Catalyst for Change
I am about to do a new thing; now it springs forth, do you not perceive it?1
Indeed, God is doing a new thing; something amazing is springing forth, if we will only open our eyes and our ears to perceive it. The signs are all around that change is in the air—in our congregations, our communities and the world. We live in a time of what Phyllis Tickle calls a “Great Emergence.”2 How will we respond? Will we answer as the church of Jesus Christ, empowered by the Holy Spirit to be God’s partner in dreaming, creating, and reforming? Will we be the church God desires and hopes it to be in the transitional context of the 21st century?
Strong congregational leadership is needed to encourage the church be the best it can be; to remind participants that church is not just a place to go, but a way to live our lives; and that Jesus calls the church to focus on discipleship not membership, on service not growth, on mission and ministry, not buildings and structure. Strong leadership is needed to encourage and strengthen the unique Christian voice and witness that our congregations can and must offer to their communities.
One critical piece of strong congregational leadership is preaching about change on a regular basis. Sunday morning worship, in most churches, is the largest congregational gathering of each week. It is important that preachers use this opportunity to challenge worshippers to consider what the church can be and do in the ever-changing context in which we find ourselves. The idea of church that many (if not most) people in our congregations have in their minds has not existed for fifty or so years: back then the church that had to simply open its doors and people would come because that’s just what people did on Sunday mornings; the church with pews so full that additional services had to be added; the church with so many children in Sunday school that a Christian Education wing had to be built. While those days are long gone and literally everything around us has changed, many of our church participants still expect that the programs and structures that served the church well in the post-World War II era should somehow still work. As a result, many of our congregations find themselves becoming increasingly irrelevant and disconnected from their communities. Preaching change means speaking frankly about the realities of our new context, not in a hopeless way but to help people face reality and make important choices about how to be the church going forward.
Preaching Change
The most effective way to preach change is by inviting people to consider God’s vision for the church as described in scripture. What did the prophets call the Israelite people to do that was pleasing to God? On what kinds of ministry activities did Jesus focus his energy? In what ways were the disciples and the apostles serving others in the early church stories in Acts? In other words, when the church is at its best, what is it doing?
The church, at its best, is truly the body of Christ—a community of faithful disciples baptizing in his name and caring for the world and one another as Jesus’ hands and feet. It helps people become what God intended them to be: bearers of Christ-like love who embody and communicate, in all they say and do, the good news of God’s Reign. This is done not by separating from the world, nor by acting for the church’s own benefit, but by engaging “in the world as it is and for the world as it could be,” as agents of transformation.3
The church, at its best, embraces its mission to serve a suffering world by offering God’s love, justice, and compassion to the least, the lost, and the left out. With wisdom, courage, and guidance from the Holy Spirit, the church changes lives, changes communities, and changes the world through compassion, creativity, collaboration, and perseverance.
The church, at its best, serves as holy ground where people of every culture, every generation, every tongue, and every talent gather together to encounter God. It crosses traditional boundaries and makes visible the connections between all people; it takes risks and steps out to be the cross-cultural church God called it to be on that first Pentecost. The church, at its best, understands that these connections lead to rich diversity, which increases the church’s creativity and makes it stronger.
Preaching change means helping churches see how the church at its best can be an agent of God’s Reign in and for the world, and asking “What’s stopping us from being our best?” Preaching change also means sharing from the pulpit stories of 21st century churches that have answered God’s call to be relevant, connected, and even transformative in their communities. These stories can be found in denominational newsletters and magazines, online and in hard copy, in blogs and on other social media. As sermon illustrations, the preacher can describe congregations that have formed collaborative relationships with other churches and/or community groups; found creative ministry uses for their buildings; started new worshiping communities in a local coffee shop, bar or gym; or experimented with a creative staffing model with a church down the street. The preacher of change lifts up ways that 21st century congregations are successfully working, not to get more people into their buildings, but to invite people outside their buildings to serve alongside them.
Of course, preaching about change is not always popular and there will undoubtedly be resistance if it appears in sermons on a regular basis. Many people in the pews of our churches don’t particularly want to be challenged. They see church as a place to “be fed,” a place where they can experience a peaceful sense of “belonging” with other people who look and act like they do. Church for them is something that happens inside the building on Sunday mornings, while challenges are what happen “out there,” in their “real lives,” the rest of the week. They realize that everything “out there” is changing, but that is all the more reason for the church to stay the same, providing at least some sense of stability in their lives. Besides, they would have no idea where to start. As Theresa Cho points out,
Many people I encounter in the church know that change is needed but are paralyzed, not knowing what to change or how to change and unsure of what the change will bring. So they limit the space and secure the boundaries with “It’s never been done that way before” or “Our policy doesn’t allow it.” The preacher’s job is to gently pry open the lid on change little by little, sermon by sermon, encouraging worshippers to consider what God’s new vision for the church might be.4
The fact that it is God’s vision the church should be seeking is a critical point for preachers to emphasize, by the way. Many congregations think that it is the pastor’s role to develop the vision, and then present that vision to the congregation in her/his sermons. Preaching change means helping people understand that it is God’s “new thing” they must work to discern together, rather than what the pastor or the congregation want to see happen. Preaching change means introducing people to the needs, interests, and dreams of those outside the church walls, proclaiming that it is there that they will encounter God and it is in their neighbors that they will find the future vision the church so desperately needs.
God is doing a new thing. Something new is emerging. One of the most important jobs of the 21st century preacher is to be a catalyst for change, helping her/his congregation be the best it can be, empowered by the Holy Spirit to be God’s partner in dreaming, creating, and reforming.
Notes
1. Isaiah 43:19
2. Phyllis Tickle, The Great Emergence: How Christianity Is Changing and Why (Baker Books: 2008).
3. Brian McClaren, A New Kind of Christianity: Ten Questions That Are Transforming the Faith (HarperOne: 2010), 164-65.
4. Theresa Cho, “Wreck this church—What kimchi, a presbytery revival, and something called Wreck This Journal have to teach a changing church,” Presbyterians Today July, 2014, http://www.presbyterianmission.org/ministries/today/wreck-this-church/. (accessed February 2015)/.
