It’s being remade

As the 1950s model declines, new ways of being the church are popping up all over, and gospel truths are now being found in new containers, writes a social entrepreneur.

TUESDAY, FEBRUARY 6, 2024

Shannon Hopkins, Co-founder & Lead Cultivator RoodGood

Picture this: An old church is now a cafe. From 9 to 5, it serves coffee, cakes and sandwiches in the historic hallowed space, with light streaming through the stained glass. Young people with piercings serve chai and lattes to customers of all ages and socioeconomic backgrounds.

Then, on a Sunday evening, with the smell of coffee still in the air, people gather around tables to talk about justice and economics and to question the role faith plays in their lives.

It’s not a secret: the way we church is changing. Yet many of our structures and systems and ways of doing church still hang on a model from another era. Modern life is different. Work is different; dating, community life, technology — they’re all different. So shouldn’t church be different as well?

This is a question I’ve been asking for nearly 30 years. Perhaps it started when I took my college friend Kim home with me one Easter. When we went to church, everyone else got dressed up, but Kim just had jeans. Afterward, she said that while her experience in church had been nice in some ways, she had felt like a fish out of water.

After college, I had friends who were longing for conversations about meaning and purpose — but church was the last place they would look for such discussions.

Over the last 20 years, I’ve worked to create communities that offer space for deep relationships and deep questions while at the same time serving people less fortunate than ourselves. I’ve tried a lot of experiments, building the road as I’ve walked it.

In turbulent times, we look for the safe harbor, the thing that doesn’t change, to help us stay grounded. For the church, I believe that the gospel — not the form of church — is that thing.

As new forms of mission and ministry are taking shape, this is a moment of hope as well as pain. Just like the messy but beautiful process of giving birth, the re-imagining of the landscape of the church is an intricate dance of pain and promise.

There’s always a risk when we step into the new. We have to let go of something to make room for fresh things. Isn’t this a hallmark of the Lord’s leading? There is an invitation to trust. We don’t have to have it all buttoned up and figured out before we step out.

As someone who has lived and worked on the margins of the institutional church for decades, I am grateful, proud and optimistic when I see all the vibrant initiatives that are taking root. It is clear this is no longer a fad of the 90s.

You don’t have to look far to see breweries and bakeries popping up in restored church properties or in new monastic communities. Just look around and you will find kitchen table entrepreneurs putting idle church kitchens into service, using food to address loneliness and food insecurity. Churches are also leveraging their land to meet the needs of their neighbors with efforts such as affordable housing, senior communities and new economic development.

These new models are creating jobs, community and new financial futures for congregations. But they’re also showing the world a dynamic church, transforming the lives of people and the community around them. To me, that looks like the gospel in action.

If you are in a church longing to see something new, how do you know where to start?

Don’t look back. When I travel, I’m often struck by the way that people in other countries seem to be looking ahead, looking forward. I find that in the U.S. and Europe we tend to look back to the “good old days.” This is not a time to look back but rather a time to look ahead and embrace the future.

Lament. You do need to grieve what is being lost. The ability to grieve well is a signature gift of those with Christian faith. After all, we believe in a gospel of death and resurrection.

Experiment. When you try new things, hold them lightly. If you want to do something with food, host a farmers market or a pop-up restaurant, but do it once or twice before making further plans and see what you learn. If you know a lot of people working from home, try a work-from-church day. As you set off to do some experiments, it is helpful to embrace a theology of enough and to approach it as a learning exercise.

Serve. It is important to adopt an attitude of service and to make justice a priority. This starts by really seeing others, loving others and understanding the challenges they face. Launch a listening tour in which you ask questions, listen deeply and find out from your neighbors what they need most. Then start right there! It will lead you to bigger systemic issues, and you’ll be able to approach that complex work grounded in the experiences of those most directly affected.

Be open to surprise. We know that the ways of God are not our ways. After all, God came to us as an infant and not as someone in power. Be ready to be surprised — and to surprise your community — by doing something new. The church is turning up and creating impact in ways that are unexpected.

I use the acronym BLESS to teach these five steps: Don’t Look Back, Lament, Experiment, Serve, Surprise.

The world hasn’t been expecting the church to radically create affordable housing, provide for those exiting prison, offer services for seniors, etc. To be honest, a lot of people see the church as an in-group seeking to push its own agenda. But that isn’t our story.

Churches becoming pubs and cafes and new housing developments? I say yes, because it is all part of the church becoming new. We can repurpose our sacred buildings so they can shimmer with hope and justice for all.

From: Faithandleadership.com

Our Savior’s Lutheran Church, a congregation of the Evangelical Church in America, is located in the western Wisconsin community of Amery. Recently, leadership asked all members to engage with the Church Assessment Tool in preparation for calling a new pastor. There was a resounding response to the CAT by a large number of people.

Leaders learned valuable information. OSLC is a congregation with a wide demographic spread and capacity to grow and impact the community and beyond. The data shows that there is eagerness to grow the external impact of the congregation. In fact, they have areas of interest that are unusually high and where members want to see additional energy invested. They include: “Work as an advocate for social and institutional change so that society might better reflect the values of the kingdom of God” and “Develop ministries that work toward healing those broken by life circumstances.”

Now, the Council and Transition Team will be making plans for moving forward into a bright future with a compelling mission, in addition to calling a new pastor.

The CAT provided valuable and practical insight for OSLC upon which governance will make better decisions, in less time and with greater confidence.

If your congregation would like to learn about the CAT and benefits of gathering the views and perspectives of all your people, contact us today.

October 2, 2023 by Susan Nienaber

Many pastors and leaders know that one of the biggest sources of conflict and decline in long-established congregations is the lack of a clear sense of purpose and direction. Not being clear is quite costly for congregations. Without direction and purpose, most congregations deteriorate into social clubs where participants compete to get their individual wants and preferences met.

The good news is that many congregations have successfully taken on this challenge. It takes time and sustained attention to this work, but the rewards are enormous. My colleague David Brubaker has made some concrete suggestions in his article “Who are We and Why are We Here?” Congregations that shift their culture and grow in vitality focus on fulfilling their core purpose. Successful congregations keep the main thing the main thing.

The Main Thing

Too many congregations focus instead on trying to keep everybody happy—an impossible task that only sows the seeds for future conflict. By the time a congregation has a full-blown case of “social club-itis,” pastors and leaders have a hard time knowing what to do to change the congregation’s culture.

How can you shift your congregation’s attention toward the main thing? Here are some ideas that have worked in other places:

Research what language your congregation has used in the past to describe your congregation’s purpose. Most congregations have attempted to clarify their purpose and direction. Sometimes that work ended up in a filing cabinet and was forgotten, but there might be some useful tidbits with which to start. As my colleague, Alice Mann, has said, it’s helpful to ask “What does this language mean for us now?” If you are part of a larger denomination check, with its leaders. It might be easier to begin by using language already worked out by others. In my system, we believe a congregation is a vital expression of our faith tradition when it is helping people grow in their relationship with God, reaching new people and meeting critical needs in the community. It’s easier for congregations to determine their purpose and direction when they have some clear initial language.

Get the congregation centered and grounded. This is key. It is hard work to break the habit of focusing on individuals’ wants and preferences. And even after you have begun climbing out of that ditch, it’s easy to slip back. Your liturgy and traditions can help the whole congregation to get focused. In my tradition, we often begin with a prayer initiative, using a type of prayer that helps folks surrender to God’s will instead of their own. We ask the pastor to work with a couple of spiritually mature folks to write a prayer for this purpose. Regardless of your tradition it is helpful to find language that teaches people how to let go and become more grounded in their spiritual practices.

Look at the Big Picture

Create space for big-picture reflection. After folks have become more spiritually grounded, help them to learn to reflect together (a.k.a., spiritual discernment). I love the image of getting up on the balcony and looking down on your congregation as described in Ron Heifetz and Marty Linsky’s Leadership on the Line. Most congregations with a case of “social club-itis” are very busy with what I call “inconsequential busyness”—activity based on individual preferences. We need to slow down to do deeper reflection.

Develop the capacity to notice when paths are opening. Discerning what to let go of and what to embrace is not easy—it requires testing and experimentation. Does a particular suggestion feel like just more of the same? Or does the idea bring joy, excitement, energy, and passion? Does an emerging path feel fresh and faithful? I would pay attention to those nuances.

Be willing to take risks. As a congregation gets aligned with its purpose, participants may experience feelings of loss, anxiety and even fear. Not everyone will be willing to get onto the train right away. Some may never want to go in the chosen direction and will complain or even leave.

Connect with People

Communicate well. Communication in volunteer organizations is really challenging and is getting more challenging all the time. Speaking of preferences! We all have our preferred ways of receiving information—phone, text, email, Zoom. Congregations that get into the most trouble with change management are usually not communicating well. Each message needs to be over-communicated. Folks need opportunities to contribute, interact, and ask questions.

Bring people along. Years ago, a mentor told me leading change is a dance: leaning out ahead of the congregation and then knowing when to drop back and keep pace. If you get too far ahead, folks get confused, which leads to resistance. Energy and momentum get lost when we don’t move quickly enough. Another pastor said the difference between planting a new church and a leading a long-established one like riding a jet ski vs. turning an ocean liner. It’s going to take a long time to turn that ocean liner! As congregational leaders, you will need an accurate assessment of their congregations’ distress tolerance, and of what messages and teachings you will need to share over and over.

Revitalization work requires a deep mental and spiritual shift, which challenges even congregations that seem most ready for change. Keeping the main thing the main thing is not just a nice idea or an interesting option. It is the core work of being a faith-based community. Without this essential piece, we are no different than the local volunteer organization down the block.

When the path forward is obvious, it is relatively easy for a leader to know what to do. We can rely on strategies that have worked well in the past. We can use existing resources and relationships to solve problems, set direction and create new opportunities. But when significant issues arise that are novel and more complex, leaders and organizations confront a crucial dilemma: How do you lead when you aren’t sure where you’re going?

Some of our uncertainty today is external to the church. Headlines remind us daily that we are in uncharted territory — and probably will be for some time. In addition to the global pandemic, our neighborhoods and cities are reckoning with social and cultural issues that affect every aspect of our lives, from healthcare to education.

The church faces internal uncertainty, too. If church members do not promptly return to in-person worship at pre-pandemic levels, what will we do to cultivate authentic community and share the responsibility of being the body of Christ? How should we disciple emerging generations when our culture often deconstructs their faith and the ways we use technology interrupt their engagement with faith?

If you’re attempting to do strategic planning, you probably need to accept the fact that it is impossible to determine what the church will need in three to five years. Susan Beaumont says that when the church is in a “liminal season,” the way forward is ambiguous, and this makes us feel disoriented.

Now more than ever, we need to clarify our purpose. Ask big questions with your leadership team:

1. Why does the church exist?
2. What and who has God called our particular congregation to do and be right now?

Sometimes, the best we can do is admit what we do not know about the future. Then we need to convene our people to listen deeply to the Spirit of God. The feeling of uncertainty may never completely disappear. But the more we listen for God’s genuine call, the more we can lead forward with courage and faith.

f leadership feels especially daunting to you these days, you’re not alone. Nothing in our preparation equipped any of us to reinvent the way we do ministry while trying to sustain ministry at the same time.

The words of writer Alice Walker remind us that “when we let Spirit lead us it is impossible to know where we are being led…” However, Jesus gives us the assurance that he “will be with us always, to the very end of the earth.” Even though you don’t know where you’re going, you do know who’s going with you. Sometimes that’s enough.

The Alban team and I always look forward to hearing your comments. You can reach us at alban@duke.edu. Until next time, blessings!

Prince Rivers

One of the more interesting initial findings of the work the Center for Healthy Churches is doing with Belmont University on 21st Century thriving is that, by itself, where a congregation lands on the spectrum of valuing history to valuing cultural relevance tends to make slight difference on whether a congregation is thriving. Instead, what we found is that thriving churches tend to have robust mechanisms for teaching and communicating timeless truths in timely ways. In other words, thriving churches find ways to make timeless practices relevant.The most important question for congregations who are trying to thrive in a 21st Century context will be only tangentially connected to issues of either trends or traditions, and it will have little to nothing to do with questions of style or methodological preference. The question that thriving congregations will ask is how we can take the forms of worship and faith development that are particular to your congregation and practice them in such a way that they meaningfully equip people to engage their faith across the breadth of their own day to day experience.
(Dr. Matt Cook – Assistant Director of the Center for Healthy Churches)

Avoiding the Avoidance of Pastoral Transition

It can take a church years, if not decades, to recover from a failed leadership transition. So much is at stake, you must get it right from the start.

Every pastor is an interim pastor. Succession is the elephant in the room of every church with a leader in his/her mid-50’s or older. The pastor doesn’t want to bring it up because concern that mentioning “succession” will bring it on sooner than they would like.

Likewise, church councils don’t want to bring it up because they don’t want to look like they’re trying to push the pastor out. Thus, the topic is avoided or clumsily discussed.

Vanderbloemen, a church staffing and Christian executive search firm, has identified signs it might be time to start talking about pastoral succession:

1 Members of the church are growing older. Its often been said that a leader attracts people who are about 10 years younger or older than the pastor. IT is true that pastors tend to relate best with those in their phase in life. A younger pastor connects with younger families.

2 The pastor has lost passion or energy. Although there are exceptions, its the nature of growing older. The drive to tackle big problems and go after a big vision just isn’t the typical drive of the older leader.

These are just some of the signs that you should begin the conversation about succession.

Since COVID-19 concerns shut down all church gatherings, leaders have had to make many decisions. Now with some knowledge of the long-term impact, its time to begin conversation about congregations’ future.

To frame the conversation for church councils, Dan Hotchkiss* of Congregational Consulting group presents four questions, drawing on his experience getting church leaders to plan ahead. Perhaps they will assist you and your leaders looking ahead during a time when this is difficult.

1. Ask: What are we learning during this pandemic time?
The last 2 months have forced churches to invent new ways to do the things they did before. We can worship virtually, conduct weddings, hold small-group ministries, and offer education classes online. Even memorial services can take place virtually. But it is not the same. No matter how we try to make online events just like in-person ones, they are different—touching people in new ways. When we can’t do what we are used to doing, we have a chance to learn. What are you learning? What are the people of your church learning? Make a list.

“Spend time with this information in council meetings and capture the result of your discussion. Think of qualitative and quantitative data you could gather that will help you learn, and then return to the same conversation when you meet again. Remember that a congregation’s “bottom line” is not found on the treasurer’s report—important as that is—but in the hearts you touch. Don’t let the press of urgent business crowd out the council’s primary concern.”

2. Ask: What has changed, and for how long?
Right now, no one knows how long the changes will last. Will social distancing become permanent? Will others continue to scoff at health measures now in place. A lot of people seem to think life will go back to normal at the expiration of the current shelter-in-place order. Its likely people in your church have opposing views.
“As a result, some council members may be nervous about venturing their thoughts about the future. I would raise this issue up front: ‘We know that right now, we can’t hold worship services or other gatherings in person. We don’t know for sure how long current restrictions will last, or whether they’ll be modified at some point. We hold a range of viewpoints on these questions. Let’s talk about the range of possibilities each of us expects, to get a sense of the uncertainty we’re living with.’”

Ask people to respond individually to several questions. You might ask, “How long before we can open up the church for public worship?” “How will people’s willingness to attend worship change even after the restrictions lift?” “How much will our congregation’s income be affected by this epidemic?”

Remember that the goal is not to resolve these questions, but to identify the range of answers that seem possible to each council member and the council as a whole. You may have one or more members who believe they know exactly how the COVID-19 crisis will play out. If so, the council will need to ask those members to accept that it will proceed based on the range of possibilities the whole group sees, not one member’s certainty.
Having sketched the range of possibilities the council finds credible, a next step is to construct scenarios to help with planning. This is a big step; not every council is ready yet. But by the end of the summer, your people will expect their leaders to have risen above day-to-day emergencies to work on finding a future for the congregation and its ministry.

3. Ask: What scenarios can we construct to guide our planning?
Each scenario should fall within the range of possibilities the council found credible in steps 1 and 2. None of your scenarios will happen exactly. Still, it is helpful to be fairly specific, because people respond more creatively to a scenario they can imagine vividly.
One scenario might be, “We open in September, but 40% of our congregation do not return, and giving from our current members will fall off by 25%.”
Another might say, “We will need to continue online worship for at least a year, but will be able to reintroduce small gatherings, with appropriate safeguards, in September. Giving from current members will decline by 30%.”

A third scenario might say, “We will become so proficient at virtual worship that attendance will increase by 20%. Any decline in current-member giving will be made up by newcomers who will give online.”

Your scenarios will be different from these, because they will fall within the range of possibilities your council finds reasonable. You choose how many scenarios to construct. Be open and let the congregation know about your scenarios once you have completed them. This takes a certain amount of courage and may challenge some council members who believe that leaders should be silent till they know all the answers, or who are afraid of the anxiety that hard questions can produce.
Decisions of this kind are not for councils to make in isolation. Councils should work closely with the congregation’s spiritual leaders and with members of the congregation, especially those on whose support success depends. The council’s role is to frame the questions in a form that allows others to participate, and to take responsibility for moving the discussion forward.

Transparency gives members notice that you may need to make significant adjustments and enlists their creativity in discerning how you will respond. And that’s the next step—to flesh out possible decisions that the council might make.

4. Ask: How will we fulfil our mission under each scenario?
When faced with a rapidly changing environment, the easy thing for any council to do is to stay the course, praising staff and volunteers who make the new situation feel as familiar as possible. This makes people happy in the short run, but risks squandering the resources that might make renewal possible by dragging out the status quo.

This is not work for the council to do in isolation, or just with the top clergy leader. It should enlist congregants and staff to gather data, flesh out options, evaluate and update the likelihood of each scenario, reflect, and pray about what God would want if God could vote at meetings. Choosing the most faithful way forward is uncomfortable work because it raises questions about cherished aspects of a congregation’s life.
For these reasons, it is helpful to set a timeline for this stage of the council’s work. Uncertainty won’t go away, but if the council commits to making some strategic choices by a certain date, that will go a long way toward reducing the anxiety this kind of planning raises.

A council that cares about its mission has the courage to let go of old ways in new circumstances. To do this faithfully, the council must step back and take a wider view of what the mission really is—distinct from the familiar ways of trying to accomplish it. This work is not easy, but in this second stage of our coronavirus crisis, it is what governing councils are called to do.

*Dan Hotchkiss consults with congregations and other mission driven. He is the author of the best-selling Alban book Governance and Ministry: Rethinking Council Leadership.

Every church inevitably goes through a time of leadership transition. Whether because of retirement, scandal, health complications, a change in calling or some other shift in a pastor’s life or career, churches are bound to walk through a pastoral succession of some kind eventually. A new Barna report, Leadership Transitions, addresses this universal reality and examines how churches navigate pastoral change and stay healthy amidst the shift.

“A make-it-up-as-we-go approach has less of a chance of going smoothly, and often fails to find time and intention for other steps that improve a transition, like including multiple types of input in the decision-making” Brian Kinnaman writes. If church leaders can plan ahead for a transition, or enlist evidence-based discernment, the church is likely to come out ahead.

Mustard Seed Consulting uses prevent methods to help organizations determine where they are in order to help them get to where they want to be. MSC offers church leaders guidance to make better decisions, in less time and with more confidence. Contact us today to learn more.

Evidence based discernment is growing as a valuable tool for congregations today. Mustard Seed Consulting LLC used the Church Assessment Tool from Holy Cow! Consulting as the most tested, widely used instrument to get keen data-based insight into the health of churches and spiritual vitality of people. 

2. Church members have active prayer lives but struggle to talk about their faith. Eighty-nine percent of respondents reported praying daily or weekly, but their conversations with God do not appear to readily extend to conversations about God with those around them. Only 23 percent said they share stories of what God is doing in their lives, and only ten percent have taught another person how to follow Jesus.

3. Respondents don’t know the Bible well. Only ten percent of respondents said they know the Bible well. Around half as many, six percent, said they don’t know the Bible well at all. The rest reported varying degrees of familiarity with the Bible, with the majority saying they know only the story of Jesus well or some stories or parts.

4. People come to church to connect with God. Church members attend church primarily because they want to connect with God: 95 percent of respondents listed this as important or very important to their church attendance. Tapping into a cultural heritage or attending church out of habit were among the most frequently cited reasons that were not important to survey respondents.

5. While 95 percent of respondents attend church because they want to connect with God, there’s a significant drop-off among people who feel they have an active, daily relationship with God. Only 68 percent said their connection to God is sustained during the week and that God plays an active role in their daily lives. The rest–almost one-third of churchgoers who participated–either said that God is not particularly active in their lives or that they are unsure of God’s presence and activity.

6. Worship, prayer, times of transition, and service help people connect with God most readily. Between 80 and 90 percent of respondents say they often or always connect with God during worship, prayer, times of loss, times of new life, and in serving others.

7. Very few young adults participated in the Spiritual Life Inventory.Only three percent of respondents were in their 20’s and seven percent in their teens.

8. The most commonly represented demographic profile of an active church member in the congregations we surveyed is a white woman in her 60’s.Sixty-five percent of respondents were female and 23 percent were aged 60-69–with only 20 percent of all respondents coming in under 40. Only five percent of respondents identified as people of color.

Research among Protestant churches show clergy tenure is relatively brief on the average. Hard data is difficult to find, but there’s general agreement that 6-7 years is a common point at which clergy make a move.

The time a pastor serves a congregation does contain common stages. Researcher Thom Rainer1 has studied the phenomenon of pastoral tenure. He’s convinced there are distinct stages with clear characteristics, even while the years he designates for each stage are not precise.

Rainer names the stages and offers the “why” behind each stage.
Year 1: Honeymoon. Both pastor and church have a blank slate and they enter the relationship hoping and believing the best about each other. Perhaps the pastor was weary of the previous pastorate, and perhaps the church was happy to replace their former pastor. For a season, neither can do wrong in the other’s eyes. That season does not usually last long.

Years 2 and 3: Conflicts and Challenges. No pastor is perfect. No church is perfect. Each party discovers the imperfections after a few months. Like a newlywed couple, they began to have their differences after a while. The spiritual health of both the pastor and the church will likely determine the severity of the conflicts and challenges.

Years 4 and 5. Crossroads, Part 1. This period is one of the most critical in the relationship. If the conflict was severe, the pastor will likely leave or be forced out. Indeed, these years are the most common years when a pastor leaves a church. On the other hand, if the pastor and the church manage their relationship well, they can often look forward to some of the best years ahead.

Years 6 to 10: Fruit and Harvest. The research is not complete, but it’s more than anecdotal. A church is likely to experience some of its best years, by almost any metrics, during this period of a pastor’s tenure. Indeed, in interviews with both pastors and members, this theme repeated. Both parties have worked through the tough times. They now trust each other and love each other more deeply.

Years 11 and beyond: Crossroads, Part 2. During the earlier crossroads era at year 4 or 5, the pastor decides to stay or leave. Or the congregations may make the decision. During this relatively rare tenure beyond ten years, the pastor will go down one of two paths: 1) be reinvigorated as a leader and ready to tackle new challenges and cast new visions; or 2) be resistant to the surrounding changes and then become complacent. It remains challenging to understand why pastors go down one path versus the other.

Pastoral tenure matters. It is far too short in many churches. I do think it is critical for us to understand tenure, because the health of the church is directly impacted by it.

Mustard Seed Consulting can provide your church evidence-based discernment for any stage of pastoral tenure. We are ready with proven tools and expertise to help pastors and leaders understand key dynamics and realities to promote longer tenure and healthier ministries.

Contact us today to learn how we can help your church.

1Thom S. Rainer, factsandtrends.net May 31, 2019