Immanuel Church, 1906 - 1963 (Changing Your Church Without Killing It)

I couldn't believe it. It was obvious this church building had been built with a deep desire to honor God and help people. Yet something had gone horribly wrong. It was now abandoned, boarded up, and left as a symbol of disappointment and shattered dreams. As was typical for many older churches, there was a cemetery on the church property. But what wasn't typical is that they buried their church! Literally! The gravestone reads: Immanuel Church, 1906 - 1963...

How surreal. The church is supposed to be a place that gives evidence to the resurrection power of Jesus Christ; where people find new life and hope. It’s supposed to overcome death and destruction not submit to it.

Yet they aren’t alone. Although you won’t often find the blatant honesty of the people of Immanuel Church, many churches are dead or dying these days. They aren’t reaching any new people with the hope of Christ. Though churches are in possession of the most profound, exciting, needed, and life changing truth the world has ever known, many of them present this truth in a way that’s superficial and boring.

We’ve all been there, haven’t we? We go, expecting life, only to be bored to tears. Because of this, most people have concluded that church has nothing to offer them. If it isn’t going to strengthen, inspire, and fill them with hope, why would they attend?

I believe that the church is the hope of the world, with this one caveat.when it’s working right. And, there in lies the problem. Most aren’t! But there is hope. The reality is that even the most irrelevant, boring, dying church can become relevant and revitalized. But to do so, they must change-which is never easy.

TAKING FLIGHT
For years, I talked about skydiving. Then a guy started attending our church that did it regularly. When he heard me talking, he thought I was serious and invited me to go with him. All of a sudden I knew the truth: I liked talking about jumping, but I really wasn’t interested in actually doing it. If I had been, I would have done something about it already. But my fear of losing face proved to be stronger than my fear of jumping. We set the date, and the date arrived. Though I looked for a legitimate way out, I couldn’t find one. On the outside, I was exuding confidence. On the inside, I was questioning my sanity and looking carefully at my life insurance policy.

As I got on the plane, I plastered a smile on my face and put both thumbs up in the air, but I felt like a lamb being led to the slaughter. Finally, we were at altitude. The regular and experienced divers jumped first. I remember watching in amazement. The guy from our church jumped out backwards and did a flip. Then it was my turn. We inched to the door. “One, two, three,” and my partner pushed me out the door. Though initially leaving the safety of the plane was scary, it was the last bit of fear I remember. From then on, it was pure exhilaration. Then, when the chute opened, it transformed the experience from a seemingly out of control frenzy to one of the most peaceful, quiet moments that I’ve experienced. From beginning to end, it was an unbelievable event.

Though it may seem like an odd comparison, the experience of change is a lot like my skydiving experience for most people. Though it’s easy for people to talk about, most are fearful about going through it.

LIMIT THE CHANGES
To effectively help people process change, the number of changes must be limited. Everything cannot be changed at once. The good news is that everything doesn’t need to be changed at once. In any given church, no matter how bad things may be, there are usually only a couple of issues hurting and hindering the church significantly. Most church transitions experience difficulty because the leaders either change too many things at one time or they change the wrong things. For a successful transition, leaders must identify those key issues and move forward slowly but steadily.

This is the path I took in the church I now pastor. In our journey from irrelevant to relevant, bound by tradition to freed by God’s truth, unhealthy to healthy, dying to thriving, we learned a lot.much of it the hard way. God has allowed us to experience our transition in order to provide help and hope to Christians who know in their hearts that something is desperately wrong with their church; for pastors, leaders, and churches wanting to fulfill God’s purpose in the world again; and for skeptics and seekers who, whether they know it or not, are desperately looking for God and His hope. . . which means they desperately need a church that’s working right.

While it’s true that many churches are dead or dying, it is equally true that they don’t have to stay that way. Your church can successfully change without compromise.

Reprinted by permission. Change Your Church for Good, Brad Powell, 2007, Thomas Nelson Inc. Nashville, Tenn. All rights reserved.

Detailed information on the conference Change Without Compromise ( February 8-10, 2007 ) is available at www.ChurchDare.com - And you can get more information on Brad’s new book, “The Art of Sacred Cow Tipping:  Change Your Church for Good” at BradPowellonline.com.

Brad Powell is the Senior Pastor of NorthRidge Church. Under Brad’s leadership for the past 16 years, NorthRidge Church has transitioned from a dying church locked in a pattern of cultural irrelevance, to an exciting, contemporary church communicating God’s Word to people from every generation. Brad is a frequent conference speaker, and provides leadership resources and encouragement for other churches in transition through NorthRidge Ministries Association and an annual conference, Change Without Compromise. Brad’s new book, “Change Your Church for Good: The Art of Sacred Cow Tipping”, is scheduled for release from Thomas Nelson Publishing in January 2007. He and his wife, Roxann, have been married for 27 years and have three adult children.

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This post has been viewed 1390 times and was added on January 15, 2007 by Todd Rhoades.
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My name is Todd Rhoades, the 'behind the scenes' guy here at MMI. I'm also on the team at Leadership Network (although that doesn't mean that they endorse everything I write here). In my past life, I was the developer of a of a website called ChurchStaffing.com. I hope you'll enjoy your time here and tell all your colleagues about MMI!

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