Revolution in the Church

[darlene]

Gladussee, your class is one of a kind. We need more of those kinds of classes. I bet your class is a growing class? We need more of those kinds of class leaders. If we had similar kinds of classes, our church would be growing by leaps and bounds. You couldn't keep people away from our church!

As far as changing the structure of our church you might get away with combining some of the conferences in the U.S. but definitely not in Canada. For instance our conference in B.C. covers all of BC, the Yukon and the part of the Northwest Territories west of the 120 meridian. Now just to travel from our conference office to our farthest church in BC takes 20+ hours. We'd never be able to travel to Inuvik by car and many places in the NWT. We definitely need this conference and conferences across Canada. We also need our Canadian Union because they deal and interact with all the things that pertain to the Canadian Government. No, please do not change the church structure in Canada. I suspect other countries also would say the same thing. Perhaps the U.S. is different though because your conferences do not cover the vast areas that we do and you also have the Black church structure along with the other.

[Woody]

The Conferences are fine ... but we could axe the Unions. I thought our church was opposed to Unions anyways.

[JeriAnne]

ONE REASON:

LOSS OF SPIRITUALITY!!!

The spirit has been ignored while the head has grown to astronimical proprotions! It is spiritual hydrocephaly!

Go watch some of Oprah Winfreys Monday night Classes with Ekhart Tolle, insert our Saviour Jesus Christ into the mix (which they erroneously leave out) and you might have a start on growing your spirit!

The more I see of Religion the more I believe it knows little to NOTHING of God or Spiritual Wellbeing. Social warm fuzzies are good but they are NOT Spiritual growth!

With so little to offer the spirit, And even more that destroys it, Churches should NOT be surprised at the booming acceptance of New Age Teachings and Philosophies!

[aldona]

ONE REASON:

LOSS OF SPIRITUALITY!!!

The spirit has been ignored while the head has grown to astronimical proprotions! It is spiritual hydrocephaly!

Go watch some of Oprah Winfreys Monday night Classes with Ekhart Tolle, insert our Saviour Jesus Christ into the mix (which they erroneously leave out) and you might have a start on growing your spirit!

The more I see of Religion the more I believe it knows little to NOTHING of God or Spiritual Wellbeing. Social warm fuzzies are good but they are NOT Spiritual growth!

With so little to offer the spirit, And even more that destroys it, Churches should NOT be surprised at the booming acceptance of New Age Teachings and Philosophies!

Amen to the above.

Let us aim to worship God in Spirit and in Truth.

For so long our denomination has focused exclusively on Truth and reached the point of being afraid and even suspicious of Spirit.

As a medical person I love the "spiritual hydrocephaly" analogy. The head is large and full, but what is inside is only water...

aldona

[Woody]

Russell Burrill in "Radical Disciples For Revolutionary Churches" had some good thoughts along the lines of our discussions ...

Quote:

"Many Adventists understand how to operate the gathered church. They invite their friends to church meetings, evangelistic meetings and other activities of the local church. This is fine, but it is not the full picture Jesus has given. The church is not the building - the church is the people. Therefore, whereever the people of the church are, there is the church. On Mondays, the church may be at the office, the factory, or the health club. As members interact with the world in their business and pleasure, they are being the scattered church. Great Commission churches will need to educate their members to BE "church" at work and at play.

For too long we have divorced our work and recreation from the area of church. It is once more time for them to be integrated." p.18

Revolutionary ??

[Bravus]

Interesting that the example I brought from a strong, growing, serving church has pretty much sunk without a trace in this thread so far. All the other points raised are very important, but without (a) welcoming people in and ( immediately involving them in serving others, I can't see massive growth happening. After all, growth is a simple equation: front door minus back door. If we drag 2 in but 20 leave, our growth is negative. Keeping those who are already here, welcoming those who turn up, is crucial. But again, the focus is not on 'ministering to their needs' but on really, truly, actively making each of them ministers to the needs of others.

[Woody]

Bravus .... if you view church as confined to a building ... then I would agree with you.Your suggestions for 'church' are great. But I think we should be able to expand that view and God would prosper.

[Bravus]

Church is a human community to whom the building is almost irrelevant. But people need to be active members of that community, not just floaters.

The idea that we are 'too number conscious' is sort of compelling - until you realise that as Christians we believe that faith is the last helicopter off the top of the burning skyscraper. In that instance, wouldn't every single extra saved individual be cause for celebration? That's a number - 1 - that should be at the heart of everything we do as a church.

[lazarus]

Here's what i'm doing in my church.

I'm preaching about the need to seek the lost, forgiveness, how to deal with conflict, did series on the ten commandments, just finished one on Nehemiah. I'm spending whole month of may on Teens.

Our worship is now what I call "open". You can dress in suit and tie, you can come in jeans. During praise time its ok to sit quietly. Its ok to stand up with your hands lifted.

I will bless anybody's baby!

Every six months we set objectives for all the departments in terms of the Mission and Vision. Those objectives are heavily weighted towards outreach.

We give one Sabbath a quarter over to outreach. I preach for about 15 mins and we go out and do prayer walking, place door hangers etc.

We send a welcome letter to every visitor.

We plant to radically change the structure of the church, smaller board, and have ministry board for all the departments to discuss just ministry not the roof.

We are in the process of turning Prayer meeting into Prayer meeting!

Our attendance is up 30% in the last 12 months.

There's slot of stuff we're not doing well but few of the things I mentioned above are making a difference.

Revolution is fun!

[Woody]

Quote:

I will bless anybody's baby!

I know this isn't the politics thread ... but then it isn't the "Real Issues in Adventism" or the Bible or Religion thread either .... so I will say this.

Isn't this kinda what the politicians do? They go around blessing babies with kisses on the campaign trail.

[LynnDel]

What about the Holy Spirit? the latter rain? Is that what is needed? Do WE bring on the latter rain if we work hard enough and have the right ideas?

[Bravus]

That is His work, and I suspect we can't bring it on ourselves. But can we hold it back ourselves? It seems to me that what underlies almost all the issues outlined here is that we really don't *care* about other people. There's no passion to get them saved. That means not fervently praying for the Spirit to work, and it means not doing much of anything useful ourselves. I agree with the 'freindship evangelism' philosophy, but that's a 'each believer brings in 2-3 new ones in a lifetime' type approach. If we really do believe we're saving lives, it's too slow and ineffective. We need better approaches - and we need ones that work in affluent countries, not just these trumpeted successes in developing countries.

[Jeannieb43]

Here's what i'm doing in my church.

I'm preaching about the need to seek the lost, forgiveness, how to deal with conflict, did series on the ten commandments, just finished one on Nehemiah. I'm spending whole month of may on Teens.

Our worship is now what I call "open". You can dress in suit and tie, you can come in jeans. During praise time its ok to sit quietly. Its ok to stand up with your hands lifted.

I will bless anybody's baby!

Every six months we set objectives for all the departments in terms of the Mission and Vision. Those objectives are heavily weighted towards outreach.

We give one Sabbath a quarter over to outreach. I preach for about 15 mins and we go out and do prayer walking, place door hangers etc.

We send a welcome letter to every visitor.

We plant to radically change the structure of the church, smaller board, and have ministry board for all the departments to discuss just ministry not the roof.

We are in the process of turning Prayer meeting into Prayer meeting!

Our attendance is up 30% in the last 12 months.

There's slot of stuff we're not doing well but few of the things I mentioned above are making a difference.

Revolution is fun!

Sounds wonderful, Laz!

This type of thing takes WORK. Planning, etc., and then execution. You're really getting people involved.

BTW, what is prayer walking?

[darlene]

Yes, what you are doing, sounds very good. We need more programs and pastors like you in our churches. And the results show by your increased attendance. Keep it up!

[carolaa]

Quote:

I think 3ABN is awesome, but it ends up preaching to the choir instead of spreading the message in most cases.

Very True. But things like 3ABN are very impersonal. And we in our daily lives can be the most powerful witness. I've found that one of the best ways to witness is to PRAY. YES ... PRAY. And I don't mean to pray in your closet. I mean to do as Neil has shared about praying with his patients. All humans have needs. And if you offer to quickly send up a short prayer for people on a casual basis ... they will usually jump at the offer and appreciate it. And guess who they will come to when they REALLY need prayer and help.

In the last church I was at, our best "interests" came from 3ABN. They were the most grounded and .... they stayed!

[carolaa]

Gladussee, your class is one of a kind. We need more of those kinds of classes. I bet your class is a growing class? We need more of those kinds of class leaders. If we had similar kinds of classes, our church would be growing by leaps and bounds. You couldn't keep people away from our church!

It is not one of a kind. I've seen several similar SS classes patterned after the one described in Chris Blake's book, Reinventing Sabbath School.

[carolaa]

Do you recall any of the main ideas that Burrill wrote about?

His main ideas were that lay people need to be doing more ministry instead of the pastors doing it. It is not the pastors' job to do ministry; ministry is the duty of *every* Christian. The pastor's job is to see that the lay people are equipped to do their job of ministry. Basically the same things EGW talked about. In fact, she says that if a church thinks they need a full-time pastor, they need to be re-converted. (I think that quote is in Revolution in the Church.) He also talks a lot about church planting as an excellent way to raise up and train new leaders and to keep churches healthy.

[carolaa]

The North American Growth rate is almost zero overall. If we keep on doing the same, we will get the same results.

Do we need a REVOLUTION? How would you see this? AND please leave doctrinal things out-of-this...

I personally would like to see more conferences geared to reach various groups.

I for example, believe, that one of our fastest growing groups where I live are reaching those who come from the Philippine Islands. If they had their own conference I do believe they would also get more funding and continue their growth at an even higher rate. I know that it will cause complications, but it is less complications than a zero growth.

Texas Conference is NOT experiencing zero growth. We have had steady increases over the last several years (2,000+ in 2007) due to the strong emphasis on church planting and, more recently, the Focusing Leaders process.

There is also a big emphasis on pastors as coaches. They are taught coaching skills and then put in charge of coaching lay-led church plants. There is also a system in place where these pastors coach other pastors who are mostly young in the ministry, and the pastor turnover rate has gone down tremendously because it provides nurture, fellowship, and guidance they need to be successful. (It also saves lots of money since employee moves are a huge expense.)

[Woody]

Russell Burrill in "Radical Disciples For Revolutionary Churches" had some good thoughts along the lines of our discussions ...

Quote:

"Many Adventists understand how to operate the gathered church. They invite their friends to church meetings, evangelistic meetings and other activities of the local church. This is fine, but it is not the full picture Jesus has given. The church is not the building - the church is the people. Therefore, whereever the people of the church are, there is the church. On Mondays, the church may be at the office, the factory, or the health club. As members interact with the world in their business and pleasure, they are being the scattered church. Great Commission churches will need to educate their members to BE "church" at work and at play.

For too long we have divorced our work and recreation from the area of church. It is once more time for them to be integrated." p.18

Revolutionary ??

[carolaa]

Another side of the coin is that sometimes I do wonder if we tend to put too much emphasis on church growth as opposed to reaching lost people.

For example, I was talking with a woman in church today who had just come back from visiting another part of the world where she is originally from. She was particularly proud of the fact that she was able to inform that pastor of the fact that her sister, who has attended there regularly for years, was not a baptized member. Subsequently, the pastor contacted the sister and baptized her right away.

Wonderful story - nothing wrong with it. But for some reason I was left with the sick feeling that church membership was the goal and that this woman believed her sister was not saved until she was baptized.

Maybe lack of church growth is what happens when we focus too hard on making people members instead of really caring about them and meeting their needs.

Maybe we care more about being right, and telling others what is right, than we care about the people we are telling.