The Big Idea
Churches and Ministries share a common set of dynamics for how an organization tends to move through time. Leaders can either accept the common course of things, or be willing to harness them.
In the hobbit Gollum asks Bilbo this riddle:
This thing all things devours;
Birds, beasts, trees, flowers;
Gnaws iron, bites steel;
Grinds hard stones to meal;
Slays king, ruins town,
And beats mountain down.
The chilling answer to this whispered riddle in the dark is - time. Something so mundane and yet so powerful. Nothing in life ever stays where we put it. This is especially true when it comes to the lifecycle of churches and ministries. Time is the one thing that will never stop moving. And as time marches, it brings with it the pressures of change.
The basic decision of every ministry is to either let time and change take its course, or understand the course and work with it. The sun rises and sets each day apart from our plans and intentions. So will the sun rise and set on our ministries unless we work while there is light. Therefore it is important to have an understanding of how a ministry tends to move through time.
Note
A more extended discussion of change and its types can be found in: Smooth and Rough Change
Time’s Parade
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Every church and ministry begins with the excitement and planning of a Launch. The future is dreamed about, people are rallied, and things take off in a run of enthusiasm and conviction.
When a launch goes successfully, there tends to be an infectious sense of momentum that pushes things forward. The idea or dream starts to come to life creating a natural snowball effect resulting in Momentum Growth.
Once the initial excitement begins to cool, the bumps and roadblocks begin to become clearer. But with a little more planning and strategy, they are often overcome and Strategic Growth continues.
When new things stop happening and all the bumps have been smoothed out. Things are running at their peak performance. Everything is now carefully calibrated and entering into Sustained Health.
Yet, as with all things that run well, time does not freeze at the top. Maintenance begins slowly with a little thing broken here or there. But as things age, the pace of maintenance accelerates.
The acceleration of maintenance eventually outpaces the ability to keep everything running as it had been. Decisions begin to become more about what should be Preserved than what the future may hold. The dreams and excitement of the launch are long gone and a fight for survival has begun.
The fight for survival never goes well. You can only lose so many things before the church or ministry becomes a shadow of what it once was. Bitterness, anger, resentment, are only a few common companions of organizations who have entered into Life Support.
So goes time’s parade. Standing still does not slow it down. Even rock hard conviction will be ground away like the canyon after a billion drops of water. We cannot change it, but we can work with it.
Riding the Wave of Time
No surfer seeks to alter the shape or power of a wave. Instead, they learn to harness it. Time is a similarly elemental force that was marked out for us on the fourth day of Creation. It is an order we should respect and use, rather than fear and fight. Only God in His power can calm the storm or make the sun stand still. Learning this respect for the course of time is a core lesson Moses asked to be taught in Psalm 90:12:
“So teach us to number our days that we may get a heart of wisdom.”
Nothing we do will reshape time’s parade. Every launch will eventually fall in line behind time and march on into decline. But why must we chain the life of a church or ministry to only one launch? Why do we allow ourselves to fight so hard to maintain the past that we lose sight of the future?
Take a moment to look as the lifecycle again. This time, however, look for the places along the curve where a new wave can be started:
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The difficulty of starting a new wave increases exponentially the later in the lifecycle it is started.
If you wait to start a new wave until a church or ministry is dying, the only way to begin again is to do exactly that - literally begin from the bottom and Rebirth the whole organization from the ground up.
If you start a little earlier, while things are declining but not yet dying, there is still some vitality within the organization that can be rejuvenated. This rejuvenation can happen through Restructuring to prepare for the new launch.
If you start even earlier and make preparations for a new wave when the first signs of slipping into maintenance occur, you are in an even better position. Now you have the power of a healthy organization to spring board into the new wave through Refocusing on a renewed mission and purpose.
But the ideal place to start a new wave is all the way back when things are finally running at peak performance. Starting a new wave there, right when most people settle back to admire their success, is precisely the right place to being. This is the height of an organization’s momentum that can be directly channeled into a new wave through Improvement.
The biggest catch for all humans in starting a new wave is that it is uncomfortable. A new wave means new opportunities, but also new challenges. It requires continued learning, and experimentation. Not as an option, but as a necessity for continued personal and community growth. The second a person (or group) begins to think “I have it all figured out” is the second stagnation and eventual decline has begun to take hold. I find this especially true in my own preaching and teaching. Something as simple as neglecting to continually learn from Scripture quickly leaves me drained, and flat. When programs, committees, ministries, and church structures become so locked down that there is no openness to learn and try something new, their slow demise has begun. Afterall… This thing all things devours…
It is only through continued connection with the Word of God and His people, that we can challenge one another to dig deeper, learn, try things, fail sometimes, but ultimately start new waves as the Body of Christ.
Footnotes
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Graphics from The Unstuck Church by Tony Morgan ↩ ↩2