Page 5198 – Christianity Today (2024)

In that long ago, far away book The Peter Principle lies the doctrine of my insecurity. The book states that climbers on the ladder of life are promoted rung by rung until they eventually reach a level they’re not equipped to handle. Thus, by doing well, a person arrives at a plateau beyond his real capabilities and successfully “out succeeds” himself. I have often been haunted by the fear that my church will one day outgrow my ability.

Only one word can prohibit this imagined debacle: adjustment. Not my adjustment to the crisis moments of ministry. Such moments belong to every pastor. Not my adjustment to wrenching business meetings or to those lonely nights that follow the hectic days when it seems that, for all my acquaintances, I haven’t got a friend in the world.

No, the adjustment required is the ability to relate in different ways to the congregation as the membership expands. This difficult adjustment, I believe, is the reason many church planters cannot grow a church from inception to super congregation. How does one relate to church members at the difficult plateaus of growth?

One church growth expert said that because of personal inclinations, there are some “fifty-member pastors,” some “two-hundred-member pastors,” some “five-hundred-member pastors,” and some “two-thousand-member pastors.” I’m not sure his statement is altogether true. But if it is, I find myself wondering which is my own magic number of competency. I only know that congregational vitality is somehow related to my ability to lead, and I don’t want my church to lose its vitality as it grows.

The whole subject makes me paranoid. Year after year, I cannot escape the dread feeling that I’m not growing as fast as the church. How do I keep adjusting-to keep from stifling my church’s growth and yet keep my church from outgrowing me?

I find certain questions accompany my fears:

Why do I react when someone accuses me of not knowing what’s going on in church administration?

Do I sometimes lash out when anyone implies I have taken too much time for myself?

Was the anger on my face obvious to the committee when I confessed to forgetting one appointment on a day I had fifteen scheduled?

Why do I sometimes feel I have created a busy church that’s all legs and no heart?

Why do I feel bad when there are sixteen people in hospitals and I’ve visited only fourteen of them?

Why do I spend the first six days of every ten-day vacation feeling guilty that I’m living in caprice while hundreds of problems remain unsolved back home?

Was I always plagued by such self-recrimination? Yes. For years I have lived in the double bind of wanting my church to grow, but fearing my competency would not suffice if it did.

I want to avoid statistical arrogance, but the truth is our church has grown in the past two decades. Twenty-one years ago, I arrived in Omaha and, with five other families, began the work. My wife and I became members eleven and twelve of what was little more than a Bible study. Now the church has a weekly attendance that would have seemed impossible back then. We aren’t one of the top ten great churches of America, but we’ve added an average of three new members a week for the past ten years. We have just finished what seems to us a huge sanctuary, and the church, at least to me, seems to be exploding in size.

At each stage of growth, I’ve had to change, and change is as hard for preachers as it is for parishioners. Yet change is the central task of pastors who commit themselves to growing churches. Failure to adjust to the church’s new stage of development is a sure way to prevent any further growth.

Let me walk you through the stages as I’ve seen them.

You Get the Pizza; I’ll Bring the Guitar

The first is what I call the “Joe, You Pick Up the Pizza and I’ll Bring the Guitar” stage of church life. Those who plant churches often begin with this pizza clique kind of fellowship. At this stage, things depend purely on the pastor’s ability to be colloquial.

I confess I graduated from seminary a little too Brunner-esque. I began a small church with the false assumption that everyone who walked into our clique was just dying to find out whatever happened to the Socinians. Like most seminarians, I hadn’t been prepared to build relationships in ordinary ways. But nobody learns what down-to-earth means any faster than a pastor who wants to plant a church.

Churches begin as colloquiums where it’s important that we can talk about little things. At this stage, there will be no talk of the Sistine Chapel or Reformation theology. Instead, the conversation will bounce from Jesus to the latest wave of public school chicken pox. Working out the exact date of the Second Coming isn’t as important as the next “all-church” picnic.

For our church, this stage was warm and clinging, delightful and close. All six families left our Sunday evening study group and reassembled for fellowship at someone’s home for pizza. We were all reluctant to break off our Sunday togetherness.

But we were little only in size, not in vision. The near global idealism of our six families produced a zealous togetherness. We knew at the outset that God was about to use his clique of conquistadors to raise the gospel flag, citadel-fashion, over Omaha. Our group rarely voiced this dream, for, spoken out loud, it seemed a delusion of grandeur. Plus, there’s always the superstitious feeling that saying anything out loud breaks the magic. Dreams should hatch silently, incubated by workers who don’t talk away the glory.

So our ministry lived in prayer, pizza, and partisan enterprise. We laughed and sang, never talking in grandiose ways about our conquest. But touching each other and being together, we nevertheless kept the dream alive.

My wife and I quite often fed the whole church five loaves and an unmultiplied fish or two. We didn’t talk much about saving the world (though we never doubted it could be done). Our themes were generally too intimate to apply the shepherd metaphor, which doesn’t seem to fit when the flock is small. We were all shepherds or all sheep or all neither. We were just a clique with a large conscience.

The information flow in our fledgling church was universal, and guilt was the one tool we used to keep each other in line. If Joe wanted to go to Kansas City for a weekend, we wanted to know it well ahead of time. He wouldn’t dare just wander off without scheduling it with us. If he did, we all called right after he missed church to chirp, “We missed you!” But Joe knew it wasn’t so much a condolence as a threat dipped in guilt and fired at close range by all of us who didn’t go to Kansas City.

All in all, we sought unanimity. We were few, and it was important that we felt alike. Each of us would regularly lick an index finger and hold it up to the group, and in such unsophisticated theological tests we measured which way the wind blew:

“Yes, we believe in eternal security.”

“No, divorced men can’t be deacons.”

“What, Joe, you let your kids play Dungeons and Dragons?”

“Dobson was great today, wasn’t he?”

“David C. Cook material is optimum.”

“The Living Bible is slangy and giddy and not to be given place alongside the NASB.”

A politburo of concord we were, yet we didn’t do it to be coercive, but to protect the dream we didn’t talk about but never forgot.

Best of all, this closeness hatched fifty-two weeks of Christmas every year. My sermons weren’t glorious, but I was somehow key, at the hub of most relationships, so I was rewarded-if not for being brilliant, at least for being central.

But Are They Members?

The next stage I’ll call the “Should We Let People Sing in Our Choir If They’re Not Members?” plateau. Little groups are protective of their togetherness. The congregation, like me, wanted the church to grow, but we wanted it to grow without widening the “we feeling” we so enjoyed.

As an artist, I have noticed I can freehand a pretty good circle-as long as the circumference is small. But if the circle is large, I cannot hold the radius equal around the more and more remote center. The effort grows eccentric.

Further, simple geometry ordains that it’s harder to see the center of the circle from a wider circumference. So the real tension of this second stage is hidden in this desire: “Let’s keep this circle perfect.” The corollary is that the circle must therefore remain small.

I began to discover as pastor that it was next to impossible to have over all the “old members” and, at the same time, to have over all the “new potential members.” While the number of either wasn’t large, it was still too large to allow my wife and me to fit them all into our small home. As soon as we began to limit “attendance” at the parsonage get-togethers, we began to hear rumblings from those not included.

We also noticed for the first time that we had inadvertently become the sole “entertainers” of our small fellowship. We hadn’t meant to be virtually the only family showing hospitality on a group scale, but we had become just that. People seemed to see this as our responsibility. They clung ever more tightly to the small circle, despite their philosophical commitment to widening the scope of our fellowship.

I began to hear the “first circle” criticizing the newcomers: “These (new) people don’t love this church like we do.” A protective exclusivism was born: “Should we let people sing in our choir if they’re not members of the church?” It was an institutional question that sought to protect their own place in the church without being really honest. I remember that the first time I heard the question, I was struck that our choir was so small-we had one man and three women.

At this stage, the number of members and adherents began to grow so numerous that lines of communication, which once had intersected with me at the hub of the circle, now began to bypass me. My self-importance suffered as I often felt I was in the dark about what was going on.

My worst adjustments came in trying to reach out to charter members who seemed to grow intentionally aloof. Were they psychologically retaliating because they weren’t the “in crowd” they once had been? Even though I tried to tell them that I, too, was experiencing these feelings, they were unconvinced. In most cases, the pain I felt was sponsored by the spiritualized criticism of those who left.

None of them quit the church for the real reason of “psychological insecurity.” But some of them found other reasons for leaving, like: “Your sermons don’t feed us anymore!” (though I hadn’t consciously changed my preaching from when it had been feeding them). Others wanted a “truly compassionate” pastor; others wanted one who would “preach the whole counsel of God.” Still others left because we weren’t being true to the “historic traditions” of our denomination. Many of these people moved about six miles away and started a church that would offer the customary programs of our denomination.

All this was traumatic for me. I learned at great emotional expense that it’s okay to lose members. Indeed, I later learned that not every potential member of the church has needs that our congregation can best meet. Still, I have never lost a family without guilt and pain.

Oops, I Didn’t Know We Had a Softball Team

Shortly after we had gathered three hundred resident members and had hired our first full-time staff person, we reached a stage where the lines of communication became sketchy. That summer, I discovered we not only had formed a church softball team, but we were doing very well in the city league.

It was the first time I could recall something that “major” being done without my having some role in the decision. My ego was bruised. But the men said that I had been “away” when the crucial decision was made, and they knew I wasn’t too “athletic” anyway, so “a group of us got a team together, and we didn’t take any church funds to pay the league fees [which is, of course, the acid test in a new church], so we knew you wouldn’t mind.”

“I don’t mind (too much),” I said. “It’s just the principle of the thing!” They could tell I was steamed, so they invited me over for pizza after one of the games. There we kissed and made up . . . except that sometimes, late at night, I would pray that they’d lose the championship game.

They didn’t, and my administrative grief was compounded by the emergence of huge trophies all over the vestibule-blue and gold plastic icons of the decision I never made. Like Zwingli (whose name, I’ll admit, isn’t cited at many softball banquets) in Reformation Zurich, I had the awfulest urge to sweep through the church smashing softball trophies. But I knew it was simply administrative sour grapes.

In the ensuing years, there would be many decisions made without my counsel. Recently, a square dance group formed right out in the open “behind my back.” Truthfully, square dancing has always looked like fun, but that doesn’t change the fact that Baptists have firmly stood against dancing of every sort ever since Herodias did her thing. The group assured me this case was different from John the Baptist’s: nobody’s head was at stake.

“What about mine when the deacons find out?” I shouted. “Deacons can make Herod look compassionate.” They succumbed, and for the most part there’s no square dancing and we’re still free from the “obvious sins.”

The point is that as churches grow, pastors must be prepared for the fact that they gradually lose some touch with all that’s going on. Yet while I may be removed from the planning of these events, fireworks often explode because of such uncharted acts. The congregational explosion may be the first time I realize I’ve been unaware. I often find myself having to patch over the bruised feelings associated with these events.

But You Married Us, Remember?

One element usually associated with growth is long tenure. When a church is small, the pastor knows every member by name. In a small church, the pastor is “in the know,” and knowing is a kind of job security, a feeling of control. This relationship is vastly different for the pastor who has such a big congregation he or she can’t possibly know each member.

I was the keynote speaker at an Arizona gathering, and when the meeting was concluded, a rather striking man came up to me with two towering, six-foot boys whom he introduced as his sons.

“I’m Roberto Blair,” he said.

“Roberto!” I replied. “Nice to meet you.”

There was an awkward silence. He waited, apparently to see how long it would take me to remember him. I realized I was in the vise. It was important to him to have me remember his name. I fished desperately. With a name like Roberto, his wife was probably named Rosita or Carlotta, but then, I had once known a Consuela . . . no, she ran the missionary lunch room in Monterey, didn’t she? It was no use. Finally I blurted out, “Have we met before?”

“Aw, come on . . . you baptized me and my boys. You even led us to Christ.”

“Of course,” I said. “Uh, how long has it been?”

He said the late fifties. I didn’t ask if he meant the 1850s or 1950s. I asked his forgiveness for forgetting and blamed it all on a clogged carotid artery. He seemed at peace, but inwardly I felt bad. I have baptized almost two thousand people in my ministry, and I find it hard to remember all their names.

Recently a middle-aged couple visited our church. When I introduced myself, the man asked, “Don’t you remember us? You married us seven years ago!” I confessed I didn’t remember.

My problem lies in the number of people I meet every week-usually between six and fifteen new families. At Easter and special occasions, we have had as many as two hundred new families visit us. Still, I can’t help feeling guilty because I feel I should remember everybody I meet and be able to recall their names. Much of my guilt comes because I was sociologically in control at earlier levels of the church’s development.

Now I must adjust to a growing remoteness. I am simply learning that the pastor of a growing church must somewhere quit memorizing saints and start equipping them. I must challenge the congregation with compassion. Unless members minister to each other, real ministry will die in the growing congregation.

The only answer is that I must stop insisting on the official singularity of the word minister. Carlyle Marney says we (laos and cleros alike) must all be “priests to each other.” As pastors, we must equip every Christian to minister, and we must quit wallpapering our offices with degrees that insist that we alone are certified ministers.

George Bernard Shaw once said that every profession is a conspiracy against the laity. God help us if that should be true of pastors. We are on the side of the laity, one with the laity. We are calling them to be ministers so that the number of members on a church roll exactly equals the number of ministers. Canadian pastor Paul Stevens is both sensible and theologically correct when he writes: “I keep the official record of it, my ordinational certificate, over my desk partly to remind me of what I am not. I am not the only commissioned minister of my church. I am not the only called person. I am not the only person who should be called a minister. If the institution of ordination perpetuates a practical heresy in the church by slighting the nonprofessional minister and favoring the professional, then it should be abolished.”

Hear, hear! This is the wisdom and the accountability of a growing church. There’s no room in the authentic, growing church for pastors insisting on their right to stardom in the ministry. My role is one of equippage and not empire.

Sheldon and Davy Van Auken called it “creeping separateness” and spoke of it as a danger in their marriage. A growing church also has a sense of creeping separateness. The task of trying to be intimate friends with everyone in the church drives me crazy. There are always new names and faces. At the same time, loneliness stalks the madness. On any given Saturday night, when the various bowling leagues or bridge cliques are flying, my wife will feel alone. Are we driving ourselves neurotic trying to be friends with the whole congregation?

We’re not complaining, mind you. We are so often tired that an evening alone is the rare gift that sometimes comes to refresh us and gives us the feeling that life can be managed. Yet in the fishbowl of a large church, our thoughts are ever on the newcomers.

The danger is that one of the “newcomers” will surprise you with a bit of history. “Mr. New, I presume? Not new? Really? I married you and what’s-her-name a brisk five years and six thousand handshakes ago?”

If the Flag Is Flying . . .

Finally, our church has arrived at what Lyle Schaller calls the “mini-denominational stage.”

I will never forget seeing Windsor Castle for the first time. As we walked about the spacious gardens and walkways, I asked if the queen were at home. The answer I received in crisp British was, “If the flag is flying, the Queen is in residence.”

I remember a long breathing spell in the middle of a racquetball game, when one of my very finest friends told me he had been a member of the church long enough to see my role changing.

When I told him his words were cryptic, he simply said, “I have seen you pass from a doer to a symbol in our congregation.” He went on to say that pastors in larger churches cannot possibly touch individual lives as frequently as they might in smaller churches.

“You’re my pastor,” he said, “but many others now provide me spiritual counsel and insight. While you’re central in my understanding of how the Word of God is ministered, you’re more the model than the mode of my counsel.”

His words both blessed and rebuked. As a church grows, the pastor’s role does become one of focus and symbol.

I still make about twenty visits a week, as do the other pastors on the staff, but at this snail’s pace, I could never visit all the families in the church in a year. The church’s need is now wider than my stamina and time. Still, visitation is important so that my ministry can have relevance to me, if not to them. If I were to cease making calls, something in my own evangelistic impetus would die, something I need to keep Aristotle’s pathos (sensitivity and feeling) in my sermons. Without a strong sense of pathos, I might never find the verve I need to convince others (as well as myself) of the priority of seeking the kingdom of God in life.

Still, I must fit all my personal ministry into a schedule laden with student rallies, staff meetings, family life, church growth, and Bible conferences. For me, the big-church syndrome means I must work harder than ever to maintain the necessary home-base feeling. I cannot feel authentically pastoral otherwise.

My resolve is bound up in my desire to be a pastor and to be thought of that way. This is an important symbol in our congregation. They must see me as someone who is always available. So when they say to me, “If the flag is flying, the king is in residence,” I want them to say it with a smile. Made in a good-natured way, the comment says, “I understand the church has grown, and growth is our calling as a church.” I hope they also see that it means they’re obligated to minister to each other.

Social Growth: A Painful Necessity

Growing can be painful. Who needs it? Wouldn’t it be better to settle down in warm, containable settings?

No, because we have met Christ, who told us to win the whole world, or as much of it as we can. Hence, as I see it, not every great church is a big church, but every great church is a growing, changing church. I realize the statement has some limitations in dying rural situations or hard-locked urban districts. Still, great churches are busy increasing either their numbers or their vision.

Whichever is the case, relationships must also widen to create room for such visions. Joseph Aldrich said we should visualize the Spirit of God hovering over our neighborhood. It is this vision that calls the church to integrate the new. Ours cannot be the greatest problem; remember how twice early in Acts thousands of people were swept into the church on single occasions. There was little question that the Holy Spirit was hovering over their urgency. As he hovers over Omaha, my own adjustment must continue.

If, as the shepherd, I am not continually growing, changing, and developing my own relationship skills, there is little hope for greatness in this flock.

The number one response to all change is anger. I have known the resentment of seeing close friends push me perimeter-wards in their growing circle of relationships. I have sometimes been angry because I wasn’t invited to some soiree where I knew laughter and good times were going to swell. I have felt hurt because the very family that I prayed with through thirty hospital visits had a prayer retreat in their home a year later and invited an Episcopal rector to direct it. I have been angry because my best friend’s daughter didn’t ask me to do her wedding ceremony, picking one of my associates. But my anger lives only till I kneel in prayer and ask God to bring to my remembrance the right of everyone to be free in the fellowship. Then I see that they’re only doing what I must do so often in my own complex world of relationships. They are picking and choosing, and they can’t all choose me all the time.

Then, too, it’s really all for Christ. And yet, when I’m honest, I wonder how much of the spotlight I would shine on Christ if some of the “edge-light” wasn’t always spilling on me. It keeps my best spiritual moments smudged with doubt about my dedication.

As for the people in our congregation, I don’t know how many more God will bring to us. All I know is that I love them. As Paul said, they are my “joy and my crown” (Phil. 4:1). I am blessed to be their shepherd, however heavy the task.

As shepherd and flock, we all have to allow for some diminishing of closeness. In a sense, this is born of self-denial. We are creating space so that all those not yet born again may also come to know Christ.

In lessening our grip on relationships, we not only set others free, but we also free ourselves. It takes courage to stand without clinging, but only as we release our grip are we free to stand straight and self-sufficient before our world. Is it not heresy to know Christ and call ourselves self-sufficient? Yes, of course, but the self-sufficient Christian finds sufficiency in Christ and not in clinging to another. At the heart of all relationships in a growing church is the strength of Christ.

Church growth always demands social growth. Especially for the pastor.

Calvin Miller is pastor of Westside Baptist Church in Omaha, Nebraska.

Copyright © 1987 by the author or Christianity Today/Leadership Journal.Click here for reprint information on Leadership Journal.

The Change Agent

by Lyle E. Schaller (Abingdon, 1972)

Schaller’s preface begins: “Anyone seriously interested in planned social change would be well advised to recognize two facts of life. First, despite the claims of many, relatively little is known about how to achieve predictable change. Second, much of what is known will not work.”

Schaller has observed, classified, and effected change in American churches for years. A holder of five academic degrees-including an M.S. in political science and a B.D.-Schaller knows the theory of change; his vast church experience allows him to apply it.

Chapters in this classic text range from “How to Cut Your Own Throat” to “The Nature of Change” to “Anticipating and Managing Conflict.” His thesis: “A systematic and anticipatory approach to planned social change is the most effective style.”

Leading Churches through Change

by Douglas Alan Walrath (Abingdon, 1979)

The process of church change can be an interesting subject-when someone else’s neck is on the block. Walrath, a church development consultant, gives readers the opportunity to observe from a safe distance through several case studies of churches in change. Some changes went well, others not so well, and the case studies point out why.

He concludes with five principles: begin well, honor the context, establish good communication, deal promptly and positively with conflict, and build a positive church image. This book can motivate students of change to become agents of change.

Leading Your Church to Growth

by C. Peter Wagner (Regal, 1984)

Change demands dynamic leadership, and Wagner wrote this book to help pastors develop their leadership role. He understands the hefty price involved in growth. Pastors have to realign their leadership style and job descriptions, perhaps forgoing cherished closeness to the whole flock.

Wagner argues strongly for taking a directive role in change. He casts light on healthy “followership,” the differences between special-interest groups and congregations, and solving the problems of change. He writes, “The indispensable first step in guiding a church through change is earning the right to lead people.”

The Mind Changers

by Emory A. Griffin (Tyndale, 1976)

If the change agent succeeds, the art of persuasion will probably have something to do with it. Em Griffin, communications professor at Wheaton College, provides a wealth of tools for the Christian persuader, and he shows how to use them ethically.

Griffin combines the best of social psychology with sound Christian wisdom to illuminate why people are resistant to change, how to move them toward change, and the best ways to solidify attitudes into commitment.

Beginning a New Pastorate

by Robert G. Kemper (Abingdon, 1978)

Sometimes the pastor is doing the changing, and few books have better advice for the pastor in transit. Kemper’s thesis is that thoughtful, intentional change makes more sense than going with the flow.

Kemper offers counsel on questions to ask a prospective congregation, things to consider when making a decision, the impact on one’s family, and the process of getting established after the change.

My copy is worn from constant reference to it during one transition I made and from the many times I’ve loaned it to pastors on the move. His counsel works.

The Unchurched: Who They Are and Why They Stay Away

by J. Russell Hale (Harper & Row, 1980)

While many of us were looking the other way, the culture around us changed. Unchurched people surround many churches, and they display a bewildering array of lifestyles and beliefs.

Hale helps us understand the changed society we inhabit and hear the sometimes-angry, sometimes-longing voices of a post-Christian culture. He combines interesting vignettes and arresting snatches of conversation with a social scientist’s insight and ability to classify. The resulting book gives solid help for church folk wanting to reach a population far different from them.

– James D. Berkley

associate editor, LEADERSHIP

Leadership Fall 1987 p. 101

Copyright © 1987 by the author or Christianity Today/Leadership Journal.Click here for reprint information on Leadership Journal.

In an age of Velcro, brewed decaf, and microwave popcorn, everyone is affected by change. Hundreds of thousands of people changed jobs this year. Some forty million changed addresses (including the Shelleys).

Not long ago the LEADERSHIP staff was musing about changes in church life.

“Yeah, church camps used to be tent frames and army cots,” said Jim Berkley. “Now they’re air-conditioned retreat centers.”

Kevin Miller and Larry Weeden immediately contributed a list of what’s “out” and what’s “in.” Trips to the Holy Land, for instance, are out; Christian cruises are in.

Also out: guitars, “facilitating,” and mega-anything. The in list featured electronic keyboards, “taking charge,” and power-anything.

“And before long,” Kevin predicted, we’ll probably see HONK IF YOU LOVE JESUS changed to HONK IF YOU LOVE JESUS . . . AND DISCLOSE YOUR FINANCIAL STATEMENTS.

Amid the laughter, I began reflecting on our ambivalent feelings toward change.

All the church leaders I know consider themselves flexible, innovative, forward-thinking. So do I. We North Americans, after all, have an image to uphold as pioneering spirits. If there’s a job to do, and if some creative change is necessary to accomplish it, well, we’ll do it.

We like to joke about the crusty folk who resist good ideas by invoking the seven last words of the church: “We’ve never done it that way before” or the more acceptable modern paraphrase, “We tried that once; it didn’t work.”

We “change agents” are beyond such primitive prejudices.

Yet in my more honest moments, I find I resist change as much as anyone.

Fred Craddock tells of being parked at the curb, waiting for his wife to finish shopping, and seeing a young woman in her late twenties sitting in the next car, dabbing at her eyes with a Kleenex.

“I didn’t know why she was crying,” says Fred, “but I had time, and I’d had a course in psychology, so I decided to figure it out: Her husband’s in a tavern around the corner. The budget won’t permit the new dress she’d picked out. She’s gotten a letter from home, her mother is ill.

“I went through the whole thing, when out of the barber shop in front of me came a young man, about thirty. He had in his arms a boy who looked about three, and the boy’s hair was cut as short as can be. Back in the car, the young woman grabbed the boy, kissed him all over his head, and cried and cried.”

Then, according to Fred, the woman said something to the man. He shook his head, but she kept talking. They argued.

Finally, red-faced, the man got out of the car, went back inside, reached under the barber’s chair, picked up a lock of blond hair, and came back out.

“Now if I’d gone up to that young woman and said, ‘Why are you crying? Do you want your child to stay a baby forever?’ ” Fred reflects, “she would have said, ‘Oh, no, no, no. But . . . I’ve lost my baby.’ “

Put in that context, something happens to the flavor of the words when they come out of the mouth: We want some changes.

Yes, most of us are for change, at least in theory. But changes are often bittersweet.

In the church, what determines how I feel about a particular change?

Most of the time, the key to my attitude is whether I am initiating the change (in which case I’m all for it) or someone else is imposing the change upon me (which tends to make me more resistant).

Sometimes proposed changes will cause us more work. Other times, they may be a painful good-bye to what had become a comfortable pattern.

But perhaps the biggest reason we resist changes imposed upon us is that they demonstrate that someone else has more power, and they are creating changes we have to live by. Or else it’s a situation that’s beyond our control (like the inexorable movement of time), and we’re not always convinced we like that.

I’ve been thinking about Fred Craddock’s story recently as our church is in the process of adding a pastoral staff person, revising the makeup of the church board, and launching a building program and fund-raising campaign-all simultaneously.

As a member of the church’s executive committee and one partly responsible for launching these ventures, naturally I’m all for the changes.

But it’s also good to remember that for many people who haven’t been wrestling with the underlying factors for several years, these changes may feel like their first-born has just been shorn.

Marshall Shelley is managing editor of LEADERSHIP.

Copyright © 1987 by the author or Christianity Today/Leadership Journal.Click here for reprint information on Leadership Journal.

I didn’t want to change.

Born and raised in the suburbs, middle-class, college educated, WASP, I found myself pastoring a church in the inner city of Chicago. The neighborhood was Catholic, blue-collar, run-down, an amalgam of white-ethnic and Mexican. Our building sat across from a housing project. I balked at calling this place home.

One weekend, I had an opportunity to get away, to preach in my home church in Bloomington, Illinois. When the last vestiges of city and suburb were in my rearview mirror, I sighed in relief. For the next two hours I soaked in the beauty of the expansive cornfields. Later, as I shook hands and conversed with old friends, one thought echoed in my mind: It’s good to be home.

Two days later, through a dirty haze, unwelcome landmarks assaulted me: gray factories, smoldering smokestacks, clogged highways.

But eight years later my name is still on the same stationery. By God’s grace I eventually adapted to foreign soil. Looking back, I see three attitudes that delayed my adaptation-and a more effective ministry.

Stay with what’s worked

I cut my ministry teeth during the body-life heyday. Accordingly, my plan was to develop the body as I had done in a previous ministry, by prayer, low-profile pasturing, and waiting for motivation and gifts to arise in the people.

Seven months after I became pastor, our pianist, who played with an energetic gospel style, moved to California. With him went our music program; we had no other musicians. Yet, for six months I refused to play my guitar. I didn’t want to discourage others from filling the void.

Later, I invited a street-ministry team for nine days of afternoon evangelism and evening rallies. The workers were enthusiastic and happy-and musical. For the first time in several months, our church enjoyed singing. When our guests motored out of town, they left behind a half-dozen converts-including a guitar-strumming pastor who now believed in motivational leadership.

I’ll be here only a short time

When I moved to the inner city, I intended to stay at least five years. But as attendance dwindled from twenty-five to fifteen, my perception of God’s will changed. God sent me here for a desert experience, for testing, I reasoned. Soon he’ll lead me elsewhere.

To my dismay, the pillar of cloud and fire never moved.

But several years ago I decided to work as if this were it-my permanent pastorate. That meant adapting for effectiveness here and now.

For example, I’d found Chicagoans tough, aloof, and hardened. But gradually, as friendships formed, I realized it was simply interaction city-style: cold with strangers, warm with friends. I learned to work within that and make the most of it.

And I’d been dwelling on the city’s blemishes and ignoring Chicago’s charms-miles of tree-dotted lakefront, large parks, ethnic restaurants, museums, zoos, libraries. As I committed myself to her, this city found a place in my heart. To my surprise, last year while riding a train, the familiar sights of skyscrapers, projects, and two-flats actually pleased me.

Never shift your philosophy of ministry

Joe Perales, a veteran of several active Latino churches in the area, would occasionally pressure me with suggestions for activities. “Larson, why don’t we have a picnic on Memorial Day?” was typical. I liked Joe a lot, but I’d invariably give some excuse. I loved preaching and its underpinnings-prayer, Bible study, and reading. The maxim “Preach the Word, and God will fill the pews” made good sense to me, so I wasn’t about to cut into my preparation for preaching by becoming a promoter.

Although my priorities were good, I came to see that the “God will fill the pews” maxim is not in the canon. It doesn’t tell the whole story. For us, conversions seemed more rare than off-street parking. “Visitors” didn’t visit.

I still put preaching first, but now I allot more time for planning, promotion, and visitation.

And so my unmalleable attitudes have softened. Before a recent Wednesday night service, I chatted with Mary, a friendly, middle-aged member who lives in the housing project and cannot read. Her relatives had invited her to attend another church, she told me, but she had declined. “This is my church,” she said, “and you are my pastor.”

Her statement gratified me, because she probably would not have felt this affinity during my first years here, nor would we have talked with such ease. It took an unchanging God to deal with an unchanging me.

-Craig Brian Larson

Central Assembly of God

Chicago, Illinois

Copyright © 1987 by the author or Christianity Today/Leadership Journal.Click here for reprint information on Leadership Journal.

When John Perkins, the founder and president of Voice of Calvary, called my wife and me over to his home one afternoon in 1981, I had some idea of what he was going to say, but I wasn’t completely sure. In the last few years, John had made two or three overtures about resigning, but hadn’t carried through. I’m not sure anyone really expected him to.

This time, however, it was different.

“Lem,” he said, “I’m going to resign and I want you to think about becoming president of Voice of Calvary.”

Eleanor and I were poles apart in our reactions. She was scared, and I was excited. I was sure this was a chance to take a significant, nationally recognized community development ministry into the Promised Land. I was ready to fly; I had no intention of putting on the brakes. It took me only half a day to decide.

Eleanor, however, saw nothing but loose ends, problems, and entanglements. She figured I was buying a $100 ticket on the Titanic for $5 and boasting about the great deal I’d gotten.

As Eleanor and I talked and prayed, I tried to calm her misgivings. In my naivet‚, I didn’t think her concerns were that large. And in the end, Eleanor agreed to support me in the move.

Looking back, there was no real contemplation. And even more important, I didn’t consult any mentor who could have warned me of what happens when you try to fill the shoes of a beloved predecessor, not to mention trying to fill everyone else’s expectations.

Not every leader, of course, has gone through the trial of transition yet. Chances are, however, that before your ministry is through, you will go through at least one. I offer the lessons I’ve learned in hopes that they might help you through some rough days.

Taking the Heat

Whenever you follow a strong leader, you sometimes find yourself in a no-win situation. On virtually any major decision, if you choose one direction, people will accuse you of being the founder’s puppet. If you opt the other way, you can be accused of being disloyal to the dream.

Right before I became president, a highly controversial firing took place. I didn’t realize when I accepted the presidency how the fallout from that firing would affect me.

I was out of town when the firing took place. As Voice of Calvary’s executive director, I was the one who usually handled hiring and firing. When I returned, a number of staff members came to me and said, “Lem, you’ve got to tell John to hire this person back.”

As executive director, I was committed to carrying out the directives of the founder. I wasn’t going to undermine his leadership by bucking him publicly.

When I became president, the pressure to reinstate the individual continued. But again, I didn’t feel it was appropriate to directly countermand a decision John had made. Even today, I still run into people who refer to that incident and say, “You’re not a very compassionate leader. That person was run over by a freight train, and you could have helped, but you didn’t.”

In retrospect, I’ll admit I was scared. I don’t know whether I was afraid of losing my job or of failing in John’s eyes. Perhaps I should have taken a stand. But I felt my responsibility was to continue the direction we were going. There was obviously a temptation to proudly demonstrate my independence by reversing the previous decision, but I felt that was not appropriate. No decision I could have made would have been popular. My wife and I definitely felt the heat.

This incident and others that quickly arose made me realize I’d overlooked a simple biblical mandate when I accepted the new responsibilities: I hadn’t counted the cost. This is not to say I would have rejected the position had I fully counted it. I’m still glad I made the decision. But looking back, I see I could have spared my wife and myself a lot of emotional and spiritual anguish had I thought things through a little longer.

I wish now I’d made an honest and unabridged list of all the organizational snags and loose ends I’d be facing. Eleanor and I would have been better prepared mentally for the tensions, for instance, had we noted from the beginning even such minor things as these: though John would hold no official position in the organization, as founder his name would always be identified with the ministry, often more prominently than any current leader’s; people inside and outside the organization would continue to invoke his name even when his opinion on an issue was unknown.

All this taught me that when you approach such an opportunity, it pays to seek wise counsel-and to take it seriously when you get it. Your spouse, other family members, or mature advisers may be able to bring you down from Mount Sinai for a while and give you a more objective view of what you’re getting into. They’re not trying to dash your dreams or your hopes. They love you, and many times they know better than you what is best. In your first blush of enthusiasm, you may be sure you’ve been handed the chance to turn the world around for Jesus. Your spouse or your family know you’re good, but not that good.

The Inevitable Comparisons

Most of us won’t be as forceful or as charismatic as the previous leader. But we’ll still have to weather the comparisons (sometimes hurtful) that will surely come.

I was offered the position in May 1981, and the Voice of Calvary board meeting was in June. John strongly recommended that I become the next president. Even though some on the board felt the selection process-namely, the outgoing president’s making the decision-was not the best way to choose the new president, they did approve the recommendation.

Although I was John’s hand-picked successor, I found that following him, a powerful and beloved man, was no easy task.

I consider John Perkins a prophet. I love and admire him. He forged a new vision for black leadership and a new understanding in the evangelical church of what it means to wed social action and social justice with biblical evangelism and discipleship.

His influence started locally and then spread nationally and internationally. His vision of a racially reconciled biblical community has gained adherents throughout the world. Under his leadership, Voice of Calvary became an international study center for Christian community development. Its influence has spread to interracial communities in Australia and South Africa.

How do you follow an act like that? Well, for a while, I didn’t know if I would. I became so tired of hearing that I was not enough of a “people person,” that I needed to maintain a “higher profile.” After overhearing comments like “Lem just doesn’t have the same vision” or “I don’t know if Lem is going to catch on,” I also had moments of doubting whether I should have been there.

I was at the bottom of the ladder emotionally. You know the old saying, “When you run out of rope, tie a knot in the end and hang on”? That was about all I knew how to do.

During this time, the most important passage of Scripture to me was in Genesis 4, where the Lord comes to Cain, the less favored, and says, “Why is your countenance fallen? [Why are you depressed?] If you do well, will not your countenance be lifted up, and if you do not do well, sin crouches at the door. Its desire is [to master] you, but you must master it.”

That passage taught me a great lesson during those dark days: Despite the temptations and the circumstances, I needed to be willing to put one foot in front of the other. God’s warnings to Cain, and Cain’s failure, were profitable warnings to me to take care not to stumble.

In the end, Cain wound up lashing out and destroying his brother. I didn’t want to do that I realized that was the “sin crouching at the door” during my dark periods of leadership. Once a leader begins lashing out, it is easier to do it again and again. And that’s a way to ensure failure in leadership.

I have great empathy now for the person who said, “Many times, taking just one more step is all anyone can do.” As a leader, you can’t always see what’s down the road. You might not want to know. Getting through the transitions and the comparisons and the accompanying depression is, most of the time, simply the result of taking one step at a time and doing what needs to be done.

The Urge to Purge

In any change of leaders, especially when the predecessor has had a long, strong tenure, the new leader finds his or her leadership tested. And during the first few months after John’s departure, I felt some people took advantage of me.

Some staff members made unilateral decisions about ministry operations, without consulting me, that they definitely would have run by John. I felt, rightly or wrongly, that they perceived me as untrustworthy.

There were times I felt the urge to retaliate for what I considered an unjust action, to purge the organization of those who weren’t eager to follow my direction.

But I’m glad now that I didn’t. If you retaliate, you may miss the fact that another person’s animosity is really God’s way of telling you the person needs to be loved through his or her frustration and hurt.

I coined a saying that helped me get through those days: “He who has the greatest truth, must have the greatest love, which is the greatest proof.” I reminded myself that anyone who thinks his truth is the higher truth can neither retaliate nor retreat from that truth if he hopes to have any credentials. Had I used my office to retaliate, I would have belied the very truth I asked others to accept.

A new leader, especially one who comes after a strong predecessor, will inevitably have to deal with being misunderstood. Reactions to you will be mixed, and retaliation won’t accomplish what you want it to.

I may have felt this more intensely than other new leaders because Voice of Calvary is not simply a place where people work and then go home to forget about their work. It’s a close community consisting of a ministry, a church, and house groups that meet regularly. That means the people you work with are also the people with whom you live and worship. Personal problems and disputes often have deeper and more serious ramifications.

I remember wishing I worked for IBM, where the corporate dynamic is different. There, or so I imagined, if some employees felt I had done them wrong, they could complain to their family members and sit around and get mad together. They could complain as loudly as they wanted, but the effect it would have on the structure and strength of IBM would be negligible.

But at Voice of Calvary (and in most churches), there are many overlapping reference points. If people feel they’ve been hurt or treated unjustly, those they tell when they go home are often fellow employees or church members with major responsibilities. Whatever the problem, it creates a tremendous ripple effect in our tight community of work, play, and fellowship. In any major decision, you never win “hands down” among people living in community.

I had to remind myself that when you follow a beloved leader, almost everyone, at least initially, is involved in the ministry because of that leader. They naturally feel a continued affection and loyalty.

I learned I needed to make no sudden moves, but instead to anticipate how the complex reactions would develop, in order to get my job done effectively.

Accepting Your Role

In every organization, there is a founder’s phase in which there is a lot of energy, excitement and charisma. The focus is on project initiation. If something is overlooked, it’s usually in the area of follow-through. The successor’s role is to contemplate the next steps and not begin projects unless there is some assurance they can be finished. When I finally understood this, it freed me to be a far more effective leader.

It took awhile to accept the fact that my role, as successor, is different from John’s role as founder. I needed to learn that charisma will carry an organization only so far. After that, it takes a good manager and organizer to keep things running.

In many ways, a second-generation leader has a tougher job than the founder. It’s my responsibility to take a vision and apply my organizational skills to make it run smoothly. We’re always open to charges of stifling the dream because we put an organizational and structural framework around it. We’re often viewed as constricting. But that’s because we have the conflicting responsibilities of motivating the workers, tending the organizational machinery, and charting the new frontiers for growth.

Voice of Calvary’s effectiveness for the first generation came from applying the gospel in new ways to specific community needs. Its effectiveness for the second generation will come from staying in touch with changing needs, trying new ways of meeting them, and blending those with the best aspects of the first generation.

I’ve had to learn to make decisions based on both the past and the future-to rely on the wisdom of past leadership when it’s necessary but to be astute enough to know when the past won’t work anymore. Keeping or redefining the vision and scope of an organization is the great challenge of the new leader. Past glories will fade, and new styles of ministry will need to be put in place in order to move forward.

Spiritually and emotionally, I’ve found this role taxing. Fortunately, I’m a sustainer and a plodder, and I’m durable-three traits that have become perhaps nay greatest assets.

Finding Emotional Support

Finally, I’ve learned you need to be prepared for an emotional roller coaster when you take over from a founder or a beloved leader. Not only do you suffer the inevitable misunderstandings and comparisons, but some people will, no doubt, leave because of the change.

One great fortune I have from the Lord is my wife, Eleanor, who, despite her hectic and frenzied schedule as a television newscaster, continually gives me her love and concern. We’ve had times of challenge, but we’ve seen each other through.

In addition, one of the best moves I made was to get myself a bailout group. Some people call it a support group, but I like the term bailout much better. It is probably a more accurate description of your condition during a transition.

This is a group of people I’ve learned over the years can be trusted; when they see my weaknesses, they don’t use them against me. They don’t expect an explanation from me every time we get together; I don’t have to convince them of my side of the story. I can let them see my discouragement, and they won’t worry that the ministry is coming apart. They accept me as I am and can provide meaningful and honest encouragement.

For instance, occasionally I have to make a difficult decision about personnel. Someone’s job must be changed, even terminated. When that happens, coworkers normally murmur, divide into factions, and chew on whatever the rumor mill produces. I’ve often wished I could tell everyone all the factors that went into the decision, but in many cases, some of the information must remain private.

Especially at times like that, I’ve appreciated my bailout group. They know the difference between agreement and loyalty. They don’t always agree with the decision I’ve made, but they’re willing to stick with me anyway. They’re “on my side” not because we always think alike, but because we’ve walked enough paths together that they know my commitment and motivation, and they’re willing to give me the benefit of the doubt.

I don’t mind taking my share of the arrows that come a leader’s direction. But I also deeply appreciate the member of my bailout group who once told me, “Lem, I might have handled things differently, but it’s your job to make that decision. I’m with you. I’m convinced you’re the leader God has for us at this time.”

My bailout group has become a reference point that gives perspective when conflicts and obstacles can so easily preoccupy me.

I’ve also taken comfort in the thought that many times God’s means of keeping a ministry’s vision close to himself is to prevent the leaders from getting too self-assured. Sometimes he gives them thorns in the flesh so that in weakness they can rejoice in the strength God has given. Other times, God may use a failure to prune back pride, or an uncertain future to encourage living by faith.

I’m becoming more and more convinced that God’s leader will never be allowed to get too comfortable. There will always be something coming undone, one more thing careening out of control. Those things continually remind me that God’s call to leadership is not a call to privilege and displays of power, but rather a call to servanthood and genuine humility.

Lem Tucker is president of Voice of Calvary Ministries in Jackson Mississippi.

Bill Chickering is a free-lance writer from Madison, Wisconsin.

WE’LL ALL BE REPLACED SOMEDAY

by John Perkins

One of the toughest but most essential functions of leaders is to prepare their followers for the day they will have to carry on under someone else.

None of us will last forever, at least not in any earthly ministry. Yet most of us want the ministry to continue, to be even more fruitful, after we’re gone. Every thoughtful leader prepares for the inevitable day when he or she will no longer be there.

During the 1970s when I was involved in community-development ministry in the Mississippi towns of Jackson and Mendenhall, I was very aware of the importance of developing leaders. I’ve always felt that leadership development is at the core of Christian discipleship, and especially so in the black community.

I’m equally convinced that groups function best when leadership arises from within the group rather than being imposed from outside.

I’ve seen churches and organizations go through major upheaval when the pastor or director leaves. They feel obligated to find someone who is similarly dynamic and forceful, but any time you go outside to find a leader, the new leader will rarely be exactly in line with the direction of the ministry. The comparisons between old and new are even more sharply defined. It takes time for the values, dreams, and personalities involved in the ministry to be fully understood by the new leader.

Another factor is at work here, too. The thrust of my ministry has been community. My vision has been to develop a group of people committed to racial reconciliation through the church, and to insist on their commitment to the cause. In some ways, it’s similar to a Catholic order-people who sense a calling to this ministry and are giving their lives to it.

This work can’t be “just a job.” You can’t pay people enough for them to dedicate their souls to a cause like this. So I felt it would be inappropriate for us to go outside, solicit resumes, and hire leadership. As a result, one of the things I concentrated on was developing a new generation of leaders from within the ministry.

By the time I left to begin another community-development work in California, the work in Mississippi was divided into ministries with separate boards and leadership structures, and there were several younger men who were qualified-in many ways more so than I-to lead the cause.

Lem Tucker became the head of Voice of Calvary Ministries in Jackson. Dolphus Weary and Artis Fletcher assumed leadership of Mendenhall Ministries. H. Spees started a similar ministry in New Hebron that is as strong as the others. And Jean Thomas went to Haiti and began a work there.

When I went to the Voice of Calvary board and recommended Lem to replace me, I didn’t sense any opposition. But even if I had, I would have made the same recommendation, because I feel so strongly about the effectiveness of home-grown leadership.

Lem had been with us since 1977 and was well qualified to head the organization. If the board had turned down Lem, I would have come back and nominated Dolphus or one of the others. But that wasn’t necessary, because the board understood the vision and supported these moves.

After the new leaders were in place, I consciously tried to remove myself from the various ministries so they could take their direction from the new leaders. At Voice of Calvary, I did remain on the board for one year, but I saw that it was clumsy for me to continue in even that indirect leadership role, so I resigned.

I’ve learned it’s hard, however, to completely dissociate from the ministry. There are natural feelings of affection and desire for continued fellowship, so I do make periodic visits to the various ministries. But I try to emphasize that Lem, Dolphus, Artis, H., and Jean are far better leaders than I am.

My strengths as a leader are in the areas of motivation and vision, causing people to believe in themselves and in what they’re doing. But I’m not a counselor. I don’t have patience. As a result, I sometimes run over people, and that’s a weakness.

I believe that ideas are stronger than situations, that ideals are the only force strong enough to overcome evil systems. Systems-whether communism, capitalism, racism, or any “ism”-can chew people up. When you’re fighting systems, sometimes individuals get hurt. In trying to build an entire community and develop racial reconciliation, I put the good of the vision over the good of any particular person. I admit that. That’s a part of myself I don’t always like.

Sometimes that causes pain-to others, but also to me. As someone once told me, “If a person gets caught going against your philosophy, you chew him up and spit him out.” That may be putting it too strongly, but I confess I have had to fire people and make unpopular decisions because individuals were not in line with the vision. Some of these people have been hurt. I really wish I could restore those individuals I’ve wounded.

My successors in the ministries in Mississippi do a much better job than I in blending concern for individuals with concern for the overall direction of the cause. And I think I’m getting better at it.

I don’t want to chew up anyone while building a better community for everyone. I’m trying to temper my idealism with more personal freedom for those in the community-freedom to act on their ideas-while remembering the good of the group at large. So I’m spending more time with staff people, listening to their dreams, seeing if we can’t incorporate those ideas into the ministry.

Since leaving Mississippi, I’ve begun another work in a different place, but the essential task is the same-developing leaders and developing a community where God’s presence is seen in the lifestyle of his people.

-John Perkins

Harambee Christian Family Center

Pasadena, California

Copyright © 1987 by the author or Christianity Today/Leadership Journal.Click here for reprint information on Leadership Journal.

There is a picture hanging in my office at Trinity Seminary that I have somewhat jokingly labeled “The Death of a Youth Minister.” The picture shows me during a youth group backpacking trip to Colorado, lying spread-eagle on the ground, totally exhausted.

A few of the kids were tired that day and were moaning and complaining, so I had agreed to carry some of their gear. That day of lugging what felt like a gargantuan pack up the side of Mt. Blanca-while the kids kept on grumbling-forever pictures for me the frustrations and the sweat that can come with youth ministry. When I later left the church, the glass over the picture cracked in the move. I decided to leave it that way. It seemed appropriate.

Now that’s not the only picture-or memory-I have of my decade and a half in youth ministry. So much of it was happy. They were great years, marvelous years of ministry. I think of special people, of encouragement. I love young people and consider ministering to them a privilege, which is why I study, teach, and write about youth ministry, and enjoy talking with youth workers. But I keep that picture on my wall to remind me of the frustration I faced in ministering to young people. Much of the frustration, I’ve realized since, stems from a few assumptions we hold about youth ministry that seem plausible but upon closer investigation don’t hold true. I’d like to suggest five axioms I’ve had to fine tune along the way.

Myth 1: The Harder the Leader Works, the Bigger the Youth Group Will Grow

When churches hire youth workers for the first time, it’s most often because the current lay sponsors are either not doing the job well or have worked so hard they are burned out. So the board’s thinking runs something like this; “Right now, the group is averaging twenty people each week. A full-time professional should easily double or triple that. I mean, look at how much time he or she will be able to put in.”

You never see that kind of numeric expectation in writing, but talk to youth ministers, and over and over they’ll say, “Yeah, that’s what’s expected. The group must grow.” And after all, we do want to reach kids.

But the problem is that this idea runs smack into a simple sociological fact: Most youth groups reach peak effectiveness when attendance reaches twenty to forty students. Unless the youth minister is an especially charismatic person with excellent communication skills, merely injecting additional time into the group is not enough to overcome the social dynamic. I know church after church that may have fifty young people on the rolls, but the average attendance is between thirty and thirty-five. If attendance increases, other kids are lost out the back door.

Recently I read a comment made around the turn of the century by Francis Clark, founder of the Young People’s Society for Christian Endeavor: “I am inclined to think that any society that has an active membership of . . . seventy-five is already too large for the most efficient work.” There were no studies behind that; the field of sociology had barely begun. But Dr. Clark had already realized what recent researchers have confirmed.

Peter Wagner and Elmer Towns have both pointed out in their church-growth studies that the average person feels known and accepted by not more than thirty people. Sometimes the figure may stretch to sixty, but the point is that there is a natural cohesion in groups that are small enough for people to know each other’s name, frustrations, skills, and attitudes. When students sense that others care for them, they develop a high degree of commitment to that group. Based on his research among 3,600 Canadian young people, Donald C. Posterski writes: “Young people . . . are attracted to circles of relationships in which their presence matters. … Bigness is not necessarily better when trying to touch people who have tasted intimacy and have experienced what it is to belong. Large size alone is threatening, it can alienate the very people the organization intends to help.”

I wish I had known this when I started out in ministry as youth director for Cicero Bible Church. The church’s Christian education director wasn’t able to put time into youth ministry, and the one couple that was working with the kids wasn’t able to carry a lot of weight, so when I came, everything was focused on me. My wife and I worked incredibly hard, trying everything that was supposed to work, but we couldn’t get the group beyond twenty-five.

Then I went to another church, and we did some innovative things. We saw the group grow significantly, and I thought, Ah, we’ve broken through that barrier! But later, group attendance came tumbling down. During this period, I was working on my master’s thesis, and when I was giving my oral defense of it, Gary Collins said to me, “Mark, it sounds to me like the Hawthorne Effect.”

I said, “What?”

“At Western Electric’s Hawthorne plant in Cicero,” he said, “productivity experts adjusted the lighting, and production went up. They painted the walls-and production went up. They changed several other things, and after each change, production increased. They finally realized the increases were not coming from the specific changes but from the very fact that they were studying the workers. Giving special attention is what encouraged the people to produce more.”

Social scientists have learned from this that the presence of the researcher may influence the results of a study. But I learned something that day about youth groups: increases don’t come so much from extra work or innovative strategies as they do from simple personal attention. And most youth workers can’t give that personal attention to more than about thirty students.

This reality, oddly, helps take the pressure off youth ministers who are working like crazy but feeling like failures because attendance has plateaued. They’re not incompetent; they’re normal. Normally, groups reach that size.

Nor does it mean the end of outreach. In fact, it helps us understand how to minister to more than thirty or forty kids. The trick is delegating, bringing on adults who can each work with a smaller group. Soon you have one sponsor working with five kids, another adult leading twelve in a Bible study, and so on until the total number of kids you are reaching moves beyond the thirty-to-forty barrier. I know that’s simple and recommended a lot, but it isn’t often done effectively. Usually I hear one of four reasons why.

“I want to do it.” This comes from youth ministers who simply enjoy young people so much that they never want to lose the chance to spend most of their time in face-to-face contact with students.

“What will I do if I hand over what I’m doing to someone else?” is a question from youth workers who fear the church will mistake delegation for laziness.

“Students will come to me anyway” is the objection of some who have built close ties to certain students.

“I can’t get qualified adults” is a problem in many churches; it may be the reason the youth minister was employed.

My point is not that these reasons are untrue, but long-lasting growth in youth ministry comes only when we work to overcome these and share the ministry with others. I remember thinking, I’ve got to give adult sponsors some responsibilities, but in my heart feeling, No, I can’t. It was the hardest thing for me to give up being needed by the kids and to allow other adults to be needed in my place.

I started by asking specific people to come into the youth group and take specific responsibilities.

“Would you be the coach for the music group?” I asked one. “Will you be in charge of a play?” I asked another, and explained that meant praying with the kids, inviting them over, and building a relationship while they worked on the play. Another adult was tutoring children in Chicago, and three high school students got close to him through that. Later, another led a group of guys in working on the youth group newspaper. Consequently, we did break through that barrier again.

As we did, my role went through stages. I had been working exclusively with the students. Then I began spending some time with students directly, and some time with adults who were working with other students. Finally, I was working through other adults nearly all the time. You will take criticism for that: “He’s not even on the high school campuses anymore.” But what can happen is amazing. You’ll still be working hard, pouring your life into those adults, but your adult team will be reaching many more students than you could on your own-no matter how hard you worked.

Myth 2: Youth Ministers Are Most Important in Young People’s Spiritual Development

Every pastor feels a sense of spiritual urgency for the people in his or her care. There is a sense of being responsible to convey biblical truth. And when we look at the families young people come from, we realize many of them hold spiritual convictions that are discouragingly vague.

This urgency, however, can lead us to believe, unconsciously, “The responsibility for this young person’s spiritual development really rests on me.” Like Elijah, we feel “only I am left.” I’ve known this feeling. It’s only natural to feel discouraged when we see kids in our group fall into trouble. We were the ones entrusted with reaching them, and we somehow failed.

A bunch of guys in my youth group called themselves “The Gutter Snakes.” You name it, they did it. One of them, Tony, came to me after a Bible study. “Mark, I’ve got to talk to you.”

“Sure,” I said. “Just let me finish a few things here.”

“I’d really like to talk to you.”

“Okay. Let’s go over on the couch and talk.”

“No, I’d like to go upstairs.”

We went upstairs into my office. He swung my door shut, sat down, and looked at me. “Mark, I just robbed a bank.”

“You what? C’mon, Tony, quit kidding me. What’s really up?”

“No, I did. You know I’ve been working for that janitorial service. Well, we were cleaning a bank this evening, and I walked by a drawer and saw it was open. I don’t know what made me do this, but I picked up a stack of twenties, dropped it into my trash can, and kept going.”

We spent the rest of the night on the phone. The president of the bank was on vacation, so we called all over to reach the chairman of the board to find out how we could make an appointment with him, confess what Tony had done, and return the money.

When Tony graduated, he went out of state to technical school to become a mechanic. The school wasn’t exactly a spiritual hotbed, and I thought, What’s going to happen to him?

Then one day Tony knocked on my door.

“Tony, what are you doing here?” I asked.

“I thought we ought to get a college Bible study going this summer,” he said.

This wasn’t my doing was all I could think as we parted that evening. Maybe I had been a small part of the puzzle, but his parents had influenced him far more than I. And when I resigned to take another position a few months later, it was Tony who assumed leadership of that Bible study.

Another member of the Gutter Snakes, Hank, was from a good family-a very good family-but he wasn’t distinguishing the family name. We had our annual senior banquet at the end of the year, and Hank brought booze and drugs. I had to confront him, but nothing seemed to get through. He went away to college, and I felt like a total failure with him. Later he graduated, went to the Boston area, and started a church.

Experiences like that taught me the relieving news that I’m only one of many influences in young people’s lives. The Holy Spirit doesn’t place a young person exclusively in my care.

Youth for Christ conducted a survey once to identify the significant people in five or six areas of students’ lives. The youth director rated high in spiritual development, but in area after area, the answer was parents or friends.

Recently I conducted five, one-hour interviews with youth workers. I asked them just one question: “What brought you to your current level of spiritual maturity?” These youth leaders didn’t talk much about their own high school youth directors. Without exception, they identified two things: a period of personal difficulty or hard times, and a warm relationship with one or both parents. Surprisingly, it didn’t even seem to matter whether the parents were Christians.

So youth leaders can take comfort they’re not alone, and then try to capitalize on that. A key part of my role as a youth director is to help students have good relationships with their parents so they in turn can have good relationships with God.

To do that well, I try to understand how a student is responding to his or her family. There are four general responses kids make.

Conscious affirmation of what their mom and dad are doing. That’s the kid you love to see-if they have committed parents.

Unconscious affirmation; teenagers don’t realize they are affirming what their parents are doing. Frequently this comes in a family with a mediocre spiritual life.

Moratorium: The kid says, “I don’t know whether I like what’s happening in my family. I don’t know where I am.”

Rebellion, which sometimes is toward Jesus Christ and sometimes away from him.

I try to help kids see which response they’re making, sort options, and see consequences. In some ways adolescence is by nature a moratorium period. A majority of kids we work with go through this stage. It’s exciting to be a helpful part of their decision process.

Understanding this, I established quarterly breakfast meetings with parents to tell them what was on my heart and to listen to them. They helped me, when talking to a kid later, to understand the family dynamics and be of most help.

Myth 3: Kids Get Most of Their Theology through Bible Studies and Sunday School

It’s interesting to ask kids why they come to Sunday school. I usually hear three reasons.

Many kids will honestly say, “I’m here because I have to be. My parents make me.” A minority of students will say, “I want to learn the Bible” or some other answer that indicates a desire to grow spiritually. It tends to be less than 30 percent. The primary reason for most kids is “to see my friends.”

This makes you begin to ask, “What is the role of the Sunday school?” You quickly realize that the most significant thing happening there, in the eyes of most students, is relationships, the bonding among friends. This is especially true of kids in junior high or early high school.

Kids come to youth events looking for friends. Even in discipleship groups, high school students are not necessarily doing careful Bible studies. They usually are spending most of the time talking about their problems and praying together. In short, a teenager will not become theologically mature until he or she is sociologically comfortable.

This means two things. First, Bible studies may be teaching theology; they may not. It depends primarily on whether students feel comfortably part of the social structure. If they feel left out, our best teaching will usually be left out as well. Second, some type of theological education will be happening wherever students do feel socially comfortable, though that may be in contexts we’d never expect.

I remember getting frustrated with kids who would come to youth group meetings but not seem to catch what I was teaching. Or wondering why there weren’t more kids like one thirteen-year-old who said, “I get tired of the fun and games in youth group. Let’s get into the Word.” Learning that Sunday school and Bible studies aren’t necessarily the only, or even best, place for kids to learn theology helps take the pressure off.

Students living biblical truth is always our primary purpose; we want kids to learn theology clearly and then put it into action. But we don’t have to feel vaguely unsettled about seemingly unspiritual icebreakers and group games. These things can prepare kids for learning. We can feel less frustrated about the kids who would rather carry on with their friends than sit and discuss the doctrine of the Trinity. They may not be so much immature as normal.

Finally, knowing this has helped me become more effective in communicating biblical principles. I’ve realized, for example, that Christian music is a big part of many teenagers’ theological education. When a kid goes to a rock concert, or rides in a car with the tape player on, he has all his buddies with him and they are having a great time. He feels socially comfortable, so when the musicians sing something, he’s open to it.

The unfortunate aspect of this is that not all the things students learn through contemporary music are, shall we say, theologically precise. To capitalize on the educational power of contemporary music, it’s important to help kids sort out what they are hearing. I do this with my own kids as we ride in the car. Sometimes a song will come on, I’ll listen, then play like I’m naive or can’t understand the words.

“Nick, is this what that song is saying?” I’ll ask my son.

“Oh, no, Dad.”

My daughter, Jori, who’s older, will say, “Yeah, that’s what it’s saying.”

Nick will say, “You’re kidding. Really?” Then we’ll get into a discussion.

The same kind of thing can happen in a thousand ways in a youth group. Whenever young people are together and feel accepted, we can be there to ask questions, to stir their thinking, and to bring in biblical ideas. They may learn as much theology in an informal talk as during our finest Sunday school presentation. I’ve learned that it’s the skills of a shepherd that produce the insights of a theologian.

Myth 4: Youth Need to Be Well-Grounded Before They Minister to Others

In his book Dedication and Leadership, Douglas Hyde tells how when he was converted to Communism, the first thing party members did was hand him stacks of the Daily Worker, a Communist newspaper, and send him to a factory to sell them. That was his first day.

When he started selling the papers, people asked questions, and he had to come up with answers. He didn’t know enough about Communist dogma to be able to take a stand for Communism, but he tried to give the best answers he could. As soon as he got back to the party office that afternoon, he said, “Hey, they were asking me this and this; and I said this and this. Was that right?”

He was ready to be taught. They talked into the wee hours about Communist doctrine.

When Hyde later became a Christian, he was surprised to find the church does the opposite. It takes a new convert and says, in effect, “Take our new believers’ class for two years and then you’ll be prepared to witness effectively.” By the end of the class the convert has lost his contacts with nonChristians and his zeal as well.

This account made me reconsider how I approached youth ministry. Was I looking for every opportunity to put kids into service, or was I largely thinking, This is their time for preparation and learning before they become adults and really serve?

Glenn Heck, a professor at National College of Education, says that in the junior high years there is a period of brain development that apparently triggers a desire to serve. Junior high students want to baby-sit, to run movie projectors. When they come to church and say, “Can I help out with little kids?” we feel a little unsure entrusting our preschoolers’ spiritual development to an eleven-year-old. So we say, “You need to be in your Sunday school class.” Then ten years later, when we really want a Sunday school teacher, these kids have already been trained not to serve.

I think of Paul, a friend who graduated from seminary and has just returned from two years in the mission field. When he was in junior high school, he went to the C.E. director of his church and said, “Can I teach? I want to teach the little kids during children’s church.”

She said, “Yes, you can teach. But since you’ll be missing the morning service, I want you to attend the evening service, take notes on the message, and turn in those notes to me each week.”

So he went to Sunday school, then taught children’s church, and in the evening took notes on the message and turned them in. The church happened to have another morning service during the same time Sunday school met, and after a while he realized he missed that, so he started going to the morning service instead of Sunday school. He dropped out of Sunday school. How tragic.

And he ended up in the ministry.

Certainly any time you allow people to serve before they are ready, it is a risk-so you have to do it carefully. But not letting students serve is a bigger risk-the danger they’ll never learn real Christianity. You learn to walk by walking; you learn to play basketball by picking up a ball and starting to dribble. And you learn to be a Christian by living out the Christian life.

Whenever my youth group was staging a concert or putting on a dinner for people in the inner city, I saw the kids learn things about the Lord they could have learned in no other way. Time and again I’ve seen it’s not “Learn, then do,” as much as it is “Do, then learn.”

Myth 5: It’s Best for a Youth Minister to Stay a Long Time

I often hear lamented the statistic that the average youth ministry tenure is eighteen months. “If you’re really committed, if you really care about kids, you’ll stay,” goes the reasoning.

I agree in general that the “stay and minister” emphasis is wholesome. There’s truth in the teaching that staying for one high school generation gives students someone they can depend on; it teaches them to trust adults in the church. And you can’t get much going in youth ministry in less than two years.

But there are two problems with the way the eighteen-months statistic is generally presented. First, it doesn’t take into account the many college and seminary students who are doing youth ministry during the school year, or other temporary or part-time situations.

Second, and more important, it implies that longer ministry is always better. Often it is, but there is a time to go. Sometimes staying can be counterproductive.

One time for a youth leader to move is when he or she is in conflict with the senior pastor or has lost respect for the pastor. There is a tendency for the leader to feel in those situations, I’ve got to stay, or these kids won’t have anything left. But staying usually creates greater tension than leaving. The kids may not understand a leader’s leaving, but at least they are not getting a negative impression of Christianity as they see two mature Christians in a cold war.

Another time, and this is tough for individuals to recognize, is when relationships with the kids have largely become more buddy-buddy than adult-student. (A similar situation is when a youth worker becomes romantically attached to one of the members in the group.) I remember one adult sponsor who became such a close friend of certain kids that she was no longer able to help them. Their growth was slowed because she was operating more as a youth than an adult. I finally had to talk with her and some of the kids to help them wean themselves. Many of them didn’t like it, and that was hard to do, but it was in their best interest.

A third indicator that it’s time for a youth director to move on is when youth ministry becomes too routine: there’s no growth or challenge, no sense of spiritual warfare. The last two times I made job changes, I felt, I’m not growing as an individual, and in two years they’ll be able to tell that. I don’t want to minister leveled out. For my own integrity, it’s time to move.

A move is hard. When a leader leaves, something is going to fall. Ministry won’t continue the same. But when youth ministry gets too routine and easy, it’s time to seek new challenges. Most churches are not prepared to say, “Well, you’ve done a nice job as youth director, so now we’ll let you expand and direct young adult ministries as well,” so usually the new challenges mean a move.

The time to move may come in two years, or it may come in seven, but it doesn’t mean failure as a youth minister. Ministry involves some moves. Well-timed, they can be productive for the kingdom.

I had a young fellow as an intern who agreed to work with me for one year. We worked together for a year, and in that time I gave him everything I could. He could have stayed for another three years and done a marvelous job, but his growth pattern would have leveled off. He needed to be out on his own.

Well, he stuck around for two more months, and finally I said, “This is now fourteen months. We agreed to twelve months. For your development as a minister to youth, you’ve got to go.” I gave him a date by which to find some other place to minister. And that felt horrible to me. That felt horrible to the kids in our youth group.

But three years later, a year after I had left, he returned to that church fully prepared to be the youth director. Had he not been kicked out of the nest, he may not have been ready. Not only did he minister there, he stayed longer than I had. I’d been there seven years; he was there eight or nine. I felt like my ministry thus stretched over about fifteen years. It happened because we were willing to face honestly, without feeling guilty about it, that there is a time to move.

Based on the successes and failures of a generation of youth ministers, I’ve offered five youth-ministry myths, generally accepted insights that don’t fully hold up. You may want to take issue with them or refine them. I welcome the dialogue. If we work together, we won’t myth the mark.

Mark Senter is assistant professor of Christian education at Trinity Evangelical Divinity School in Deerfield, Illinois.

* * *

THE ULTIMATE YOUTH PASTOR

Periodically, LEADERSHIP receives resumes from people seeking pastoral positions. But rarely has one stood out like the following, which was forwarded to us by Michael Simone, assistant pastor at Virginia Beach (Virginia) Community Chapel.

Joe Phizgeschichte

1640 Wittenburg Dr.

Energy City, Tennessee

OBJECTIVE:

Position in local church that will utilize creative leadership abilities such as: memorizing fifteen Ideas books, driving straight through to any destination on the West Coast, counseling one-on-one in fast-food restaurants, and knowing how to do ninety-nine things with bananas.

QUALIFICATIONS:

1. Do not desire the pulpit.

2. Ran three bicycle trips to Disney World last year (lost only two kids).

3. Can drive a bus, forklift, or twenty-year-old church van.

4. Have card file of toll-free numbers for all major film distributors.

5. Able to role play any family crisis (acting out all the parts myself).

6. Never went to senior prom (and thus understand the emotional pain of adolescence).

Age: 28 (going on 16)

Health: Excellent (some hearing loss, providentially)

Marital status: Married, two children. (Family has me on videotape for use during long absences).

* * *

YOU KNOW YOU’RE TOO OLD FOR YOUTH WORK WHEN …

You think Swatch is past tense for switch.

“The Boss” refers to your spouse, not Bruce Springsteen.

You can’t resist asking:

-Girls to tuck in their blouses under their sweaters.

-Boys to wear their suspenders on their shoulders.

-Boys or girls to tie their sneakers.

You think pizza ought to be reheated before it’s eaten for breakfast.

You assume shopping malls are for shopping.

You volunteer to host the senior-adult Bulgarian travelogue in order to avoid another lock-in.

You lose the spiritual gift of sleeping with one eye open at youth camps.

You think retreat means rest.

Your third fifteen-passenger van has 99,000 miles on it.

You begin to question, on a summer trip, why you often drive more consecutive hours than the federal government allows truckers to.

You dream about going into a nice, relaxing occupation like being an air traffic controller.

Your grandchildren ask you what you want to be when you grow up.

-Doyle Sager

First Baptist Church

Sedalia, Missouri

Copyright © 1987 by the author or Christianity Today/Leadership Journal.Click here for reprint information on Leadership Journal.

For more than fifty years, those wanting to keep an eye on trends have turned to the Gallup Poll. It has long supplied reliable data on social, political, and economic changes-and religious ones as well.

The man responsible for taking this religious pulse, who saw spiritual attitudes as a societal vital sign long before religion was front-page news, is George H. Gallup, Jr., president of the Gallup Poll and executive director of the Princeton Religion Research Center, both based in Princeton, New Jersey. Gallup’s father pioneered the science of survey research, scoring a coup with his prediction of Roosevelt’s victory over Alf Landon in 1936, and son joined father in 1954.

But George Gallup is more than a household name; he is a committed Christian seeking to keep church leaders informed about significant factors of public belief and practice, pressing to find data churches can use to make positive changes.

LEADERSHIP editors Jim Berkley and Kevin Miller journeyed to Princeton to question the master of questioning on the changes facing pastors.

You once planned to enter the ministry. What led you into public opinion research instead?

I majored in religion at Princeton University and intended to go into the Episcopal clergy. Toward that end I worked one summer in a church in Galveston, Texas. It was a black church, with a white rector for the first time in nearly one hundred years. My job was to help him run the summer Bible school, the baseball team, and activities like that.

It was a great experience. Indeed, if I were yet to go into the ministry-and I sometimes still long for it-I would want to serve in such a setting. The rector I worked with was instrumental in breaking down racial barriers in the church, and it meant a lot in my life to see that.

But while weighing the choice of the priesthood or survey research, I realized that in a way my father’s field provided a lot of things I was looking for in the ministry. It gave me a way to help people, by raising the level of information and finding out what the public’s needs are. More specifically, it provided an opportunity to help churches of all denominations determine how to reach people better.

Surveys are an invaluable guide to show pastors and leaders the church’s levels of belief, knowledge, and practice, which can help pastors deepen beliefs, raise the level of practice, make it more meaningful, and reach out to new people.

So polling is, for you, a ministry?

I first realized that when I was with those people in Galveston. They are remarkable people, but how do you give them a voice? Through surveys. It’s wonderful to give people a voice.

Surveys can penetrate deeply and give people a chance to be heard or to commiserate-a chance to be. People get to talk about their church, their way of life, their country. Giving them that chance says, “I care enough about you to want to know what you think and feel.”

I do have to wear two hats in a sense: a pollster’s hat and a Christian’s hat. But speaking as a Christian, I think our duty as a church is to create a setting that allows a person to have a personal encounter with Jesus Christ. And I think understanding people’s attitudes helps make that possible.

If you were to become a pastor, what would be the first thing you’d do?

I’d want to create the feel of an extended family in my church. People everywhere are hurting, and the church, as an extended family, can help hurting people.

But the first thing I would do is take a survey. I’d want to find out where people are in their religious lives and what are their potentials and frustrations. Then the next step would be to try to encourage everybody to get involved in a Bible study or a prayer-fellowship group.

My wife, Kingsley, and I are in a couple of small groups. Both are made up of a wide variety of people, and that’s the strength of the group experience. We’re from diverse backgrounds, but we meet together in a spirit of openness and love.

Some people would say that religion is a private, internal matter that can’t or shouldn’t be scrutinized by research. How would you respond?

I conduct research into religion for three reasons. One is sociological. The spiritual or religious element in American life is a key determinant in our behavior-in some respects more so than traditional background characteristics such as education, political affiliation, and age. If you want to understand society, you need to understand the religious dynamic.

Second is a practical reason: If ministers want to minister to people, they need to know what the challenges are, what they have to do. Surveys can help them focus their efforts.

Third is the religious reason. If there is a God looking over us, and I believe there is, then to bring us closer to God, we should do everything possible to examine the relationship between God and humankind.

We have been focusing our efforts in the area of religion more and more. Religion is the last area for pollsters to explore in depth. Political and economic beliefs have been explored ad nauseum. But not much has been done in the area of religious research. I think many exciting discoveries lie ahead as we explore the spiritual life of people around the world.

What do we know about spiritual life, and what remains to be discovered?

We don’t know an awful lot-except that spiritual experiences are very common. For example, in one of our surveys we found that about 40 percent of Americans have had an unusual, life-changing experience. The British recently found roughly 50 percent having this kind of experience.

So that brings up questions: What are the common elements of these experiences? What brought them about? How are they changing lives? The early evidence indicates that lives are being changed in a more ethical direction. Or for these people, life has more meaning. They are less fearful of death, or more eager to reach out to others.

Thus it becomes important to examine this experience and determine how it can be encouraged-not in an artificial way but in settings that will allow these spiritual experiences to happen, since they are life changing in a positive direction.

Up until now, it seems, our emphasis in the church has been on “the day I found Christ.” I’d like us to look a little more at the day after-what do you do with this experience?

Have any of the results of your polls truly surprised you?

Oh yes. I was surprised at the high proportion of people who have had spiritual experiences: four in ten. The proportion who believe in a living Christ surprised me. I thought people would be thinking of Jesus Christ more in a historical perspective, but 64 percent express certainty that Christ rose from the dead and is a living Presence. As a Christian, I find this very encouraging.

I’m amazed, however, at the low level of Bible knowledge. It’s shocking to see that only 42 percent know that Jesus was the one who delivered the Sermon on the Mount.

And I think the fact that nine in ten Americans are not deeply committed Christians is worthy of concern.

What do you mean by committed?

We use a list of ten questions that deeply committed people of all denominations would agree to totally-such things as believing in the divinity of Christ, or believing one’s faith should grow, or trying to put faith into action on behalf of others. These are the givens, the very basics. We have people respond to each of these on a four-point scale: strongly agree, agree somewhat, disagree somewhat, or disagree strongly. Taking all the people who say “agree strongly” on the ten questions, we arrive at about 10 percent. On that basis we have labeled them the highly spiritually committed.

Then we looked at those people in terms of volunteerism, how happy they are, tolerance, concern about the family. That’s where the exciting discoveries are, not with the churchgoers or the people who even say religion is very important. You have to go deeper.

What have you been able to discover about this committed 10 percent?

These people are much more concerned about the betterment of society. They’re more tolerant of other people. They are more involved in charitable activities. And they’re far, far happier than the rest.

These factors are especially interesting sociologically since these people tend to be in what we call “downscale” or lower socio-economic groups.

Downscale people typically are less involved in charitable activities because they have less time, less tolerant because their level of formal education is lower, and less happy for obvious reasons. Because they go against the grain for their socio-economic group, they really stand out. They are a breed apart, the truly spiritually mature.

If the numbers of these people can be increased, they will have a disproportionately powerful impact on society.

That’s why I’ve tried to develop commitment scales to put calipers on the spiritually committed segment of the populace. I hope to write more about these people, because this segment is going to make a difference in the future.

With people like these, the church is going to change from the bottom up. It’s not going to be pronouncements, conferences, strategies from the top, it’s going to be people on the grassroots level bonding together and inspiring the church.

That’s a rather radical proposition. Leadership won’t come through the leaders . . .

I think it will trickle up, although it will probably be a result of both factors-from the top down and from the bottom up. The most fervently committed persons are generally from the downscale groups, but the influence of these highly committed Christians moves back up into other groups.

How much do people’s stated opinions truly reflect their behavior?

In view of the fact that religion does not appear to be creating a more loving society, I’d have to say “Not much.” Something is wrong with the way religion is being practiced. It doesn’t seem to be working in the broad sense. We’re still beset with many problems, so there is apparently a gap between belief and action.

My friend Terry Fullam, rector of Saint Paul’s Episcopal Church in Darien, Connecticut, says that true believers are people who act upon their belief. It’s as simple as that. And as difficult.

In a survey we did for the Christian Broadcasting Network called “Twenty-four Hours in the Spiritual Life of Americans,” we concluded that much of religion, unfortunately, is superficial-“feel-goodism.” Prayer becomes mostly petition, and the Bible is not approached in a meaningful way. People want the fruits of faith but not the obligations. They’re not willing to take up the cross. As Anglican bishop Michael Marshall puts it, “People are following their own agenda and not Christ’s.”

How reliable is church attendance as a predictor of behavior?

There’s little difference in ethical behavior between the churched and the unchurched. There’s as much pilferage and dishonesty among the churched as the unchurched. And I’m afraid that applies pretty much across the board: religion, per se, is not really life changing. People cite it as important, for instance, in overcoming depression-but it doesn’t have primacy in determining behavior.

Recently for CBN, we asked a series of questions on whether people rely more on human reason or on an outside power, such as God, for moral guidance and for planning for their future. More opted for human reason than for God, although less so among evangelicals. That shows that whatever people say about their beliefs, when they get right down to it, they are not totally prepared to trust God.

You’ve been polling for thirty-four years. What major changes in the church have you witnessed during that time?

The fifties were a boom period, and by that I mean that there was a lot of church building, religious book sales were going up, and church attendance was higher than it is today. Church membership was higher. People were placing great importance on religion.

Beyond that, however, it’s difficult to comment about commitment levels, because only recently have we started to develop scales that measure deep commitment. On the whole, 1950 was far different from now in terms of surface indicators, but commitment is harder to gauge. It might have been deeper, but we don’t know.

What other changes are quantifiable?

In terms of church involvement, there has been measurable change. Back in the late fifties, a much higher proportion of people said religion was very important in their lives-about eight out of ten. Now it’s down to five or six in ten, so there’s been a big drop, which came mostly in the mid sixties to the mid seventies.

Then, about ten years ago I picked up indicators of a revival of interest in religion. But that revival didn’t necessarily translate into dramatically climbing attendance or membership.

Religious interest still seems to be growing. When we polled for CBN on the question “Are you more interested in religious and spiritual matters than you were five years ago?” the majority said definitely yes. Bible studies and prayer-fellowship groups have grown. So increased interest is not necessarily seen in attendance or membership-that’s been remarkably flat-but it is seen in other religious activity.

What happened to that great evangelical surge of the late seventies?

It was a great surge of interest in and awareness of evangelicals. In terms of numbers, there hasn’t been any great growth in the proportion of evangelicals as far as we can tell. But evangelicals have been more vocal, more active, more visible. That’s given the perception that there’s been a huge surge in the evangelical movement.

Is church life significantly different now from what it was in the fifties, or are our perceptions colored by nostalgia?

The intensity of life was always present-the sorrow and human problems and all-but there’s a whole new complex of issues now, such as the drug issue. The pastor is called on for a much more active role in dealing with problems like divorce or alcoholism or pornography or other sex-related problems like disease and unwanted pregnancies.

How has people’s confidence in the church changed during the same period?

I can go back only about fourteen years, because that’s when we started a regular measurement of confidence in religion. Nothing much changed between that first measurement in 1973 and July 1986. But then confidence started to turn down, and it has taken quite a slide since then.

I think part of it-and this is speculation-was the discomfort over the relationship between religion and politics. And then, of course, the trend downward was accelerated by the scandals of 1987. They have given a black eye to organized religion as a whole. Frankly, all the squabbling and the chastising of one another has not enhanced religion’s image one bit Maybe some of it has been necessary, but it doesn’t sit well with the public. The damage may be only short-term, but I suspect it’s going to be difficult to recover from fully.

In another sense, perhaps the unveiling of a scandal can be for the good. It’s house cleaning, and that’s all to the good.

Is change occurring in the church at a greater rate as time goes on, or do we just seem to think that change is accelerating?

Futurists say change comes about at an accelerated rate. After all, things that took centuries to change now change in a matter of decades or years, so in that sense, change has speeded up. Technology certainly seems to be exploding.

But public attitudes are different from technology. Basic attitudes don’t change at that rate. They tend to change much more slowly.

How does a local pastor deal with the accelerated change around him or her?

I may sound hung up on surveys, but in order to find out what’s happening, you need to poll, even every year. What are the priorities? Where do people see improvement made in the church? Is your outreach plan working? Things like these can be monitored. That’s one way to keep on top of events.

Often it will take a pastor years to determine the level of knowledge in the parish: What are people doing about their faith? Do they know how to pray? Does the Bible have any meaning for them? Do they share their faith? What do they believe about God? Finding this information informally consumes time, and you still don’t know for sure.

Maybe mine is too mechanistic an approach, but I want to know exactly where people are in these areas. What are their reasons for believing or not believing? Are they having trouble with their prayer life? Is it meaningful? Is it something they want to keep doing? Are they reading the Bible? From our studies, the Bible is clearly not being read. It’s revered, but not read.

So you would validate your informal reading of the congregation’s pulse with a more formal poll?

Always. Often the pastor is surrounded by active people who are the hard workers. They may give the impression that things are better than they are. It’s easy to miss the attitudes of the majority. In the same way that politicians can get terribly misled by everybody around them saying, “You’re wonderful!” pastors may pick up a misleading perspective of the church.

As effective as surveys are, what are their limitations?

To borrow from the political world, surveys are a good way to inform leadership. They’re a source of information. But they should not be the controlling factor, because a leader is to lead, not follow public opinion.

A leader will want to assess the information carefully, because, after all, the survey is the parishioners talking to their pastor. A leader would be committing a great error not to be attentive to what people need and want. But he or she also needs to use personal judgment.

How is public opinion changed?

It really doesn’t change very quickly without profound developments or events. For example, the Tet Offensive rapidly turned public opinion against the Vietnam War. People felt the war was unwinnable after that.

To be more specific, how can a pastor shape opinion toward change?

He or she can leave. (Laughter)

Seriously, let’s go back to the bottom-up theory. Really it’s not the pastor in charge of the church; it’s Jesus Christ. Everybody is a servant of Christ, and maybe he is speaking just as importantly through the laity. That’s why I believe in small fellowship groups. They have a correcting mechanism: If somebody feels God spoke to him, maybe God did. Maybe the change is necessary. But still the person has to convince others about the plan.

What’s the pastor’s role in change?

Certainly pastors are key players. They set the tone. But the leadership comes not only through them; it can come from people in cell groups who are constantly praying and seeking God’s will. There’s power from there, too, as well as from the top.

When pastors want to bring change into a church, how fast can they move?

Maybe it’s naive to say this, but I think it can be done quite quickly if they concentrate on getting groups together and finding good leaders to handle each of those groups. There’s tremendous power to sustain the church if you start with a good nucleus and move out through groups.

Americans are among the loneliest people in the world. We need to reconnect. In the church we’re beginning to rediscover each other and come together and bond. I think it’s the best thing that can happen to this country.

Earlier you said that attitudes change very slowly, and yet now you are saying that within a church some changes can be made rather quickly. Why is that?

You always have to allow for the Holy Spirit. The Spirit is often ruled out when people plan strategy. With the Holy Spirit operating, things can be done in a miraculous way and done quickly.

Since society is constantly changing, how far ahead can churches realistically plan?

Well, on a totally visionary level, an ideal wish list, you can dream ten or twenty years hence. But for a game plan, I don’t think churches can plan much beyond five years in most cases.

Let’s look toward the future. What changes will pastors face in the next decade or so?

I think sex-related issues-artificial insemination, abortion, premarital and extramarital sex, homosexuality-will be enormously important. The sexual revolution was so profound that I don’t think the pendulum will ever swing back all the way to the Victorian frame of mind, even if it does swing back a little.

We will still need to do a lot of talking about abstinence. Our society’s emphasis has been that you should be totally free; if you don’t do anything you want to do sexually, you might somehow harm your psyche. Because of this line, it is important for churches to emphasize restraint.

And another issue, without question, is the moral dilemma surrounding gene splitting. There’s also the problem of divorce and the problems of drug and alcohol use. And the whole area of child abuse is going to continue to be a problem. It’s some of these immediate problems, close to the church’s door, where we can step in and make a big difference.

The continuing breakdown in ethics and morality worries me. Materialism is one of our root problems in this country. We’re an addicted society, if not to drugs, then to overeating, to sex, to money, to cars, to owning. There’s far too much emphasis on having rather than being.

People’s hearts seem to be in the right place. Polls show that they put personal aspects of their life ahead of material aspects. They put their family ahead of possessions and getting ahead of the world, and that’s encouraging. But I think we’re overwhelmed with the allurement of and attachment to “the good things of life.” The church has a big challenge in fighting that continuing battle.

With reams of data about massive social problems, how do you keep from getting discouraged?

I think of the encouraging trends I see.

One is the great respect for education. Whether they pursue it or not, nearly everyone seems to put a high premium on education.

Another is our tradition of volunteerism. The proportion of people involved in volunteerism is growing, and volunteerism is important to the stability of our society.

Third, and the most important, is the spiritual dimension of Americans. It is seen in the volunteerism, much of which is religiously motivated. If somehow the importance of religion were to decline in this country, our country would be badly hurt.

The spiritual resilience of our country-it’s still there even though culture seems to be winning out over religion in many ways-gives me hope. I think there are enough people spiritually on fire to bring about change.

My wife and I attended the International Conference for Itinerant Evangelists in Amsterdam, led by Billy Graham. To see those evangelists, ten thousand strong, from all over the globe, joining in praise to God was one of the most moving events in our lives. The courage and commitment of those people is remarkable. In fact, we learned that three of the participants were martyred upon returning to their countries-just for having attended the conference.

They are examples of the highly spiritually committed. So you can see why I’m eager to pursue that research. I think there will be some valuable discoveries there that could be applied to help other people meet our Lord.

Copyright © 1987 by the author or Christianity Today/Leadership Journal.Click here for reprint information on Leadership Journal.

With both Jesse James and James Dobson the sons of ministers, generalizations about the effects of growing up in a pastor’s home are difficult. But the question remains: How do the unique dynamics of the minister’s home life affect ministry now, and in the next generation?

To investigate, LEADERSHIP editors Terry Muck and Marshall Shelley gathered four individuals who’ve seen both sides-as PKs (preacher’s kids) and as pastor/parents:

H. B. London, Jr., is pastor of First Church of the Nazarene in Pasadena, California. His father, Holland London, served as a pastor and district superintendent in Missouri and Arkansas, and now enjoys an itinerant ministry. H. B. and his wife, Beverley, have two sons: Brad, 28; and Bryan, 24.

Chuck Smith, Jr., pastors Calvary Chapel of Dana Point, California. His father pastors Calvary Chapel of Costa Mesa. Chuck and his wife, Chris, have five children: Will, 11; Jennifer, 9; Michael, 7; and twins Scott and Karen, 3.

Joseph Stowell III recently became president of Moody Bible Institute in Chicago after serving for six years as pastor of Highland Park Baptist Church in Southfield, Michigan. Both his father and grandfather were pastors. Joe and Martie Stowell halve three children: Joseph, 18, Libby, 16; and Matthew, 14.

Richard L. Strauss is pastor of Emmanuel Faith Community Church in Escondido, California. His father, Lehman Strauss, pastored eighteen years in Bristol, Pennsylvania, and in 1957 moved to the Southfield, Michigan, church that Joe Stowell would later serve. More recently, he has been in itinerant ministry. Richard and Mary Strauss have four sons: Steve, 32; Mike, 28; Mark, 27; and Tim, 23.

They discuss both the effects of growing up in a pastor’s home as well as trying to maintain a healthy one.

Leadership: What did you enjoy most about being raised in a pastor’s home?

Richard Strauss: I enjoyed the fact that my dad was respected. I mean, here was a man standing in the pulpit teaching the Word of God, and people were listening and writing things down, and their lives were being changed. And that was my dad!

I was a retiring child, not outgoing at all. Dad was such a strong personality that he overshadowed those around him. But I didn’t resent that. I felt like some of the respect people had for him trickled down to me. Part of my identity was being his son.

H. B. London: My dad traveled a lot, and being an only child, I missed him a lot. He would come home from some faraway place (whether ten or ten thousand miles away), and he would tell me about the places he’d been and the people he’d met. I wondered if I’d ever be able to do something like that.

Then at one point, he was chaplain of the St. Louis Cardinals during the days of Stan Musial and Enos Slaughter. On my sixteenth birthday, he asked, “What would you like to do?”

“I’d like to go to Stan Musial’s restaurant,” I said. So with a bunch of my friends, we went. I’ll never forget sitting there and Stan Musial coming by, talking to us, and giving me an autographed picture.

Joe Stowell: One of my best memories is having great Bible teachers around our dining room table: M. R. DeHaan, Sidlow Baxter, and others. I remember one meal when Frank Logsdon, former pastor of Moody Church, leaned over to me and said, “God has given you a great daddy.” That stuck with me. I felt like, My dad’s a good guy, an important person.

Chuck Smith: My fondest memory, too, is having godly people in our home who were so animated and enthusiastic when they talked about the Lord. Their devotion to the Lord and the ministry made me feel as though this was the most important subject in life.

One time my dad had been at a pastors’ conference and met four colleagues. This was kind of out of character for him, but Dad spontaneously invited them over to the house. It was stimulating to me because they weren’t sharing statistics about who had the most people in their churches; they were sharing their common commitment to Christ.

Leadership: As you were growing up, was the church a place you enjoyed or endured?

Strauss: When I was young, I didn’t go to enjoy it; I went because Dad made me. But I enjoyed being there because that’s where my friends were. And those friends were important to me. At times I was willing to endure some of Dad’s wrath in order to be accepted by my peers.

What I didn’t enjoy were those folks who would periodically use my dad’s position against me: “You’re the pastor’s son. Now how could you . . .”

I resented that manipulation, the double standard.

London: You long to be normal, treated like any other kid, but you know you aren’t “normal,” at least not within your dad’s church.

Stowell: I seldom went to church for the right reasons. Sometimes I wonder if anybody really does. I, too, went because my friends were there. I had friends in the public high school, but if push came to shove, my friends at church counted more.

London: I was just the opposite. I did the perfunctory thing and went to church on Sundays and Wednesdays. But school, sports, and baseball camps represented so much more of my life than church.

I wasn’t a bad kid, but I didn’t radiate any spiritual depth either. I wanted much more to be accepted by my peers in high school than by my peers at church. I didn’t want anyone to know I was a preacher’s kid. There were times when I wished my dad were a bricklayer, an accountant, a garbage collector, anything but a preacher.

In fact, my lifestyle was such that when I went back for a high school reunion ten years later, having been to seminary, they gave me an award for the “Profession Least Likely.”

Smith: As a pastor’s kid, you learn to relate within your church subculture. You get outside the subculture and you’re less comfortable.

At school, I didn’t want anyone to know I was a Christian, let alone a pastor’s kid.

Plus, up until I was in junior high, my dad was pastor of a Four Square Church. I mean, try explaining that one to your friends! (Laughter)

Leadership: Did your parents recognize the pressure on you as PKs and try to compensate at all?

Smith: My dad was aware of the down side of being a pastor’s kid. There were lots of restrictions on our behavior because of what others would think, and Dad was aware of that.

He had a saying-“When your dad owns the candy store, you’re treated to certain privileges.” For instance, one time Dad was the director of a weeklong summer camp. He took me along, and most of the time I was kind of lonely because he wasn’t really there for me. There was always a crowd of people around him. I only caught him coming and going.

But one evening, everyone was finishing dinner, and he came to my table and whispered, “Grab your swimsuit and meet me at the pool.”

The pool was closed then. But he opened the lock and we got in. I’ll never forget it-just Dad and me swimming in the pool. It was like he “owned the candy store” that weekend. As camp director, he had access to the pool, and he wasn’t breaking any rules by going in there with his son. Things like that were very special to me.

Leadership: Do you now realize some benefits of your upbringing that you did not realize when you were younger?

Strauss: Several things come to mind. My dad had his study at home, and one day I walked past his study and heard him talking. I knew there wasn’t anybody in there. I thought, Who’s Dad talking to? So I sat down and listened. He was praying.

I sat there for ten or fifteen minutes and listened. That was a moving experience, and after that, every once in a while if I knew he was praying, I’d sit outside his door and listen. That’s something that’s grown more meaningful now than it was at the time.

Stowell: I think being a PK, being in the public eye, helped forge my life. What grated against me at the time actually became a part of my training. Learning to live with people watching you, learning to show deference to people who expect more of you than they would of others. I appreciate that now.

Leadership: For you, those expectations were a plus, something to live up to.

Stowell: It was a training time, because the rest of my life I was going to live in this fish bowl.

When I graduated from seminary, I asked my father what I should do-be an assistant pastor? He said, “No. Go right into the pastorate. You’ve grown up in a pastor’s home. Go for it.”

Growing up in a pastor’s home is a seminary education in itself. You develop a sixth sense for the issues of ministry.

When my own children started coming along, I asked my dad, “Why do you think all three of your children went into the ministry?”

He said, “I don’t know. Your mother and I can’t take credit for it. We think it’s because the church in Hackensack, New Jersey, consistently prayed for our children. In prayer meetings, people would pray aloud for you children by name.”

I attribute that to the fact that my behavior drove ’em to their knees. (Laughter)

But I do think as pastor’s kids, we may have more prayer poured into our lives than other kids.

London: In the late forties and early fifties, legalized gambling, I’m sure with Mafia ties, was being brought into St. Louis.

My dad took a strong and public stand against it. I remember the threats and the phone calls he got, and the guards we had around our house at times. At one point my mom and I had to move from St. Louis to another town because of the threats on our lives.

I remember how bold my dad was, and not just publicity bold; he really felt strongly that if someone didn’t take a stand against this that a lot of children and young people would be harmed.

During the time, as a seventh and eighth grader, I was embarrassed by the editorials making fun of my dad for his holy roller approach and such. But I think he instilled within me the attitude that says, “Just because you’re the underdog doesn’t mean you have to quit.” He gave me a sense of boldness and pride about who I was and what I represented.

Smith: One thing I took for granted that I’ve come to appreciate is the intimacy with God and his Word that our family enjoyed. Our constant orientation was toward God. That’s where we sought our solutions; that’s how we addressed life.

So when I was sick, and there was a period in my childhood when I was sick quite a bit, I just expected my grandmother to put her hand on my forehead and pray for me. I came to expect spiritual ministry as well as medical attention.

My wife is still somewhat uncomfortable praying aloud. But for me, having grown up this way, praying extemporaneously is a natural expression. I’ve appreciated the fact that I feel at home in Scripture and in the presence of God. Part of that is due to the environment in which I was raised.

Leadership: Your ambivalence here is interesting. All four of you have profound respect for your family life. Yet you’ve said that in school, the pressure from your peers was so great that none of you was ready to stand up and say, “I am a pastor’s kid!” Most of the time you hoped people didn’t talk about your dad’s vocation. There’s respect for the man, but embarrassment over the role.

Smith: It’s a matter of cultural dissonance. My comfort zone was inside the subculture of the church. From birth, I’ve been trained how to act in this environment.

But the outside culture, at least in my upbringing, was presented as so bad, so evil, that I couldn’t help but be uncomfortable when I was outside church settings. Any time I heard profanity at school, I’d find myself asking the Lord to forgive me for hearing it. With this overactivated guilt mechanism, I lived a dual life, trying to straddle two cultures.

I wish I’d understood then that some differences are largely cultural. I’ve been trying to sensitize our high school Christians to that fact, and it takes some of the stress off. I tell them, “You don’t have to act in a secular culture the way you act in a Christian culture. It’s okay not to use Christian vocabulary in a secular culture. What you’re doing is almost missionary work. You have to learn cross-cultural communication.”

Had I known that in high school, I think I could have existed better with a sense of cultural relevance instead of seeing everything as necessarily a spiritual compromise.

London: The term now is nerd. I don’t know what it was then, maybe clod or square, but whatever it was, I didn’t want to be one. I would do anything not to be square or nerdish-to the point of rejecting many of the things I knew better.

As an only child, I didn’t have anybody at home who was facing these things with me. So my peer acceptance was not at home; not even at church, because those people didn’t matter to me that much. It was at school where it seemed so important that I was accepted. I did not want to be a nerd.

Strauss: It’s hard not to be, especially if you grow up in a home where there are lifestyle restrictions. I grew up within a pretty restrictive framework, where movies and dances were no-nos. How could you be accepted by these people when you consistently avoided the school dance? And you didn’t go to most parties. And you didn’t know the movies they were talking about.

I remember people in our church who had greater liberties than our family had. I envied them. But we could never adopt their standard because others in the church just wouldn’t hear of it.

Stowell: And there was always a bunch of little spies at public school who went to your church. “You know what the pastor’s son did at school today, Mom?” And then the mom would tell the deacon’s wife and so on. You never escaped the tension.

I think the ambivalence you mention goes back to the ambivalence of your father’s position in the world. At one time, the ministry was one of the most respected professions. These days, when they rank the prestigious professions, ministers don’t even make the list. So you move from your church, where your dad is highly respected, to the outside culture, where no one knows what your dad does-or if they do, they’re put off.

Leadership: Did you ever resent the demands ministry placed on your parents? Were there times when you felt, either justifiably or unjustifiably, that other people had stolen your parents’ attention?

Stowell: I would say no, but for one reason. Vacations saved it for me. If we hadn’t taken our vacation as a family, I would have felt that way. My dad didn’t make a conscious effort to do something with me five days a week. He had meetings; he was gone a lot of evenings. But two things stand out in my memory that demonstrate to me that Dad did care for me and that I was important to him.

Several times he took me to Yankee Stadium for the Memorial Day double header. Or on an occasional day off, when he didn’t go to the office, I’d say, “Dad, let’s go see the Yankees.” And he’d take me. Very memorable.

Then we also took the whole month of August for vacation, and we drove to Michigan, where my grandparents lived. And Dad and I would go fishing on the St. Joe River. We had a rowboat and we’d row up the river and fly fish as we drifted down.

I think those times saved me. For eleven months he belonged to other people, but in those ways, he said, “You are important to me.”

Strauss: I agree. Our times together were summer Bible conferences. But my dad did something else that sticks in my memory. When I was about five, he had a portrait taken of just him and me with our arms around each other, and he wrote across that portrait, Pals. He hung it in his study. I used to go in when he wasn’t there and just stand and look at that picture. It meant more to me at that age than anything in life. In fact, I’ve got it at home now.

Smith: I never thought of the ministry taking Dad away. That would have been too abstract for me. And it wasn’t a big issue for me, because in junior high, I pulled away from my parents and wanted to put as much distance between us as I could.

But when I was younger, I do remember him going off and not being able to understand why I couldn’t go with him.

Other times, I remember how rude the people at church seemed to be to us kids. After a service, I’d be standing there holding Dad’s hand, and they would step right between Dad and me-literally and figuratively coming between us. They either ignored me or seemed annoyed that I was there, since their lives were falling apart and they had to talk to the pastor.

So I remember growing up hating adults, these people I always had to be polite to.

I think Dad was sensitive to what I was feeling. He would let me hang onto him, grab his pant leg, and I never heard him say, “Go away. I’m trying to talk to this person right now.”

Leadership: How did your experience as a pastor’s kid affect your decision to enter the ministry?

Stowell: One reason, from a human perspective, that I’m in the ministry today is that my dad was respected by people.

Not only did people look up to him, but I could see he was a man of character. He cultivated the godliness that earned their respect. I never saw Dad being manipulative or playing politics. I saw his genuine interest in others and love for the Word of God. That’s where his credibility came from.

As a boy, I was impressed by that. I’m not sure I’d couch that in spiritual terms-“That was my call to the ministry.” But it was a beginning-“The ministry is a good thing to do with your life.”

Strauss: What it did for me was to keep the ministry an option. It wasn’t an unpleasant prospect. Because I’d seen Dad used by God to touch lives, I saw the ministry as something, if God directed me that way, that I could live with.

Smith: I felt just the opposite. When I graduated from high school, I wanted to be in physical education, definitely not the ministry. I didn’t want to get calls in the middle of the night. I wanted to do something where you put in your time and then went home to your wife and kids.

In junior college I began to feel the pull of the world, and I knew if I didn’t get something going with God, it would suck me in. So I made a decision for Christ, but with the stipulation that he not call me into ministry. I knew my dad felt rewarded by what he was doing, but it wasn’t attractive to me. I didn’t want those intrusions in my life.

Stowell: I admired my dad and my granddad. Many times I thought, I want to be like them. But I sure had questions about the ministerial image: the schedule, the way people looked at you, the way they thought of you. I didn’t want to be holy all the time. I didn’t want to cough in a deeper voice. (Laughter)

Smith: Or carry a Bible wherever I went.

Stowell: That bothered me. In my senior year of college, I felt this nudge to go into ministry. But even when I got to seminary, I wanted to make sure my image reflected the strength of character and person I saw in my father.

Smith: I was fortunate in that Dad was very athletic. He was an all-star football player, and even now he’s very active in tennis and water skiing. So I didn’t have that image of the pastorate.

My resistance was slightly different. I told myself, I’m gonna be secular. Not profane, but secular. With Christ living in me, I want to be comfortable with non-Christians. I didn’t want to be a minister who was uncomfortable in secular surroundings.

Leadership: Now all of you are in the ministry and have PKs of your own. How do you see your role? To your family, are you the pastor or the father?

London: As our kids were growing up, I looked at them as my sons and myself as their father. Yet spiritually, my preaching, instruction, and example as their pastor has had great influence on them. I’m the only pastor they’ve ever had.

Stowell: I don’t think of myself as their pastor. I do pastor them on Sundays. But when I walk in the door at night, I don’t think of them in congregational terms. My home is my escape, a place where I don’t have to be The Pastor.

Smith: My mom probably “pastored” us more than my dad did. She definitely provided the spiritual leadership for us growing up.

Strauss: We pastor our children in the sense of guiding them and providing direction for their lives. But I don’t see myself as their preacher. I struggle with dads who preach at their kids but don’t listen, who have an agenda for every conversation: Dad speaks, kid listens.

I have a tendency to be like that. But I’m grateful that God gave me a wife who won’t let me. I don’t want to be the family preacher, except on Sunday.

Stowell: I can stand up in front of hundreds of people and articulate a spiritual principle and illustrate it. People even take notes. But that afternoon, sitting with my wife and kids, it’s a lot harder.

Leadership: No notebooks come out?

Stowell: No! I’m not nearly as articulate or convincing. I’ve given a talk to teenagers on dating, morality, and handling temptations. I tried to sit down and cover that with my kids. It didn’t work. I wondered, What’s wrong with me? I just lost the gift.

That’s the difference between fathering and pastoring. Fathering is a very different role-our impact goes beyond the realm of precept. Our impact comes from our character, attitude, integrity-our caring and love for them.

Smith: In the pulpit it’s what we say; at home it’s what we are.

Leadership: What does your family contribute to your ministry?

Smith: I find my family gives me a realistic view of life. Since I’ve tried to limit my counseling, there are people who are unnecessarily alarmed: “You don’t counsel anymore, and I’m afraid you’ll get out of touch with your people.”

That’s mythical as long as you have a real family in a real world. You’re in touch with where your people are. You have job problems. You have to put gas in the car. Your kids get in trouble at school. I mean, it’s the same stuff.

But besides that, they offer stability and support. They’re on my team. They encourage me. They believe in what I’m doing for God. I think that’s important. I want to be behind them in the same way in whatever they’re doing.

Stowell: Not only is my wife my best critic, but she has also, in a sense, become the goal of my ministry. Evaluating my preaching, I ask myself, Did I feed Martie this morning? If so, I feel I’ve done my job. She’s heard most all my sermons. She also knows me, so she would know if my preaching did not match my practice. It’s a great treat to hear her say, “God really worked in my life today.” That’s the ultimate compliment.

Smith: One Sunday after the service, I came in and stood in the kitchen next to Chris and said, “Can I help you with anything?” She got me busy with some vegetables, and I said, “Boy, I just don’t know about today.”

“What are you talking about?” she asked.

“Oh, the message.”

“Honey, it was great!” she said. “It spoke to my needs. It was really powerful.”

“Thanks, Dear.”

Then she said, “Is that what you were fishing for?” (Laughter)

Leadership: In a profession as demanding as the ministry, should the family be expected to pay part of the price?

Strauss: I ask myself why many pastors allow other people to come before their families. In many cases it is a genuine love for people and a desire to meet their needs. But I wonder if there aren’t other motives that sometimes cloud the issue. Sometimes we in public ministry have a greater need for affirmation, but our families see us as we are and don’t always give it. But we can be the hero to that struggling person over there. So we spend the time where we get the most praise.

Smith: Also, a lot of ministry is fun-getting up in front of people, teaching them how to live their lives. At times it’s a lot more fun than being home changing diapers. And if you’ve got an excuse to get out seven nights a week, I mean, what wife can argue with God? But that’s unfair.

London: Most of us see ourselves as called-out people, different from lawyers or plumbers or salesmen, and I do think God has a special covering for us. There were ball games I should have seen that I didn’t. There were other kids I was giving more attention to than my own at times. But I think God knew my heart and my motivation. It wasn’t selfish, and it wasn’t egocentric. Oh, it may have been sometimes, of course. But most of the time it was genuine.

Stowell: We can’t presume on God’s covering and neglect our families, but it’s true, they do make sacrifices because of the ministry. There were times we planned a family outing, and someone got into a near-fatal car wreck, so I had to go to the hospital. The only thing that keeps me sane is believing God does compensate and offers a covering because we’re doing it for him.

Strauss: I think the kids understand, too. If you’re faithful and you really have their interest at heart and you’re there most of the time, when an emergency comes up, they’re not going to begrudge your taking care of it. My kids haven’t.

I heard Howard Hendricks say, “Your family is not apart from your ministry; it’s a part of your ministry.” I found that helpful. Our loved ones are legitimately a high priority in ministry. If we build the greatest works by human standards yet fail our own families, I don’t think we’ve really honored God with our lives or our ministries.

Copyright © 1987 by the author or Christianity Today/Leadership Journal.Click here for reprint information on Leadership Journal.

It was the first crisis of my first pastorate. I had challenged the people of that Colorado church to make a “faith promise” of increased giving for world missions. To my delight they committed an additional $5,700 per year, a 50 percent increase over the existing missions budget.

I practically floated to the missions committee meeting, where I recommended we draft a revised budget. But there wasn’t even a second to the motion. As one committee member said, “Pastor, when the money actually comes in, we’ll decide how to spend it.”

I was hurt and angry. God, missions, and I had suffered a terrible defeat.

Seventeen years later, I see the episode very differently. What I then thought was a spiritual issue I now understand to be a generational issue. The difference was not that I trusted God and they did not. The difference was more that they had lived through the Great Depression and I had not.

Projections of perceptions

We all tend to project our own experiences, perceptions, goals, and values upon others. We assume that what is valid for us is valid for everyone else.

Twentieth-century perceptions have been largely shaped by two significant events: the Great Depression and the Baby Boom. Even those not born in the 1910s, 1920s, and 1930s or the decades after World War II have been greatly influenced by these monumental eras of social change.

The Depression generation was small compared to those before and after. Only 24.4 million live births, for example, were recorded in the United States in the 1930s (which explains why many churches today have proportionately fewer members aged 49-57). They married younger, and more of them have stayed married than have their children. Women bore children younger and had more of them.

Economic times were tough in the 1930s, but hopes for a better future were fulfilled. Unprecedented growth began in the 1940s and boomed into the 1950s and 1960s. A generation was produced that remembered the hard times but moved ahead through diligence and perseverance.

By contrast, the Baby Boom of 1946-1964 produced 76 million American births, by far the most for any comparable period in the nation’s history. The differences from their pre-War parents are legion. They grew up amidst prosperity, yet under nuclear threat. They got more education, married later, and had fewer children (which makes for some very high expectations in child care). They also can’t remember a time without television (which affects the way they listen to communicators). In short, they have different perceptions of life, including the church.

Churches dominated by leaders born before World War II risk perpetuating attitudes and programs that may make it difficult to minister effectively to those born after the war. These attitudes can be found in statements like “We can increase our youth group and evening service attendance the way we did in 1954” or “Let’s teach stronger denominational loyalty so our young families won’t leave us for that independent church.”

Of course birth date does not always determine perceptions, and not everyone projects personal values on the rest of the church. Some people born in 1960 think and act as if part of the Depression, and others born in 1929 share the perceptions of baby-boomers. However, churches that seek to effectively reach and minister to those born after 1950 will intentionally design their ministry with the characteristics of the new generation in mind.

Timely touches

Much has been written about this generation. For example, it tends to be more conservative politically and theologically but much more permissive on social issues such as divorce, remarriage, the role of women, use of alcohol, and extramarital sex.

Our church has found the most significant characteristic of the new generation, however, is its receptivity to the message of Christ and the church. The combination of demographic and social currents at the end of this century makes this huge group more open than ever to the gospel.

We’ve found a few simple strategies make this outreach more effective.

First, look for leaders born between 1946 and 1964. Remember that the numerical peak of the Baby Boom was 1957 (those turning 30 in 1987). Certainly this does not mean the elder board should be determined by birth year, but it does say that baby boomers should increasingly come to places of prominence and influence in any church serious about reaching this generation.

Second, be ready to minister to children. This generation is coming back to church, and the primary reason is that they are having children. The number of married couples with children under age eighteen rose by more than 400,000 in 1984-86 This reverses a fifteen-year decline. Baby boomers have married and borne children at older ages than their parents. Safer childbirth for older women, availability of child care when both parents work, and the ticking out of the reproductive clock are all adding to the “baby boom echo.” Some 24,630,000 married couples have children under eighteen.

These parents have high expectations for their children and for the institutions that serve them. When visiting a church, the decision to return may be based far more on the nursery facilities and care than upon the denominational affiliation on the outside sign. So our church has focused on nursery facilities and a strong children’s program. The church with an emphasis on children’s ministry will attract new parents who might otherwise be closed to the church.

Third, be ready for non-traditional families. Because people during life’s transition times are more open to the gospel, we’ve found there are excellent opportunities to reach this generation-but only if we’re willing to deal with tough family situations.

The prevalence of divorce today is both a tragedy and an opportunity. Our church is trying to maximize the opportunity through seminars and classes such as “Divorce Recovery” and “Healing Broken Relationships.” I’ve been amazed how many can be attracted even from simple advertisements in the “personals” column of the newspaper classified section.

This, of course, is just the starting place. We then wrestle with how to assimilate divorced and remarried persons into the mainstream of church life. Increasingly we’ve found people choose not to be classified by marital status at all (single; married; formerly married) but prefer to be known simply as “adults.” In many ways, this makes the assimilation process easier and more natural.

Fourth, focus on special occasions. When is the time that most baby boomers who are open to church first attend?

We’ve discovered the primary re-entry point is Christmas Eve. In many churches Christmas Eve attendance now exceeds Easter Sunday morning. Christmas Eve represents tradition, family, nostalgia, and religion all at once. Also, it is one of the least threatening church services to attend.

Some of the principles we’ve tried to keep in mind in planning our Christmas Eve service are these:

1. Advertise so those who are unchurched but open to a Christmas observance will be aware of it.

2. If possible, offer more than one service to accommodate different schedules.

3. Make the program our best quality effort. From the music to the message, we want to present biblical truth in a straightforward manner and in a way that encourages a newcomer to say, “I’m glad I came.”

4. Offer child care. Even though some parents choose to keep their children with them through the service, they will know this is a church that cares for their children.

5. Delete the offering. We don’t want a visitor’s first impression to be that the church is more interested in money than the person.

6. Keep the lights low. Dim candlelight will allow first-timers to slip in and out, “testing the water” before making a decision about future involvement.

Reaching baby boomers does not mean compromising truth or Scripture. It does call us to be Christ’s agents for effective evangelism in a way that relates to the current generation. Understanding our own culture is as necessary as a missionary’s learning the culture of another nation.

In this context, I’ve appreciated Lowell Mason’s words of more than a hundred years ago, which Charles Wesley put to music:

A charge to keep I have,

A God to glorify.

A never dying soul to snare,

And fit it for the sky.

To serve the present age,

My calling to fulfill;

O may it all my powers engage,

To do my Master’s will.

-Leith Anderson

Woodddale Church

Eden Prairie, Minnesota

Copyright © 1987 by the author or Christianity Today/Leadership Journal.Click here for reprint information on Leadership Journal.

It could have been any one of a dozen Saturday night church basement suppers I have been to over the years. Metal folding chairs on a linoleum floor. Long rolls of white paper for tablecloths. Fried chicken, mashed potatoes, and peas served on paper plates.

When I arrived, one of two hundred invited guests, the church members were standing nervously in small groups. Leaders whispered encouragement for them to greet us and start conversations or direct us to literature-laden tables where we could select free tracts-or a copy of the Quran.

There were other differences between this and other evangelism suppers. The banners on the wall read “Allah be praised” instead of “Jesus Saves.” After dinner, the program featured not reformed drug addicts telling how Jesus had turned their lives around, but Chicago suburbanites relating mind-opening experiences with one of the world’s fastest growing religions, Islam.

Actually, I wasn’t an entirely naive attendee of the dinner. While doing research for an article on the growing number of Muslims in the United States, I visited several mosques. A mosque member invited me to this Idd-Ud-Adha banquet, a yearly celebration of the prophet Abraham’s example of sacrifice and obedience to God.

As I listened to the chanting of the Quranic texts, the explanations of Muhammed’s life, the testimonies, and the questions and answers, I realized there is a great deal of spiritual hunger among my friends and neighbors in this metropolitan area. I thought of Mother Teresa’s statement: “Suffering is increasing in the world today. People are hungry for something more beautiful, for something greater than people round about can give. There is a great hunger for God.”

Could that be why two hundred had gathered here tonight?

In addition, I realized I was not offended by these explanations of a foreign faith. I learned a great deal. The people were kind. I admired their commitment, even when the content of that commitment did not square with my own understanding of truth.

I started thinking about how nonChristians react when we share our faith with them. Most people appreciate it. Most strongly identify with honestly expressed religious feelings. Most are curious about the content of faith. They may once have known a real Christian-if so, the memories may be pleasant. Or they may be ignorant of the gospel story-in that case, just the story alone merits telling.

I once talked an Asian Buddhist friend into reading the Book of Matthew. Later I asked how he’d liked it. “I cried,” he said. “Jesus was a wonderful person.”

We sometimes forget the power of Jesus’ story, indeed, the power of Jesus himself. Several years ago George Gallup discovered tremendous acceptance of Jesus among the American population: 87 percent recognized the important impact Jesus has had on Western culture; 70 percent believed Jesus was divine; 62 percent had no doubt that Jesus would be returning to earth.

With that kind of general acceptance of the principal figure of our faith, sharing the gospel should be easy. Simply present Jesus. The rest follows. Philipp Melanchthon, the great German Reformer, said that “to know Christ is to know his benefits.”

One person who discovered the singular power of Jesus’ name and story was British preacher Charles Spurgeon. Recalling his conversion, Spurgeon wrote: “The preacher read the text, ‘Look unto me, and be ye saved.’ Then he looked at me and lifting up his hands, he shouted, ‘Young man, look to Jesus Christ. Look! Look! Look! You have nothing to do but to look and live.’ I saw at once the way of salvation. Simply by looking to Jesus, I had been delivered from despair, and I was brought into such a joyous state of mind that, when they saw me at home, they said to me, ‘Something wonderful has happened to you,’ and I was eager to tell them all about it.”

And chances are, the people were eager to listen.

We live in a spiritually hungry world. Our culture is ready and open. We must tell them about Jesus.

* * *

Throughout LEADERSHIP’s history, we have published a reader survey page. On that page we have often asked the question, “What is the most difficult problem you face in your ministry?” One of the most frequent answers has been, “Apathy in my congregation.”

We have tried to address that problem with articles on recruiting volunteers, maintaining church morale, and motivating foot-draggers. Pastors have shared ways they have discovered to stimulate and encourage.

Now we are offering a new resource in the form of an insert for church bulletins: What’s Right with the Church (see the card elsewhere in this issue).

We intend What’s Right to be a monthly, two-page pep pill for congregants who drag themselves to church and wearily serve. Compiled by our LEADERSHIP staff, the insert will tell stories of the good things happening in the church. It will show great church members past and present. It will highlight idea-triggering quotes from respected Christians, and, of course, a church-wise cartoon that will bring a smile to the lips of even the most hardened congregational Scrooge.

Our editors are bullish on pastors and bullish on churches. We pray that What’s Right with the Church will be a tool to make your church members bullish on pastors and churches, too.

Terry C. Muck is editor of LEADERSHIP and a senior vice-president of Christianity Today, Inc.

Copyright © 1987 by the author or Christianity Today/Leadership Journal.Click here for reprint information on Leadership Journal.