I had someone tell me last week that they didn’t believe in “constructive criticism.”  They went on to say that criticism is just that, criticism.  I took his point to mean that encouragement to change or grow shouldn’t be “critical” or negative, but, well, an encouragement.

That sounds good.  Too bad it doesn’t happen that way very often.

Even within the body of Christ, negativity toward something or someone that we want to see change or grow often comes with an edge.  While there is never an excuse for wounding one another, it would be naive of us to expect one another to be in complete adherence to the leadership of the Holy Spirit.

Dealing with that hurtful brother or sister is a subject for another day, but let us agree that, from time to time, we will have to deal with someone who desires some changes in our behavior.

Our natural reaction to this is always to push back.  No one enjoys being pushed on and we are particularly repulsed by unkind or insensitive words. However…

The wise man or woman will listen to all that is said, try to understand what the person wants and, more importantly, why they want it.

Then you are able to evaluate the challenge for what it really is and not for what you initially may take it to be as influenced by your emotional reaction.  More often than not, you will find some kernel of truth that might help you as a person.  Sometimes, you find they are just being selfish.  I’ve noticed that talking the “criticisms” over with others who are more neutral to be helpful in discerning the nature of these “suggestions.”

Bottom line:  When it comes to criticism, best not to throw the baby out with the bathwater.

Love this quote from Bob Roberts:

“Sharing the gospel is the responsibility of every single believer … I learned a few years ago that the church is the missionary … it means that every believer is a missionary and that my job as pastor is to help them to figure out beyond prayer and giving how they connect with the world like the men of Cyprus and Cyrene did, using their vocations and jobs and wielding a powerful story.”
- Bob Roberts, Glocalization

When wherever you are is your mission field and you are at your job more than anywhere else, it should change the way you look at your place of employment. It moves from a place where you work to earn money to get things to the place you go to live out the Gospel in front of others.

Since jobs are rarely ideal, it means you will often be put in trying circumstances… where the difference between one being redeemed and one not should become obvious to everyone.

Been a while since I’ve written here, which is kind of stupid since I pay for the privilege of hosting my own domain.  That’s money poorly spent, if I’m not using the website.

Fascinatingly, I’ve still had a steady flow of traffic, which seems to be coming from search engine hits of previous writings.  I wonder if these random readers wonder where I’ve gone.

Whether or not you feel that I owe you an explanation, I’ll go ahead give you one.  If you aren’t interested, feel free to stop reading and I hope you look for me another day.  Whereupon, I hope that you find me, since that will mean that we are both well because I am writing and you are reading which means that we both are capable of doing these things and both have disposable time on our hands.  And that’s a good thing.

Lots of reasons for me not writing.  Some are simple, like: I’ve been a bit busy, I’ve used my free time differently and I was tired of blogging.

Other reasons are more complex, like: my creativity was lacking, I’ve not been inspired and I’ve had some difficulties at church.

The last one is really the main one.  Without going further than I ought, I’ll just say that my stress level has been up as we’ve implemented some Missionally oriented changes at our church to mixed reviews.  Added to that, I didn’t want people reading into anything I wrote and I had some who actually did that, so I quit writing.

Right response?  Maybe.

Given my passion levels at the time, I’d probably do it again.

Suffice it, then, to say that I’m feeling a bit more passionate and less stressed.  I’m not sure that “all is well” in my church, but is there ever a time in any church when that happens?

I’ve determined to put my head down and work toward the really good stuff that is happening and to allow my thoughts to grace the electronic billboard that is the Internet once again.

God help us all.

Really. ;)

I’ll be posting links to all the latest Vietnam updates on the Vietnam page.  Because the internet is so sporadic where we are working, I will upload several articles at a time when it is available and my schedule allows.

I have not dropped off of the Blogosphere again.  i have actually been working on yet another graphic, affectionately dubbed “Art’s Charts” by Marty Duren.  At least I think that it is affectionate.  Maybe I’m deluding myself again.

If I am, I can only say that life’s more fun that way.

In the meantime, I need to prepare for that post by writing this one regarding culture as it relates to transitioning a church (or any organization, for that matter).

Culture can simply be defined as a system of values commonly held within a community.  These values guide the actions of the individuals and the whole.  Culture is also fluid as each individual within the community influences the others to increase or decrease its specific values.  So, culture is not uniform across a community.

As an example, within the world community, America has its own culture, distinguishable from England, French, Russian, Ugandan, Korean, Japanese, Spanish, Mexican and Kenyan… just to name a few.  Yet even within America, the differences between regions (North/South, Midwest/Northeast/West Coast) and even within regions (Louisiana/Georgia) is obvious to those immersed in those cultures.

All of this is to say that culture is as specific as the community to which it belongs.

For American churches, we deal with a massive host of ingredients: National, regional, state, local, evangelical/liturgical, denominational (or “non-denominational”) and so on.

The sway of these components create expectations among the individuals, and those expectations are as diverse as the individuals within the community.

If culture is a fluid, dynamic system of commonly held values that govern our behaviors, then there will be a fluid, dynamic of commonly held expectations that everyone involved will adhere to those values.  This in itself creates and holds tension within the community.

To attempt transition means that you are saying to the community that certain commonly held values are no longer held as high as they once were while certain other things previously not valued should be.  Some are likely to respond well as you will be championing similar values.

For others, it will seem that you are telling them that they are and have been wrong.

That may not be what you are trying to say (most times it shouldn’t be), but that’s the undertone and it will be noted.  And, it creates resistance.

It is why transitioning a church is one of the most difficult things we can do.  It is why deconstructing everything is important.  You need to understand the current culture to influence it.  You need to know what is going to cause people to throw out the anchor, and what is going to motivate them to make a change.

Questions to ask:

1. What is the history of the church?
2. What do they consider to be the “signature” of the church to the community?  What does that tell you of the values of the church?
3. Who makes up the church?  What are the demographics?
4. How open to change are they?  Have they realized that a shift in values is necessary?  To what extent are they ready?
5. Find the primary influencers within the community. What do they value? How open to change are they?
6. What does the church “do?”  What it does should tell you what it values.

The Great Commission Task Force gave its preliminary report to the Executive Committee of the Southern Baptist Convention last night.  To listen to the rearrangements proposed, you would have to consider that they did choose to deconstruct… I wonder if they deconstructed everything.

This is not an endorsement or even a commentary of whether or not I agree with their report.  It’s not a response in any way.  But it is a recognition that in moving the SBC from one thing to another, the group responsible for the initial direction has had to go through some similar processes as Pastors and lay leaders do when transitioning a church.

You do have to deconstruct – that is break down the elements that make the whole, understand how they work and why, comprehend the intended result and the actual result.  Then, knowing where you need to go, you can map out a change.

*Please note that deconstruction is not destruction.  I had one person message me with that misunderstanding and, of course, the two things are quite different.

The question I posed the other day was when transitioning, do you have to deconstruct EVERYTHING… or could you just process through the major systems?

While I asked for opinions, the only ones I received were in email form and twitter direct messages.  On the other hand, it was read at a much higher rate than any of my other posts in the year.

Nevertheless, even if everyone else is shy, I promised my answer and so I’ll give it now:  Yes.  You must deconstruct everything.

Truly, there will be things that you will not think to evaluate, but that you really should.  Simply put, the better you understand it all, the easier it will be.  While solid deconstruction and the understanding it produces does not guarantee success or even ease and failure to accomplish the process of deconstruction does not promise failure in the transition, the fruit of your efforts is greater and sweeter to all when a sweeping inventory is undertaken.

As you may know, I’ve been pastor of Skelly Drive Baptist Church for three and a half years now.  The stated intent when I was called, by both the church and myself, was to transition the church from what it was into a church more effective at reaching today’s society.  You can read more about what I think that church might look like here: IVM.

While the specific form of the church is not the subject of this series of articles, the act of transitioning a church is.

Transitioning anything, especially an organization of people joined around a common perceived purpose, requires some level of deconstruction.  You must look at what the systems are, what they intend to produce, what they actually produce and what you want them to produce.  Only then will you be able know what to change to get them from one inefficient or misapplied system (if they need change) to the more efficient system.

But the process of deconstruction is a dangerous one.  Not everyone, particularly in a church that has it’s own history and exists within the American church culture, is a fan of change or is even capable of it.

And the nature of deconstruction in the collective mind is to explain to everyone why the way they’ve been doing it is WRONG.

That’s the way it is perceived, anyway, and it creates resistance.

All of this begs the question(s):  When transitioning, must you deconstruct everything?  Must all deconstruction be revealed to the full organization?  What is public and what is private?

I’ll leave you to opine on this today (if you will).  My thoughts and experiences later.

Rick Jenkins posted this on Facebook this morning and I thought it was definitely worth a repost…

The Big Red Tractor from Jacob Lewis on Vimeo.

Yesterday, I wrote an article on forgiving others that was spurred by a conversation with a good friend.  The conclusion of that article suggested that it is simply more relaxing and enjoyable for you to forgive than to do anything else.

This conclusion, though, begs the question, “When I forgive, does everything go back to the way it was?”

The answer is, “No. Never. Never in a million years.”  But more on that in a moment.

We first must differentiate between forgiving and reconciling, which is fairly easy to do.

To Forgive is something you can do with or without the offending party’s participation.  Forgiveness is completely within your grasp.  Nothing but you can stop you from forgiving.

To Reconcile is something that you both must do.  It is the restoration of love, trust and friendship.  To reconcile you must be able to accept your failures, their failures and whatever offenses have been (usually this goes both ways) have got to be made right.  Either you or they make reparations for the offense(s) or they are intentionally forgiven by the offended party.

To reconcile, both parties must be mutually satisfied with the restoration.

Which brings us back to the question of whether or not things go back to the way they were, and my answer: No. Never. Never in a million years.

Whether or not you simply choose to forgive or are able to reconcile, you are never the same.

Forgiving instead of reconciling implies the offender hasn’t made things right, which means they haven’t earned back our trust.  That relationship is never the same.

I have numerous relationships with people that I have forgiven, that are congenial and friendly, but I don’t trust them anymore.  I give us all the gift of forgiveness so that things aren’t tense or mean spirited.  That doesn’t mean that I am open to being taken advantage of repeatedly.

When you reconcile, on the other hand, things are never the same again either… they’re better.  Like the schoolyard fight between children, we can shake hands and become best friends afterward.  It takes us to a new level that is not possible without us both being honest, accepting our responsibilities and doing whatever we can to make right what we’ve done wrong.

Just by the way, Jesus (and the rest of the Bible) encourages reconciliation.  Forgiveness is the second best option and only when the other person won’t participate.

I suppose that the key to being able to forgive just might lie in the ability of the wounded party to understand what pardon brings to them.

It’s human nature to nurse a grudge and it just feels good.  For a while.  I always enjoy that (self)righteous feeling of the moral high ground.  Too bad, I suppose, that it’s just an illusion.

No matter how innocent I am within the dynamics of any particular situation, the truth is that I am just as capable… just as guilty… of taking advantage.  Twisting the truth.  Improving my own situation at the expense of others.

There is no moral high ground within humanity.  We are all quite wicked.

Still, this is not the most important mental gateway to forgiveness.  Rather, that would be the realization that failing to absolve another only enslaves you.  For the most part, the object of your wrath will be ignorant of your opinion, but even if they are not, they are most capable of creating their own Moral Mountain on which to stand, matching your viewpoint with an equal opposite.

And yet, even that pales in comparison to the impact dispensing clemency has on you.  It is liberating.

A grievance is a burden.  Feels great for a while, but after that brief moment of self delusion wherein you have some sort of unassailable virtue, your rancor begins to exhaust you.

Every time you see your offender, you are right back in the prison of a self generated unpleasant mood.  Every time you think about them, you are oppressed by this obligation to anger.

And you don’t have to bear it.  It is completely up to you whether or not you continue in your animosity.

Only don’t suppose that I suffer from the misconception that mercy is an easy thing to dispense.  Just because it’s good for you, doesn’t mean we like it.  Still, it is medicine for the soul, no matter how difficult it is to swallow.

To sum up:  Let it go.  It’s exhausting to play “King of Moral Mountain” and it’s a comfort to be happy instead, so do it because it makes your own life better, not to mention that it improves the lives of those around you – maybe even your nemesis.