Keep the Main Thing the Main Thing

Keep the Main Thing the Main Thing

by | May 18, 2020

Crises generate both chaos and miracles. While the COVID-19 pandemic has caused breakdowns of every sort, it has also created breakthroughs. The pandemic has revealed to us what’s most important, most essential, to us, especially in the areas of worship, spirituality, and faith community.

As churches begin to re-open their buildings, and the church’s life takes on a more familiar feel, you or your people might be tempted to crank up all the old activities of the church. Let me sound a word of caution here. Before you do so, it’s essential to ask yourself how you will keep the main thing, the main thing.

In this article, I want to help you clarify which activities and offerings are central to the church and peripheral. Which activities should you hang on to, and which ones will you want to keep on pause? Just as importantly, I want to share a new short course with you that will help you make the most of the crisis we are in.

While COVID has caused breakdowns, it also created breakthroughs. It has revealed what's important, especially in spirituality and community. Share on X

What Matters Most in Church Life

What constituted success in the church’s life before the coronavirus hit may be very different from how you think of success now. I invite you to reflect on the church’s life before the pandemic to compare it with the church’s life now, during the pandemic, to answer the following questions.

Ministry and Mission 

Begin with the ministries of the church. Before the coronavirus hit, what ministries did the congregation consider essential? What ministries does the community feel crucial now?

The answer to the second set of questions likely points to the spiritual heartbeat of your church. It probably has something to do with worship that matters. Prayers that touch the heart and encompass the common good. Peaching that connects with people’s lives. Opportunities for the community.

This set of answers also points to the real Mission of the church, while the first set of solutions may include the shadow mission of the church.

Who Is Involved 

Next, reflect on who was involved in the church’s life before the coronavirus hit? Who is involved now? Provided that your congregation did not suffer many losses from COVID-19, you may find that you have more people involved than you did before the pandemic. Including new assistance from community members. If so, celebrate. A partnership between congregation and community points to the church’s life and deep Mission: demonstrating the love of God and neighbor as dearly as the love of oneself.

How to Keep the Main Thing the Main Thing 

Put together these newly identified essential ministries of the church with the people engaged in the delivery ministry. You have the makings of the main thing of ministry. Now, how do you keep this all alive?

When Worship is No Longer Building-Based

When Worship is No Longer Building-Based

by | Apr 23, 2020

Christians believe that out of death comes resurrection. Even Christians have been hard-pressed to believe that new life could arise out of this pandemic. Yet that’s what’s happened. Take church buildings, for example. Their size, shape, and cost have shaped our ministry and mindsets for millennia. They have been both a blessing and a burden.

Yet once church buildings had to shut down, congregations found something quite surprising. The change in the nature and scope of worship changed freed people from building constraints.

This article will discuss the shift that has happened and three ways to turn this unexpected gift into a long-term culture shift.

Once church buildings had to shut down, congregations found something quite surprising. The nature and scope of worship changed and freed people of building constraints. Share on X

Pre-Pandemic Mindset: Building-Based Worship 

For many congregations, the building has defined ministry. The building’s upkeep may have been your de facto ministry, and a concept Bishop Robert Schnase calls a shadow mission. When buildings set the parameters, it can be challenging to break free of historical precedents. Ghosts of worshiper’s past, as much as the building’s structure, play a part in reinforcing conventions.

The coronavirus has done for many churches what they could not do for themselves. Not only have congregations been forced out of their buildings, but the size and scope have also changed. Congregations are now moving from building-based to relationship-based worship.

Mid-Pandemic Mindset: Relationship-Based Worship

Now that worship is a distributed experience and is no longer centralized in one building, and can be reinvented. Worship takes a new feel when people worship with mailed bulletins, emailed orders of worship, pre-recorded videos, Facebook Live, or some other fashion. Instead of being solely building-based, worship can become more intimate, more immediate.

When the structure of a sanctuary does not confine, the dynamics of worship can organically morph. Suddenly, the building gives shape to relationships. Those relationships include both person to person and person to divine connections.

Interactive Church can be far more interactive this way. For instance, at an online family Passover Seder I conducted, everyone got up from their seats to open their respective doors for Elijah. If you send out printed bulletins or create home-based worship, be sure to include actions and reflections to engage worshipers.

Authentic When you Livestream worship, gone is the distance between the pulpit and the pew. A camera’s immediacy means the message must be genuine to connect with people, especially for people whose attention spans have shortened due to screen time.

Organic Evangelism Boulevard on Broad UMC, whose “storefront sacramental” worship services formerly attracted a full house of 30, has expanded to 50+ online. Evangelism is so much easier and organic online. Led by Rev. Drew Willson, this congregation has also found that distributed worship has released them to fulfill their vision: “Extending God’s table.”

The shut-down of churches has forced quick shifts in congregational life. There is no guarantee that these quick shifts in mindset will automatically translate into culture shifts. Let’s talk about how to intentionally transform these rapid shifts into positive, sustainable culture shifts.

Turn This Quick Shift Into A Culture Shift

  1. Frame the online experience in favorable terms. Yes, you and your people may be missing each other much. Yes, you may miss your building. Yes, you may miss the freedoms the pandemic has momentarily restrained. However, framing the online experience with gratitude will help you keep this option alive once social distancing has eased.
  2. Expand your options. Once people have online options, they treasure them. Online ministry means your people can participate while traveling, indisposed, sick, or feeling lazy even when face to face worship is once again available.
  3. Extend your shelf life. Unlike starting an additional worship service, which depends on a certain number of people to be considered viable, online worship has an entirely different shelf life. It can be experienced hours or months later and still be fresh.

 

Surprising Culture Shifts for the Church from COVID-19

Surprising Culture Shifts for the Church from COVID-19

by | Apr 16, 2020

For decades all signs have pointed to the decreasing role of religion in American life. Then came the pandemic, and with it, church culture shifts.

Churches, uniquely suited to provide meaning in uncertain times, quickly moved worship online. In the process, congregations filled a sudden need for community. Amazingly, worship attendance surged. Church-hopping became popular once again. This uptick in worship attendance is just one of the surprising gifts of the pandemic. Elsewhere I write about how to turn this quick shift into a sustainable culture shifts.

Today I will highlight another quick shift and unexpected gift the pandemic has brought and how you can anchor it in your congregation’s DNA. Just as importantly, I’m going to tell you about a unique set of three one-hour classes I’ve created to support YOUR resilience. You can continue to lead your congregations on the front line of change.

To fully appreciate this quick shift and unexpected gift, let’s take a look at one of the church’s pre-pandemic mindsets.

When churches moved online, attendance surged, a surprising gift of the pandemic. Here's how to turn this into sustainable culture shifts. Share on X

Pre-Pandemic Mindset: Wait Until “They” Tell Us What To Do.

For the last several years, United Methodists have been waiting, rather impatiently, for the General Conference to direct their future. Those quadrennial global proceedings would have answered the question: Will the denomination split into smaller denominations to pursue divergent visions? Or will the denomination stay united, at least in a name? Until an urgent question is addressed, many decisions, including critical missional initiatives, have been delayed.

This isn’t just a national dynamic. The wait-until-they-tell-us-what-to-do approach has hampered congregations at the local level for decades. Congregations often slow down decision-making as they await the arrival of a new pastor. For churches that receive a new leader every three-five years, all this waiting creates two problems. First, the church itself slackens as it defers responsibility for sharing the good news. Second, the community is daily ­­­­­impoverished as the ministry is withheld.

The pandemic has changed that. Not only has General Conference been postponed until 2021, meaning there is no one else upon which to impose decision-making responsibility, but churches have been thrust into a “decide now” dynamic.

Mid-Pandemic Mindset: The Decision Is Ours To Make.

The rapid changes wrought by the need for social distancing have created an immediacy in the church. There is no time to wait for “them” to decide. Instead, churches have sprung into action, all hands on deck, with a refreshing immediacy.

Not only have you offered online to worship, online giving, and online Bible studies, but you have creatively reached out to health care workers, children, parents, the lonely, the sick, and the just plain bored. Church members are moving into action, seeing a need, and filling it. All around you, the community has responded beautifully.

At last, the church has taken ownership of its direction, its ministry, its gospel. It is no longer waiting on some other authority to permit it to be agents of change. It’s as though the church has taken up its mat and walked. It’s a delight to behold.

Necessity is the mother of invention. And this newfound new sense of authority has been refreshing. But will it last?

Turn this Quick Shift into Sustainable Culture Shifts

I will be curious to see if this quick shift turns into a culture shift. Not only has General Conference been delayed by a year, but many Annual Conferences will be postponed as well. This is a good testing ground. In the meantime, churches are free to do what they are called to do: love, pray, worship, minister, lead, and connect.

To anchor this quick shift into the DNA of the congregation, take these three steps:

  1. Celebrate the courageous ministry of the local church. Acknowledge the congregation’s rapid response and decisiveness. Over the next three-twelve months, as you emerge into the new future, don’t let these days and months of ownership go unappreciated. Tell and retell your stories of action, compassion, and bravery.
  2. Discern where else you have been “waiting on them to tell us what to do.” Ask God to show you how you can bring to bear the new mindset of “the decision is ours to make.” You’ll be surprised how renewing this can be. Especially on the heels of this season of effectiveness.
  3. Strengthen the mid-pandemic mindset of ownership. Do this by leading the church to be response-able in ways large and small. Exercising responsibility is like working a muscle—the more you use it, the healthier you’ll get, and the more comfortable you’ll be going forward.

Leader, this season is more marathon than a sprint.

Unexpected Gifts From COVID-19

Unexpected Gifts From COVID-19

by | Apr 13, 2020

COVID-19 has brought with it a flurry of unexpected changes. One month ago, I never would have expected to wear a mask to the grocery store, practice social distancing, or wash my hands incessantly. Life has changed dramatically and there have been some unexpected gifts.

There is an upside, though. Even as people have rapidly incorporated unwelcome habits into their lives, the church has been gifted by the pandemic.

It’s true. The pandemic has managed to kill off some mindsets that no longer served the church. Many of these shifts, decades in the making, happened seemingly overnight.

Over the next several weeks, I will highlight three of these quick shifts and how to turn them into sustainable culture shifts by anchoring them in your congregation’s DNA.

COVID-19 has brought with it a flurry of unexpected changes. But it's also brought unexpected gifts. Here's how you can create a culture shift. Share on X

Pre-Pandemic Mindset: We’ve Never Done It That Way Before 

Do you know the seven last words of the church? “We’ve never done it that way before.” These words of resistance have slowed or stopped many needed changes in congregational life. Those seven words were a sign that tradition had once again triumphed over risk.

However, with the rapid onset of the coronavirus and the changes it necessitated, congregations quickly became aware that the pre-pandemic mindset wouldn’t do. To continue resisting change would mean nothing less than abandoning the church.

Mid-Pandemic Mindset: Whatever It Takes To Stay Together

As church doors shut to slow contagion, congregations took on practices they had resisted for years. Most congregations never dreamed they would launch online worship services, Facebook live, or Zoom Bible studies in a matter of hours or days. Yet, fueled by a deep desire to maintain the church body, congregations adopted a new mindset, “We’ll do whatever it takes to stay together.”

As congregations quickly moved online, they found something somewhat surprising. Worship attendance has grown, not shrunk. The frail and infirm can now worship without bracing the weather, roads, or inaccessible sanctuaries. Visitors can pop in and out at will, reasonably anonymously. The curious can try new forms and styles of services with little risk.

Turn Unexpected Gifts Into A Culture Shift

When face to face gatherings prevail again, will your people still see the need to keep an online presence alive? Will they invest in the tech to upgrade their online presence?

You can’t know for sure now. So, here are three ways to anchor this quick shift in the congregation’s life to become a sustainable shift in culture.

First, name and acknowledge the quick mindset shift that has taken place. Ground this shift in biblical stories such as Abram and Sarai following God’s call into an unknown future. Recall how, along the way, God made a covenant with this couple and changed their names, signifying an essential shift in their connection.

Second, sacralize the quick shift. You’ve already begun by leading Easter services online. Now think ahead to Mother’s Day, graduations, and Pentecost. Plan now for the sacred to come alive in “the diaspora.”

Last week, I led an online Passover Seder for my parents, siblings, partners, and kids. Together we were spread out over seven households in four states. We wouldn’t have gathered together on our own for this holiday. But the pandemic brought out both a creative urge to stay connected and a fun way to accomplish it while commemorating a sacred occasion.

Third, and most importantly, boost your immunity to burnout, fatigue, and isolation. You are at the forefront of leading rapid, unexpected change. While change can be exhilarating, it can also be exhausting. Quick shifts can’t become culture shifts without sustainable leadership at the front.

You are in the midst of significant societal change. Now is the time to lean in with creativity and courage.

Forty Days of Apostleship: Can We Rise Again?

Forty Days of Apostleship: Can We Rise Again?

by | Apr 6, 2020

This is an Easter like no other. With COVID-19 impacting everything, from the way we shop to the way we worship-life has been upended. Initially, I had hoped that by Easter, we could be out and about again. Hoped that life could return to some semblance of normal, that the curve could be flattened. It seemed like a good plan, a hopeful goal until it was clear that it wasn’t to be. We can learn a lot from 40 days of Apostleship.

This disappointment has given me pause. I’m no different than the disciples—they, too, hoped for a quick Kingdom victory. Instead, they lost Jesus to crucifixion. After, the disciples hid in fear—we are sheltering in place. The disciples feared they had no future—we are consumed by constant bad news. The disciples did not know about Jesus’ resurrection; we are agnostic about when and how this nightmare ends.

We say we are an Easter people, but the persistent question is, can we rise again?

It's not easy to maintain a strong belief in possibility in the face of frightening news. Even the disciples had a hard time with it. Share on X

Forty Days of Apostleship 

As we complete these 40 Days of Apostleship, we have focused on expanding our faith from believing in Jesus to believing like Jesus. As we explore Jesus’ beliefs, we have identified six key ones. 

Today we come to the sixth of his most important beliefs: Jesus believed that he would rise again. In other words, Jesus believed in possibility.

Jesus Believed in Possibility 

Several times in the Gospels, he confided in his disciples that things would get very dark, very bleak. However, the light would dawn again. Jesus told them, “The Son of Man will be delivered into the hands of men. They will kill him, and after three days He will rise.” Mark 9:31

Not only did Jesus believe in the possibility for himself, he thought it for his disciples. He told them that even though they would all scatter once he was threatened, he would still be there for them. “But after I have risen, I will go ahead of you into Galilee.” Mark 14:28 Indeed, he met them on the path as they headed back to Galilee.

Soulful Step 

Right now, right here—amid disappointment and social disconnection—it’s time to up your faith in a positive, albeit unseen, future. The bleaker the circumstances, the more critical it is to believe in possibility. Besides practicing social distancing, washing your hands, and taking other precautionary measures, thinking in opportunity is the most critical thing you can do right now.

Embrace the Belief  

As your soul makes room for this new level of belief in possibility, use the DARE model to embrace and embody the idea. Adapted from Dream Like Jesus: Deepen Your Faith and Bring the Impossible to Life, this model invites you to use your imagination to call forth something new into being.

DARE to Dream

DREAM:

  1. Begin to dream now of what a positive future could look like.
  2. Focus on your future habits, gratitudes, family life, or congregational structure.
  3. Consider how the pandemic will bear good fruit for the state of medicine, community services, and the health of the earth.
  4. Allow the Holy Spirit, rather than the newscasters, to shape your vision and guide your thoughts.

ALIGN: Align yourself with God by receiving divine courage, comfort, and confidence to dare to dream. Then invite others into your dream of a new future by sharing it out loud. One caution: don’t share your sacred vision with naysayers whose only interest is in doom and gloom.

REALIZE: We have realized just how precious our human connection is. Precisely because they are sheltering in place, one friend is hosting weekly neighborhood potlucks by Zoom. My own four siblings and I are gathering weekly with my parents via House Party. This week, we’ll have an online Passover Seder. It’s been years since we’ve all been together on holiday. I dream that after the pandemic has passed, we’ll continue our precious new habit.

EXPAND: Watch how one good idea expands into others. Watch how spirits rise, buoyed on the life-giving stream of possibility. To broaden your dream, even more, collage, paint, or draw it. Engaging in this level of imagination isn’t wasted. Nor is it pie in the sky. This expression of possibility is co-creation with God.

Apostolic Action

Build your resilience to fear, resignation, and hopelessness by carrying good news on your lips. Resist the temptation to repeat the latest talking heads’ talking points. Instead, make it a point to note that He is Risen. And that we too will rise again. We will.

I know it’s not easy to maintain a strong belief in possibility in the face of frightening news. Even the disciples had a hard time with it. 

Forty Days of Apostleship: Believe in Your Potential

Forty Days of Apostleship: Believe in Your Potential

by | Mar 26, 2020

As COVID-19 continues to sweep the world, its impacts are many. There has been a loss of work, loss of human contact, and even life loss. The pandemic’s most devastating impact, however, is the loss of a predictable future. When will life return to normal? Will life ever return to normal? The uncertainty can be debilitating, and this is why it’s more important than ever that you believe in your potential.

I wonder if this loss of certainty, of predictability, is what Jesus felt as he set his face toward Jerusalem? If so, your Lenten journey is likely more closely aligned with his than ever before.

As the church heads into Palm Sunday, that’s why this week of the 40 Days of Apostleship is paramount. Jesus had to deepen his faith to make it through an uncertain future. The same is true for you. I want to tell you how Jesus did it, and how you can too.

We have explored how to expand our faith from merely believing in Jesus to thinking like Jesus. This expansion accompanies the move from discipleship to apostleship. Are you ready to take the next step?

Even on the way to the cross, amid great suffering and uncertainty, Jesus leans into his beliefs. He believed in his potential. Do you believe that you can fulfill your potential? Share on X

Jesus Believed in His Potential

Because Jesus believed that he and the Father were one and that he did nothing apart from the Father, he could maintain an abiding belief in his potential. In other words, Jesus trusted that with God, he was capable of accomplishing what he sent him to accomplish. Even on the way to the cross—amid great suffering and uncertainty—Jesus leans into this belief. Listen in as Jesus talks with God: “Glorify your Son, that your Son may glorify you. I have brought you glory on earth by completing the work you gave me to do.” (John 17: 1, 4). You can hear the trust and confidence in Jesus’ prayer.

But what does this prayer mean? I had to look up glory and glorify to be sure myself. The glory of God refers to the radiant presence of God. To glorify, then, means to confer this quality on another. It’s a sign of divine approval. Jesus, through the quiet confidence of his belief, is asking to share in the glorious presence of God as a sign of God’s divine approval.

Soulful Step

When you are facing extreme uncertainty, belief in your potential is essential. Even so, it is one thing to know that God fully approves of Jesus and that the Divine presence and radiance is with him. It is another thing to know that Jesus and God fully approve of you. And that the radiant presence of God dwells within you. But it does.

Check this out. After Jesus prays for himself, he reveals his desire for every believer to be welcomed into divine unity. “I have given [all believers] the glory that you have given, that they may be one as we are one. I in them and you in me.” (John 17:22-23a)

Embrace the Belief

Do you believe that you can fulfill your potential? Or do you wrestle with the seven fears of highly effective leaders? If anxiety gets the best of you in uncertain times, you are not alone. So, let me ask you this: Would it make a difference to know that you bear the radiant glory of Christ within you? Not as an afterthought or an earned reward, but only by your connection with him? Most of us yearn for God’s attagirl or attaboy. The scriptures say you have it.

As you embrace this belief, it becomes easier to believe in your potential. You can do what is in front of you.

Perhaps you have heard of the “human potential movement.” It’s the idea that even ordinary people have the extraordinary untapped capacity. While it’s a movement that gained a footing in the 70s, it’s a biblical concept. If mere fishermen could train into apostleship, then you can rise to COVID-19 and the leadership challenges it presents.

The truth is, you not only have untapped human potential, but you also have untapped spiritual potential. Believing like Jesus means that you have a divine partnership, your prayers have power, you have superpowers, and purposeful life. The more you believe, like Jesus, the more your spiritual potential begins to take shape.

Apostolic Action

It’s time to let the glory of God shine through you. Co-create a positive future with God by rising to the challenges that are before you now. 

Finally, as you face uncertainty this week, practice seeing the glory of God in yourself and the people around you, even if you are standing six feet apart.

© Copyright 2020 Rebekah Simon-Peter. Adapted from the forthcoming volume, Believe Like Jesus.