Simplicity Itself

February 14, 2012

2:37 PM

Following the endless conversations about “what comes next?” in The United Methodist Church, it becomes more and more apparent that most of the suggestions, reports and recommendations made thus far are all designed for just one purpose: to avoid the hard work that actually must happen. In my humble opinion — one I have espoused now since 1986 — there are three things we MUST do to create a viable future:

Become Christian — actually embrace our spiritual disciplines, rituals and practices as the baseline standard for what it means to be United Methodist. You don’t care to pray? You’re too busy for weekly worship? You don’t give generously of time and money? All great… but you don’t get to be a Methodist.
Get out of our buildings — the ministry is in the world, not sitting on our butts in a sanctuary. Church suppers and craft fairs and bazaars are great fun — and we should enjoy the fellowship they bring — but they are not our ministry. More of our churches are known by the “witness” of their dinners, buildings, entertainment, and websites than by any work of compassion, mercy, justice, or spirituality.
Institute a learning culture with accountability — here’s a clever concept: let’s make “discipleship” our standard for inclusion rather than “membership!” The key to discipleship is a lifelong commitment to learning and improvement. As long as people are on the path of development — of their inward growth in relationship to God, Christ, and others, as well as their outward service to neighbor, community and world — the are “active” members of the community. The only real change we would make to membership would be the acknowledgement that there is NO SUCH THING as an inactive member.

So, to summarize: growing, giving, loving, learning, out in the world = in; complacent, comfortable, consumeristic, coddled, contented = out. Results? Fewer folks, smaller and fewer buildings, higher standards for leadership, true accountability, and much stronger witness and impact. We might not have the same access to resources, but then again we would quit mortgaging our future so that money for missions no longer is drained away in unGodly interest payments. Our leaders would stop thinking big buildings are actually indicators of good leadership. We would be embarrassed by our waste instead of so grossly proud. Smaller, better churches dedicated to serving God. Not a bad vision for the future. Good enough for Jesus, good enough for us.

Our current reports and recommendations are beautiful illustrations of worldly, materialistic, acquisitive values founded upon image, ego, and popularity. We loved the report that showed how nice people think we are, but we have yet to find any report that points to our importance or effectiveness. Being liked is so much more important than being good. Actual inclusion in a community of faith should be dependent on our willingness to serve God, not on our demands to be served. Can multitudes attend our services? Sure, but they won’t be “members” (or friends, associates, affiliates, pals, facebook friends, etc.); they will be the people the church serves, not the church. This is kind of biblical — check out the gospels and Paul…

The key to our future is simplicity itself: we must shun the cultural values of more, bigger, brighter, shinier, easier and insipid and embrace once more a commitment to quality, integrity, accountability, learning and improvement. Bigger isn’t better; better is better. Let’s trade a Call to Action for a Call to Integrity — might be a good move.

Editor's note: See initial reactions to this post on Rev. Dick's blog, United Methodeviations, or add your own comments below.

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Simplicity Itself

This is an old argument, one I was close to when I left seminary. But because anthropology was my major, I found I had to look at more elements than the ideal in order to see what all a pastor has to work with.

When I started a new congregation, we hoped to establish a church without walls. We met in homes, then in spaces rented from neighborhood churches, and finally attempted to plan for an all-purpose building that could serve the community and not just us.

We found that unless I took a job outside the church to supplement my family income and that unless the cultural value was met for an identifiable location for the congregation, we could not continue as a church.

It is obvious that another pastor may have succeeded because there were examples around the country of a wide variety of congregation-to-building experiments were succeeding. Most of those had the major disadvantage of a very small pool of pastors to draw upon when the original pastor left. Solving problems of succession of pastors for churches is one best handled by a collaborative ecclesia of some size for there to be a pool to find an appropriate candidate.

Few communities succeed without significant smaller groups that share the overall goals but allow for individual expression in one or more of the principle elements of culture (education music/art, family, political structure, etc.), That is why large churches with many active small groups, community and world outreach, and humane management are successful. Smaller churches can provide similar quality of ministry even in areas where demographics make growth unlikely. Both need a base of operations and both face the temptation of idolizing the building or its organization or its wealth, which I agree with Rev. Dick are barriers to being the church

As a mission pastor, I was amazed at how much having a facility impacted the identity and effectiveness of a church.

"God's colony in man's world" needed a functional stockade.

And it needed a relationship to a larger entity from which it drew collaboration on larger community and world mission efforts as well as a pool for succession.

If a church in Rev. Dick's sense is to survive beyond the vision of its current pastor, then the larger collaborative fellowship we experience in a denomination would have to be built up. And for the sake of identity, a location identifiable in the community would need to be established.

It is just a whole lot easier to operate as a pastor when those are already in place. Dealing with the idols some members have do make it complex, which is hard for those who want "simplicity itself." It is a whole lot more humbling, which we pastors need every now and then.

In summary, every excellent vision works only in a cultural/social context either built by that vision or is already in existence. Otherwise it becomes a sect that fades when the visionary ages and dies.

Rev. Jerry Eckert more than 14 years ago