Look at the chart on page 78.
Where do you find yourself? Where do you find the church?
Yesterday I had a conversation with a young adult where I serve--we talked about the future of the church and the significant decisions the congregational leadership needed to make about its future. As I was trying to express the road blocks I had experienced I mentioned that the church's DNA was one of its biggest issue. This congregation was founded by a group of people (who are wonderful, really great people) who were nevertheless somewhat ambivalent about starting a church.
Why? I am thinking it has to do with the very hard and exhausting work of founding a "traditional church " (meaning a church with ordained clergy and land/buildings). Think about it, these were folks just starting our with young families and working to get a church up and running was one more thing in a very busy life. I also think the world is just so different than it was when the majority of our churches were started. Knowing founding members of two churches (one 50+ years old, the other 20+ years old), I see two very different worlds.
I find this to be one of our biggest issues as we look at starting new faith communities. I keep going back to Elaine Heath'sbook where she talks about alternative models for faith communities. One model that struck me was a group of clergy are leaders at the church and also work other jobs. The offering goes to mission and to support those who go to seminary so they can become prepared to lead in a local church. I am liking this model more and more as I think about change, church and success in today's real world.
-Nicole
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I liked this chapter because it summed up some of the differences of paradigms that the world operates under. I see my training as mostly a Western world view, but in later years have determined that the lenses have been changed to be more towards what the author talks about as the Gospel view.
ReplyDeleteI come from a lay pastor family, my grandparents were both lay speakers and worked to pay the bills outside of the church. I often marvel at being paid for something I love to do, and yet I wonder am if the model of working like you mention Nicole is better suited to today's world? Is this part of what needs to change in the church? If so, not only the local church culture but our whole way of operating as a connection needs to reflect this change as well. If we work only part time for the church what does this do to our statistics and our view of whether the church is vital? Do we dismantle the structure so that there is not so many committees on the District and Conf. level so pastors could work both in and outside of the church without it being a burden to them and their families?
And is this the only model that is effective?
After working as a chaplain, I noticed how inflexible my schedule became for doing things outside of work, vacation was limited there was limited time to take for conference or continuing ed, it all had to be done around my job, which came first. Taking a week for conference was not recognized as job related.
But I was in a place where I had many people to talk to about their spiritual journey's, those who had not gone to church ever or lately, or may not of talked to their pastor about the issue, I was a trusted outsider sort to speak. And the work was very rewarding. I think the model of having a group of clergy serving part time might be a way of reaching more ethnic groups, and give the church a way of reaching a more diverse group than if it is left up to a single pastor. Just my random thoughts!
Steve, I think it is time for us to look at a variety of models for ministry but it is hard to know what the possibilities are. I recently read some of Neil Cole who writes on the Organic church movement and that was interesting but hard to translate to our buildings. I know at Santa Margarita we have some unique opportunities because the world has changed so much that within the congregation you can hear people on the more old school understanding of needing buildings and others who reject the buildings (and the money you need to raise to have them). I know when I got there and someone told me it would cost 5 million dollars to build phase 2 I had a lot of conflicting feelings (like how much good 5 million could do in the world instead of being put into a building). I guess I have come to place in ministry where I value buildings only for the community they would enable.
ReplyDeletePerhaps those of us who are in a great building, like Walnut, should look at how the community is served by the building rather than visa versa. Having a thriving preschool program during the day, and then figuring out what to host at night that will serve the community is my next task. Also, we have tried having meetings in public eating places, so we are more visible to the community. Just so you know we are still paying off our building expansion project, and boy will I be ready when it is, that money sure could be used for more programing and outreach.
ReplyDeleteI was a little surprised to discover that I identify mostly with the Eastern paradigm. And I connected pretty easily with the Gospel paradigm. The problem (for lack of a better description) is, as I work on finishing my CVM I realize I'm being measured mostly by a Western paradigm. I'm (we're) being asked to set numerical goals relating to church growth when I've become way more interested, and invested in spiritual growth. I'm in a wonderfully human congregation that is only beginning to re-engage God in a transformative way and that is going to take time, lots of time. And patience. And attention, etc.
ReplyDeleteOn a more hopeful note, the four UM pastors here in the Imperial Valley met with our DS to discuss a strategic plan for developing Spanish speaking ministries. We (the four of us) had come to agree that we needed someone to give direction to the plan on a full time basis, which meant creating a new appointed position. One of the four of us is a Spanish-first-language pastor and would be great in such a position. What we came to in the meeting was the idea of forming a kind of cooperative parish in which the three of us would "cover" the needs of the English speaking folks in the one local church that would potentially lose a full time pastor. We're also working together on youth ministries and ministries focusing on the poor, homeless and hungry in the valley. I think this is working partly because we're isolated from the main stream of local churches in our district.