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June 2012

Dealing with Competition in the Church

Church people don’t like to think about competition. They like to think it’s a “live and let live” world.

They are wrong.

Church is very competitive. At its very foundation is the need to overcome evil. Christ took care of that…but we still build prisons.

Within a denomination there is competition for members.

One of Redeemer’s members tells the story of how, when their family was considering joining Redeemer, a pastor visited from a church several neighborhoods away. At the time, that pastor was serving on Synod Council which had designs on Redeemer even then (1998). The pastor asked them why they would want to join a little church that had never had Black members. (He was wrong about that, by the way.) You’ll be happier in a church that has more Black members, he advised. That family didn’t heed his advice. They joined Redeemer and became cornerstone members of a new ministry that began to grow the church—growth that went unrecognized by Synod.

Roman Catholics try to solve the problem of competition for members with a parish system that counts all Catholics within a geographic area as members of a designated parish. Exceptions include ethnic congregations. This makes for less “shopping” when Catholics relocate, but in this system, if people aren’t happy they just stay home. Many do.

There can be competition within the parish. Whose running the day school? Who will sing that solo? Who has the pastor’s ear?

Pastors compete for more than members. They also compete for calls, usually to the richer congregations. Funny—in the Bible, when God called people, it was usually to undesirable service.

Competition extends to denominations. All are looking for members and support.

In America, the competition goes beyond that to competition between faiths.

Competition is part of the human spirit. You will never be able to extinguish it. Best to recognize it and use it in a way that brings out the best in us.

08 Jun 2012

The Church: Is bigger better?

The Ambassadors from Redeemer have visited nearly 50 churches since we were locked out of our own church.

We started with congregations near us, close to the city. Most of our early visits were to small congregations.

As we drifted toward the suburbs, we found congregations to be a little larger. But in all our visits we have visited only three or four churches with more than 100 in attendance (all but one on significant holidays).

As a general observation, the larger the church the more similar things are. The liturgy is more set in stone. The hymns choices are more predictable. You have the organ. You have the choir (with paid section leaders, in some cases). The involvement of the people is more standard. People file out of the sanctuary in groups that don’t interact much. The bulletins look alike. The list of activities could be cut and pasted from one to the other.

Smaller churches are unpredictable, more likely to be innovative in their worship, more diverse and more inclusive. They are livelier and more spontaneous. More people are involved — sometimes in unusual ways. There is more going on between the people, even in the worship setting.

(See our Ambassadors Report.)

No wonder most people belong to small churches! That may not be where the money is, but it is where there is a lot of action. And still the attention of church leadership is on bigger congregations — that overall fewer people will join—because most people choose to belong to smaller churches.

How do we grow small churches without forcing them to lose their personality? How do we tap their energy and ideas? Or are we most interested in tapping their assets? That’s a real question. There is an  economic dichotomy in the Church that is the source of a great deal of church conflict. The economic model that the Church aspires to is not the economic model that people support with their hearts or their pocketbooks.

Most of the economy of churches revolves around the ability to pay clergy and support hierarchy, but that’s not necessarily where ministry is most effective.

But that’s how the Church measures success.

07 Jun 2012

The Good Thing About Church Conflict

Everyone in church is a member of one big happy family, right?

Church veterans know this isn’t true. Church conflict happens. And it’s a good thing, too. Generally, people fight about things that matter to them.

The Church goes to great lengths to hide conflict.

Church leaders begin by analyzing conflict. They look at the players (often excluding themselves) and classify them into “types.” This combatant is a “thinker.” The other is a “feeler.”

Oh, that explains it! Now the conflict should go away.

It doesn’t.

Then, the Church moves to Plan B. Ignore the conflict. Wait for it to go away. The Church is actually very good at Plan B. They often wait for decades.

The problem doesn’t go away.

The most important question to ask in church conflict is “Why do God-loving people care enough about an issue to fight?” Dig, dig, dig for the answer to this question.

Religion is about the hearts and souls of the faithful. When we invite people to join us in worship and community, we invite them with all their sensitivities. We ask them to live their faith and that means being willing to take a stand. Without this, every Christian may as well stay home.

When conflict erupts, embrace it. You have people who care. Look to their motivations. Why do they risk peace?  Why do they care to come to church and face unpleasantness? Why not stay home with the multitude of people who don’t care? (Counterproductive as this is, it is often the chosen remedy.)

It’s your turn to care. Care about the people involved in the conflict. Caring will motivate leaders to ask the right questions. Listening to answers increases their knowledge of their community, and they are better able to serve. Conflict serves a purpose!

Caring is more important than resolving the conflict. In the end, caring will resolve the conflict.

06 Jun 2012

Church Lingo: Keeping Our Message Obscure

Simplicity is a sign of truth and a criterion of beauty. Complexity can be a way of hiding the truth.”
— Helena Rubinstein

The message of Christianity is simple. God is love. Because God loves us, we are to love one another.

This simple message becomes obscure in the hands of theologians and church professionals. There is incentive to make it complicated. Church leadership has a very long tradition of cultivating mystery about their work.

Like many cloistered professions, the Church creates its own lingo. We know what we’re talking about. Why don’t you?

The difference is that our “business” is the message. We need to communicate clearly.

When we make our message obscure we defeat our purpose. It is no wonder that the “we” of the church is a shrinking number.

Let’s look at some of the hot buzzwords in the church today. (Warning! All words commonly used in the church are not actual words!)

Mission: Mission originally meant the act of sending. It has come to describe organizing for the propagation of faith. In that sense, it is a compelling word to Christians. Today, it is attached to almost every enterprise and is often the “hook” for fund-raising. Almost every solicitation for funds from any church-related institution has this word displayed prominently. People are far more likely to give to a “Mission Fund” then to sacrifice for the day-to-day operating expenses of bureaucracies—which is where the money can go. And so we have the Synod Mission Fund, the Seminary Mission Fund and the churchwide Mission Fund. The better to attract dollars. Congregations! Hurry! Start your own mission fund and get your piece of the pie!

Missional: This is an attempt to make mission an adjective so the word “mission” can be used more often. Coming soon: more non-words like “missioning.”

Discernment: This is the act of figuring things out. Discernment seems more intentional and focused. It is used often by church leaders and denominations. They spend a great deal of time trying to figure things out. When they can’t, they write about discernment and it seems like they have accomplished something or are about to accomplish something truly great. Results of discernment are not discussed nearly as often as the acts of discernment. Very few people actually recall the discernment process or a discernment meeting. They were probably busy trying to figure things out while someone else did the discerning.

Viability: Church leaders love to talk about viability — the ability to stay alive. They usually focus on other people’s viability and not their own.

Transform: This has been a church catch word for a while. The word “change” was just too scary. Nobody wanted to be “changed” by church leaders. They are not standing in line to be “transformed” either, but it sounds better. It is never quite clear what the goal of church transformation is or when transformation actually occurs, but we are all working at it.

Transformational Ministry: This is a much talked about but seldom seen phenomenon. Often, it has little to do with transformation or ministry. It has more to do with economic viability (see above). Congregations can transform greatly but go unrecognized until they can contribute more to the denomination or hire more professional help. If you are really good at transforming no one will notice. It is like a magic act. The rabbit appears and then it disappears. But what happened to the rabbit when it disappeared? It doesn’t matter to the church as long as the act keeps playing and it can be chalked up as transformational ministry.

Thus ends today’s vocabulary review. Do you have a favorite church buzzword?

photo credit: visualthinker via photo pin cc
05 Jun 2012

Don’t Know How to Start Blogging? Start here!

2×2 recommends signing up for this five-part workshop on business blogging. Don’t let the word “business” scare you off. Blogging is blogging and the leader of this workshop understands and explains it well. You can easily apply what you learn to evangelism.

Click here or on the sidebar image for registration information.

The five-session workshop begins July 10. All sessions are recorded for replay and transcripts provided, so you don’t have participate live.

You can get in for 50%-off until this Thursday.
This is a step-by-step course designed to help your business quickly implement effective blogging techniques, attract great customers and gain a unique competitive advantage.

And it’s fully online!

Your instructor is Michael Stelzner, the founder of one of the world’s largest business blogs: Social Media Examiner and author of the book Launch.

WANT TO KNOW MORE?

This workshop is a live systematic study course where each session builds on the previous one. This allows you to master a discipline under the guidance of a single instructor.

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Here’s what Blogging Fundamentals for Business will cover:

* Blogging strategy
* Creating great content
* Blogging metrics and technology
* Launching (or relaunching) your blog
* Blog promotion tactics

Remember, you can get in at half price if you register by this Thursday June 7th.

02 Jun 2012