Tentmaking

I haven't done this before, but I'm doing it now.

If you would be so kind, I would like to ask you to read the following and give me your thoughts. Whether you consider yourself an advocate or opponent of these ideas, I would appreciate your wisdom.

Here goes...

Scripture says more about "“being"” the church than it does about "going to church."” As sincere followers of Jesus, our concern should be the active, intentional, daily engagement with the Holy Spirit in a way of life that is marked by humility, obedience, love and power. These are marks of a true disciple or follower of Jesus. The problem with simply "going" to church is that it tends to reduce the practice of the Christian life to a scheduled event that happens for a couple of hours every Sunday; church attendance gets confused with real adherence to the teachings and demands of Jesus.

And it’s getting worse.

Consider some statistics from a recent report;
1. Less than 20% of Americans regularly attend church; half of what the pollsters report.
2. American church attendance is steadily declining.
3. In only one state is church growth outpacing its population growth.
4. The increase in churches is only 1/4 of what's needed to keep up with population growth.
5. In 2050, the percentage of the U.S. population attending church will be almost half of what it was in 1990.
(Outreach Magazine May/June 2006)

People from many corners of the American church world are wringing their hands and decrying the end of church as we know it. Perhaps they should, but maybe this is good news. Maybe the decline of church-as-usual is an indication of God doing something entirely new and different right under our noses. If so, it would call for more than one new kind of ministry paradigm. Maybe we'’re at that point as a culture where, once again, form can more faithfully follow function. Maybe we can regain a solid, Biblical vision of the Kingdom and in response, create new ways of (as one author calls it,) "“churching."” This will require a radical re-thinking of leadership.

Given all this, it begs the question; is a caste of professionally trained and educated clergy is the best source from which to draw this new leadership? It seems the movement these days is from highly centralized, attractional events (we call them church services) towards smaller, more fluid, home/office-based initiatives.

I believe that these new initiatives will best be led by men and women who have the freedom to teach, shepherd and direct others without the burden of building and sustaining extensive, demanding and increasingly ineffective conventional church structures. Furthermore, their leadership could be enhanced if they could avoid total financial dependence on the churches in which they lead. If they could, like the Apostle Paul, make money by their own hands, three very important things would result: (1) Financial resources could be directed to other, more missional needs. (2) Leaders would be free of the pressure to compromise for fear of offending the ones paying his salary.” (3) In the absence of a co-dependent culture where everyone defers to the professional pastor to perform all the spiritual work, the gifts of more people would pressed into use.