Jun

15

The Present Future-Part 3

June 15, 2007 |

The Present Future

For an introduction to this series, go to here

New Reality Number Two: The Shift from Church Growth to Kingdom Growth

With rare exception the “growth” [in the church growth movement] was the cannibalization of the smaller membership churches by these emerging superchurches. “Consequently, a large part of the leadhip of the North American church suffers form debilitation and even depression fostered by a lack of significance. The army of God has a lot of demoralized leaders.”

McNeil argues that the church growth movement is a transition between the old church culture and the emerging culture. “Unfortunately, it fell victim to an idolatry as old as the tower of Babel, the belief that we are the architects of the work of God. As a result, we have the best churches men can build, but re still waiting for the church that only God can get credit for.”

Wrong Question: How Do we Grow This Church? (How Do We Get Them to Come to Us?)

A Lily study released in 2002 found that one-half of churchgoers attended churches in the top 10 percent of church size.

“Churches have jumped headlong into the customer service revolution. Many have purposefully studied the unchurched population to determine the best ways to be ‘seeker sensitive’ or ‘seeker-driven.’” …and the result has been diminishing returns.

Tough Question: How do We Transform Our community” (How Do We Hit the Streets with the Gospel?)

“Churches that understand the realities of the present future are shifting the target of ministry efforts from church activity to community transformation. This is turning the church inside out.”

“The world does not want what the typical North American church has to offer,. We can keep trying to get them to want what we have or we can start offering what they need. They need what people always need: God in their lives. The North American church culture is not spiritual enough to reach our culture.”

“Jesus preached that God accepts people as they are so that, in the light of his love, they can come to their senses and clean up their act.”

“The Pharisees were monoculturalists (all religious fanatics are). Monoculturalism does not embrace kingdom growth, because it insists that people conform to a cultural standard in order to gain admittance to the religious club.”

“Church leaders mostly whine about how the church is suffering under this cultural shift rather than making serious adjustments to make the church more available to people who are not a part of the church culture lifestyle anymore.”

“The target of most church ministry efforts has been on the church itself and church members… In the future the church that ‘gets it’ will staff to and spend its resources on strategies for community transformation.”

“Jesus’ strategy was to go where people were already handing out… Taking the gospel ro the streets means we need church where people are already hanging out. We need a church in every mall, every Wal-Mart supercenter every Barnes and Noble.”

“What are we do afraid of ‘out there?’ … we are afraid of not knowing how to engage people in genuine conversation. I think we fear rejection. I think we don’t know what to say. I think we are unsure of what wee have to offer to people. I think we are not that enthusiastic about being evangelistic because we feel we don’t have a compelling story. The power of the gospel is lost on church members who can sign off on doctrinal positions but have no story of personal transformation.”

What it’s going to take “to gain a hearing for the gospel in the streets of the 21st century is the small of cleaning solution, dirty faces, obvious acts of servanthood.”

“We Christians in the church have been great at speaking the truth without love. We do have the truth. The trouble is, people can’t hear it form us because we haven’t earned the privilege to share it.”

“It’s not our job to convict people of sin. That’s the Holy Spirit’s job…”

“…since the church is absent from the streets, people are turning to all kinds of false answers to their spiritual quest. Church members then have the gall to sit inside the church and pass judgment on people for their errant beliefs.”

“They’re not coming to us. We’ve got to go to them.”


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