Christian church life in America is encountering unprecedented change. The older traditional mainline churches are in steep decline. World-wide, Christianity is growing at the fastest rate ever, and most of that is in Pentecostal expressions. Why aren’t traditional churches growing? What can these older churches do in response? These are fundamental questions I am trying to address, drawing on tools from psychology and sociology that are basic to my discipline of Organizational Behavior. I bring a passion for classical theology as applied in my 30 years of pastoral ministry.
I would advise you to leave all your sociology, psychology, organizational behavior and related things behind if you want to understand why the church is not growing. Willowcreek, Fuller Seminary and the church growth movement that originated in the 80’s and the 90’s were man-originated attempts to grow the church. Christ grows His church, not man. Instead read the Gospels and Acts closely as Jesus disciples the 12 and Paul works in Acts. What are Jesus’ commands about discipleship? What did Paul mean when he told people to imitate him? What was his lifestyle? Read Mark chapters 1 and 2 very closely. What is Mark saying here about what happens when we respond to Jesus command to allow Him to make us into fishers of men?
Appreciate your comment Roy. We Lutheran pastors are trained to be good theological engineers. We need to add a little marketing orientation. To understand the way our Lutheran culture works, the behavioral sciences can give us a lot of worthwhile insights. I think we can fine-tune our Lutheran culture without compromising our Lutheran theology. You may have seen my book Evangelical Style and Lutheran Substance.
I hope to hear from you more as continuance of the style/substance issue.
Congregations live in a culture that affects the behavior of church participants. It would be foolish to ignore such insights. I will send you separately a summary of the behavioral concepts that shaped my understanding of what has happened to mainline churches.
Yes, the days of Church Growth are over. The rationale, as I saw it first hand, was that churches should do the practices of the mega churches. Peter Wagner, whom I knew well, wrote like a journalist not an analyst. A set of practices doesn’t grow churches. Only the Holy Spirit can bring true church growth.
But just telling believers to imitate Jesus won’t change their behaviors. We have to invite them to let the Spirit in to change their hearts. Lecturing is the worst form of communication that is effective.
Dave