TILL HE COMES Blog

Every once in a while I read a book that puts into words what I have been thinking, but couldn’t quite express. These are not so much “Aha!” moments as “Yes! Someone who understands!” moments. This last month, I happened to read two such books. Both put into words what I have been thinking and feeling for two-three years now.

Previously, I wrote about how the average reader can only read about 4000 books in a lifetime. These are two books I am glad are on my list. Both books might have made it into my Top Ten List. Definitely my top twenty.

The first book, Church Without Walls by Jim Petersen, is a book I’ve owned for about ten years, but never got around to reading. It’s probably a good thing I didn’t read it ten years ago, because it wouldn’t have meant much to me back then. Ten years ago, I thought I had church all figured out. I even wrote a book about it (I thank God it never got published…). Jim Petersen bases his book off of some church planting work he did in Brazil in the 1960s. He found that to really reach people who wouldn’t step foot in the typical church, he had to radically change the way the church looked and functioned. In the rest of the book, he summarizes the historical, theological, and biblical insights he came to as he struggled with how to allow this new church of Brazilian Christians be the church in their culture. (I recently learned that this this story is further developed in a new release, Will this Rock in Rio? by Ken Lottis.)

Jim Petersen then takes the lessons he learned in Brazil and applies them to our own time and culture. His basic conclusion is that various traditions have locked us into doing church a certain way, and have ceased to be helpful for many of the people we are trying to reach with the gospel (cf. p. 208). By abandoning some of these traditions, we actually liberate the church to live the gospel in our culture and communities. I’m looking forward to reading this book again.

The second book which got my heart racing is Repenting of Religion by Greg Boyd. Most Christians love to say they have a “relationship” not a “religion.” But the truth is that most of us just have another religion. I see this first hand every day at my job where I get to interact with people of seventeen different religions. Whatever differences they all may have, one thread runs through them all (Christianity included) — judgment and condemnation.

As Christians, we judge gays, lesbians, the rich, the homeless, people of other religions, atheists, heretics, criminals, drunks, drug addicts, prostitutes, pimps, politicians, and anybody else we can think of to point our finger at. Greg Boyd points out that Scripturally, these are not really the sins that God is most concerned about.  God is more concerned with other sins, which happen to be found in the lives of most Christians, especially those of us here in the United States.

But even this not Boyd’s point. He doesn’t just want us to shift our finger pointing from one target to another. He wants us to stop the pointing altogether. Finger pointing – judgmentalism – is a symptom of religion. “But wait!” you say, “Jesus judged. Paul judged. We are even told to judge each other! What about those texts?” Boyd is not ignorant of these texts and deals with all of them. His basic conclusion is that the only judging Jesus and Paul do is to judge the self-righteous, hypocritical, legalistic religious people for committing the sin of judging others.

As with everything Boyd writes, this book challenges your thinking and causes you to see certain Scriptures in a new light. If you want to learn to live out the love of Jesus within this world, you must read this book.

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It’s popular in Christian circles today to talk about creating community. It is argued that one of the greatest things lacking in most of our churches is a sense of community, that we all belong, and are headed somewhere together — and actually enjoying each other’s company as we do it!

Whole books are written about how to develop this community within your church. Church planters talk about founding communities of faith, hope, and love. Many churches will even put the word “community” in their name.

However, the more I read the Scriptures, the more I get this strange feeling that Jesus never really intended to create a community. Instead, my reading of the Gospels leads me to believe that Jesus never intended to found a new community and ask people to join it, but rather to find already-existing communities, and join with them. So he went to synagogues (the teaching centers), weddings, dinner parties, watering holes, and join in the community that had already naturally developed.

There were, of course, always problems in such communities, and Jesus frequently tried to heal the brokenness and pain that was present in the community. But this is a more natural way of developing community than by putting together a bunch of strangers and saying, “Now get along!”

So are you trying to “plant a church” or “reach out” to your community? How about rather than starting something of your own and asking them to join you, why don’t you find out what God is already doing in your community, and then see how you join them. Don’t try to found the community; just find the one that is already there.

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I’ve never been one for prepackaged group Bible studies. Generally, I disdain them. To put it crudely, (in the words of a famous line from Monty Python and the Holy Grail) I fart in their general direction. I can’t tell you how many hundreds of hours I have spent yawning and eye-rolling through such studies.

However, I was recently sent a group study which I not only like, but thoroughly recommend! Yes, this group study is worth the money you spend on it! It’s called The Tangible Kingdom Primer and is based on a book which I recommended last year called The Tangible Kingdom by Hugh Halter and Matt Smay. The book itself is one of the best books I have read on how to live a life of evangelism and mission for church planting. The more I work on planting churches, and the more I read about the gospel and the kingdom, the more convinced I am that this book is a “must read,” not only for church planters, but for all who follow Jesus.

And now, the eight-week guide makes the ideas of the book even more accessible. This is a fantastic tool to help Christians become “missional” and “incarnational” according to the gospel. I highly recommend that groups of believers around the country go through this study while reading The Tangible Kingdom. The study contains stunning images, thought-provoking questions, and most importantly, missional insights into key biblical texts.

If you really want to follow Jesus, this little guide will show you what it is, how to do it, why we should, and (most often forgotten) where. (Did you know that it is hard to follow Jesus if all you do is “attend church”?) If you want to “reach out,” but don’t really know how, this primer is the place to start.

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This post concludes my “What if…” series. I am sure I will have more questions in the future as I try to seek answers to those already asked, but that’s what this process of reimagining church is all about.

I know that most of these questions will come back to haunt me in the future….

What if Prayer were different?

What if when we prayed for something, we concluded every prayer by asking, “How can we ourselves be an answer to our prayer?”

What if we didn’t feel the need to bow our heads, close our eyes, and fold our hands when we pray?

What if prayer was more like a conversation with God than a strange, wordy, repetitive incantation?

What if we stopped saying “Father” after every phrase? (I thank you, Father, for this beautiful day, Father, and for the opportunity to be here, Father….). He knows we’re talking to Him. He doesn’t need the constant reminder.

What if we didn’t backtrack on our prayers of faith with the statement “…if it’s your will”? (I know Jesus prayed this way once, but that’s a subject for a different study.) 

What if we stopped using prayer as an excuse for gossip?

What if strategies for getting money were different?

What if we didn’t pass tithe plates?

What if, when someone wanted to give a large sum of money to the church, we had them sign a document saying that they understood this did not entitle them to any sort of recognition in the church, or any power or say over where/how the money was used?

What if we didn’t take “special offerings” multiple times until we got the amount we were “praying” for?

What if we didn’t pressure people into giving “10%” (which is a misunderstanding and misapplication of the Old Testament principle of tithing)?

What if fellowship were different?

What if believers actually cared for each other?

What if we wanted to spend time together? How would we encourage this to happen?

What if we were more interested in loving and serving each other than in being served?  But HOW?

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One big issue with church today is where, when, and how we meet. So as we think about reinventing church, there are several questions that need to be asked.

What if the meeting times, places, and format were different?

What if the best time for a church to meet is not on Sunday morning?

What if the best place to meet is not in a building?

What if the best format is not song, announcements, songs, prayer, sermon?

What if believers realized that church has nothing to do with the building on the corner?

What if we didn’t have the financial black hole of a building?

What if when we had “service” we actually did some service?

What if our only “service” of the week was service? (Meet. Eat. Teach. Serve.)

Ministries
What if we started ministries based on what spiritual gifts were present in the church, not based on what the church down the street was doing?

What if we didn’t feel like we had to offer all things to all people?

What if we had fewer ministries, and did not expect people to be involved or present in all of them?

Church Planting
What if our goal for church planting wasn’t to plant churches, but to make disciples?

What if our goal wasn’t to get a crowd together, but to change the world, to turn the world upside down?

What if our way of “doing church” was so simple, basic, memorable, easy, reproducible, that anybody could do it, no matter how long they have been a Christian, or how much they know, or how much training they don’t have?

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When it comes to church, I can’t tell you how often I’ve heard people tell me, “Don’t reinvent the wheel.”

I imagine back in cave-man history when they had square wheels, a certain caveman— we’ll call him Firestone—noticed that square wheels didn’t roll too well, and so started asking some “What if” questions. His first was probably, “Square wheels are easy to make, but those corners sure cause problems. What if we rounded them off?”

Probably the other cavemen came around and, through a series of grunts and club beatings, told Firestone, “Don’t reinvent the wheel.” He especially got grief from the wheel cutters, because they had been making wheels like this since their great, great grandfathers developed opposable thumbs. “Besides,” the stone cutters said, “if we have to round off the corners, it will take us a lot more time to make wheels. Right now, we can cut two square wheels a day. If we have to round off the corners, we can only make one wheel a day.”

For a while, Firestone was a little discouraged. But then one day, he came across a wheel cutter named Michelin who shared similar ideas. They sat for long hours into the night, talking about round wheels, and that even if it took longer to cut round wheels, it would save everybody a lot of time, because now the wheels could actually be used. “Why doesn’t everybody see this?” they wondered.

So one day, they stopped talking about it, and actually made a round wheel. At first, people made fun of them. Firestone and Michelin were scoffed at and ridiculed. “A round wheel,” they were told, “doesn’t look right on a square cart.” But then people noticed that the carts were actually moving and transporting things, and so the criticism shifted. ”All that rolling,” they were told, “will cause the wheel to crack. Square wheels are better because they don’t roll, and so don’t crack.”

But Firestone and Michelin just kept making round wheels. After a while, they even had a few disagreements with each other on how to make the best wheel, and so agreed to go their separate ways. At first, the naysayers cheered, and said things like, “I won’t say ‘I told you so’” even though “I told you so” was exactly what they were saying. However, wheel production actually increased. Instead of one group making round wheels, there were now two. And the competition caused both cutters to continually refine and redesign their wheels.

Today, both Firestone and Michelin continue to “reinvent” the wheel, adding treading that sloughs off rain, traction that handles curves better, and studs for driving on ice and snow. A day may come when they will reinvent the wheel again, so that all of us can do life faster, smoother, and more efficiently. Maybe, eventually, they will get rid of wheels altogether, and we will ride on air.

I want to reinvent church. Why? A lot of it has become square and isn’t going anywhere. People come week after week, and work, and serve, and sweat, and teach, and give, and pray, and the church doesn’t go anywhere. There’s lots of lights and big, white-toothed smiles, warm handshakes, and media glitz, but the people aren’t going anywhere.

Don’t reinvent the wheel? Sorry. It needs to be reinvented.

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A few posts ago, I complained that the typical “church planter profile” is based only on the big and successful churches which have “Type A” personalities at the helm. I questioned the idea that “mega-church” status should be the goal for all churches, and therefore, that only “Type A” people should plant churches.

Someone once told me that “It takes all kinds of churches to reach all kinds of people, and all kinds of churches require all kinds of planters.” I agree. So what is it about the Type-A person that attracts crowds and convinces so many people that their way is the right way?

One answer may be that such leaders are louder.

A recent Time article revealed that these loud leadership types are wrong more often than the quiet types, but people will often follow and agree with them, for the simple reason that they speak up first and loudest. Here are a few quotes:

Repeatedly, the ones who emerged as leaders and were rated the highest in competence were not the ones who offered the greatest number of correct answers. Nor were they the ones whose SAT scores suggested they’d even be able to. What they did do was offer the most answers — period.

“Dominant individuals behaved in ways that made them appear competent,” the researchers write, “above and beyond their actual competence.” Troublingly, group members seemed only too willing to follow these underqualified bosses. An overwhelming 94% of the time, the teams used the first answer anyone shouted out — often giving only perfunctory consideration to others that were offered.

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I took a “church Planter’s Assessment” test a while back and failed. But I didn’t like the way some of the questions were worded, and so I decided the problem was with the test, not with me. So I took a different assessment, and failed that one too. But again, my complaint was that the questions seemed to be…weighted in a particular direction.

For example, on both “tests” many of the questions seemed to be geared toward leading lots of people, raising lots of funds, and getting lots of conversions. It seemed to me that the creators of the test were only testing for one certain kind of church – the rapidly growing megachurch.

So I did some research into how the tests were developed. It turns out they interviewed and sent personality inventories to some of the pastors of the fastest growing megachurches in the country. Then, based on the results, tests were created to help find people who had similar traits and characteristics as these megachurch pastors.

Does anyone else see a problem with this?

How about the fact that fewer and fewer people are finding spiritual fulfillment in the “megachurch experience”?

How about the fact that the megachurch model is, for the most part, does an incredibly poor job of helping people come to faith in Jesus (most megachurch numerical growth is transfer growth from smaller churches).  

How about the fact that the megachurch model generally does a rather poor job of helping people develop close, interpersonal relationships, and leading them down the path of discipleship?

How about the fact that the megachurch model is primarily a western, 20th century, logical-extreme c0nsequence of the “church growth movement” experiment, which was itself based on business models and Christendom-style thinking?

How about the fact that the vast majority of mega-church pastors have Type-A personalities, who–while good at leading large organizations, and generating a lot of excitement and publicity–are not so good at many of the “shepherding” aspects of pastoral ministry such as interpersonal relationships, tenderness, compassion, humility and patience?

I could go on (and on). I am not trying to bash megachurches or their pastors. I think that both are accomplishing some good things for the kingdom of God, and both have helped a lot of people. The only thing I am tired of is this idea that the megachurch mentality, structure, and systems are the only right way to “do church” (whatever that means). I am tired of being told that unless I can raise $100,000 to blow through in a year on radio ads, billboards, and door hangers, I can’t plant a church.

Somebody needs to write a book called “How to Plant a Church on less than $100 a Month.” I know it can be done, because I am beginning to do it. Are you ever going to hear about this church? Probably not - I’m planning on not even naming it. (When and why did we start naming churches, anyway?) Will I ever get a book deal out of it? If I did, who would read it? Will President Obama invite me to the White House for a luncheon? Not a chance. Will I get asked to speak at a church growth conference? The idea is laughable.

But I think Jesus is pleased with the direction I am headed, and that’s all that matters–even if I did fail two “church Planter’s Assessments.”

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I have been a long time reader of Chris Elrod’s blog, and he recently announced his departure from the blogosphere. To say goodbye, I am posting one of his final posts below that all church planters (and all who are followers of Jesus), should read. I strongly encourage you to also go and browse his archives (which are still active).

You will be missed Chris!

You Gotta Love that Sh*t
by Chris Elrod

Curse words are just words…but oh what a tapestry of division they can weave.  Recently I was meeting in a restaurant with some other church leaders.  Sitting near us were two truck drivers that were cussing up a storm in their conversation.  In between f-words and a-words one of the guys said REAL LOUD…”you gotta love that sh*t”.   That was the final straw for one of the pastors at our table and he asked the waitress if we could move to a different location…because he was offended by the language of the men.  That’s when it hit me…some people are offended by cussing…but it’s music to my ears.  When I hear cussing…I hear people far from God.  When I hear people far from God…I hear an opportunity to make an impact for the Kingdom of God.

I seriously don’t understand “leaders” that plant churches that appeal to themselves.  I don’t understand “leaders” that plant churches to reach other church people.  I really don’t understand “leaders” that plant churches with no real heart to reach people far from God.

Don’t get me wrong…reaching people far from God is messy.  They cuss…they have serious issues…they smell…they drink…they live lifestyles that are at times really repulsive.  Reaching people far God also means going to places that church folks have been taught not to go.  People FAR from God do not hang out in Starbucks or Junior League meetings…they hang out in bars, porn shops, downtown streets, bowling allies, courtrooms, emergency rooms and R-rated movies.  It’s not easy…it’s not pleasant…it’s not always rewarding.  However, reaching people far from God with the Gospel of Jesus Christ is what the Father called us to do.

I know that quite a few potential church planters read my blog so let me say this to you.  If you don’t want to do ministry that is messy…don’t plant a church.  If you just want to “feed the saints”…don’t plant a church.  If you just want to stop having to take orders from your current pastor…don’t plant a church.  If you just got fired, let go or laid off from a ministry position…don’t plant a church.  If you are still trying to impress seminary professors with your preaching skills…don’t plant a church.  In fact, if you think planting a church is cool…don’t plant a church.  If you think those things, It’s probably going to be best for you to get a job in your state denominational office…where it’s safe, there’s a steady paycheck and you only have to interact with other Christians.

On the other hand if you love the smell of vomit and beer….if you love to hear about people’s addictions…if you love hearing the f-bomb dropped by every member of a family (including kids)…if you love people wearing halter tops and Budweiser t-shirts in the Sunday service…if you love people putting three dollars cash in the offering plate and crossing their arms during worship…if you love getting 3 a.m. marriage counseling calls…then by all means…plant a church.  I’m not talking about you liking that stuff…I’m talking about…you gotta love that sh*t!!!

Church planting done right is messy…and attracts messy people.  If you don’t have a passion for the mess…if you don’t hear someone cussing and think, “That person is a potential guest for my church”…if you don’t wake up every day with an unquenchable thirst to see people far from God come to know Jesus Christ as their Lord and Savior…church planting is going to be a miserable experience for you!!!

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