Congregational Life Centre
Our mission is to encourage possibilities
Transforming Your Congregation
Centre Staff
Shifting to
greatness is what we see ahead for the church. Last newsletter talked about
individuals making a shift to the point where they can provide the constructive
leadership the church is crying out for. This newsletter is about leading
our congregations through the deep changes that transform them from yesterday's
model to tomorrow's powerhouse.
We use the term "transformation" rather than "reformation" for a very good reason. Martin Luther started a reformation when he nailed a list of propositions to the door of his church in Wittenberg November 17, 1517. In doing so he was issuing an academic challenge to anyone in the Catholic Church of his day to enter into a debate. One thing changed that innocuous challenge into a full scale movement - the printing press. A printer made a copy and began to sell them. Within two weeks Luther's fighting words had spread across Germany and within a month across Europe.
What that reformation was about was a change in the source of religious authority. The Catholic Church said that it had the authority to interpret scripture. Luther insisted that scripture stood on its own, and he had every right to interpret it in a different way.
Today we are in a time of transformation. A transformer changes one kind of power into another. Electrical transformers change the 2,000 volts in that line strung between power poles into the 220 volts we can make use of in our houses. The transformation in the church is changing the way we read those scriptures so the church has real power to make a difference in people's lives.
The Transformation Guru
When we are clear about our mission, we know why we exist. If we are a Christian church, our mission is to establish the just society that Jesus called the Kingdom of God right here in our neighbourhood. The vision of a new society that Jesus had does not change. What does change is our neighbourhood as urbanization, secularization, globalization take place. The question then is how to make Jesus' vision a reality in this new situation. That is our mission, and to carry it out means transforming the church from a child of the industrial revolution to the communications powerhouse that is needed today.
William Bridges was the pioneer who realized there were three phases in any effective transformation process: the ending, the neutral zone, and the new beginning.
The ending has to be a clean break with the old way of doing things or thinking about things. It is not easy for us human beings to let go of baggage we have gotten used to carrying with us, even if it is weighing us down. We need to be freed to move ahead by committed leadership that knows there is a better way, even though they may not be totally clear about what that better way is. This is the kind of leadership that is willing to risk a voyage of discovery, knowing that to continue doing things the way they have always been done will continue to give the same results - a dying church.
Then comes that in-between stage, the neutral zone. Yes, Star Trek probably got the phrase from William Bridges. There is bad news and good news about the neutral zone. The bad news is that it is an uncomfortable place to be. You will hear loud voiced, "Why don't we just get on with it." If pressed, there is no clarity about what it is that they want to get on with, except it will not be that different from what has been done in the past.
Søren Kierkegaard, the 18th century Danish philosopher, likened the in-between time to being "out on the deep over 70,000 fathoms of water."
We have found Robert Quinn's image of building the bridge as you walk on it very helpful. The world today is changing so quickly it is next to impossible to look forward five years let alone ten to create a plan. Entering that neutral zone means not knowing what that new beginning will be. Sometimes it is not knowing whether a new beginning is possible. But you go on, knowing that to stay where you are is the recipe for a slow and increasingly painful death.
The good news is really good. The neutral zone can be a time of great creativity. If you are willing to put your anxieties on hold all kinds of helpful ideas will emerge. Don't leap on to any right away. A wise teacher once said your first idea will be what you think you ought to do. Your second idea will probably be what you feel comfortable doing. The third idea may well be what God is calling you to do - the thing that is really needed.
The task of the leader is to keep things moving slow enough so there is time for those really creative ideas to emerge. The over-zealous need slowing down, the hesitant need time to catch up. It's that kind of a balancing act.
Then comes the third phase - the new beginning. For the Israelites, the new beginning was entering the promised land. Jesus talked about the need to put God's new way ahead of family traditions or cultural expectations. In the early church the Jerusalem council opened the door to people who were not Jewish becoming followers of the new way. Risky, each one of these, but the results were outstanding.
The Promised Land
The promised land today is Jesus' description of the Kingdom of God - God's New Community. Across the church there is the dawning realization that the fascination with "saving souls" that dominated the medieval church and mesmerizes contemporary evangelicals is way off base. What Jesus was about was a transformation of society from the domination by Roman and Temple elites to a radical egalitarianism. The last were to be first. The weak were to be supported. The strayed were to be forgiven. Those who asked for help would receive it.
It's there in his initial declaration in the Nazareth synagogue. "God has chosen me to bring good news to the poor, to proclaim liberty to the captives and recovery of sight to the blind; to set free the oppressed and announce that the time has come when God will free this people." (Luke 4:18-19) That is the promised land.
For years, centuries actually, the church has stressed the need to follow its rules and regulations in order to get right with God. The transformation that is taking place is that here and there, and in a number of people everywhere, the call of Jesus to care for our neighbour is being taken seriously. "The greatest commandment is this - to love God with all your heart, strength, mind and spirit, and your neighbour as yourself." Jesus made it clear that if anything separated us from that neighbour, handling that was our first priority. Then and only then would it be possible to develop a deeper relationship with God.
A new day is upon is. The time for reformation is past. We are now in the middle of the Great Transformation. It is a time to either join in with God's flow of history, or get out of the road as congregations recapture the mission that Jesus envisioned - being partners in the creation of God's New Community.
"Leadership Ventures" Congregational Life Newsletter. January 2012. Volume 18 No. 3.