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By Clark Cowden
San Joaquin Presbytery
The
North American culture at the beginning of the 21st century looks
quite different from the way it looked at the beginning of the 20th
century. North American Protestant denominations also look quite differently
today than they did at the beginning of the 20th century. Many
books have been written to describe the myriad of changes that have taken
place, and how our modern-day denominations have struggled to change and adapt
to the transitional times that we live in. Large organizations do not change
or move in new directions quickly. Organizations carry a historical baggage
that often impede the decisions that are necessary to bring health and growth.
Many denominations today are dysfunctional, spinning their wheels over the
same old conflicts, and never moving forward into new arenas of ministry.
While some resign themselves to the inevitability of this discouragement,
others dream new dreams of church networks that can flourish and grow.
People today are dreaming of a church network that:
- Enhances local church ministry rather than hinders it,
- Builds and strengthens congregations rather than
embarrassing them,
- Casts an inspiring vision for ministry,
- Defines the core beliefs of our faith,
- Pushes congregations to engage their communities in new,
missional ways,
- Is freeing and not controlling,
- Is faithful to Jesus Christ and the revealed,written Word
of God,
- Focuses on transforming individuals and communities
through the power of the Holy Spirit, and
- Shares the whole gospel with the whole person.
The 21st century North American culture is a
post-denominational world. Most people who look for a church to belong to, do
not care what denomination it is a part of. They care what kind of ministry,
preaching, love, and care happens in that local context. The only future for
denominational structures is in adjusting their priorities to serve the local
congregation. [1]
Without vital congregations, there is no support base for any kind of world
mission.[2]
The denomination that desires a vital, healthy future is one that focuses on a
few main things. Today’s denomination must have a clear sense of purpose and
vision, and resist the temptation to try to be all things to all people. It
must be purpose-driven and vision-driven. Today’s denomination must focus like
a laser on these key areas:
- Casting an inspiring vision,
- Defining the few, central bedrock beliefs,
- Communicating and livings its core values,
[3]
Enforcing well-known boundaries of acceptable, ethical
behaviors,
Strengthening local congregations,
Supporting, training, and encouraging pastoral and lay
leaders, and
Providing connections with other Christians around the
world.
Without these commonalities, there can be no unity in the 21st
century denomination. Unity does not mean uniformity. These is plenty of room
for flexibility and creativity within the guardrails that scripture
establishes. But, it also realizes that not everything is acceptable. Not
everything is just a difference of opinion. Some ideas are false teachings.
Heresy exists today, and some people are being led astray. In a culture that
says everyone can decide their own truth, the healthy denomination continues
to confess the truth that God has revealed in the scriptures, and lovingly
points out what God has said is not true.
The denomination of the 21st century is one that
will function more like a missions agency than a regulatory agency. A missions
agency looks for ways to help ministry happen. The regulatory agency looks for
ways to prevent things from happening. The missions agency prays for God to
raise up workers for the harvest and looks for ways to identify who God is
calling. The missions agency encourages these people, trains them, and sends
them out. The regulatory agency overloads people with minutia and paperwork,
and micromanages less important things.
In a missions agency, the polity guides the mission so the
mission can happen. In the regulatory agency, the polity controls, determines,
and limits the mission, because the polity is more important than the mission.
In the missions agency, the polity is a servant to the mission. In the
regulatory agency, the mission is a servant to the polity. The regulatory
agency uses the polity to maintain power and control over people. The missions
agency uses polity to help, assist, and bring order. The regulatory agency
tells people what they have to do. The missions agency listens to people, and
asks them what they need to accomplish the mission better. The regulatory
agency believes it knows better than its field workers do. The missions agency
believes its field workers know better than it does, because they are the ones
on the front lines of the ministry.
The regulatory agency operates from a permission-withholding
mindset. The missions agency operates from a permission-giving mindset. The
regulatory agency does not trust its people or its committees. It is always
second-guessing them, and re-debating what they have already decided. The
missions agency trusts its people and its ministry teams, giving them the
freedom to make the decisions to move the ministry forward. The regulatory
agency operates from a hierarchical position, imposing its higher will upon
the will of the levels beneath it. The missions agency operates from a
position of concentric circles, where different people are responsible for
wider areas of ministry, not to control, but to empower and support and hold
accountable. The regulatory agency believes that what is best for the
denomination is what is best for the congregation [4],
with the strength coming from the top down. The missions agency believes that
what is best for the congregation is best for the denomination, with the
strength coming from the inside out. The regulatory agency believes that
congregations should blindly serve the denomination in all matters. The
missions agency believes that the denomination exists to serve its
congregations, pastors, leaders, and people, and that the more they are
served, the more they will voluntarily and whole-heartedly serve the
denomination.
However, the only way a denomination can make this shift
from being a regulatory agency to a missions agency, is to get its people to
accept and agree on the central articles of unity: core values, bedrock
beliefs, motivating vision, common mission, and a few well-known,
well-enforced boundaries of ethical behavior.
The core values include things like priorities (what we do),
process (how we do the things that are important), people, doing mission as
opposed to just talking about mission, and doing holistic mission which does
not divorce people’s physical and emotional needs from their spiritual needs.
The bedrock beliefs are the few essentials of the faith that
have stood the test of time, and will never be compromised. The old cliché "in
essentials unity, in non-essentials diversity, in all things charity", still
holds true today, but it can only work when the essentials have been defined
and everyone knows what they are. There must be agreement on the central
beliefs of the faith. Not every belief is true, and not every teaching is from
God. The 21st century denomination that is healthy will define
these, and allow people to choose if this is a church they want to be a part
of or not. One problem that the Presbyterian Church has had since the
conflicts of the 1920’s is the mindset that theology divides and mission
unites. This is wrong. There can be no real unity without theological unity.
Churches continuing in the Reformed tradition, operate under the belief that
the Holy Spirit is still alive and active in the world today, but that the
Spirit will never lead us contrary to what God has already revealed in the
written Word of God. Word and Spirit cannot be divided.
The motivating vision is what the denomination repeatedly
casts before its people. Without a vision people perish. "The most important
problem in the church today is a fundamental lack of clear, heart-grabbing
vision. The church in America has no vision. It has programs and institutions
and property and ministers and politically correct hymnals, but no vision." [5]
"This is a time for a dramatically new vision. The current predicament of
churches in North America requires more than a mere tinkering with
long-assumed notions about the identity and mission of the church. Instead…
there is a need for reinventing or rediscovering the church in this new kind
of world."[6]
People need to know why the denomination exists. People need to know why the
denomination is doing what it is doing, and how the vision and mission of the
congregation fits into the overall picture of what God is doing in the world.
The common mission of the church describes how the North
American church operates in its own post-Christian, post-modern context. But,
it also looks at how we engage with our mission partners in other countries. A
global perspective, that does not assume that North Americans know more than
others do, and is willing to learn from Christians in other countries, is
critical for a healthy strategy of world missions.
The 21st century denomination cannot be healthy
without having some well-known behavioral boundaries. The church needs clear,
ethical standards that are lovingly and firmly enforced. Today’s North
American culture tempts the Church away from a Biblical morality. It’s a fact
that well-meaning, Christian people stumble and sin. The Church does not seek
to destroy people when they fall, but in order to lovingly help them, the
Church says yes, you have sinned. Confession and repentance are needed. The
Church will lovingly hold people accountable, and help them get the assistance
they need. But, for each person’s own health, and for the health of the
Church, a "no-boundary" denomination where everything is acceptable cannot be
tolerated. If the Body of Christ has no backbone, it is spineless.
The 21st century denomination seeks to empower
its congregations to reach their full kingdom potential. It connects its
churches to resources, rather than producing resources itself. It realizes
that there are a lot of products already being published by other sources, and
encourages its churches to utilize any resource that is faithful to the
scriptures. The denomination realizes that loyalty cannot be assumed,
demanded, or regulated. It must be earned. [7]
This denomination trusts its congregations with their property. The
denomination knows that forcing a church to be a part of its network is not
helpful to the ministry of the Kingdom of God. The denomination must be more
concerned about ministry than money or property, and so congregations are
deeded with their property, to use as they see fit.
"The denomination is a voluntary association. As such, it is
a collection of self-selecting individuals who make a commitment to
participate… Implicit in the nature of the denomination, then, is the freedom
of every individual to make or break their commitments". [8]
The 21st century denomination operates from a
Global/Local perspective. [9]
The denomination maintains contacts with other denominations, church networks,
and missionaries all over the world, but increasingly it encourages local
congregations to do the same. The denomination knows that the closer people
are connected to real mission work, the more the church will be strengthened,
the more people will give, and the more the kingdom of God will advance in the
world. The denomination encourages its churches to contribute to any missions
that are faithful to the scriptures, whether they are Presbyterian or not. The
denomination will encourage its local congregations to become "mother
churches" that take the initiative to reproduce themselves by "birthing" new
congregations, and will support congregations in these efforts by providing
needed resources. The denomination will not be threatened by any other
Christian organization. Rather, it will partner with other churches and other
parachurch organizations to reach their local and global communities for
Christ.
National assemblies for these denominations would look quite
different than the ones we are familiar with today. National assemblies would
focus on the needs of the ministry: training pastors, laity, and missionaries
for ministry, encouraging leaders who are discouraged, times of inspiring
worship, connecting people in meaningful relationships, commissioning
missionaries, and helping local church people connect with the missionaries
they are supporting. Very little time would be spent on debates and arguments.
The annual gatherings would have the ability to declare an issue "decided", so
that the same issue would not be allowed to dominate and consume the meeting
every year. That is not what most people are looking for from the church
today. The denomination and its gatherings will be much more relational than
organizational. Its meetings will be more like family reunions than political
conventions. Every church will be connected through the internet with regular
e-mail conversations, so people will be able to "get in touch" and "stay in
touch". The denomination will not focus on its own survival, but will focus on
giving itself away for the advancement of the kingdom of God.
We must be willing to let our traditional forms and
structures that are the foundation of the institutional church die. [10]
Are we called to make sure that there will always be a Presbyterian church, or
are we called to be faithful to the Gospel?[11]
"I love the Presbyterian Church and its theological tradition. But sometimes
we lose our way. Sometimes our tradition becomes more important than the
simplicity of the Gospel. Is it possible that we suffer from the same problem
that the Pharisees of Jesus’ day suffered from? Is it possible that we love
our traditional trappings more than the Gospel itself?"[12]
"Not all forms of the church that we inherit must continue. … Such
communities, if they are founded for mission, will be prepared to change and
perhaps even to cease existing in a specific form."[13]
It is time for a change. A small tinkering will not do. It
is time for a radical new reinvention of the denomination. The 21st
century denomination will function as a servant to its missionaries, its
pastors, its lay leaders, and its congregations. It exists to help them do the
ministry on the "front lines". The denomination is the support system, the
rescue squad, the back-up team that works to make the most ministry possible.
It seeks to glorify God in all it does, operating under the authority of
scripture. Through its congregations and its people, it calls all people to
repentance and faith in Jesus Christ as the only savior and lord of the world.
The church will only be fruitful when it is faithful, and if it is neither,
God will remove it from the vine(John 15:2). Jesus is the vine and we are the
branches. Apart from Him, we can do nothing (John 15:5).
Comment on this Article visit The
New Wineskins Document Review
[1]
Mike Regele, Death of the Church (Zondervan: Grand Rapids, 1995), 203.
[2]
Ibid., 204.
[3]
Thomas Bandy, Coaching Change (Abingdon: Nashville, 2000), 141.
[4]
Darrell Guder editor, The Missional Church (Eerdmans: Grand Rapids,
1998), 72.
[5]
Mike Regele, Death of the Church (Zondervan: Grand Rapids, 1995), 229.
[6]
Darrell Guder, editor, The Missional Church (Eerdmans, Grand Rapids,
1998), 77.
[7]
George Bullard, "Can Denominations Thrive in the 21st Century, Or
Is That Just a Fantasy?" (Net Results, March 2001: Net Results, Inc.),
29.
[8]
David W. Hall, "The Pastoral and Theological Significance of Church
Government," in David W. Hall and Joseph H. Hall, eds., Paradigms in Polity
(Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1994), 12-34.
[9]
George Bullard, "Can Denominations Thrive in the 21st Century, Or
Is That Just a Fantasy?" (Net Results, March 2001: Net Results, Inc.),
30.
[10]
Mike Regele, Death of the Church (Zondervan: Grand Rapids, 1995) 199.
[11]
Ibid., 210.
[12]
Ibid., 210.
[13]
Darrell Guder, The Missional
Church (Eerdmans: Grand Rapids, 1998) 241.
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