I just read this interesting article from the Alban institute:
Basically the author, N. Graham Standish is arguing that the reason why a majority of churches are dying is because they have stopped listening to God. He claims that every "thriving" church he has attended are all open to the presence of God in their community. I don't know what he means by "thriving," but we'll assume it means they have more than 200 people a Sunday and really good donuts.
He claims that all of those other, apostate churches are mired in rational functionalism which is rooted in the idea, "that we can uncover the mysteries of life and the universe mainly through rational thought and disciplined investigation. It is the tendency of denominations, their congregations, and their leaders to subscribe to a view of faith and church rooted in a restrictive, logic-bound theology that ignores the possibility of spiritual experiences and miraculous events."
Sermons are basically academic papers. Churches are run like a rote institution. They are cold, vapid, and basically dead.
Those "thriving" churches are "open to God at its core." That is basically all Standish says about those "thriving" churches.
Mr. Standish (or is it Rev. Standish, or Dr. Standish?) I am calling you naked. Well, I'm not actually calling you naked but your theory naked. It is weak, hypercritical, and groundless. I think that is the nice way to put it.
It is very easy to go to almost any church and say, "well, since you are doing things that I don't like you must not be listening to God, you heathen, bastard church."
It is just as easy to say, "this church is doing well because it is doing the things that I think are exciting and important. They must be listening to God. Let the angels sing and rejoice."
Basically Standish is saying, "if you can't see what I see then you are Godless and doomed to failure." If you can't see the fine clothes on the emperor, then you must be a fool.
But I will call out the emperor's nakedness. Standish's critique and claim is nothing but putting up a false facade of spirituality and making other struggling churches feel like crap. There may be some value to the critiques he makes, but the package stinks. Thanks N. Graham Standish. Thanks a lot.
7 comments:
Awesome!
So what do you propose instead? Did you read my comment on the article? I liked it. I think it hits home in a very powerful way. If "saving" our congregations (whatever that means) were about being smart and educated, then we would have solved our problems already. So, what do you propose is in the air/water etc? I am very interested in hearing what you think he could have said or should have said instead. Or what would you suggest?
Ummm, Alban Institute published this article and we don't know if the author is a Mr. or Rev. or Dr.?
Which ever it is, I too would like to know what "thrive" means. Too often such positive descriptions of such church experiences are more emotional than spiritual. Logic and reason have their place in theological and ecclesiastical conversation. But I'm still waiting for a clear definition of such terms as "thrive" that differentiate between logic, emotion and spirit.
My church, on the other hand. Is doing quite nicely despite that fact that it is nonexistent. ^_^
The Alban Institute is pretty clear on those terms over all. Read Bass' "Christianity for The Rest of Us" etc. There's a ton of stuff. Or just search their site for "thrive" and see what pops up.
In general, I think the critique is right on target. More committee meetings will not help a congregation thrive (to be a place of spiritual and social transformation, in short, a place for the Gospel of Christ to be proclaimed and lived).
The article, and followup comments all assume an understanding of what success means for the church. I see this frequently. What does "thrive", "healthy" "doing quite nicely" mean for you? I think a fundamental unanswered question swirling under so much stuff written to improve the church is "how we we measuring success in the church today?" and what is it based on? Economic measures (numbers)? How people like it? or are happy? what are New Testament measures? What if getting smaller, not bigger, were the measure (mustard seed)? NT more concerned about the quality of life lived in community that will startle the world.
Thanks everyone for your comments - in general I don't think there is one solution or one problem. The attempt to bring everything into one nice, neat package is what irks me. I recognize that Tripp is trying to defend Alban and with good cause. My experience with Alban has been that it is a credible organization which is part of the reason why I was surprised and not happy with this article.
I wonder if many churches struggle with a mix of spirituality and functionalism sometimes leaning too far one way or the other. This may be the case for many pastors and many individual Christians.
Indeed, Jonathan. I think you are right. The reason why I resonated (hate that word) so strongly with the article is because it described so many experiences I have had so well. And, to be honest, when congregations get in trouble (nnd, like Dale, I'm not sure what we always mean by that) they usually think they can problem solve their way out of trouble. I'm not sure this is necessarily so...in fact, I typically think it's not.
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