Church: Thinking about structures

As a missioner (of sorts) and one of the biggest issues I come across has nothing to do with the Gospel or evangelism or even 'paying the share' but has to do with the size and structure of a church.

So many people want large churches but fail to realise that this means the end to being a 'family' church.  When I say this the listener throws up their hands and starts explaining how they want families and how families are oh so important. So I have to explain that somewhere around the forty to fifty member mark the church runs like a family - often, but not always, with the minister are the father (but always invariably the primus inter pares*) and above this we find more pastoral support structures which evolve into programmes and stratification before eventually giving way to a corporate structure (which I'm increasingly seeing relabelled as a 'modern minister' model).

Church and management are words that should go together but the problem is that they seem to mix like Guinness and Lemonade (if you fancy a bit of fun ask for a Guinness shandy some time - two drinks in one!).

Many of those who are spiritual eschew structures and anything that sounds like management whilst some I meet have well organised and well-oiled machines running like clockwork but without love, joy, peace and all the other fruit and traits that speak of Jesus and new life. But there is a balance and this is one of the rarest things to behold and yet a joy when we do. I know because I've seen it (but just don't seem to be able to make it mine!).


When talking to one dogcollar recently I was amazed at the passion they had for their sub-fifty church to become a 'large church'. They were longing for the day when they might become a 'midi' church and continue on to the diadema that is a 'larger churches day' at the cathedral. I have to say that having been at them the journey would definitely be better than the arriving but hey ho, you've got to have a dream and talk about the things you'd like to do. After all as hymn 999 in hymns Ancient and Ancienter so rightly continues: 'You gotta have a dream, if you don't have a dream, how you gonna have a dream come true?'

The problem is that I see people organising church out of existence (and yet we really do need structures, organisation and processes - accountability, lines of support (and management)  and job descriptions and the like). The problem is I do see churches where there's so much dissipation and chaos that any talk of a God of order is taking the mickey. Letting the lunatics run the asylum is not delegation and the Stalinist approach to church management only fuels transfer growth (at best) and the end of church-going (at it's worst).

One of the greatest aids to growth is a mixed-mode, mixed-economy Church. One where Emerging church emerges and lives alongside Fresh Expresssions and traditional church models and all live in harmony. One where churches send their members out to 'make Christ known' and do this as the end in itself, not as press gangs who will bring back impressed church members to the mother ship.

So, following on from some troubles conversations and some querulous folk who are exploring what it means to be leading church and are confused by what they see in the place they belong, I thought I might intersperse the baptism dialogue (which will continue at a pace at which other might keep up and perhaps take the lead) with some thinking about collaboration and delegation and how it is neither 'do what you want' or 'do what I tell you to' but us reasoning together and walking in step with our eyes on the cross and our hands joined in fellowship and common purpose.

* First amongst equals

Church as a place: of Safety

It seems to me that one of the most important things that being Church brings is safety and this comes about in a number of forms:

Safety to be honest about our problems because we know:

• We will be listened to

• We will be given time

• We will be helped to further identify and resolve those problems

• We will find respect, and

• We will not be condemned or ridiculed

Now whilst I'm sure many will read this and say, "Yeah, we all know that already,' I am certain that a good many others will find at least one of the points above has been missing from their experience of church somewhere and at sometime: And of course we all have, because Church (and church in the local sense) is made up of flawed and imperfect individuals.

Of late I have encountered a number of people, near and far, who have engaged me in conversation and during it has voiced their sadness at the way they have been treated by others in the club we know as Church. I wish I could say that it was limited to leaders or people with some degree of authority but in fact it seems to me that perhaps we are all, across the board, becoming just a little less tolerant and a lot more impatient.

I made this comment to a church leader (they weren't CofE so for once I can breath a limited sigh of relief) and their response was, 'Well, they're just so demanding. They want your time and want you to listen to them and then want you to make their problems go away and I don't have the time for all that!' Sadly they weren't that impressed by my response to their response, because I merely pointed out that if they weren't there do do that then what did they think their role was?

What followed was a litany of 'I have to ...' and you know what, they didn't have to at all, the problem came from the fact that they were not only a blinking control freak but they also functioned as the lord of all they surveyed - running their little club as a fiefdom when some were granted rights and privileges whilst others were merely pew-fodder and their to be commanded and controlled. But I must be getting better for I merely smiled and left them to all that work they have to do - but sadly, one of their members I met have decided that they should do that too and have joined another (still not CofE) club elsewhere.

Now I know that we all have people around us who want time and a listening ear but never respond to advice.

I know that there are always people who have opinions and want things to be done differently - and perhaps if they wanted to 'do' the things done differently in the different way they wanted them to be done rather than merely criticise and make their demands they'd find life was a different reality for them too!

I am also all too aware that there are those who continue to do really silly things (and claim it was satan what made them do it perhaps?) and continue to repeat their mistakes at an alarming rate and sometimes increasing intensity - BUT - we have to make our churches safe and this means getting priorities right:

People are the most important thing we have in church and even if this means that we invest hours in them only to see them leave - it is right that we did it, and right that we do it again for the next person.

I'd rather have  a 'worship band' that sounds like Des O'Connor and a church (for Church = people) that purred like a Rolls Royce than the other way round - for I know which of the two blesses God.

Rather than keep looking for church growth and seeking the lost (and attractive to those in other churches) we need to concentration on shepherding our flock for this is where real Church is to be found and it also results in retention. Bringing them in is relatively simple - it's the keeping them that takes the work and if you aren't prepared to do that work - then you need to be prepared to lose them: And send them with a blessing!

A friend recently said of my blog that it was a place where I often appeared 'to have a cob on' and they wondered how people read what I wrote without 'chucking a brick through my window' (verbally rather than physically). Now I have to admit that I'm rarely angry when I write this stuff - it's merely a five/ten minute dialogue internally - the physical evidence of an inner struggle, consideration or 'trying to make sense of' moment.

I don't write to lecture - but as a 'memo to self' which I invite others to read and consider and offer correction, advice, pity or prayer - but if it touches a nerve, inflames a passion or gets you going too, them I am doubly-blessed.

Church is a great place - it's only some of the people in it that make it a pain,

Church is a bigger pain when the people who make it so are those who lead.

So if you're a leader - how are you doing?

Ask your members ;-)

phew - nine minutes - keyboard's smoking and I'm off to early communion, funerals, school assemblies and a couple of meetings and whatever else the day brings - please pray for those who lead, we're not always sitting indoors with our feet up :-)