A New Look at David and Goliath

Malcolm Gladwell is pitching a new book, David and Goliath. If it is anything like his earlier books, (The Tipping Point and Outliers) he will change our cultural outlook with a fresh and statistical look at accepted wisdom and practices.

CBS’s 60 Minutes featured his new work today. Gladwell says that when large forces do battle with small forces there is a tendency to exaggerate the power of big and underestimate the capabilities of small.

This tendency is played out in the Church. How well we know!

The big and powerful Southeastern Pennsylvania Synod of the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America ( SEPA / ELCA ) decided it was wise to flex its muscles in our Philadelphia neighborhood in 2006.

They were struggling. SEPA’s 170 churches just weren’t contributing the way they used to. SEPA’s budget was regularly running a profound deficit. They were strategizing not so much with mission in mind but with their need to maintain staff and pay salaries.

Someone thought up the idea of forcing smaller, debt-free churches into giving up on mission and deeding assets to them. They tried this a few times with little resistance. Then they chose Redeemer as their target.

Problem: It’s against their governing rules. Churches are not required to bequeath assets to the regional body unless they were begun as mission churches.

Solution: Find a way to make small congregations that are not “mission churches” into mission churches and then force their hand. Failing that, find a way to get the church members out of the way.

And so SEPA started using the word Involuntary before the words Synodical Administration in their constitution which had been tweaked from its first reading to be in violation of its incorporating documents. They gave it added validity with its own acronym. ISA must be legal!

Involuntary Synodical Administration is not found in the synod’s constitution. Synodical Adminsistration in the original constitution was permitted only with the consent of a congregation. The intent of allowing Synodical Administration was to help congregations not bully them.

No one was supposed to notice. And almost no one has! The practice of forcing churches to close for the benefit of SEPA became accepted. Everyone could wonder which church was next. Tread carefully.

In East Falls, the resources of 170 churches were pitted against the resources of a small neighborhood congregation and a handful of individual members that Goliath SEPA decided to attack personally.

The strength of SEPA was exaggerated. Eight years later the mission of one small church is still being underestimated.

It hasn’t been easy. Courts didn’t want to be involved in upholding church law. Neither did 170 congregations, the synod assembly, the synod council or the national expression of the ELCA with  law offices paid by congregations but working for the synods. Neither did very many individuals. Just turn the other way. Pretend to know nothing. Redeemer will get tired and disappear. The property can be sold. Rejoice! “Mission” accomplished.

SEPA took possession of Redeemer’s property in 2009 and locked out the members who donated the assets. There was no process, no negotiation, no mutual discernment, no thank you. Just bullying.

This brings us to Gladwell’s next point. When there is confrontation with vastly lopsided odds, the underdog is put in a unique position.

The underdog must innovate. Gladwell gives some examples of innovation coming from the smallest and most unlikely places. Each received so little regard from the establishment that they were free to re-invent. In some cases, they made enemies doing it, but were eventually accepted when egos stopped overshadowing results.

Interestingly, church leaders have been promoting innovation and change for decades. The bishop involved in this dispute even wrote a book about it—Transforming Regional Bodies. In this book Rev. Claire Burkat openly advocates that small churches should be allowed to die to preserve synodical resources.

But this doesn’t lead to transformation—just the shifting of resources and the eroding of mission.

The Goliath nature of the Church is unable to transform. It doesn’t appreciate its Davids.

Larger churches have no need to transform as long as their numbers can continue to support a couple of pastors and support staff. They define success even as they are starting to fail. Most large churches are in decline, too.

Middle-sized churches are preserving resources, hoping to reach the status of large churches or at least maintain church as they know it. Change might threaten their perceived stability.

Smaller churches have no luxuries. Many have minimal or inadequate professional help. Pastors seek calls in the larger congregations where they won’t have to do the evangelical work of building community. Consequently, each member of a small church plays a vital role in church mission. With less clergy oversight, they are free to experiment.

Redeemer was always a bit entrepreneurial in that regard. But without property, with no clergy, and while being entirely unwelcome in the ELCA, we forged ahead.

While SEPA and the ELCA pretend we don’t exist, we’ve accomplished a great deal.

We’ve become the church of the future, the church that can rewrite how small churches will survive.

Our next post will give some details.