Transforming Church

How being a member of a congregation can get in the way of more effective faithfulness to God is because of what wider churches and most congregations have done with constitutions and guidelines to operate congregations. Add to that what members have assumed to be the privileges of membership and you have congregations that march to a different mission than the one received from Christ. In many ways congregations today struggle with the same issues the apostles did immediately following Christ’s ascension into heaven in the first century.

The membership issues for the apostles were not written into constitutions, but were just as binding as guiding principles in which all of them had invested. Their mission was shaped initially by the belief that Christ wanted them to stay and witness within Judea, giving their attention to Jews wanting to convert to Christ. A more damaging layer was added institutionally when they then assumed that one had to become a Jew before becoming a Christian. Only Peter's vision and the persistence of Paul eventually got the apostolic church on track.

The huge importance we have given to being a member of a congregation, even "our" congregation, has preempted the significance and importance of discipleship. Much in the fashion of sitting on their hands, people have become content to sit in the pew on Sunday being an "active confirmed voting member." Once that status had been achieved they had "arrived," so to speak, and for most of them the remainder of their lives becomes a wasted opportunity to grow as a disciple. Continuing to distract them are the privileges of membership afforded active members who "receive Communion and make a contribution of record at least once a year."

The greatest privilege is that they get to vote. They get to determine what the congregation should be and what it should do. Not only do they get to do that at congregational meetings, they get to elect a council to manage the congregation's ministry the way they think it should be done. There is little reality, apart from Word and Sacrament, that this is "Christ's Church." Even though Word and Sacrament is key, there is little assurance the remainder of the congregation’s ministry is being directed by the Holy Spirit instead of the members of the congregation or its governing council.

As much as I have appreciation for the historical significance of confirmation directing fathers to instruct their children, I wish we could somehow redirect the focus of confirmation today to making a commitment to discipleship. Notwithstanding doctrine and correct theological perspective, intellect and reason lead to conclusions, which is a mixed blessing. Emotion, more specifically passion, leads to action, to discipleship. Instead of wrapping an entire ministry around a program identified as confirmation (not even a missional term) we should be helping young people discover beyond a perception of the Gospel their spiritual gifts and passion, which have much higher stakes for Christ than a presently understood or memorized set of beliefs.

Becoming more evident, even in the time it has taken you to read this article it is all the more important to have discipleship become the focus or our relationship to church instead of membership. Some may see that as overly radical thinking, but Christ is depending on it.

B. Renaming Committees as Teams
How many times today do we today hear, "I want to help with the church’s ministry, but please don’t ask me to be on a committee"? I am discouraged by the number of pastors who think they can change that by simply renaming their committees as teams. Is that supposed to fool somebody? When I ask them about what they’ve done, they usually answer, "Well, that’s the first step to changing them from committees to teams." The foolishness of that comes out when I ask them how they intend to do that and they reply they don’t know. Do pastors think the Holy Spirit will take it from there, or are they just hoping beyond hope that someone in the congregation from the corporate world will step up to the plate and make it happen?

In reality committees and teams bear absolutely no resemblance to each other, and transition either way is likely to end in tragedy. Well, in truth, it is all too easy to turn a team into a committee, but it is just about impossible to change a committee into a team. All you accomplish by simply renaming a committee a team is making it relatively sure you will not be able to help people understand what a team really is. To anyone reading this who does not fully appreciate the difference between a committee and a team I am making a moot point. Please check out these articles on our website: Anatomy of a Committee and a Team and Building Effective Teams.

Since teams ideally have only a single focus they do not have agendas. It is like they have a single item agenda. The simplest way to see the function of a team is that, since it has only one agenda item to address, meeting about it becomes rather unnecessary. It makes more sense to simply gather to do the work, and then talk about it at the same time as needed.

Since a team does not have a multiple agenda, the only reason it would have to meet to begin with, it does not need a chairperson to be responsible for the agenda or run the meeting. And since it does not have to spend (waste) time organizing and juggling agenda items, it does not spin its wheels from month to month gaining little or no ground with the ministry. Most committees spend 80% of their time and other resources keeping the machinery running, leaving only 20% to accomplish the ministry. Once you take away the wheel spinning, you also remove from the equation frustration and burnout. The alternative of teams finds everyone excited about everything being accomplished.

A team does not need and should not have an appointed or elected entitled (chair) leader. Generally the person with the greatest passion for its objective will be the key leader of the team, but never appointed or publicly acknowledged as such. All members of the team are perceived as leaders, and at different stages in the team’s ministry different members (leaders) will step forward to lead. Every effective team, however, does have a key leader who has surfaced.

The reason for a team to exist may be for a couple of weeks, a couple of months or a couple of years, but few teams have reason to go on indefinitely. When their work is complete they simply disband. Individuals may be part of more than one team at the same time, depending on their passion and time available. If a team picks up more responsibilities (agenda items), generally it divides into more teams. It is most important that teams never risk going back to become a committee.

Everything about teams becomes impossible if you give them the job of a committee. For the hope of getting to experience the vitality and excitement of team ministry, PLEASE, PLEASE, do NOT rename your committees as teams. If you do, you are shooting yourself in the foot. Instead, take whatever time is necessary to prepare for teams, even start true teams while you still have committees, but if you allow both to exist for too long a time, you’ll find committee members jumping ship to be part of a team. As quickly as you can be ready for it, disband your committees. When you do, your ministry will be blessed beyond measure. Even if you end up with ten times the number of teams as you once had committees, which is not unusual, you will have absolutely NO volunteer enlistment problem. If what you presently have is really committees, I know you do.

Other ways addressed that hasten a congregation’s decline include: "The Copout of Asserting 'Youth Are the Future Of the Church'," "Leadership In the Wrong Hands," "Clinging To What We Have," "Wasting Energy Overcoming Weaknesses," "Insisting On Only Traditional Worship," and "Mistaken Motivations For Growing the Church."