I remember being asked what I would do if ‘they found the body of Christ’. Like, the physical body of Christ. Would I switch faiths? Have no faith? And so on. Truthfully, it’s going to be hard to convince me you found THE body of Christ, so this is largely a hypothetical exercise. But it is a worth while exercise.
What is the greatest challenge to your faith? What would be the greatest challenge to your belief in God? If you were to ever stop being a Christian, what would cause it?
The gym is an interesting place. You can find people trying to change their lives in there by trying to lose weight and stay healthy. These are the people that go into a gym with the out of style workout clothes, who look a little lost. They’re also often really worried that everyone is looking at them because they’re doing the exercise wrong, or just look out of place. But they’re the person that really should be there, and deserve the praise.
You can also find people who really only like looking good. They go everyday wearing the trendiest workout clothing and gear. They look huge, and warm up by lifting my max on bench press, and then lift weights that are essentially fake to me. And I hated working out next to these people as a lanky runner who could barely bench close to his body weight. But I always wondered just what those body builders could do in the real world. They were great at bench pressing, but other than that, I didn’t think they’d really be good at anything athletic. I never really felt like that was an ‘honest’ workout. It just allowed you to look like you were really fit, while only being good a just a few things.
Crossfit, as a workout regimen, has exploded over the last few years. It focuses on constantly challenging people to improve their overall fitness, using a wide range of exercises and skills, all at a fairly high intensity. (Don’t worry if that didn’t make any sense, it’s not really important for the rest of the post). It’s become so popular that is its’ own brand of gym, complete with clothing and gear. The people who do Crossfit (affectionately self-referring to themselves as ‘Crossfitters’) wear that brand like a badge of honor. That brand is proof of our initiation into the craziness that is Crossfit.
American christianity has really fallen into a “gym membership” type of situation. You can find a lot of people who show up on Sunday morning, look really good, and go home, without really ever showing a ‘functional Christianity’. Then you have some people who look out of place, but are the real rock stars of the church, because they’re there to meet Christ, and don’t care how they look. Then there’s a third group I haven’t talked about yet: the people who have a membership, but don’t show up. And the problem is that shouldn’t be allowed.
Somewhere along the way, the church broadened the definition of ‘Christian’ enough to mean just about anything nice. ‘That’s mighty christian of you’ became a popular phrase to describe a kind action. And now, we’re so scared of evangelism and upsetting people that we just keep the definition broad.
Early Christians were describe as fanatics. People looked at them like they were in a cult (to be fair, to worshippers of Greek gods, they were). There wasn’t anyone who would say they were a Christian without putting some skin in the game. When you risk going to jail and execution for going to church, you tend not to fake it.
Today, there are a lot of people who are socially Christian. They’re good at looking, acting, and sounding Christian. But they can’t really do anything practically with their faith. Still others think that because they’re in a “Christian nation”, or because they are members at a church, that they’re truly “Christian”.
And my complaint isn’t really against them. It’s against the church, for allowing this gym membership mindset to settle in.
I knew who the ‘crossfitters’ were when I was working out there. They were the ones who, day in, day out, were there to suffer each miserable rep with me. They weren’t the ones with the trendiest gear. They weren’t the ones who came only when they saw a work out they liked. They came prepared to love the work out, or hate it, depending.
You can’t call yourself a crossfitter without putting the sweat in.
You can’t call yourself a Christian without doing the same.
I’ve only been at this church leadership game for a few years, but I grew up in a strong United Methodist Church when I was younger. Throughout college and seminary, I had heard about several people who were going to be in every decision a church makes. Every new idea, or new approach would inevitably get their input. Here’s the kicker, they’re not on any roster, official committee, and they don’t come on Sunday morning.
They’re ‘just in case’, traditions, and the pillar of the church (Okay, I admit, they’re not really people, but they may as well be). But I wonder what would happen if we would start to think about them as actual people in the meetings. Like, if we set out chairs for these three people, would we begin to realize the difficulty in our decision making processes. Maybe then we would realize just how crowded our meetings are.
I remember trying to have conversations and make decisions that I felt like would help steer the church in a good, Godly direction, only to have ‘Justin’, ‘Tray’, or Miss Pillar shoot it down. We couldn’t make room by getting rid of things that hadn’t been used in two decades, just in case we’d need them again. I’ve been told we can’t allow coffee in the sanctuary because of tradition. And I’ve been told that we can’t remove a tree because Miss Pillar’s late husband planted it, even though it desperately needs trimmed and no one likes parking near it.
Now, I’m not opposed to traditions within churches. I’m a big fan of contingency plans. And I understand that the church I am serving now was built and sustained by many, many people. But these three voices often crowd out any new ideas, innovations, or needed transitions. These three things will stifle a decision making team like nothing else. And more importantly, these three voices don’t leave room for the Smith’s to say anything.
The Smith’s are that new family that just moved in down the street, and are looking for a church. They’re the people who have been coming to the church for a few months, who are looking to get more involved but don’t know where to start or even if they fit in. The Smiths are the people who the church keeps saying they want involved, who the church wants to take leadership, but only if Tray, Justin, and Miss Pillar stay on the committees. So long as those three people get the final say about the decisions the Smiths make, the church will be happy. So the Smith’s never become leaders. They never fully engage in the church. Maybe they even leave. And the church is left wondering why there’s no new life in leadership. So what do you do about this? I’m glad you asked (well, I mean, I asked for you…)
1) Begin with Prayer– I know this sounds obvious, but I have had more than my fair share of meetings that didn’t begin with prayer. Now, I know some of this is my fault (I am the pastor after all), but a lot of churches simply don’t have a culture of prayer. They don’t begin their team meetings, worship services, or fellowship events with prayer. Without a good culture of prayer, the congregation, and it’s leadership, will not be able to hear and follow the voice of God. Ultimately, we can’t make the best decision without a culture of prayer.
2) Ask ‘Who is this decision for?’ – If your church is trying to grow and make disciples, that means you’re looking for younger families and people who don’t go to your church. That means the people you’re trying to reach, are not at your meetings. And if you don’t remember who your decision is for, you and your team will gradually gravitate back into thinking about the people who are familiar to you. So ask yourself and your team, ‘How does this decision help the Smiths?’ Caveat here: There are definitely times and places for the decisions to be made for the long time church members. Their service should definitely be honored. Holding special services, offering formal ‘thank you’s’, and other ways to honor them are definitely good and Godly things. In those cases, you should definitely be answering ‘who’ with ‘Mr and Miss Pillar’.
3) Have guidelines for Justin and Tray– Traditions and contingencies are important. They really are. But your church doesn’t need piano receipts from 1956. And you should be able to explain why the tradition is important to the Smiths. I hated being told ‘because I said so’ when I was a kid (to be fair, it was easier than explaining that traffic is dangerous to a seven year old) and I imagine you did too. Being told that we can’t move the pulpit ‘because it’s formal’, despite not using it, is not going to answer the Smith’s question anymore than ‘because I said so’ did when you were a child.
Traditions can be vitally important to a church, but only if the church knows what they mean. Why do some churches light candles at the beginning of a service? Why do the kids go forward for a few minutes with the pastor? Why do we celebrate communion when we do? Why do we keep the pews instead of chairs? Why does or doesn’t the pastor wear a robe? All of these questions can mean something. But if we can’t explain those ‘somethings’ to the Smith’s coming in off the street, we are in trouble. And as far as dealing with contingencies, have a general guideline for when something is obsolete. How many years do you need to keep the piano that no one plays? How long do you need to keep the choir music?
If a person has thirty years and hundreds of songs worth of sheet music stored in a spare room, even though they only sing about twenty different songs a year, we would call that person a hoarder. So why is it normal for the church to do it?
So there you go. Three things I think can help us deal with the pseudo people at all of our meetings and in all of our decisions. Let me know your thoughts down below. If you find something helpful, share this blog with your friends.
Leadership in established churches is tough. I don’t mean that to sound like a complaint. I’m just being honest. You’re dealing with a culture that is long established, deeply rooted, and likely something that isn’t thoughtfully considered or noticed. And because the culture of a church can settle into kind of a mindless routine, the idea of building momentum can be incredibly difficult. I say this from personal experience, as well as loads of anecdotal experience.
Here’s the thing: the culture isn’t usually something that was intentionally put in park. It just kind of happened. A church may have tried a new outreach years ago, and had loads of growing pains in the process of putting it together. They had started to build momentum, but then got exhausted, or got just enough momentum going to get the outreach to be seemingly self sustaining. It’s kind of like that scene in ‘Little Miss Sunshine’, where they need to get the van going fast enough to shift into second gear in order to start. A lot of churches can push hard enough, long enough to get to first or second gear. And then they’ll hit cruise control until they run out of gas.
The thing is a church that wants to grow beyond where they are has to eventually push past what they’ve done. So how, oh great and powerful Oz, do you go from first or second gear into third, fourth, or even fifth? Minding the fact that I am not in your church setting, I have a few ideas that I developed here recently from replaying my favorite computer strategy game, ‘Starcraft’.
First of all, you need to know your ‘style of play’. In the game, there are different species with different abilities and traits, and they lend themselves to different playing styles. Are you aggressive? Are you good at rolling with the punches? Does it take you a little bit to get up and running, but once you start, you’re a juggernaut?
Some of us are really good at coming up with quick ideas, and getting little victories early. And those little victories can build on each other. Others take a little time to figure out which direction they want to go, but once they get going, they’re really tough to stop. Still others are incredibly gifted at changing direction mid step. Know you’re style of leadership, and use the strengths God gave you.
Secondly, you need to know your teams capabilities. Each species in the game have certain strengths and weaknesses that lend themselves to those playing styles. Like wise, each team has different abilities, skills, and talents. You have to know what they are, as well as what they are not.
And you need to be brutally honest with yourself about those capabilities. I know you want to save souls for Jesus, and grow the church like no one has before, but that doesn’t mean that your praise band is suddenly going to be Hillsong. If you’re not honest about capabilities, you’ll risk putting your team members into positions to fail because they were nowhere near prepared.
Third, you need to form a strategic plan of attack, and stick with it. After you play as a species a time or two, you usually figure out what you like to do with them. And once you know whether you want to attack via ground or air, in large swarms or surgical strikes, you can put the right pieces in place, in the right order, and do it with a purpose.
Similarly, once you have an set destination in mind, you need to lay out the plan and go with it. This isn’t to say that you don’t tinker with or tweak the plan along the way. But you don’t want to abandon the plan at the first sign of resistance or difficulty. You need to be confident in the steps you’ve laid out, and follow through with them.
There is a lot more I could (and likely will) say on this, but those are three things I’ve found to be helpful in building momentum, both in the church and in computer games.
The Dead Drop 