This week I am at the annual Church of God Area Administrator's meeting, in San Diego. This is a tremendous opportunity for district leaders to gather together for collaborative exchange, learning and fellowship. One of the features of our event is spending a day with a noted, outside resource person. This year John Kaiser, author of Winning on Purpose: How to Organize Congregations to Succeed in their Mission, was our guest. Kaiser is one of the leading experts today on congregational structure.
The whole matter of structure is an peculiar one for the Church of God. As I've highlighted before, our relationship to organizational structure came about more by necessity than by design. The result has been structures that are often ineffective, and even dysfunctional. This can be observed at all levels: national, regional and congregational. Fortunately, we are beginning to recognize the need for change; although our uneasy history with organization makes it difficult.
I encourage you to read Kaiser's book. There are many practical applications that are very relevant to the Church of God and our polity.
The whole matter of structure is an peculiar one for the Church of God. As I've highlighted before, our relationship to organizational structure came about more by necessity than by design. The result has been structures that are often ineffective, and even dysfunctional. This can be observed at all levels: national, regional and congregational. Fortunately, we are beginning to recognize the need for change; although our uneasy history with organization makes it difficult.
I encourage you to read Kaiser's book. There are many practical applications that are very relevant to the Church of God and our polity.
5 comments:
It is early as I read your post. I am still having morning coffee, following breakfast ... musing on your comments.
I am in the midst of reading Gospel Trumpets 1881-1886. Your measured and thoughtful comments seem so different from the passionate proclamations of Warner & Company as he confronted denominationalism with his holiness and unity message.
I wonder within myself if your measuring of ecclesiastical measurements help the church make any more difference than did Warner's passionate outpouring of theological purity.
Our world is riding a speeding train of social change, and while I am in wonder at the delights of my computer, just how much are we energizing the passengers with hope as they face unsolved problems that go back to the garden of Eden.
I Always enjoy your comments, Lloyd...
This is really a comment to Wayne. We live in a very different world than that of DS Warner. In Warner's day there was very little of church structure to the Gospel Trumpet and the method by which Warner and his associates spread the word. Out of necessity, we had created complex systems of structure. As an inintended result, many of our churches have been hijacked by congregation members with supposed good intentions.
While those intentions include worship and growing spiritually, they also include a lot of "whats in it for me". It's more about maintining the status quo, than reaching the lost, it's more about minister control that ministry.
I am a member of a church in Florida that has followed Kaiser's model. I can tell you first hand that it works. It is not easy to switch to this model as many well entrenched church members see it as a threat to their control. But it needs to happen or many of our churches will die a slow and painful death.
Bottom line is that we need to get back to recapturing the original purpose of the church and refocus or structure to accommodate it. We need to intentionally create programs, budgets, small groups and community initiatives to reach the lost. That is what Kaiser's model does. Jesus did not say to us "If you build it they will come" he said "GO and make disciples".
I do not think that DS Warner had to get approval from a church board or council to travel and preach the Word of God his way. But if he were here today, I fear that he would not be allowed to do church his way.
Kaiser's model works!
Thanks Charlie.
While I have great agreement with you, I recognize Warner did have to walk free of the status quo of his day to do ministry his way and preach his message. That was the significance of his exit from the N IN Eldership with 5 supporters.
I am not familiar with Kaiser, but wonder how your church is changing its immediate environment.
And yes, I too have been a victim of those power struggles.
As a Movement (that lacked the movement) I believe we, with the exception of a few leaders, have yet to discern the power within our message. If we could catch Warner's I have a dream vision, we would see something in the religious realm akin to what is taking place today politically with Barak Obama's entrance into the White House. We would see small churches develop greatness, we would see people's lives transformed beyond the narrower scope of "salvation" and we would see a new wave of denominational cooperation.Wayne
Wayne - well said!
"Church" as we know it is on its way out the door, and it can't be too soon. According to researcher and Christian statistical analyst George Barna, North America is in the early stages of what may well become the most significant spiritual reformation of the past hundred years!
Unlike previous Great Awakenings, which worked to bring people into organized religion, this new movement involves people coming away from reliance upon the organized church into a deeper connection with and reliance upon God. Already in our country, millions of Christians have stopped “going to church." Barna expects that in 20 years "only about one-third of the population will rely upon a local congregation as the primary or exclusive means for experiencing and expressing their faith."
So the question is, will the Church of God be part of the solution or the problem?
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