Category Archives: metrics

April 14, 2013 · 7:56 pm

Portrait of a Pastor

I received a gift this morning.  A gift so full of love and hope that I am still nearly breathless.

Several years ago, Vicki Attaway made her way to the church I serve, having heard that there was a female pastor there and that she might find it welcoming and comfortable.  Within a short period of time, I discovered that Vicki, as am I, is a graduate of Rice University. An immediate and unbreakable bond formed. There are few of us and even fewer women of our generation who can say that.

In time, Vicki’s love for God and willingness to serve became invaluable to me and our community. She arrives each Sunday morning VERY EARLY. The building sits empty and still. In that stillness, she sets out the elements for the weekly Service of Holy Communion. She keeps those elements supplied as we run low, including baking the gluten-free wafers that I and a few others must have. She changes the altar-cloths and stole colors as the liturgical seasons come and go. She puts fresh batteries in my microphone and has the mouthpiece properly threaded through the hole in the pocket of my preaching gown. She marks my hymnal with the hymns of the day, puts out the registration pads, maneuvers new wicks in the candle-lighters, cleaning them out as necessary and places fresh candles on the altar as needed. She competently handles dozens of other little noticed but vital tasks.

She prays for me diligently during our worship services. She is the unlucky recipient of the first drafts of my newspaper columns. Patiently, week after week, she reads, critiques, calls me out when necessary, sharpens the point, and then, after all that, has to clean up my many typos. I’m a fast and rotten typist.

I try to get to the building early enough each Sunday so the two of us can enjoy a few moments of quiet catch-up. Sometimes she sits nearby while I play a game or two of computer solitaire, supporting that time to clear my brain and clarify my focus.

I  was privileged to meet Vicki’s parents, the lovely George and Virginia Attaway. The Attaways, founding members of a church in Denton, loved their daughter and delighted in our friendship.  The excellent seamstress Virginia made cushions for our kneeling rails and also fixed my preaching robe so I did indeed have the right kind of pocket to hold my microphone receiver. The “holy pocket,” we jokingly called it.

Two years ago, I was stunned to receive a call from a church member and learn that Virginia had died suddenly. That church member had been working on the floor of the hospital when Virginia died, thank goodness, or I might not have found out nearly so quickly. I raced to the hospital, my own heart breaking with the broken hearts of this weeping family.

After Virginia’s death and after over 50 years of vital marriage, George, in his mid-70′s and in excellent health, sank into a deep, deep depression. No surprise–this loss was  too great. On April 3, 2013, he, too,  passed from glory to glory, almost exactly two years after Virginia’s death. Intractable pneumonia took over after a necessary surgery for a diseased gall bladder.

Right after the surgery it looked like an uneventful recovery would send him home in a few days. George and I had a wonderful conversation in which he indicated that he was ready to start living again. He would emerge from those two years of sadness. He did, of course, but not the way I or his family had hoped.

This morning as I entered the church ready to begin those Sunday morning preparations, I walked to my desk to find on it a parcel with an envelope attached. Never one to bother with the niceties, I tore into the parcel and ignored the note. What I found was this, one of two charcoal portraits:

A George Attaway portrait

A George Attaway portrait

I looked at it, tears coming so rapidly I could not wipe them away fast enough. George, an extraordinarily gifted artist, had spent some of his last months of life drawing those two portraits of me. I opened the note:

Dear Christy, 

Daddy drew these for you in December.  I never had a good time to give them for you, but now I do.  He came alive again to have a chance to draw something very meaningful to him.  It got him out of his chair, saying, “Now I have a goal”  – to draw Christy.  

He labored over it with love and worked his heart out to get it right, saying this is a beautiful woman inside and out.  His hands were literally on your face as he drew it.  

You were precious to him.  He was so glad that I had you as a friend.  He wanted to see if he still “had it” (i.e., the ability to draw portraits.)  I definitely think he did!  He drew the front of this card. 

What a gift he had as an artist.  And what a generous, kind and intelligent man he was.  So courageous in life and even in his death. 

Thank you for loving him.

Love,

Vicki

I have many moments when I wonder if make any impact for the Kingdom of Heaven. Those times when my innate tendency for melancholy colors everything I see. Those times when I am able to acknowledge only the undone and not the done. Those times when I forget the privilege I have of participating in the salvation path of so many people. Those times when necessary administrative tasks so load my desk that my Bible and prayer book disappear under the piles. Those times when I am blind to everything but the cross before me.

I struggle with the knowledge that the evaluation of my effectiveness in ministry rests heavily on two things over which I actually have no control:  how many people show up for Sunday worship and how much money they contribute. I acknowledge the necessity of such use of metrics.  But they say so little about the massive ministry that takes place within this fairly small church community. They say nothing about those newspaper articles or blog posts that are read by thousands. George Attaway was one of many who found much of his pastoral care in those articles and in many ways considered me his pastor.

But as I sat at my desk this morning, those unchecked tears pooling on the just dusted wood (I am officially on vacation as of this afternoon and ALWAYS dust my desk before leaving!), I knew a moment of pure love.

Thanks be to God!

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March 6, 2013 · 11:31 am

A Modern Take on Luke 15–Probably Heretical, Possibly Shedding Fresh Light on a Shocking Story

Let's Have a Party--The Lost is Found!The Complaint

A group of VERY IMPORTANT church leaders began to grumble about Jesus.  “He ignores us, the movers and shakers, the ones divinely given the leadership of The Church. Instead, he takes his meals with people who don’t even give $5 a year to our coffers, haven’t partaken of the sacraments in years AND even support gay marriage and homosexuals as ordained!

The church will decline in numbers even further if they get their way.  Why isn’t he dining with us in the hotel conference room so we can form a new strategy on how to build growing, vital, money-generating congregations with metrics that make the heart soar?  How dare he?”

The Three Part Response

Jesus, hearing their complaints, began to tell a story.

Part One: The Loan Shark

One day, the owner of a loan shark business, who also volunteered in the local drug rehab facility as an non-credentialed, uneducated chaplain, noted that one of his clients failed to appear.  Till then, that client had always shown up on Friday to pay a pittance against his loan.  The loan shark looked at the long lines of the desperate who were trying to keep their heads above water with these payday loans. He shouted at them to go home and come back next week and raced out the door.

After searching every bar, pool parlor, jail and hospital in the area, he came up empty.  Finally, in the back alley behind the liquor store, he found his client, drunk and without a penny in his pocket.  The loan shark owner dragged him to his car, took him to a shelter and got him a shower and clean clothes. Then he went back to the shop and paid the guy’s weekly payment out of his pocket.

He treated his friends with a beer later saying, “Sure it cost me, but I nearly lost one today–and now he’s been found!”

Part Two:  The Housekeeper

A woman had consistently been told by her ministry board that she was not suited to be a pastor. She finally found a job as a housekeeper in a large, no-tell motel.  Ten maids worked for her, none documented US citizens. She needed all of them seven days a week in order to keep up with the grueling workload.

One day, only nine appeared.  Grateful for her rapidly increasing facility with Spanish, she questioned the others. There had been an INS raid the night before.

She knew if she left the premises, she would lose her job.

But she took off anyway, found an attorney, presented her case and got the woman released. It turned out that her husband in her country of origin had left burn scars all over her body and had told her he’d kill her if she ever showed up again.

The housekeeper took her employee home, called all her friends over and said, “Let’s have a party!  I may have lost my job, but I found the one I had lost–and that’s a lot more important.”

Part Three: The Important Businessman

A highly accomplished head of a multi-national company and active lay-person in the church had two sons. He was  grooming them  to take over the business on his death.  The younger one, impatient and disenchanted with being in his older brother’s shadow, formed a different plan.  He disrespectfully told his dad off one day and demanded his share of the business immediately, not after his father died.

That powerful businessman looked sadly at his son, knowing how complicated it would be to split his business. But he also loved his son and wanted it to work for him.

The older brother stood nearby, silent with a quiet smile on his face. The father made up his mind:  He would go ahead and give his sons the entire business now.

He broke up the company, transferred one part to his youngest son, and gave the larger section to the older son.

He also gave up all his stock options, rights to make any decisions, or even take an income from it. Finally, he retired to a guest house behind the main house. The older son and his family took full occupancy of the elegant mansion.

The father’s sadness grew as he followed the business dealings with the younger son’s division.  Eventually, the business failed and bankruptcy followed.  His son never responded to his father’s calls, texts or emails. He refused to friend him on Facebook or accept an invitation to connect on LinkedIn.

The older son took over the rest of the business and prospered financially. He assumed important leadership positions in his local church, even contributing so heavily to the Capital Funds Drive that they named the educational building after him.

His dad kept inviting the older son to the guesthouse for a dinner and conversation. However,  business, church and family duties kept his time fully occupied. He kept telling his dad he’d come by later but never made it.  He had heavy responsibilities, after all.

Years passed.  The father grew lonelier. He started doing sophisticated Internet searches to see if he could find any news of his youngest son.  Unfortunately, he did: arrests for DUI’s, vagrancy, short stint in jail for drug possession. His attempts to contact the younger son were rebuffed.

People in the church felt sorry for the dad. Rumors, starting with the holy phrase, “We need to pray for . . . ”   flew everywhere. Quietly and subtlety, these good, praying church people blamed the father for having done something indefinably wrong and also blamed the younger son for being an ungrateful wretch and silently hoped he’d disappeared for good.

The  most pious ones kept telling the father, “God has a plan here–you need to learn to rejoice in your trials and not be so sad about this.”

The older brother was held in careful respect by all, although no one really dared cross him. He was said to go into a sulk if he didn’t get his way.

One day the father, aimlessly driving around town, ended up at the local long-haul bus station.  He saw a lot of lonely people there. He started hanging around, occasionally buying someone a meal, watching kids so a harried mom or dad could go to the bathroom, listening to sad stories. In time, he learned how to connect people with local social services and help them find a place to stay or even a job.  His reward came in seeing some hope in their eyes.

Periodically, he would pray with someone, and tears would flow.

Every time a bus pulled in, he looked up, watched the tired faces as they poured out, and thought about his boy.

This work began to give his life structure and meaning.  He showed up at the bus station every day for two and a half years. He learned the names of all the staff, talked with them about his son, learned about their families, joy and sorrows, and helped out when he could.  And each time a bus came in, he looked at their faces, holding each in prayer.

One drizzly, frizzly, just-barely-above-freezing-night, about 45 minutes before the last bus of the day was due, the father, unusually weary, decided to go ahead and drive home.  Just then, one of the custodial staff asked for his help in unplugging a stopped up toilet. One of the constant problems with the aging and sometimes abused facility.

Really wanting a warm drink and a warm bed, he reluctantly agreed.  Because of the chill, he’d put on a new cashmere sweater given to him by his daughter-in-law, along with a Burberry overcoat.  He put them aside and rolled up his sleeves.

The complex and time consuming repair left them both splashed with the remains of someone else’s digestive process. They finished just after the last bus arrived.  Five exhausted people had already straggled off, but the bus driver had to wake the last passenger, and had half carried, half-dragged him off the bus.

The driver turned to the father–would he help out here and see if he could get him a place to spend the night?

Wearily, the father agreed and sat next to the traveler, by then slumped in a rigid plastic chair with head in hands.

“When did you last eat?  Do you have a place to sleep? I might be able to help.”

The traveler said, “No one can help me.  I’ve made a mess of my life.  I told off my dad years ago, lost my business and all the money he gave me, found out I couldn’t even hold a job, and decided to come home and throw myself on his mercy. Thought maybe he’d hire me to do something . . . and at least I could eat.  But now that I’m here, I realize this was a stupid pipe dream, just like all the rest of my dreams.  I can’t face him.  I’m too ashamed. I wish I were dead.”

The father sat there, quietly stunned.  This was his son’s voice.  He looked closely at the back of the young man’s head–how familiar it was!

“Son, I’ve been looking for you for years.  I have never stopped loving you.”

The father got up, grabbed that good sweater and warm overcoat, and placed them around his son’s shoulders. “Let’s go home.”

Three days later, the older son came home from business travel, first class of course,  to find dozens of cars parked both in the driveway and on the well-manicured grass around the back near the guesthouse.  He walked into his own quiet, undisturbed house and yelled out, “What’s going on? What are all these cars doing here? The place looks like a low-rent used car lot.”

His perfectly coiffed and exasperated wife said, “It’s that crazy father of yours.  I told you he’d gone off his rocker when he started hanging out at the bus station. But would you listen? Nooooo.  That rotten, wastrel brother of yours has come home. Your dad is throwing him a giant welcome home party.  I’m sure he used what is left of your inheritance by having it catered by the most expensive restaurant in town.”

The older son stalked out the back door and headed purposely toward the guesthouse. He passed groups of laughing people, many in bus company and cleaning staff uniforms.  Children ran about everywhere, loud in play and joy.

He stood outside the guesthouse door and saw his brother wearing the cashmere sweater his wife had bought his father.

“Dad, what are you doing?”

“Son!  Welcome!  Your brother is back.  Grab your wife and children and have a steak with us.  Let me pour you a glass of wine–I’ve bought the best for this. Just wait until you taste it!”

“Dad– how can you have a party after what he’s done to you?  He’s brought shame and embarrassment on all of us.  I’ve done nothing but be faithful to you and you NEVER had a party for me.  And who ARE these people you invited?  None of them has ever been to our church and they are certainly not my employees.”

“Son, anytime you wanted to, we could have partied. Everything I have has always been yours.  And today, I celebrate, because what has been lost is found.”

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December 8, 2012 · 12:25 pm

Local Shopping, Personal Service, the Power of Connection, and the Art of Discipleship

Broken Vent Hood Light CoverA few weeks ago, in a need to do something that I could start and finish, I cleaned the stove. When I took off the light cover from the stove vent hood so I could wash it, it promptly broke.

“No problem,” I thought.  ”I’ll just get another one.”

Placing the broken on in the car, I decided that the next time I was near one of the large, big-box, home improvements stores, I would get a replacement.

A few days later, I the opportunity, so brought it with me and began to look for assistance.  After a long wait to flag down an apron-clad person whose job is to help people like me find what we need, I heard the news, “Well, we don’t actually carry those.  However, I’ll give you the number of the parts person and you can get in touch and find what you need.”

After returning home, I discovered I could get the info off the website.  A neck-twisting moment of getting the model and serial number later, I confidently typed in the information.  A few seconds later, a photo of exactly what I needed popped on the screen.  Success!  Except . . . they didn’t have any.  They suggested doing a web search for the product.

Not deterred, I did exactly that.  Quickly, the cover I needed popped up.  I headed to the website and . . . they didn’t have any.  A little longer search and I learned that the stove manufacturer no longer made this cover.

I searched a little while longer and, eureka!  I found it!  Yes, one obscure parts store had one.  And they were charging $54 for it.  Yep, $54 for a cheap piece of plastic.

I rebelled.  Just not going to do this.  The last and final suggestion after more web searching:  go to some local appliance dealership (NOT a big box store) and see if by chance they had one in their parts inventory.

Last week, I did just that.  Went to McNeill’s Appliances in Denton.  Within seconds, I was greeted and introduced to their parts expert.  I explained the situation, and showed her the cover.  About 1/2 second later, she said, “You are right–they are no longer manufacturing that part–but another manufacturer is and I think I’ve got one here.”new-cover

Three minutes later, my purchase completed (for about $7.00), and warm Christmas greetings exchanged, I walked out knowing that when I do need to buy another large household appliance, I will go there to do so, even though I might pay more for it.

The Connection with the Consumer-Driven Church

Recently, I wrote a series of posts about my concern over the Consumer-Driven Church model.  The question I am asking, “Can a consumer-driven church actually create disciples of Jesus Christ?”  Now, I’m defining a consumer-driven church as one in which all stops are pulled out to keep the extremely fickle “consumer” i.e., potential church-goer, happy.  I’ve received some very good and thoughtful replies to that post and have been thinking about it some more and wish to clarify my thoughts:

First, should we do every single thing possible to give people an excellent church experience?  Yes, I think so.  Facilities need to be clean, directional signs abundant, and barriers low.  Welcome should be both fully warm and extremely sensitive to different needs as people enter.

Second, should we utilize technology in order to ensure that the Gospel is heard in the ways people are experience the rest of their lives?  Yes.  I even wrote my D-Min project on the use of multi-media in worship.  I learned, though my project, that the good use of multi-media made the message far more memorable and understandable to anyone who has been raised in the world of receiving information visually.  Most auditory-only messages quickly go out of the brain.  A well-prepared message with multiple sensory and visual enhancements has a much better chance of longer impact.

What’s The Problem?

So what’s the problem?  Let’s assume for a moment that there are some parallels between the mega-church model and the big box store and the smaller church and the local, family owned business.  The level of personal connection changes radically from one to the other, but so does the cost-effectiveness of the operation.

I don’t think it is possible to mass-produce disciples.  I do think it is more cost effective, however, to mass produce church members/attenders.  From what I have both experienced and seen elsewhere, the art of discipleship is honed by deep, one-on-one interaction.

There’s nothing new to this idea.  Jesus had hundreds, even thousands of followers, twelve whom he formally named as followers, and only three who were apparently given greater, intimate knowledge of their Teacher.

I am guessing we need a means to gather together the hundreds and the thousands, and the consumer-driven church model may indeed be the best way to do that.  But we’ve also got to enhance the relationships between just the one and the few.

And here’s where I get stuck.  I am aware that, as pastor to a medium-membership church (just barely over the line from a small membership church), I can effectively disciple only a few.  Technically, if I want to really grow my church, I don’t spend a lot of time on those intense, often complicated relationships.  I’m out doing visionary things, painting big pictures for my leaders, making multiple contacts in the local community, honing messages and organizing the kind of worship that leaves people saying, “Wow!”

I’m also enabling an effective PR machine, am adept at all social media outlets and spend much of my life composing 140 character “tweets” that will have people panting for more.

And yes, I know the drill:  disciple those who will disciple others who will disciple yet more.  I’m also aware that the further those groups grow from the source, the more likely there will be a lack of overall cohesion.

Many fast-growing religious groups have grown on that small group model because it is a tightly controlled one.  People are taught exactly what to teach others, and standardized material is used across the board.  That’s the big-box church style:  standardize as much as possible because it enhances efficiency and cost-effectiveness.

Doing tailor-made, individualized discipleship takes massive amounts of time and energy. And its costs more.

I think we need both.  I know I am who I am today both because of the standardized, mass-produced model (I was a part of Campus Crusade for Christ when it was doing its most rapid growth and expansion) and the powerfully individual time I received from many who were willing to invest in me, especially as I entered into a time about 25 years ago where I had to completely re-think my theological constructs.

We’re going to have to address the issue of cost-effectiveness if we are going to live out our mission of making disciples.  The more we buy into the big-box model, the more successful we may become on one level of measurement.  I just continue to fear we will lose our soul and our real purpose in the long run.

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December 4, 2012 · 3:42 pm

The Consumer-Driven Church Model, Part Three

Note: this is part three of a three part series. Part One is here; Part Two is here.

Three Things to Keep in Mind

First: not all growth is good growth.  When effectiveness is measured only by numerical growth, we make the fatal mistake of assuming that just because something grows rapidly, it is doing so under the blessing of God.  All gardeners and physicians know this:  rapid growth doesn’t necessarily mean good, healthy or desired growth.

Second:  the process of making disciples is a long, slow, and often painful one.  A disciple is one who is actually willing to walk the path of the Teacher, in this case, Jesus.  That path leads to the cross, a place of utter aloneness and excruciating pain.

It is at the cross that the question must be asked and answered:  Will I be a person of forgiveness and reconciliation, no matter what the cost, so I can go all the way to the resurrection?

Most will say no.  It’s not fun anymore at that point.  It’s no longer bells and whistles and loud music and video screens and constant movement and distraction.

Discipleship takes place in those moments when we are called to be still, to know that God is God, and to be able to say with the great man of old, that poor, beat up Job, “Even though He slay me, yet I will praise Him.”

Third, unless we address the deep and expensive structure of The United Methodist Church, we are doomed to follow the consumerist model.  But the cost to maintain our current structure leads us to think we have no choice.  And a place of no choice opens the door to the sin-compromised state where the ends are worth the means.

If we are going to go forth and do what we are called to do, then it is time to completely re-examine what holds us together.

When I entered into this church, I was drawn to two primary areas:  the expansive, inclusive, wide grace-infused theology and the power of being a connectional church.  Our theology turns us toward God and showers us with grace. Our connection turns us toward one another in covenant relationship.  In covenant, we may pass that grace around, support one another as necessary and together live out the daily challenges of being disciples of Jesus.

A consumer-driven model is rarely grace-filled and is fundamentally competitive, not covenant or connectional, in nature. Others must fall for us to stand.

Consumerism means that those who know little of grace, little of deep sacrifice, little of the challenges of picking up our crosses daily, call the shots.

I look at the money that was spent to pull off the show we call “General Conference” this past year and weep.  Every need had to be catered to.  It appeared on occasion that the least gracious hijacked the floor and engineered the direction of the Conference.  The displeased consumers, i.e., delegates, kept threatening in one way or another to take their business elsewhere.

The administrative arm of the church, which should be there to enhance the work of the local discipling community, instead pulls giant amounts of money out of the offering plates each week and month.  It loads upon local clergy and congregations, that place where the work of discipleship takes place, impossible-to-decipher forms and strangling requirements for minutely detailed reports that are never looked at except to determine how much money to squeeze from them the next year.

The world laughs and says, “You have nothing useful to say.”

But we do.  Yes, we do.  We have the Gospel.

And yes, we must address the crisis.  But it is much deeper than numbers and noses.

Let us answer the primary question first:  “What IS a disciple of Jesus Christ?”

Then we can ask: “How can our forms of worship, gathering, instruction, connection and structure actually aid in the process of shaping those disciples?”

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· 3:42 pm

The Consumer-Driven Church Model, Part Two

Note: this is the second of a three-part series.  Part one is here; part three is here.
 

The Church is In Crisis

I suspect everyone agrees that The United Methodist Church, as a world-wide organization, is in crisis.  Our membership grows older and the death tsunami looms. Few churches see a vital future. People in the US church, who have been the principle financial support of the worldwide church, are moving away from denominational religious structures.

The crisis leads to pressure to have numbers that look good. We’re no different in that sense from any business that must please its stockholders and keep itself solvent for the sake of the economy and for the employment of the people involved.

One of our solutions has been greater accountability as we seek to push those numbers into the plus column and reverse the trend of losing members.

In response, denominational leadership, i.e., our Bishops (like worried Boards of Directors of corporations) cry loudly for public dashboards where pastors  (their underlings) will be required each week to post attendance, offerings, the number of those joining, being baptized, and making professions of faith the Sunday before.

“Metrics” have become the rallying cry to ensure survivability.

Those metrics will define pastoral effectiveness.  The pastor with the best numbers gets the most accolades, “attaboys,” glory and promotions.  Nickels and noses are all that count.

Sounds pretty consumerist/corporate so far.

A recent article in the United Methodist Reporter exemplified this trend.  A megachurch with an organ that alone probably cost more than the entire church building where I serve, is investing $2.1 million dollars to seek to attract new, young worshippers.

They’ve completely revamped a meeting space so that it has every bell and whistle anyone could want in order to present a high-tech, visually stimulating, professionally planned and choreographed worship time.  The musicians and technicians are all highly trained, and all paid.

According to the article, the young pastor, a gifted man for whom I have much respect, will be fully funded for nearly three years.

This is the best of all business—or church—start up strategies.   Everyone knows that it is easier to start large than to start small.  Any business walking into a new area wants immediately to gain a huge footprint and lots and lots of name recognition.

Get the people in the door, make sure they have a great experience, and send them back out hoping they’ll tell others about it.

I hope this works.  I hope the metrics do look good.  I hope this becomes a vital congregation, full of life and growth.  I hope that so many people come and so much giving takes place that people will stop bemoaning the fate of The United Methodist Church.

But I do wonder if it will make—or shape—disciples of Jesus Christ.

Note: this is the second of a three-part series.  Part one is here; part three is here.

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· 3:41 pm

The Consumer-Driven Church Model, Part One

Bizarro Comic Strip, November 14, 2012

Bizarro Comic Strip, November 14, 2012

I recently walked out of a local electronics store in some frustration.  I have an older inkjet printer that needed new ink cartridges.  Now, ink cartridges are some of the biggest consumer rip-offs ever devised, so I wasn’t in a great mood when I walked in.  My irritation grew when I realized that my aged printer does not have its exact model number indicated on any of the multitudes of printer cartridges available.

Two different sales staff tried to help; each came up with a different solutions.  Both admitted that if I bought a cartridge, put it in the printer and it didn’t work, that I could not bring it back—possibly wasting a lot of money.  Only solution: go back to the office, open the printer case, hope the exact model number of the cartridges I need were there, and then come back and buy the exact match.

Result? First, I have resolved to purchase a different printer, and never, ever again touch one made by that particular manufacturer. Enough is enough.  Second, I probably will give it two or three thoughts before I go back into that particular consumer electronics store again.  It really isn’t their fault—but I am disenchanted.

I find it easy to decide to change both printer brands AND store preferences.  Printers and stores abound, all competing mightily for my business.  I can and will freely hop from place to place, brand to brand, price to price.  All it takes is one bad experience and I’m out of there.

That’s a lot of pressure to please.  Retailers know it.  Manufacturers know it.  Designers know it.  And everyone hops frantically like so many adrenaline-fed bunnies trying to please us increasingly fickle consumers so we’ll stay loyal to their brand.

As the Bizarro cartoon above says, “they are huge now, but I’ve been a fan since Monday.”  And next Monday, someone else will be huge, someone else will be pleasing the fickle crowds.

This is why a consumer-led church builds on a problematic foundation.  The church is not called to please.  We are called to make, or I prefer, “shape” disciples of Jesus Christ.

The moment we buy into the consumer-led model of church growth, using business success as our model, we have inevitably left that mission of shaping disciples behind.

Why? Because the moment we displease someone by . . .

  • offering a worship service that is not quite perfect or as good as the one down the street
  • presenting a nursery that doesn’t have the latest in child check-in/check-out procedures
  • stepping on someone’s toes theologically
  • insisting that people work through their conflicts with each other in the name of a higher calling
  • asking people to follow Jesus to the cross and forgive their enemies and do good to them so they might really experience the resurrection

. . . we run a huge chance of  losing our “customers.”

At its essence, Christianity is anything but a consumer-pleasing religion.

Jesus did not please very many people.  The larger crowds hung around hoping for a feeding or healing miracle.  When Jesus disappointed, they quickly dispersed.  They were the first century equivalents of our consumer religious folks.   Even the closest of Jesus’s disciples were in it for themselves—they did want those most powerful right and left hand seats in the kingdom, after all.

 
Note:  This is part of a three part series.  Part two is here; part three is here.

 

 

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November 14, 2012 · 1:17 pm

Judicial Council Decisions: The Emperor Has No Clothes

The United Methodist Church cannot be re-formed. It’s over for us with our current structure.

The Judicial Council’s decision to revoke the involuntary retirement of Bishop Earl Bledsoe over issues of violation of procedural minutia found in the Book of Discipline (not over the question of his effectiveness, which was not being ruled upon) has forever made this clear. It is over.

It’s easy to get frustrated with the Judicial Council for the rulings of the last few months. Their work has thoroughly reversed decisions made by General and Jurisdictional Conferences.

However, I think that would be a mistake. They’ve done the United Methodist Church a huge favor. Because the members of the Council were faithful to the letter of the law, which is exactly what they are supposed to do, we now know for sure that this emperor has no clothes.

They have revealed an important truth and truth does very much set us free.

Many gifted, intelligent, godly people slogged through interminable meetings seeking to follow the rules and still lead us into substantive and necessary change. We easily see those as wasted hours in light of the aftermath of the Judicial Council decisions.

Again, I say, let us receive the favor here. There is simply no sense in trying to do that kind of thing anymore. It can’t work. Period.

We are going to have to engender our own revolution/reformation or die slowly of strangulation by methods that no longer support the heart of Methodism. No one in their right mind wants to die this way. But we are now at the crossroads and must choose: strangulation or revolution?

I wish we didn’t have to do this. Revolutions hurt, and leave scarred landscapes and burnt-out buildings. People die. Pain becomes our middle name. Sad tears accompany nearly every decision. Passionate arguments punctuate every discussion.

But the structure has cracked and the un-repairable foundation now sits exposed. John Wesley was an autocratic organizational genius who could do to the clergy under his command and the churches of his movement things that are now not just unworkable, but also unthinkable.

And our own efforts at tinkering with the denomination we inherited? Well, we’ve danced around it, modified it, adapted it and culturally-contexted it. Time to stop. It’s over.

What do we have left? We have the most powerful theology of grace that has ever infused the human race. We have words about God that tell us that God is ever before us, wooing the world into repentance, relationship and wholeness. We have an understanding about our redemption and forgiveness that forever sets us free. And we actually do believe that we can, in cooperation with the Spirit of God, be perfected in love.

That’s what we have.

All the rest of it, our pensions and health insurance concerns, our episcopacy and our itinerancy, our megachurches and our itsy-bitsy rural congregations, our connection, our conferences, our metrics and our vestments, are just window dressing.

We have grace.

The question we now ask: Can grace-infused theology hold us together in the revolution that is now necessary? Can we plant ourselves firmly on opposite sides of huge issues, pray, argue and fight our way through this, and see a healthy and actually united Methodist church born yet once more? Can we free ourselves from the death strangle of our current methods and still be Methodists?

If we can’t, or we won’t, then we need to die anyway. We deserve no better than to slowly lose oxygen as we wander forever lost through the dead-end maze known as the Book of Discipline. If we can and if we will, then we will unleash the Spirit of God yet once more.

It’s time.

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June 13, 2012 · 10:10 am

Dead Soil Produces Dead Souls: Thoughts on the Toxic Church

I hear the word “toxic” bandied about all the time, both applied to people and to churches.  The word means poisonous, of course.  Poison is “a substance with an inherent property that tends to destroy life or impair health” (from dictionary.com).  So if we are in a “toxic” relationship or toxic church, we are in a situation that promotes the opposite of what most of us want to experience, which is life and health.

Not too long ago, this question popped up in an online discussion board primarily for United Methodist clergy:

“Why do so many conferences allow problem churches to continue being problem churches? Why do conferences not discipline problem churches?”

Five Factors

Now “problem churches” is a euphemism for a toxic, death inducing environment.  As I thought about it, I came up with five factors that I think help identify a death-inducing or toxic church environment

  • a tightly held lay leadership structure
  • insistence on seeing the pastor as their employee
  • little or no numerical growth in membership, worship attendance and giving
  • lessening impact of ministry in local community, AND
  • continued payment of apportionments.

I know lots of other benchmarks are being used to describe churches that are alive versus those which are dying, but let me explain my reasoning here.

A tightly held lay leadership structure says quite clearly, “there is no room at the table for you.”  I still remember those highly insecure junior high school days of walking into the school cafeteria and hoping, just hoping, that some group of girls would make room at their table for me.

I was never popular and had a lot of social insecurities.  Those were always agonizing moments for me and left a deep impression.  I think I’m not alone.  Most of us would like to be able to walk into a room and have welcoming faces immediately open up a space for us.  Healthy, secure people do that.  Of course, hardly any junior high girls are that emotionally healthy or secure, so it rarely happens there.  But in a church where people are called to grow up in Christ, it should be the norm, not the exception.

When the atmosphere says, “There’s no room at my table,” something has gone terribly wrong. Junior high immaturity rules–as in Lord of the Flies.  God forbid–but it happens all the time.

About number two, that insistence on seeing the pastor as their employee:  When that is the case, then the pastor’s primary job is to keep the people happy.  And when that becomes the primary clergy responsibility, disaster, i.e., toxicity, is inevitable.  The state of happiness (nowhere mentioned in Scripture, by the way, as a hallmark of holy people) is an ever-moving target and is used all the time for emotional blackmail.  Pastors, whether in an sent system like ours, or a call system like some other denominations, must be able to speak out truth–and truth, while utterly freeing, often makes people uncomfortable.  A pastor’s job is to create a place where people may grow spiritually and offer the fruits of that growth to the world.  That very well may mean plowing the fields periodically and ripping out weeds when necessary.  It may not make people happy, but it is necessary.

For the third factor I lumped all of our many numerical metrics under one category. While these factors, little or no growth in membership, worship attendance and giving must be used to assess a church’s health, they should not be given more attention than they deserve.

In some locations, demographic factors are so strong that those numbers are meaningless.  A church showing some growth in all areas but is in an area that is itself growing rapidly could be far more ill than a church with no numerical growth but with numerical stability yet surrounded by a demographic in steep decline.

The fourth category about lessening impact in the local community needs to be understood this way:  a church can continue a strong giving and emphasis on distant missions and still be highly poisonous if that distant mission emphasis is not matched by local transformation and effectiveness.

There is a truth to this cliché, “Charity begins at home.”  Most churches are rooted in their communities, and when those communities either do not trust the local congregational offers of help, or the local congregation is detached from more intimate community needs, than something has gone very, very wrong.

The fifth one, the consistent paying of apportionments (or whatever regular larger connectional giving the particular church has been in the habit of funding) may come as a surprise.  Generally, we say that a church NOT paying apportionments is in trouble.  But here’s why I think it is the opposite: as long as the problem church continues to pay its apportionments, it provides appointments for clergy (in the particular system of the UMC), keeps the money flowing for Conference officials pet projects and paychecks, and therefore eliminates wider incentives for action at a higher level to deal with the growing toxicity.

The Structure Supports the Problem

In other words, our very structure supports these kinds of problem churches and hinders real action, so they continue to offer death, not life to any who come in contact with them. The drive for scriptural holiness no longer energizes the community.  For the most part, hearts of people sitting around those closed-off tables have been hardened to the movement of the Holy Spirit.  Furthermore, he necessary rebuilding of church culture into an open, servant-hearted, generous place would destroy what has been there a long, long time.  Thus the resistance to meaningful, in-depth change will be so huge that any clergy seeking to bring that kind of transformational pastoral leadership will have to be run off quickly.  This is rarely done consciously, but is generally done consistently.

I want to quote my favorite gardener, Howard Garrett, AKA “the dirt doctor,” here on one of his pet issues:  using toxic chemicals to get rid of pests in gardens and fields.  He writes:

Research has shown that pests are attracted to weak, unhealthy plants that got that way from the use of toxic pesticides and artificial fertilizers. Healthy plants with proper trace minerals and sugars are mostly immune to pests.

Toxic chemical pesticides have a purpose. They keep unhealthy plants alive by killing the pests that nature has sent in to take them out. These toxins are harmful to pets, wildlife, livestock and humans; they contaminate the air, soil and water, and they are costly and time consuming to apply. They do one other thing as well. They make money for the people who manufacture, promote and sell them.

Insects are nature’s cleanup crews. Their job is to move in and take out unfit plants. Preventing or even interfering with that natural process without solving the cause of the stressed plants serves no one but those who sell the toxic pesticides. There’s a purpose for everything, including salt fertilizers and synthetic pesticides. They keep sick, unhealthy plants alive so more toxic chemicals can be sold! Simple as that.

Could it be possible that we need to keep sick, unhealthy, toxic churches alive so we can hire more over-priced consultants to sell us that latest quick fix for them?

Liken the problem church to ground that has been poisoned by chemicals of some sort.  Despite the best efforts of gardeners or farmers, nothing healthy can ever grow there. That soil has to either go through extensive decontamination processes or actually be removed and replaced by something that is healthy and alive.

It is the same with the church: the poisons have to be removed; they cannot be accommodated.  Otherwise, the dead soil in the church only produces dead souls.

The only really effective discipline would be to close the church, sell the property, and start afresh, building from the ground up a new culture. But new church starts do not participate in apportionment giving for quite a while.  So again, there are parts of our system that actually encourage toxicity and hinder the hopes of more transformational ministry.

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March 17, 2012 · 1:23 pm

Academia, Metrics and the Church

Recently, I posted a response on the Missional Methodist blog about what I see happening right now in The United Methodist Church.

I mentioned that I see huge parallels with what is happening in the academic world and what is happening with the church. Academia is being told: the purpose of education is economic–getting good paying jobs for the graduates. The real purpose of a good liberal education–to teach people to think widely and deeply over multiple disciplines so they might serve as ethical and well-grounded leaders in multiple areas–is being replaced by this purely functional model.

So, the real purpose of the church: the process of forming and shaping disciples who will live as radical followers of Jesus is also being replaced by a functional model: “Vital” churches–i.e., those whose vitality can be measured by metrics which are almost all economic-driven.

I was thinking about this when I read the local columnists featured in the Saturday Dallas Morning News.  One writer, a junior at Coppell High School, wrote powerfully of the way she is being deprived of real learning by being told only to present facts, not how to think their way through them.  This bright young woman is getting the worst of educational theory and is smart enough to know it.

Are we in the church smart enough to recognize that we are being taken for a similar ride?

Real disciple-making cannot be measured by metrics.  If Jesus had to abide by today’s metrics, the funding for his church plant would have been pulled almost immediately.  He packed ‘em in occasionally, but the opposition to his radical message of God’s grace and inclusion of all in that holy-kingdom space was just too much for most.  And, when he did pack ‘em in, he didn’t even take an offering to pay back the church-planting/metric-driven bosses who were deciding whether he had planted a vital group or not.  Instead, he pretty well gave away what little he had.

Yes, he would have quickly been labeled ineffective or without fruitfulness or unappointable or whatever the latest term is to describe the problem clergy who are not fitting the success mold.

But then again, Jesus didn’t have a pension or health insurance or career path or crushing apportionments so his higher-ups could live comfortably and travel all around the world to countless meetings to they could write more policies and create more regulations and definitions to worry about.  He was just the doorway to grace.  Cost him everything.

I am all for the connectional church.  That is why I chose The United Methodist Church. Having wandered over multiple different Christian theologies, I think the Wesleyan understanding of God and grace is more biblical and life-giving than anything else I’ve ever seen or experienced.  But I, too, think we are losing our way right now.

It has become too expensive for many churches to have full-time clergy who are devoted to the art and practice of discipleship and still be free to feed and clothe and visit and envelop their communities in acts of love and grace that open doors to salvation.  The pressure on the clergy to produce the numbers needed is often crushing, fear-producing and soul-destroying.  Unworkable and expensive real-estate holdings function like handcuffs with no release key.

All is not lost.  It never is, for God will win.  That’s our promise.  That’s our hope.  We just need once more to realign ourselves to the heartbeat of God, a world of mercy and justice.  That never has been and never will be easy.  But it can be done.

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