Tuesday, April 27, 2010
Keys to a Great Church of Christ
Last week at HIP I outlined five things that make a great Church of Christ. If things are not going well, or if your church is not growing, or if you want to be a famous preacher, or have your congregation recognized in the brotherhood as one of the "with it" congregations, there are five sure-fire ways to make it happen. I have been in and around Churches of Christ all my life and I have seen these happen over and over.
Build. Add classrooms, a fellowship hall, a youth center, a coffee house, or remodel the auditorium. A building church must be a growing church. And, when completed, you have something tangible to point to that you have done "for the Lord".
Programs. Find the hottest, newest program going and bring it to your church. We are always looking for the next great evangelism program. I am so disappointed that Jesus did not see fit to explain more fully the programs involved with making disciples in Matthew 28. Baptize and teach seems a little too unfocused. Everyone can get excited about a new program. And training and implementation can easily take a year in which we can know that we are just on the verge of doing the next great thing.
Process. This is the hot thing now, but it has been around forever. Elders function too much like a board so develope a model where they shepherd. The ministry leader model was one of the great process changes. Then we had the Senior Pastor model. Pretty soon the trendy thing will be to have deacons. Change the structure and problems will magically dissapear.
Staff. I remember when the answer to losing our young people was to hire a youth minister. And how did that work out? Not enough members involved, hire a Connecting Minister. Things not going well, get a new preacher. Change staff, or add staff, and the problems are solved. And if not, it is because we hired the wrong staff.
Worship. If all else fails, change up worship. Add a praise team, stop using a praise team. Go instrumental. Make worship a concert. Be more reverent during communion, or be more interactive during communion. Sing more great old hymns. Sing more meaningful contemporary songs. Sing higher, sing lower. Sing faster, sing slower. Use more interactive media. Go back to simple church.
Or maybe we ought to realize that change is not accomplished from the outside, but from within. Maybe Satan just uses all of these things to distract us from doing real ministry.
Just my thoughts.
WARNING: SARCASM ALERT
Build. Add classrooms, a fellowship hall, a youth center, a coffee house, or remodel the auditorium. A building church must be a growing church. And, when completed, you have something tangible to point to that you have done "for the Lord".
Programs. Find the hottest, newest program going and bring it to your church. We are always looking for the next great evangelism program. I am so disappointed that Jesus did not see fit to explain more fully the programs involved with making disciples in Matthew 28. Baptize and teach seems a little too unfocused. Everyone can get excited about a new program. And training and implementation can easily take a year in which we can know that we are just on the verge of doing the next great thing.
Process. This is the hot thing now, but it has been around forever. Elders function too much like a board so develope a model where they shepherd. The ministry leader model was one of the great process changes. Then we had the Senior Pastor model. Pretty soon the trendy thing will be to have deacons. Change the structure and problems will magically dissapear.
Staff. I remember when the answer to losing our young people was to hire a youth minister. And how did that work out? Not enough members involved, hire a Connecting Minister. Things not going well, get a new preacher. Change staff, or add staff, and the problems are solved. And if not, it is because we hired the wrong staff.
Worship. If all else fails, change up worship. Add a praise team, stop using a praise team. Go instrumental. Make worship a concert. Be more reverent during communion, or be more interactive during communion. Sing more great old hymns. Sing more meaningful contemporary songs. Sing higher, sing lower. Sing faster, sing slower. Use more interactive media. Go back to simple church.
Or maybe we ought to realize that change is not accomplished from the outside, but from within. Maybe Satan just uses all of these things to distract us from doing real ministry.
Just my thoughts.
