limits to organic church...
Are there limits to the "organic church" impulse?
We've made a value out of "creative inaction"... that is, seeing an issue, allowing the tension to rise (while pointing out/dialoguing about the issue), not solving the issue for people, seeing the community create its own solutions.
I guess I'm wondering this morning what the limits are on that.
As faithful readers (both of you) know, I've been thinking through issues of teaching and protecting in the church, particularly in this organic church model. Drew was asking about specific problems we may have been encountering... (Sorry I didn't answer yet, Drew!) There haven't been problems as much as premonitions of problems. I feel like it's just a matter of time before a church who has never had any specific people problems actually has some to untangle.
The other part, the teaching part, is prompted by a couple of things.
First, we have recently been stoked to see a good number of kids/teens becoming a part of evergreen...actually, I'm not sure if they themselves are actually becoming a part of evergeen, but that's a different post! How do we teach them? I have wanted to answer that question in community and consensus, as we do with most important decisions.
The other issue is purely doctrinal (bah dum dum). Erwin McManus says that the two signs of a true, living church are sexual immorality and heresy (please note NT epistles!). That is to say, if you are really having an impact, you will be integrating people into your community who do not yet share Christian morality/beliefs. If you look around, and everyone there believes and behaves in EXACTLY the same way... you're in trouble. Anyway, while I'm sure there's some immorality going on (I'm fairly sure someone in our community has a raging addiction to the bra ads in the Oregonian), what I'm more concerned about (at this moment) is the heresy part.
We've made a huge effort to allow for doubt and questions and opinion on matters religious and Scriptural... the hard part is, you have to balance that out, right? You have to provide the opposing, orthodox Christian view. And you have to do it well. It would be much easier to silence dissenting or alternative voices, but that's not community and that's not going to reach the people we are wanting to impact. The problem is, you can't let those voices be THE voice of your community.
It has fascinated me for awhile that our online presence, our forum, comes off as MUCH more liberal than our actual, real-space community. We need to balance that more...
Anyway, back to limits.
It seems as though there are times when leaders, even in this organic church model, need to be proactive. The trick (and man is it a trick) is to do so in such a way that you do not
1. let people off the hook (that is, fail to buld tension or build tension over an issue and then release it in such a way that everyone feels like "Oh good, someone else is taking care of this)
2. create dependency (that is, you become proactive in such a way that you yourself, as leader, are the solution to the problem... e.g. creating a program which you are then responsible to manage, recruit and run)
So... teaching. How can we be proactive to ensure that good discussions and learning are happening, that conversations are balanced, and especially that our kids are being given foundational learning experiences with Scripture, and yet not let the people off the hook and not create a dependency on leadership to just magically make it happen...
Sorry for the rambling post! I'm such a verbal processor... Thanks, oh blog of mine for listening!
We've made a value out of "creative inaction"... that is, seeing an issue, allowing the tension to rise (while pointing out/dialoguing about the issue), not solving the issue for people, seeing the community create its own solutions.
I guess I'm wondering this morning what the limits are on that.
As faithful readers (both of you) know, I've been thinking through issues of teaching and protecting in the church, particularly in this organic church model. Drew was asking about specific problems we may have been encountering... (Sorry I didn't answer yet, Drew!) There haven't been problems as much as premonitions of problems. I feel like it's just a matter of time before a church who has never had any specific people problems actually has some to untangle.
The other part, the teaching part, is prompted by a couple of things.
First, we have recently been stoked to see a good number of kids/teens becoming a part of evergreen...actually, I'm not sure if they themselves are actually becoming a part of evergeen, but that's a different post! How do we teach them? I have wanted to answer that question in community and consensus, as we do with most important decisions.
The other issue is purely doctrinal (bah dum dum). Erwin McManus says that the two signs of a true, living church are sexual immorality and heresy (please note NT epistles!). That is to say, if you are really having an impact, you will be integrating people into your community who do not yet share Christian morality/beliefs. If you look around, and everyone there believes and behaves in EXACTLY the same way... you're in trouble. Anyway, while I'm sure there's some immorality going on (I'm fairly sure someone in our community has a raging addiction to the bra ads in the Oregonian), what I'm more concerned about (at this moment) is the heresy part.
We've made a huge effort to allow for doubt and questions and opinion on matters religious and Scriptural... the hard part is, you have to balance that out, right? You have to provide the opposing, orthodox Christian view. And you have to do it well. It would be much easier to silence dissenting or alternative voices, but that's not community and that's not going to reach the people we are wanting to impact. The problem is, you can't let those voices be THE voice of your community.
It has fascinated me for awhile that our online presence, our forum, comes off as MUCH more liberal than our actual, real-space community. We need to balance that more...
Anyway, back to limits.
It seems as though there are times when leaders, even in this organic church model, need to be proactive. The trick (and man is it a trick) is to do so in such a way that you do not
1. let people off the hook (that is, fail to buld tension or build tension over an issue and then release it in such a way that everyone feels like "Oh good, someone else is taking care of this)
2. create dependency (that is, you become proactive in such a way that you yourself, as leader, are the solution to the problem... e.g. creating a program which you are then responsible to manage, recruit and run)
So... teaching. How can we be proactive to ensure that good discussions and learning are happening, that conversations are balanced, and especially that our kids are being given foundational learning experiences with Scripture, and yet not let the people off the hook and not create a dependency on leadership to just magically make it happen...
Sorry for the rambling post! I'm such a verbal processor... Thanks, oh blog of mine for listening!
12 Comments:
It seems that if one focuses on doctrine/theology, there will be division of the stems of wheat. It seems that if we focus on living as Christ lived, and wheat will be divided from the chafe.
--my two cents.
everywhere i go there is bob.
found you when i was perusing the cbc blog. i have a good friend, who after 30 years of being a cbc'er, had to pull out of the matrix. she directed me to the cbc blog. outrageoous tithing pollicy for their employees!!!
and then there was bob!
great blog, bob. can i link you?
about your post: imho of being a churched woman for over two decades empowering people to think for themselves and to lead is not usually a tidy process.
At the end of the day you are the leader and how you lead in the messy business of church will impact people more than a 25 minute sermon. lead in grace, people will follow in grace. lead in control, people will be led by control. lead in wisdom, etc...you get the picture.
Paul addressed heresy head on when it was necessary. But it was not his focus.
Being identified as liberal...so what? do and be what God is calling you to do. there will always, always be naysayers. I'm sure Jesus was considered a "liberal" by the pharisees in his day. There were rumors galore that Jesus associated with "those people".
Bob, with that hunger of yours for God and all that he wants for you and Evergreen i can only believe that the Holy Spirit himself will mentor you in how to do church.
so glad to hear some youngin's are getting to Evergreen. Now you need some old fogey's with their experience and wisdom. :-)
Hey Starla- I hear you... is there a way to teach, though, that doesn't lead to division? How do we give people the great foundational knowledge in the scriptures that we got through sunday school and all that jive... maybe without the jive?
What I'm thinkin' about...
pam! good to e-see you again...
link away!
:)
b
hey pam- thanks for the encouragement!
I'm not so concerned that we appear "liberal"- I know to a huge section of the Church we are way too liberal, and I'm okay with that. I also know to a huge section of the populace, because of a belief in Jesus, we are way too conservative. Okay with that too.
I guess was I ws getting at, was that I want our online personality to match up a little closer with our actual personality, and to be a good vehicle not only for questions and doubt, but also for answers. It seems like learning happens when we take questions and doubt to the next step and aren't content to just sit there... so- someone has to be leading through the questions and into what comes next. I think this is the work of the community (c'mon everybody!) but probably especially the work of the elders (who "should be able to teach" according to st paul)...
does that make sense?
bob, i think if you preface the "potentially divisive" teachings by explaining your inner turmoil (as you have in this post), people will understand that you are teaching to unify around truth not to marginalize the unorthodox.
So good to read about what's going on with Evergreen. I feel like I'm getting to sit in thebackground and watch and cheer you guys on.
I had thoughts and, as always, this is in theory, not in practice (yet), but thoughts nonetheless:
I hear you saying that you want Evergreen to be a place of Biblical tradition (i.e.- teaching foundational truths of God through scriptures, rituals, etc) and simultaneously a place of criticism toward that same tradition.
If I'm hearing you right, it sounds like you just need to express that desire to the community. This isn't something you get to have in your head and not share, it's a value- a communal one.
It's healthy and necessary to learn through traditions that we trust (in this case, it's you, but it's also your community's culture and the traditions therein) and be critical of them at the same time. It's the same way you listen to a trusted friend, but ask for other people's counsel along with it.
My hunch is that I'm not expressing this well, so if it's muggy, just email me.
Much of this is expressed well in Lesslie Newbigin's "Gospel in a Pluralist Society" in the early chapters.
My hope is that Evergreen and our own church here will steer through this in a way that honors God.
"How do we give people the great foundational knowledge in the scriptures that we got through sunday school and all that jive... maybe without the jive?"
hmmm...I really think you do it through the practice of the disciplines: prayer, study, meditation, simplicity, worship, service, etc. Putting yourself in a place that God can change you.
But, maybe you should ask Kelsey--she grew up catholic, but has a crazy hunger for the word of God and puts us evangelicals to shame.
True!
I think her experience may be a little different than some of the teens we have now though... that's one of the things I was thinking here- how do we give teens "Sunday School knowledge" without "sunday School jive"?
okay, I'm officially confused. I thought I was responding to the blog on doctrine/teaching. Now, it seems we are talking about youth group? children?
Oi.
No, you're right... sorry, the difference in my head was clear. I just see adults as basically needing help forming the right questions, finding the right resources and figuring out the answers.
Kids/teens aren't ready yet for that level of abstraction. They need to be given the answers (bible stories, principles) and then be taught how to think about Scripture... I think the first (adults) will be less of a challenge than the second (kids/teens)...
but it all falls under the general category of teaching...
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