I found some interesting statistics from my friend Rex Miller recently:
Churches struggle to get greater engagement from their staff and volunteers. In fact, they struggle more than companies. Gallup’s surveys show that only 17% of an organization is pulling the weight of the organization. 54% are going through the motions and 29% are undermining efforts.
Our conversations with hundreds of church leaders validate these insights. But isn’t it troubling that at least 83% of people in church are coasting or undermining their church’s efforts. Especially when the Bible is filled with references of being a “servant of all” and “loving one another.” And the numbers for churches are even worse than for secular companies!
How could profit-driven companies be more engaging than churches with a transcendental Kingdom purpose?
What say you?
Ed,
The fact that 29% of people working for the church are undermining efforts is astounding. Im shocked at that number…
As for the 54% going through the motions…Now that I can see. As someone who works in the design world, I think that at least a small number of these are due to the physical spaces they work in…from my observations with churches, the spaces that the staff work in are often times much more poorly outfitted than similar employee’s space who work in the secular world.
How often is the admin space the last space a church worries about doing right? This doesnt explain all the numbers, but i bet it accounts for at least a portion of the difference.
I think it’s because they don’t see the kingdom. Church can become a social network instead of absolute truth. After that shift, the individual does what sounds enjoyable to him/herself at the time…which is usually not service (especially service others can’t see and recognize).
An
Derek,
The 29% is troubling. However, I doubt most of them really want to be there. Typically what causes that response is a bad experience with someone in the church. And that is far too common.
Your thought regarding work space is quite interesting. And I’d agree it very well may have something to do with resignation on many staff’s part.
The big issue I’ve observed driving resignation is a poor job of church leadership in discerning clearly who they are and where God’s called them to go. A fuzzy vision and mission results in a fuzzy response by the congregation…as well a fuzzy building design when the church builds.
Ed
An,
Why do you think some see the Kingdom and others don’t?
Ed
Ed, you wrote “The big issue I’ve observed driving resignation is a poor job of church leadership in discerning clearly who they are and where God’s called them to go. A fuzzy vision and mission results in a fuzzy response by the congregation”
The first thing that came to my mind when reading these troubling statistics was, “Only 17% of of church goers have an accurate picture and idea of who God is.” As we study the Bible and what it says about God our view of our creator should be increasingly big, glorious, majestic, inspiring, awesome, and powerful. This in turn works to make our view of ourselves more accurate. We begin to see how small, helpless, inconsequential, and dead we are without the marvelous mercy of God holding us up.
John Piper wrote this preface to an article. *note – I don’t know how you feel about the title of the article, but please don’t let the “C” word undermine your consideration of the passage. It’s rich in it’s appreciation for our Sovereign.
I am convinced that the answer to so many church issues lies in our leadership preaching and focusing on the glory and richness of God as laid out in scripture. Romans 9:23 gives us a glimpse of what God desires “…to make known the riches of his glory for vessels of mercy, which he has prepared beforehand for glory- …”
Thoughts?
Peace,
Luke
Ed,
People don’t see the Kingdom of God, because they look in the wrong places.
They don’t have the full understanding about the Kingdom. Religion has made it fuzzy.
Luke 17:21 lets us know that the Kingdom of God is in us as believers.
It is God’s way of doing things. A new government/economy/thought pattern. That is why scriptures says to seek it first, then all the other stuff will be added to us.
If a persons vision of the kingdom is fuzzy then the vision and mission is fuzzy, which leads to the fuzzy building design as you said.
This fuzziness turns into frustration then into murmuring, complaining (54%) and eventually undermining.(29%)
Luke,
There’s a lot to digest there and I’m out in West Virginia for a few days with Len Sweet. I’ll be back with some thoughts earlier next week.
Ed
Tyrone,
No doubt things are fuzzy because we’ve made it so.
I’m often provoked by Acts 4:13 where the Jewish leaders of the day were astonished by the boldness of Peter and John and took note that they had been with Jesus.
I’m not sure I’m astonishing people on a regular basis…you?
Ed
I feel the same.
The Jewish leaders were astonished because Peter was not the scholar but yet was bold enough to say and do things that were above the leaders heads. I do disire for God to work through me like He did Peter. Jesus liked having Peter around when it came to doing something bold and seemingly impossible.
Albert Eistein was quoted saying “The significant problems we face today cannot be solved at the same level of thinking we were at when we created them.”
Eistein was on to something.
I’m ready for God to work through Christ followers to astonish the world and solve these problems.
His ways are higher than our ways.
Tyrone,
I’ve always appreciated that Einstein quote. It throws the responsibility for solutions squarely on our shoulders.
His ways are surely higher than ours. But for them to be manifested through us it seems we must be with Jesus. We must set aside time and effort to walk with him, to commune with him, to have His mind.
That’s the hard part for me,
Ed
Because we are not like little children in spirit. We have lost our awe of what is happening around us…we are not as trusting, as forgiving or as hopeful. We live in the moment like children at times…but it is usually only in our self-centered moments.
We often loose our first love for Christ in the daily struggle as well-the time when we would do anything to win His favor; anything to serve Him, anything that might bring joy to His face- to our one and only purpose for living. We didn’t care about others approval-not really, it didn’t matter if we did things perfect…I was ready to jump if He said the word at 14 when I found Christ. I find that place sometimes now…but I wish it was all the time. I wish, like in The Pilgrims Progress, the vision of the city, the perfect purified city would linger a little longer through the lens so I could remember.
An
Here’s an excerpt from one of Saint John Cassian’s texts (from the beginning of the 5th century) that I think may dovetail with what Ann and Luke were saying. Abba Moses is answering how it is possible for us to know God inseparably when God is “invisible and incomprehensible”.
Abba Moses replied: ‘To look upon God at all times and to be inseparable from Him, in the manner which you envisage, is impossible for a man still in the flesh and enslaved to weakness. In another way, however, it is possible to look upon God, for the manner of contemplating God may be conceived and understood in many ways. God is not only to be known in His blessed and incomprehensible being, for this is something which is reserved for His saints in the age to come. He is also to be known from the grandeur and beauty of His creatures, from His providence which governs the world day by day, from His righteousness and from the wonders which He shows to His saints in each generation. When we reflect on the measurelessness of His power and His unsleeping eye which looks upon the hidden things of the heart and which nothing can escape, we are filled with the deepest awe, marvelling at Him and adoring Him. When we consider that He numbers the raindrops, the sand of the sea and the stars of heaven, we are amazed at the grandeur of His nature and His wisdom. When we think of His ineffable and inexplicable wisdom, His love for mankind, and His limitless long-suffering at man’s innumerable sins, we glorify Him. When we consider His great love for us, in that though we had done nothing good He, being God, deigned to become man in order to save us from delusion, we are roused to longing for Him. When we reflect that He Himsefl has vanquished in us our adversary, the devil, and that He has given us eternal life if only we would choose and turn towards His goodness, then we venerate Him. There are many similar ways of seeing and apprehending God, which grow in us according to our labour and to the degree of our purification.’
Of course, there are still questions of praxis that need to be answered, but this seems to be a decent starting point.
An,
Great thoughts and a good reminder of what our spirits were like way back there in childhood.
Ed
Nick,
An interesting read for sure….
When I really stop and think about it I wonder how we can really grasp Him in His fullness. I can’t begin to grasp the detail of the cell, atom or the electron…or get my arms around the size of the Milky Way. And God created it all.
So how could we ever grasp the magnitude of Him. The question seems to be, can we trust what we do know about him and deal with the ambiguity of our faith.
Maybe that takes us back to the “trust of a child” thought.
Ed
And for anyone looking for childlike awe, I have one name for you: GK Chesterton. Thank me later.
Thanks Nick. =)
Does anyone else find comfort in the fact that God called Job a “perfect servant” and then later tells Job he hasn’t even scratched the surface in finding out who God really is. So we don’t have to know everything to be perfect servants if we strive to serve Him with our all? Amen…because I feel like full understanding is a long way off. =)
An