While many churches in your area  need better attendance, stronger finances, more involvement, and increased membership, something deeper is required to tie everything else together. The biblical focus of being church by God’s free grace in Jesus Christ provides that missing something. It involves the biblical formation of people in and between each subsystem of a church body as a living system in Christ in light of biblical teaching about Christ’s Church. Without such formation, the outer functions of doing church evaporate when divorced from the inner substance of being church.

What I hear in listening to clergy and laity concerning their churches confirms the need for a renewed outlook on being church. We are overloaded with programs about doing church. Our excessive focus on programs and an inadequate biblical view of the church creates the unhealthy environment for the startling statistics concerning clergy health, clergy family life, and congregational conflict. I would venture to say that examples of these statistics are present within any geographical area of churches.

I.   The needs of pastors and their families?

From what I hear, what I read, and my own experience, pastoral and parsonage wholeness needs developing along the lines of physical, mental, emotional, moral, relational, and spiritual fitness. This not only involves a vital devotional life but also the spirituality of leadership, co-dependency issues, family of origin blind spots, relationships and boundaries, as well as proper care of one’s physical and mental health. While these themes apply to the individual pastor, they also apply to the individual family members and the pastoral family as a whole.

Although, I do not know the pastors of our district very deeply, oftentimes a few clergy or someone in their family is dealing with serious mental health issues. Those with personality disorders usually conceal them behind religious masks.

II.  The needs of laity and their families?

The issues addressed in the discipleship of the laity and their families toward further holy wholeness in Christ parallel the issues of clergy. Oftentimes a few laity or someone in their family is dealing with serious mental health issues. Those with personality disorders usually conceal them behind religious masks.

Discipleship toward holy wholeness in Christ. This is where the real work of developing church health happens. Here one-on-one and small group discipleship as well as special workshops can lead each person toward wholeness in Christ. Such ministry helps build a healthy pool of people from which a healthy leadership team is developed.

Beyond that basic need, I see several other systemic needs such as: the encouragement of a healthy leadership team, the development of congregational spirituality, as well as the formation of group harmony within and between a church’s various subsystems. From such work on being the church, the equipping and empowering of whole people in Christ for healthy ministries to a hurting world will have a better opportunity to arise and thrive.

Again from both my experience and reading, I would venture to say that some inactive laity and former clergy need the church’s healing ministry for they have joined the ranks of the dechurched because of some painful experience in the local church.

III.  What are the needs of the unchurched?

The unchurched are dealing with similar life issues that we all face as human beings yet without the resources of the Christian faith and a supportive Christian community.

IV.  How do we help pastors, and laity  look at their life and work in new ways?

Answer included in response to the next question.

V.  How do we provoke/challenge them to action?

Share ideas in an area  newsletter on a monthly or even a weekly basis. Addresses the before mentioned issues with practical, biblical help by also offering workshops on either a large or small scale.

Overall, you can cast a vision for a new way of being and doing church that is far more biblical and healthy than what many clergy and laity  may be operating out of. Casting such a vision can serve as a wake up call to both clergy and laity. Casting a vision can create some interest in further instruction.

Also, you can serve as a change agent through grace-empowered vision casting. Brief, biblical and practical articles about healthy persons, church leaders, loving relationships, boundaries, etc. in a narrative style would help communicate the vision. Such communication not only addresses the heart, mind, and behavior but also relationships and spirituality.

Now that you have read the map, go and explore the territory in more detail using the this left hand column of buttons as your compass.

Since January 25, 2003

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