I will be interested to see if the pushback I get on this comes from younger leaders or middle-aged corporate employees who have a personal investment in being emerging experts.  I realize, it is the people who joined the emerging movement 15 years ago and the missional movement a decade ago who are still pitching it today.  And don’t get me wrong, there is great good that has come from both camps — I myself was an early adopter of missional church back in ’03 and have promoted it ever since — but it is critically important to realize that where we continue to lead, those we seek to reach are no longer following.  Oh, there are a few, but not many.  Once both movements became about institutional preservation and corporate structure and planning, they lost their allure to younger people.  Some of the responses and reactions I heard in my recent encounter:

We aren’t looking for acronyms that tell us how to live our lives — PEACE = Prayer, Engagement, Action, Compassion, Excitement — give me a break.  Are we five?  Are we stupid?

I have no patience with celebrity gurus telling me what the church really is.  If these people knew what they were talking about they wouldn’t be hosting conferences, they would be out serving God.

When the underground movement became the status quo, real meaningful service all turned to talk.

Just one more way that Christianity got turned into church.

A total sellout.

We want to be something not talk about being something.  I can’t watch another contrived, condescending video of some young, cool pastor “rapping with the audience,” looking so sincere and spouting drivel.  They really think we are morons.

I have mentors and guides.  I don’t need a church on the corner; I need relationships.  The church wants me to help them.  I’m looking for people who will help me help the world.

It all got so f****** stupid.  All the good is tied up in all this <junk > that has nothing to do with God.  I’m thinking the Bible has it right — a small group with no building going where the people are and living best they can to do what needs to be done.  Churches don’t get that.

There were lots of statements echoing similar sentiments, but not one defense of what ten years ago was the latest, greatest thing.  Times move fast, and if you close your eyes everything changes and you realize how far behind you are.  Surfing websites and reading the latest publications, it gives the impression that “missional” is the new hot thing.  But in this 4G world of ours, “missional” is so 17 seconds ago.

It reminds me again what I thought I learned doing research in Nashville, but have somehow forgotten: you cannot lead from an office, you cannot stay up to date sitting at a computer, you cannot sit inside the institution and see the institution as it really is.  You have to get out and walk around.  You have to talk to people.  You have to observe.  Don’t look for experts on young adults, or youth culture, or coming trends — go talk to young adults and youth and people living their lives in the world.  By the time it is written down, it is old news.  We need to stop thinking ABOUT people and relate TO people.  The church needs to stop trying to provide ministry FOR groups and individuals and be in ministry WITH people.  Middle class, privileged people have the luxury of meeting at conferences to talk about what they should be doing instead of doing it.  But we had better wake up to the fact that a highly motivated, energetic, and interested generation has absolutely no interest in joining us in our meeting rooms and at our conference tables.  The day of figuring out how to get them to come to us and to be like us is done.  We need to leave our comfy churches and our monuments to ego and go where the world is.  What was emerging is emerged, and what was missional is missed.  What is, is — and we had better learn to go where the need and desire is quickly.

– (this is satire and parody; I am fully aware that these things AREN’T really in the Bible… but thanks to those who have expressed concern!)

And Jesus said, ’Beware of false prophets who come advising all sorts of worldly and simple solutions to complex and important problems.

He said this in response to the ancient prophecy, “And there will come a day when Towers Babel, Inc., will be hired by the high priests and Pharisees to tell unto God’s people what they ought to be doing, since God’s people will have forgotten and become verily confused.  (which in itself was prophesied, ‘the people who walk in darkness will either turn to prayer and the light of discernment or they will stop and ask directions from strangers,’)  And on that day, there shall be downsizing and branding and a hunger and thirst for best practices and dashboards,

But I say unto you, identity is not to be confused with image; meaning shall not be reduced to marketing; and the Spirit shall not be confused with structures.  For it is written, ‘Those who cannot discern shall count heads, and those who have no witness shall advertise, and the first shall be lost as false prophets share vision that has little to do with God’s will.

The follower known as Robert, also called Bob, inquired, “Should we then form a task force to survey our target audiences, monitor our results on a dashboard, and dissect all the work that has thus far been done by outsiders to offer alternative proposals and petitions?”

Jesus responded, ‘I am THIS close to smiting you!  The time for talk is through; we must be doers of the Word and not reduce the Word to ‘words’ in reports and recommendations to endlessly discuss and debate and destroy.  Until we remember who we are and why God needs us here, there is little else to discuss.  Before we make decisions about structure and processes, we must first recapture our identity and purpose!”

Then Bob asked, “So, is this then a ‘Calleth to Activity?’ O Lord?”

Jesus wept.

Don’t just sit there, do something.  If I hear one more person defend our current denominational studies with the dismissive, “we gotta do something; something is better than nothing; we don’t have a choice,” argument, I am going to explode.  I received an email this week from a pastor explaining to me that “the church IS a business, and we have been running it very poorly.  Hiring the best secular consultants has been a brilliant idea, and we are finally going to start being competitive and profitable.”

I understand this is simply a difference in defining the nature, vision and values of what it means to be church, and to a certain degree I acknowledge that “the church is a business,” but I maintain it is a unique kind of business and the reason we are failing is that we have tried too hard to be a business instead of a church.  We have created a system and structure that is never going to be effective at discipleship without a total overhaul.  The machinations we are exploring at the moment with our suggested downsizing and church growth gimmicks and leadership credentialing gymnastics are individually and collectively inadequate to foster systemic change.  They will not create a new system, merely weaken the existing system and speed up the consequences currently on the horizon.

I was talking with one of my university colleagues who teaches organizational theory and critical thinking.  He reflected, “there are too many variables not being taken into consideration and way too many gaps in logic.  What has been identified as core issues have not been verified, and the recommended solutions don’t actually solve the problems being addressed.”  It was nice to receive confirmation from someone who really understands this stuff.  His other observation was, “Are you telling me that in a denomination as large as yours, there are not resident experts within the church who could have provided the services you’ve paid exorbitant amounts of money for?  Why are you paying people who don’t understand you to do for you what you are fully capable of doing for yourself?”  I have asked a version of this question many, many times.

My last rambling thought comes because I have been reading some books by Peter Senge, Peter Drucker, and Thomas Sowell.  Each reminds me that downsizing is a lousy path to growth, saving money is not the same thing as profitability, safety nets are not the same as stable foundations, and form that fails to follow function doesn’t lead from good to great, but from good to gone.  We, indeed, have serious challenges ahead.  We have got to take decisive action.  We have squandered the luxury of time and have backed ourselves into a corner.  But I disagree that doing something is better than nothing — doing the wrong thing is not better.  There are signficant, long-term implications that must be addressed (like our missional priorities, intended outcomes, leadership concerns, lousy fiscal stewardship including unfunded liabilities and escalating debt resulting from our greed and lust for more, and our global identity and relationships — to name only a few) before we make reactive decisions about structure and the creation of a power elite.  The potential long-term damage is too great to settle for short-term benefits and false profit.

It will take us a while to get somewhere better.

A focus on quality will take us somewhere different from a focus on quantity.

There are dozens of congregations in United Methodism who know this (though dozens out of tens of thousands is pretty depressing…)

What makes these congregations unique is that they operate from a few basic assumptions:

1. things of lasting value are never cheap or easy to obtain/create
2. God expects the best from us, not whatever we’re willing to give when convenient
3. no one can improve without a signficant investment of time and effort
4. spiritual formation is a lifelong pursuit of intentional learning and practice

In the past week I have been accused repeatedly of trying to make rare exceptions — highly committed Christian communities of faith — into a gold standard.  I have been told that I cannot expect an “average” congregation to commit to the rigors and requirements of Christian discipleship.  Additionally, it is unfair for me to make it sound like this is what Jesus expects of us by quoting selected scriptures.  I have been told that I am naive, irrational and unreasonable, and that simply because a handful of churches are doing it doesn’t mean others should aspire to do so as well.  Baloney (or bologna, if you prefer).

In literature and poetry there is a concept – synecdoche – where an example or a figure of speech is used to represent a totality.  For example, to use the phrase “communion of saints” to represent all Christians who have died or the current efforts of some church growth pundits to use “disciples” as a term meaning worship attenders.  I often talk about “the church” as if it is one single thing, and my definition of “vital congregations” is representative to my research, but is light-years away from today’s United Methodist Church leadership’s. 

The benefit of a good and true synecdoche is that it is an accurate generalization when the example does represent the universal.  It leads to a clarity and a shared understanding.  When I lift up deeply committed, healthy congregations as “vital” I am seriously lifting up a synecdoche — what these churches are, any church can become — given four things:

1. desire — our churches are not in decline because they can’t be better; they are in decline because they don’t care enough to be better
2. time — if it takes a church decades to get to a bad place, it will take more than a few months to get to a good place
3. appropriate metrics — lt me say again that counting people who show up indicates nothing about health, value or impact.  A 5% increase in attendance in no way means you are doing better ministry.  A 5% increase in the number of people using their gifts in the world or a 50% increase in the number of people served in the community are a step in the right direction.  Qualitative metrics that indicate the ways people are maturing in their Christian vocation are really on track.
4. visionary leadership — pastors, laity leaders, and denominational servants who get it — who care about the integrity of our Christian witness and support faithfulness over attendance and church budgets.

There is nothing here hard to comprehend, and nothing beyond the capacity and grasp of any existing congregation.  Certainly, many churches won’t want to do these things, but none CAN’T do these things.  Same goes for any individual in our congregations.  Those who want to, do; those who could care less, don’t.  We don’t need to make this seem more difficult that it really is.

Let the conversation continue.  I notice a very interesting phenomenon this week.  The majority of readers who agree with me are posting their comments directly on the blog.  The majority of people who disagree with me and think I am way off base are emailing me directly.  Why is this?  I encourage everyone to have the conversation on the blog.  It doesn’t bother me at all when people disagree with my points, but I think this is a very healthy and important discussion to be having.  Our constant focus on numbers will continue to kill us; but a meaningful shift to qualitative metrics could transform us.  It has happened in enough individual congregations to illustrate the process for the whole.

Then Jesus said, ’Think well and hard before you respond to the call to be my disciples, for many are called but few are truly prepared.’

Robert the follower, also called Bob, piped up, saying, ‘What’s that ‘disciple’ thing?  Is that like believing you are God’s Son?’

‘It begins with belief,’ replied Jesus, ‘but it is much more than that…’

‘You mean we ought to listen to you and do what you tell us?’

‘Well, yeah, that’s also part of it, but…’

‘I know, I know, you want us to be sure to attend synagogue when the kids don’t have soccer or band on the Sabbath,’ continued Bob.

‘Uhm, well, actually I’d put the bar a bit higher…’ reflected Jesus.

‘Oh, sure, sure, we should also do like the poor widow and toss in a penny whenever the plate gets passed…’

‘No, Bob, I want much more than that…’ Jesus said.

‘Got it! You want us to volunteer to serve on committees and maybe even teach a class,’ Bob proudly concluded.

‘You’re missing the point completely, Bob.  Unless you leave father and mother, sisters and brothers, spouses and children, and give up all your possessions, you can’t BE a disciple!’ said Jesus.

‘Whoa, whoa, that’s not gonna work!  Who would want to do that?’ asked Bob.

‘The point isn’t about whether YOU want to or not.  It is about what GOD might want!’

‘Yeah, well, there’s such a thing as going too far, is what I’m sayin’.’ commented Bob. ‘I am perfectly willing to be your disciple as long as it’s convenient and doesn’t cost me anything.’

‘Bob, unless you are willing to take up your cross daily and follow me, you cannot be my disciple,’ intoned Jesus.

‘Good luck with that.  This disciple thing has to be attractive, you know?  If you don’t work harder to make it sound fun, most people aren’t going to be interested.  You need a logo and a catchy slogan.  Maybe find a celebrity to endorse it…’

‘Bob, Bob you are distracted by many things.  But there is only one truly important thing: put God first in all you do, and commit yourself to loving God and neighbor and self,’ instructed Jesus.

‘Okay, fine, I can do that.  But lay off the leaving family and giving up my stuff.  That’s probably not gonna happen.”

The Revised New Revised Standard Revised Version (RNRSRV)

Once again I received a barrage of emails and phone calls from kind people informing me that discipleship is an unreasonable and unattainable goal, the way I describe it in my posts.  In a dozen different ways, people explain patiently to me that very few folks actually have any interest in discipleship and that if we insist that people take their faith so seriously, we will lose them in droves.  Many tell me that the church is not set up to promote discipleship and that churches have never had true discipleship as a goal or objective.  A few point out that discipleship as we talk about it today isn’t the same as discipleship in Jesus’ day.  We need a more practical and achievable discipleship.  The bottom line is, if you want to truly be a disciple, the last place on earth you will waste your time is in church.  Most churches make discipleship a very low priority, and to try to say that our mission should be to make disciples of Jesus Christ for the transformation of the world is to deny and insult the real reasons that people come to church.  I hear all of this… and I continue to disagree.

When I conducted the denomination wide study on healthy, vital congregations, I discovered dozens of congregations — mostly between 40 and 300 active members — engaged in functional processes of cultivating, equipping, training, supporting, and deploying spiritually functional disciples.  The impact of these churches were phenomenal — small groups of people touching thousands of lives because they spent the majority of their time away from the church building, meeting and serving people in the name of Christ wherever there was need.  All ages, races, propensities and perspectives rising above their egos and agendas to become something greater united by the Holy Spirit.  It is possible, but alas, it is not popular.

In just about every case the story was similar: the day the church got serious about discipleship, an exodus occurred.  The comfortable and the complacent, the consumer and the customer all headed for the door.  As “church” shifted from noun to verb, those who sought to be served rather than serve headed down the street to a different church that wouldn’t expect as much.  The most frequent response was simply to stay home and withhold financial support.  A war of attrition commenced in an attempt to smoke out the disciples and allow the church to return to “normal.”

But what was different in the churches where discipleship was embraced rather than disdained?  Generally, smaller congregations that shared a strong, compelling vision for service to others formed the core.  While clergy might champion the vision, the ownership of the vision pervaded the entire group.  Expectations were clear and high, and accountability was loving but firm.  Success was measured qualitatively — “how well?” was asked more frequently than “how many?”  And when “how many?” was the measure, it was of how many lives were touched, not how many people attended a function at the church.  Communication was open, inclusive, and transparent.  Engagement in the activities of the group were a high priority for all ages.  Giving of gifts, resources, energy, time, money and talents were ubiquitous.  Church wasn’t a place, but an identity.  This reality came about by hard work, dedication, and intention.  More people were turned off by it than were attracted by it — much the same as the majority who came to Jesus.

There is no place in the Bible where discipleship is described as easy, cheap, or fun.  The concept of a passive discipleship — what has become the norm of “church membership” — is a contradiction in terms, and an unacceptable standard by which to define ourselves.  A mediocre faith is indicative of a mediocre God, and I can’t imagine that God is pleased or amused.

I once led a workshop on spiritual leadership in a local church.  I emphasized the importance of prayer, Biblical reflection, and a time for conversation and discernment at each board, council, committee or team meeting.  The chair of the Trustees stopped me and said, “We have way too much work to do to waste time with all that touchy-feely crap.”  Heads nodded around the room, and I looked to the pastor.  Sheepishly, he confessed that the meetings were packed full, and everyone’s time was too valuable to add more to the agenda, so he agreed that prayer and Bible study would need to be held off until a more appropriate time — business meetings needed to focus on business.  I attempted to reframe the spiritual work as the business of the church, but was stopped again — this time with a phrase that defines for me the essence of our real problem: “Prayer won’t pay the bills, I’m afraid.  We owe a half million on this building and the help we need from you is how to get more people who will come and give more money so we can afford to stay in business.”  It’s sad when our business isn’t in making disciples, but in building churches too busy to be bothered making disciples.

Dan.  I hear you, and agree with many of your points, but I am curious to how you propose to live this out either in your ministry in the Wisconsin Annual Conference or in any proposals coming forward to the General Conference.  Obviously, it is easy to point out problems, but it becomes much tougher to offer solutions.  What are your solutions? (from John)

My suggestion ARE my solutions, but I acknowledge that this is fundamentally a systems problem.  We have designed a church system around numbers, money, prestige and survival, so any suggestions that threaten such a status quo will be viewed as unreasonable or unfeasible.  To hold people accountable to the standards of discipleship will drive the less committed away.  Many of those will take their money with them.  Fidelity to the gospel will result in fewer people rather than more; less money rather than an increase.  To leave our buildings is to leave the monuments and edifices that we have built in our own honor.  What a blow to our egos to do with smaller and less?  That is not the American way.  Too many pastors work too hard for too many years to consider serving a small church in a modest building.  But our buildings keep us inside.  Christ has left the building.  So, the choice for us is do we hold onto our buildings or do we follow Christ?  Most American adults don’t want to learn; they want their opinions affirmed.  To grow, to change, to learn, to be transformed — these are not the values that drive our dominant culture.  The values of comfort, security and the preservation of the familiar are our governing values — even in the church.  Christ calls us to a learning culture, where we never arrive at the final destination, but are always in process, always becoming something better than what we have been in the past.  There is simply no way to commit to comfort, security and the status quo and be a full member of the body of Christ.  Our faith isn’t about US, but about God’s will.

So, if you believe we are so <screwed> up, why do you stay?  You make it sound like our church is run by a pack of morons who are totally clueless and/or selfish.  It doesn’t make sense that someone who works for the church dislikes it so deeply. (from Tom)

I am one of those naive believers that if you want to change a system you must be part of the system.  Real change my come from the fringe, but it is still on the board someplace.  It is way too easy to walk away and then criticize and complain.  I love the potential of the church too much to abandon it.  And my critique of leadership may be too harsh and unfair.  I believe that systems produce what they are designed to produce.  Our current system produces decline, mediocrity, discord, complacency, and a witness of irrelevancy and impotence.  The problem is that we elevate leaders within this system to keep it going.  I cannot imagine what many of our bishops and general secretaries feel at the end of the day.  Satisfaction and a sense of achievement?  I doubt it, but that’s just me.  The majority of pastors serving local congregations claim that they are no longer living the call that originally brought them to ministry.  The dreams and visions of spiritual leadership have given way to corporate management.  We see broad evidence of burnout, poor health, stress, and early retirement (where it is affordable or merely going through the motions where it is not).  This is not the church we want, but instead of recreating our church by a spiritual enlightenment reformation, we merely discuss institutional preservation.  We talk about plastic surgery and call it change.

I am not sure I understand what you want the church to do.  Are you saying we need to get better at keeping people out?  I would think we would want to do everything in our power to make it as easy as possible to become Christian.  I like the idea of calling everyone a disciple like our bishops promote.  I think we should let everyone in and not keep anyone out. (from Gail)

This is my definition of cheap grace: taking all the benefits for absolutely no personal cost or responsibility.  Do we let a musician who refuses to practice a chair in the orchestra?  Do we let anyone volunteer to play a sport regardless of their commitment to the team?  Do we allow anyone to practice medicine because we’re all interested in health?  There is a clear distinction between believing in Christ and being a Christian disciple — and then emerging as a Christian spiritual leader and teacher (discipleship not being the end of the journey…).  The United Methodist Church raised the bar.  Our mission is not to help people believe that Jesus Christ is God’s Son.  No, we said that we exist to “make disciples of Jesus Christ for the transformation of the world.”  Shame on us when we then define discipleship as attending worship whenever we feel like it.  Our deep commitment to mediocrity is evidenced by the fact that we allow our lowest common denominator — consumeristic Christian believers who come to church to be served — to define us.  Membership in The United Methodist Church is meaningless.  We have no standards, expectations or accountabilities by which to judge if a person is living up to the vows they make to God and to their Christian community.  Our baptismal vows and the commitments we make each time we share communion are abstract at best, ignored at worst.  We are indeed an “easy” church, and we communicate to the world that there is no cost — and therefore no value — to being Christian.

Anyone who has followed my writing for any period of time knows that I believe we should be in ministry to all people and should be welcoming and ready to include all who wish to be connected.  But connection is not the same as committed.  We need committed Christians to be the church; we need the church to serve a needy and broken world.  We do not need the needy and broken world to define us.  We need God to define us as a people who will give all they have and are to serve God’s will.

Simple is not the same thing as easy.  Easy is what we have tried to be for way too long.  Simple is what Jesus called us to: love God, love neighbor as self.  Pray.  Know God.  Produce the fruit of love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, generosity, faithfulness, gentleness, and self-control.  Love mercy, do justice, walk humbly.  Nowhere are we told to become celebrities, build big buildings, or fill sanctuaries.  My lament is that we like what we have.  Mediocrity is the new fantastic.  We just want to make sure we have a pension in a few years and that people will respect us.  My sense is that this isn’t enough.  We have a world in pain; a planet in crisis.  If we could actually BE Christ for the world, I think most of our other “problems” would go away.  Are we willing to make the changes that are needed?

1. become Christian — actually embrace our spiritual disciplines, rituals and practices as the baseline standard for what it means to be United Methodist.  You don’t care to pray?  You’re too busy for weekly worship?  You don’t give generously of time and money?  All great… but you don’t get to be a Methodist.
2. get out of our buildings — the ministry is in the world, not sitting on our butts in a sanctuary.  Church suppers and craft fairs and bazaars are great fun — and we should enjoy the fellowship they bring — but they are not our ministry.  More of our churches are known by the “witness” of their dinners, buildings, entertainment, and websites than by any work of compassion, mercy, justice, or spirituality.
3. institute a learning culture with accountability — here’s a clever concept: let’s make “discipleship” our standard for inclusion rather than “membership!”  The key to discipleship is a lifelong commitment to learning and improvement.  As long as people are on the path of development — of their inward growth in relationship to God, Christ, and others, as well as their outward service to neighbor, community and world — the are “active” members of the community.  The only real change we would make to membership would be the acknowledgement that there is NO SUCH THING as an inactive member.

So, to summarize: growing, giving, loving, learning, out in the world = in; complacent, comfortable, consumeristic, coddled, contented = out.  Results?  Fewer folks, smaller and fewer buildings, higher standards for leadership, true accountability, and much stronger witness and impact.  We might not have the same access to resources, but then again we would quit mortgaging our future so that money for missions no longer is drained away in unGodly interest payments.  Our leaders would stop thinking big buildings are actually indicators of good leadership.  We would be embarrassed by our waste instead of so grossly proud.  Smaller, better churches dedicated to serving God.  Not a bad vision for the future.  Good enough for Jesus, good enough for us.

Our current reports and recommendations are beautiful illustrations of worldly, materialistic, acquisitive values founded upon image, ego, and popularity.  We loved the report that showed how nice people think we are, but we have yet to find any report that points to our importance or effectiveness.  Being liked is so much more important than being good.  Actual inclusion in a community of faith should be dependent on our willingness to serve God, not on our demands to be served.  Can multitudes attend our services?  Sure, but they won’t be “members” (or friends, associates, affiliates, pals, facebook friends, etc.); they will be the people the church serves, not the church.  This is kind of biblical — check out the gospels and Paul…

The key to our future is simplicity itself: we must shun the cultural values of more, bigger, brighter, shinier, easier and insipid and embrace once more a commitment to quality, integrity, accountability, learning and improvement.  Bigger isn’t better; better is better.  Let’s trade a Call to Action for a Call to Integrity — might be a good move.

Not that it has always been the Methodist way.  We actually are only a generation removed from a denomination-wide exploration of systems thinking, critical analysis, theological reflection, and missional focus.  It has only been in the few years since we hired secular consultants to tell us what our “brand” ought to be that we lost our minds and determined that downsizing and best practices are the solutions to all our problems.  The ray of hope that systems thinking brought us quickly dimmed however for two simple reasons.  First, we would have to actually change and make some hard decisions.  Second, it would be hard work and we would have to take our faith very seriously.  Making disciples would displace keeping believers happy and comfortable.  We would have to share power with our southern neighbors.  We would actually have to resolve some differences around theology and the authority of scripture.  We might have to even change General Conference from a legislative policy process to a missional discernment and visionary engagement process.  When faced with the hard work, we opted for the path of least resistance.  Now, once again, we are faced with hard realities, and instead of being prepared, we are operating in our traditional reactive mode.  All so unnecessary.

It has been fascinating to watch the response of our invested leaders in critique and complaint about the work of the Connectional Table, The Call to Action, The Ministry Study, and our ruminations on a global church.  Open dialogue vs. defensive posturing.  Critical thinking vs. mindless endorsement.  Public praise vs. private contempt and despair.  A growing consensus that none of this will fly vs. an irrational defense of the quality of the proposals.  Censorship and denial of negative voices vs. a hyper-elevation of the random pockets of praise.  Where is there an openness to working together to come to a synergistic and sustainable improved solution?  What will the atmosphere be by the time we convene in Tampa?  Will all sides and opinions be committed to raising the bar and working together for a true solution or will we be arranged in competing camps with fragmented agenda and turf to protect?

I keep using the metaphor of the Emperor’s New Clothes and I have been in regular dialogue with bishops retired and active, associate general secretaries, lay leaders, conference counterparts, and seminary professors who are all in agreement with the basic sentiment and who are all raising a similar question: why are we allowing clearly inadequate solutions and proposals to be crammed down our throats?  When did this become about political posturing and weird territoriality?  This is all our church.  It is in trouble.  It needs the best and brightest working together.  It needs to show the business consultants the door.  And it needs to knuckle down and do the hard work of envisioning a viable and sustainable future.  We do not need to be asking what form should we take until we answer the question why are we here?  Assuming the old answers suffice is not enough.  Where is the leadership?  Where is the vision?  Why are we not being asked to spend serious time on our knees in prayer and deep contemplation?  Why are we not drawing our metaphors and images from our scripture instead of marketing firms?  Why are we not fasting?  Why is our conversation all about cutting and reducing and downsizing and denying voices and races and generations.  Why is all our focus on what we are not, and what we have lost, and what we cannot do?  We are fixated on the wilderness and surviving in the wilderness and getting through the wilderness, but there is no talk about a Promised Land.  We are committed to our own survival without any good explanation why our survival is worthwhile.

Should we eliminate waste?  Should our boards and agencies make some serious cuts in the short-term?  Should we be working constantly to become the best church we can be?  Without question.  I have never opposed the need for a Call to Action, a Connectional Table, or any of the other reports and recommendations we are working on.  My criticisms have all been along the lines of noting that people say our boat is sinking and that our solution should be to give it a new coat of paint.  Wrong solution to the problem… or sometimes good solutions but applied to the wrong problems.  We have been looking to those outside our church for counsel on how to be our church and we have been steered down some interesting pathways.  When faced with critical issues about our identity, we hired marketing firms to focus us on our image.  When faced with poor results and dismal outcomes, we hired consultants who focused us on our product instead of our processes; our structures instead of our systems.  In so many ways it feels like our church had a heart attack and has been sent to a plastic surgeon for treatment.

A few years ago, our bishops starting talking about “a Methodist way.”  I wonder what they meant?  If by the Methodist way, we mean a systemic commitment to live the means of grace and to equip people to live in a stable balance of works of piety and acts of mercy, I think we have the basis upon which to build a future.  But if the Methodist way is to be reactive to the whims of our secular culture and to set our missional priorities and our performance goals on the basis of the money available and the number of people attending worship, then we have already determined our fate.  Branding and dashboards and defining health in terms of size give me little hope that the Methodist way means the former.  And if we waste any more time on the latter there won’t be anything left to “re-form”.

I know what it is like to work hard on a no-win situation and have outsiders criticize and condemn.  I am usually on the other side.  But when a growing number of voices question our list to the dark side, isn’t that the time to step back and consider that something bigger might be going on here?  Treating huge issues like guaranteed appointments, structure, global relationships as one-dimensional is outrageous.  The implications of each are far-reaching and potentially cataclysmic.  Take away guaranteed appointments as a leverage against poor credentialing processes and lack of accountability?  Fine, but how many gifted pastors have come into UM ministry because of the perk of guaranteed appointment?  With every other negative weighing against ordained ministry — pay, hours, stress, esteem — you want to remove a positive as you recreate a “culture of call?”  And for those whom guaranteed appointment has been an incentive to work hard?  Oh, well, they’ll get over it.  And let’s downsize to grow without clarifying the missional goals and objectives that a new structure might achieve.  Who needs a Promised Land?  We’ll figure out where we can go after we gut the structure.  Just as long as we get the power out of the hands of the many and place it in the hands of the few.  And instead of casting a vision for a global church witnessing to solidarity and unity, lets fragment as quickly as possible so that we don’t lose power.  Our theological differences and the 800 pound human sexuality gorilla?  Ah, we don’t have time to address those, we have agencies to close.  Now, let’s cherry pick which agencies to exempt.  We certainly don’t want our pet agency lumped in with “those” agencies.  Everyone quickly scramble around and waste exorbitant amounts of money trying to justify your continued existence!

These are huge issues, and I am not trying to denigrate the work anyone has done — it has all been hard work.  But has it been the work to bring us where we need to be heading into General Conference?  And are we doing ourselves any favors by voting support for half-baked, non-critically thought through decisions?  It is great to vote our confidence in the intentions of those elected to serve the church.  But great effort does not equal great job.  Voices around the world are raising serious and valid questions about our various and sundry reports and recommendations.  All our websites and newsletters and press releases that celebrate the party line don’t make it true.  Preventing alternative voices from being heard may get you your own way, but it will not serve the best interests of The United Methodist Church.  Perhaps the Emperor is not completely unclothed, but he seems to be wearing rags when he could be more finely adorned.  I hope and pray our discussions cut through the rhetoric and the rah-rah and that enough annual conferences declare that they will not merely settle for a poor plan, but will come together to forge something much, much better.

With the exception of UMCs with more than 2,000 active participants, (so I am only talking about 99% of our congregations) the healthiest churches in our denomination are those choosing to excel in one or two areas instead of continuing to be mediocre at a lot of things.  The awakening to the fact that The United Methodist Church” has become the Phoenix University of Christian churches (according to Jon Stewart… I still love this line…) is not something of which we can be proud.  Our commitment to be a “good” church prevents us from being a “great” church.  Becoming “world class” in one or two areas of ministry is open to a much larger percentage of our churches than being great at many things (reminds one of Mary and Martha, doesn’t it…?), but it requires a bit of a sacrifice.  A congregation may find something in which to excel, but it will have to stop doing other things if it wants to free resources and capacity to be successful.

The same holds true for our denomination — if we want to actually make a lasting impact in the world.  Our four focus areas have given some guidance, but how well have we done keeping these four balls in the air?  Malaria looks good — that’s one ball.  Pockets of ministry with the poor pop up from time to time, but more often than not we’re chasing that ball as it scoots under the sofa.  Our Call to Action is calling us to juggle fewer balls, but the balls to drop and the balls to keep are arbitrary.  There is no clear sense of what we need versus what we don’t.  Yet, we will make decisions about what agencies to keep and what leadership to retain, even though we don’t know what we want them to do…

Our focus is too broad.  We are still trying to be all things to all people.  We still want more people, so we cast our nets as wide as possible, sacrificing depth for breadth.  So much could change if we would only shift our primary focus from size to quality, from “big” to “excellent.”

Another result of our unfocused approach to ministry is that it gives us all something to disagree about.  With so many issues big and small to manage, we can ignore the big things we agree on to bicker and snipe about where we’re different.  This becomes a perfect excuse to not be effective at anything.  We are too busy trying to be right to waste time trying to be effective.

This is a fine example of the good, the bad, and the ugly.  Because we are okay with being mediocre, we allow the things we are bad at to drain our resources and prevent us from being great at anything.  The more we try to do, the less we excel, and in many cases the more we damage our reputation and credibility.  An example of this is our current denominational need for leadership.  To attract new leaders, our Ministry Study recommends we lower our standards and shorten our time of preparation, yet we already suffer a crisis of quality in leadership.  Making our credentialing process LESS rigorous not only won’t improve our leadership, but the results promise to be ugly.  The same is true of our denominational plan to downsize before we clarify our missional priorities.  We will simply try to do as much as we always have with fewer resources, shifting our mediocrity to gross insufficiency.  It should be fun.

Form follows function.  Function defines focus.  We have got to be crystal clear about what we are trying to do and why it is so important before we progress too much farther on how and who.  Bigger won’t necessarily give us a future.  Better will.

Lo, and behold, travelers from the east and parts southeast and newer developments more to the south actually than the east, were on a quest — some having traveled weeks, others months, others years — all hoping to discover the Messiah promised to the Jews, but with anticipated collateral benefits for various and sundry gentiles, Pagans, and an occasional Druid.  Dozens of seers, prophets, magi, prognosticators, and visionaries milled together with camels, mules, donkeys, and one totally confused llama.  A few straggled behind.

“Where are we bound this time?” one asked.

“We have heard a rumor that the Messiah may come from Nazareth,” answered a second.

“Nazareth??” exploded a third.  “What possible good can come from Nazareth?  That’s miles from here!”

“That’s what they are saying,” replied the first.  “But the buzz is firstest-rate.”

“Like the last time?” sneered the third.

“How were we to know the father was a pig merchant?” reflected the second.

“Someone should have done some checking, is all I’m saying.  It isn’t likely that the King of the Jews will come with a side of bacon.  Sometimes I feel like this is all a waste of time.”

“Well, it can’t be too much of a waste of time, or that king Herod wouldn’t have gotten all up in our faces,” said the second.  “That man is nuts.  All you said is that we wanted to know if he had heard of a better king being born anywhere and he completely lost it.  He wouldn’t get so upset about a ‘waste of time.’”

“I guess not,” said the third.  “I think I’ll take a pass on Nazareth, though.”

“What will you do,” queried the first.  “Where will you go?”

“I heard about this great inn in O Little Town of Bethlehem, not too far from here.  I pidgeoned ahead and reserved the very last room.  Hey, I have an idea.  There are three beds.  You guys could cometh witheth me-eth,” invited the third.

“What?”

“Excuse me.  My bridge keeps slipping.  You could come with me.  It would be fun,” chided the third.

“I don’t know.  I would hate to pass on Nazareth then find out it was the Prince of Peace, Lord of Lords, etc,” worried the first.

“Look, I can almost guarantee you that the Messiah won’t come from some little backwater bog like Nazareth,” said the third.

“You know,” began the second, “I am a bit weary from all this trekking and questing.  A night out and a comfortable bed doesn’t sound half bad.  We could get all dressed up and treat ourselves like kings!” enthused the second.

“When you put it that way, it sounds great.  I like the sound of we three kings from the orient are looking for a good time.  I’m in,” pledged the first.

“Me, too,” added the second.  “Do you know how to get there?”

“Oh, you can’t miss it.  They have this great big star sign right over the stable.  Come on, nobody will miss us, and we’ll hook back up with them in a couple weeks.” explained the third.

The trio departed, unaware that they were carving a special place in history for themselves.  Dressed in their finest robes, the three conversed as they approached Bethlehem.

“So, when we find the baby, what are you planning to give him…?” asked wise man the first.

“Well, it was a toss-up between frankincense and costly nard, so I went with the frankincense — since the nard was so costly,” shared the second.

“Take a gander at this,” boasted the third.  He whipped out a small chest, and flashed a small treasure in gold.

“No way!  You know there’s a ten denarii spending limit!  Ah, man, that makes my myrrh look pathetic!” roared the first.

“Myrrh?  Really?  You’re giving a baby death balm?  You’re unbelievable,” responded the third.

“Hey, guys, there’s the inn.  Let’s take our animals to the stable out back…”

On this twelfth day following Christmas, we celebrate the Epiphany event — one that is much more grounded in myth and fantasy more than a Biblical basis.  We don’t know exactly where the travellers are from.  We have no idea how many there were.  They are from the fringe caste of magi (seers and forecasters — magicians), not kings.  The gifts have been interpreted as symbolic since the early first few centuries — gold, frankincense and myrrh foreshadowing the power, majesty, and conquest of death in Jesus’s future.  It was not until college that I realized that Epiphany as a Christian celebration was a “late” addition to our tradition, and that Hebrew culture understood epiphany to mean the revelation of any deity to humankind.  The Hebrew scriptures are filled with incidents of epiphany.  It also came to be associated with the number three in the primitive and premodern superstitious early Christian culture.  The story in our Christian tradition is a capstone to the Christmas narrative, the significance of which is all but lost today.

The angels appeared to Mary, Joseph, Zechariah, and the shepherds to clue them into the miracles as they were about to unfold.  Jesus, as the Christ, came as a complete surprise to them.  Following his birth a wonderful shift occurs.  In Matthew, the magi appear on the scene; in Luke this visit takes the form of Simeon and Anna, but in both cases confirmation of Jesus’ Messianic nature comes from those who were looking for him!  Jesus wasn’t a happy surprise to the magi or Simeon and Anna — he came as fulfillment to what they lived their lives in anticipation of.  The magi KNEW the Messiah was coming and they identified Jesus as the Christ-child they were seeking and searching for.  In the tradition and the narrative this is huge.  This makes it all real.  This gives it weight and truth and credibility.  We often don’t see it this way, or don’t give it the weight it deserves, but the two gospel writers who found such importance in the birth narratives both used a validation story to confirm that Jesus is the one true Son of God.  In both cases, Jesus is not just the King of the Jews, but he is the Redeemer and Savior of humankind — Lord of the whole wide world.  In an age of competing Messianic candidates, confirmation and validation were crucial.  Those with the “special powers” of discernment and perception — magi and prophetesses — knew immediately who Jesus really was.

And so by our faith and by the convictions of our hearts, we too know who Jesus is.  Now comes the hard part.  The infant Messiah has been born into our lives once again.  We have to make some effort to look for and find this newborn King — then we have to make room for him on the thrones of our hearts.  We must nurture the babe and allow him to grow into the Lord and Master of our lives.  We give over our will to his Will, changing our ways to The Way.  We take less and less, give more and more, and we risk being changed from the inside out.  We love the romance and the pageantry of the visit of the wise men, but we too often downplay the sacrifice of the wise men.  The physical gifts they give represent, most likely, their lifetime accumulation of wealth.  The implication of their obeisance to the babe is an ending to a lifelong quest — their reason for being is fulfilled.  They end as the Messiah begins — and so it is for us.  We give our lives to Christ, but do we really?  Are we wise as the wise men are wise, or are we kidding ourselves?  Time will tell, but epiphany calls us to open ourselves to the incarnation all over again.  Thanks be to God.