Messin’ With the System (and A Beloved Metaphor) May 19, 2009
Posted by Dan R. Dick in Church Leadership, Congregational Life.Tags: Church Leadership
3 comments
There are a number of pastors who feel I am being too hard on the church, too critical of our ministries — and by extension, too critical of them. I apologize for that. I believe from the depths of my being that pastors and 
laity leaders are doing the best they can, and that none of them are trying to be anything less than good leaders. I also believe that the church we serve is constrained by its own system — the tag line of much of my teaching comes from Dr. Ezra Earl Jones’ deeply profound observation: “The system is designed for the results it’s getting.” Our current system of church is designed for decline — it is an institutional preservation model out of step and time with the larger culture and spiritual movement of the day. And pastors are stuck in this system. Take fine china, run it through a wood-chipper and what have you got? (Hint: not fine china!) You take the best intentions and efforts of deeply committed Christians and run them through a wood-chipper and what have you got… you catch my drift.
Picking on pastors is not my intention, and not my desire. I rarely ever meet a pastoral leader who is not willing to change and grow. We all know we can do better. We don’t need some annoying blogger running around poking us while nagging, “Do better. Do better. Do better. Do better………” But I do keep hammering on the system we’re in, hoping to trigger some new thinking about how to BE better within a broken system. No pastor or local lay person has the power, influence, or position to fix (or greatly change) the system. All they can do is adapt within the system to maximize their impact and effectiveness.
