No one denomination is referred to here.
“Is the Church dying?” was the question I was asked. The church in question had been busy in recent years trying to find a new strategy, a way forward, so that it can find new life and continue. The old mantra was that, unless you believed in what they believed, others were in the wrong, was still very much key to their understanding. It was as if there was a line drawn in the sand, and the church stood firmly on one side, but rarely had anyone asked why a line had been drawn in the first place.
I’d like you to imagine a small deserted island surrounded by a sea, but which had a ferry which serviced the island. The time was about 30 years ago. The church decided that the current strategy was just to continue and all would be fine. The ferry arrived and left on schedule, taking all that wanted to go, but left many still on the island.
Those remaining felt that all was still ok as they had their original strategy which they knew so well. So, what’s not to like? They kept going. They maintained their idea that evangelism was central to everything, as many could look after the congregation pastorally. Years went by, and their wisdom increased, or was that their age? They tried various different ways to evangelise , but others had heard it all before. This meant numerous revisions to their evangelism plan, but nothing really worked. The members of the congregation worked hard as they volunteered each and every week to meet the needs of the church, with or without any minister in place, for increasingly often, the ministerial position was vacant for some years.
As time marched onwards, these volunteers became tired, possibly even exhausted. Nevertheless, they couldn’t stop as that would mean the end of the church – or that is how they felt. And so they continued, possibly well beyond their physical and mental limits. They had so much experience that few others could even contemplate taking over their role as lay people in charge. So, they continued onwards. This helped them not to feel a victim of their own desire. They so wanted the church they had been born in, grew up in and then played a vital hand in maintaining, to just do that …continue, in that form. It was traditional, and comfortable.
There’s a phrase that “we were so busy fighting off the crocodiles,
we don’t know which way the canoe was pointing”.
There had been many crocodiles in recent years, but they had been repelled, or so they thought. You wonder whether they had recognised every crocodile.
The issue was that the last ferry had called and left. That last opportunity to make a significant change had come and gone. They were now deserted, literally. With everyone on the island, isolated; all they could do now would be to maintain the existing model of church. But, they were still desperate to make changes. The number of ministers had reduced but they could still be re-deployed, they could “fight fires” wherever issues appeared. The structure of church could be maintained if those meetings could continue as they were. The gatherings could be an effective way to see those in the island, even if the faces were becoming more and more common, and the numbers attending fewer. With the age of the church now, fewer of the congregation were able to get out and ‘make church’ each Sunday. Even ‘online streamed’ services were beyond the capability of many of the church to effectively produce. Of greater concern was that fewer people were able to visit those unable to ‘make church’. It should be easy as there were so few people left but the ministers were so busy ensuring that the conventions were kept, and all of the church laws, and polity, were adhered to. However, some folk just needed to be listened to, to rekindle spirituality in whatever form resonated with folk.
The people cried out “is the church dying?”, and the ministers said “no, of course not”. But the divergence was now more marked. The Church was on rails, not able to be sufficiently dynamic to make dramatic changes. Not that it would have helped. Why? The last ferry had gone some time ago.
Many of the congregation were still concerned that, following the attacks from the crocodiles, they were unsure where they were going. Then again, they were still able to sail in their canoes, they were still afloat – so that was positive, wasn’t it?
Yes, we are mixing metaphors but, in all life, when we use descriptions, we can consider different perspectives to make the picture more understandable. If they were still floating, they might need not to worry about where they were going, but ponder that they were ‘already there’. How do you mean?
The message had always been that we were on a journey: either to Heaven and not to Hell (whatever that means), but could it be that ‘being with God’ was the journey. It didn’t mean they had to go anywhere, just realise that they were already there ‘with God’. Rather than making yet another strategic decision, reinventing the proverbial wheel, they could discern that the spirituality that had sought for so, so long, might be found in that relationship with God, where they were. Yes, the ‘church’ as they knew it was dying, but they didn’t need to seek such a transformative solution, just be… where they were. But what about conformity, someone else to tell others what they should or should not believe? Well, as the world has seen with the different denominations, they all had had different perspectives, and they had kept going for 2 Millenia. Perhaps, commonality was about our relationship with God. Perhaps different cultures, at different times, saw, felt, experienced God in different ways.
What is your response to this?