make the high value of their property either an issue or the center of conversation!
  • They put the Kingdom first and emptied themselves: all of the elders offered to resign—and did.  The senior minister took a different position in the church.  Other ministry leaders let go of their territory—gave up their keys!
  • They put the Kingdom first and did not let the minority of naysayers either lead or derail the leadership. There were those who were fearful of losing their identity. Others were fearful of losing control over their own destiny. Others were—just fearful!

These faithful Southlake leaders are setting an example for all leaders in declining churches.  Many of our churches are beginning to reach a critical point in their decline, where just keeping the doors open is a matter of concern.  The Southlake solution is not the only solution—but putting the Kingdom first and emptying yourself should be part of every solution that every leader considers!

The leadership of The Hills Church of Christ also showed boldness and great vision. Again, I am not in the inner circle at The Hills, but here is what I know from the outside:

  • At the time they were approached by Southlake, The Hills was in the middle of a 10 million dollar campaign (Greater Things) that was demanding a great deal from the entire staff and eldership! They could have easily been too busy to even look at the Southlake dilemma.
  • Part of the 2020 Vision of The Hills as well as part of the Greater Things campaign that had already been announced was the establishment of a satellite campus on the west side of Ft. Worth that was going to require staffing and over a million dollars of investment to launch in 2011.  They could have easily said that starting one new campus was enough for this year!
  • With all of the above, The Hills could have easily offered only a half-way solution or a temporary arrangement—but they didn’t! They went all the way. Even this week, less than a month after the official merge, the Hills is spending a large amount of money on renovations at the Southlake building so that it will be the same quality as the North Richland Hills campus—if not better!  Key staff members as well as selected elders have already shifted locations. Not all the foundation is in place, but it will be soon!

The result of the prayerful work of these two groups of church leaders is that two congregations are now one. Both are stronger, both are excited about the new beginnings, and rather than a funeral, the community of Southlake is going to see fireworks!

Posted in Uncategorized | Leave a Comment »

« Newer Posts - Older Posts »