Preparing for the Church’s Future
Preparing for the Church’s Future
We’re Due an Upheaval
It has been observed* that church history seems to come in eras of 500 years.
Between the coming of Christ and the fall of the Roman Empire** was a period of about 500 years.
Between the fall of Rome and the Great Schism in 1054 - the separation between the Roman Catholic Church and the Eastern Orthodox Church - there were about 500 years.
Between the Great Schism and the beginning of the Protestant era (often associated with 1517 when Martin Luther nailed his 95 theses to the Wittenberg door), there were about 500 years.
Guess what? It’s that time again. It’s been about 500 years since the beginning of the Protestant Reformation. Could we be in the final days of an era of church history and the beginning of a new era? Could it be that much of how we’ve done church is about to be shaken, and new ways of seeing the gospel advance are about to begin?
In the transitions between these previous eras, there were tremendous social and cultural upheavals. Long-standing patterns would partially collapse, and new ones would arise. These times of upheaval have been compared to having rummage sales.*** When you have a rummage sale - like maybe when you’re about to move - you get rid of things that no longer work or things you haven’t used in years.
During these times, we’re uncertain about what stays and what goes. Some will defend the traditions no matter what. Some will seem like rebels because their former loyalties no longer make sense to them.
Five possible changes
So, knowing full well that we see through a glass darkly, and that our perceptions regarding the future are very partial, here are five changes that I expect to see in the near future. None of these changes will be made easily.
1. Small Groups will become a much more important unit of church life.
Currently the primary unit of church life is the congregation. Small groups are very secondary in importance (even though we say differently).
In the future Church, these smaller units - these spiritual households, or micro-churches - will be primarily where discipleship happens, watchful care for one another is exercised, sacrificial love is practiced, gifts and callings are identified and encouraged and neighbors and workplace associates are drawn in.
Congregations will certainly not disappear. They will still be vital. But they will probably meet less frequently - maybe as little as once monthly.
2. Lay leaders and part-time leaders will share a bigger responsibility for ministry.
There will continue to be congregational leaders, who will lead and equip the micro-church leaders. There will also be city-wide leaders. But all leaders will be focused on equipping ordinary Christians to do the work of the ministry.
The ratio between the people of God and “full-time vocational ministries” will change. Lifeway Research estimates that the current ratio between full-time paid staff and church attenders is 1 to 76. I wouldn’t be surprised if that becomes more like 1 to 500. I am guessing that the early church employed “full time vocational staff” much less than the Western church. And today, the world’s fastest-growing churches (usually in persecuted settings) get the work done with much fewer “full-time vocational ministries.”
I was recently introduced to a new term for a kind of church leadership: “co-vocational.” Unlike “bi-vocational,” where you work at Starbucks until your new church plant can afford to bring you on full-time, a co-vocational minister develops a professional career - architecture or management, for instance - in which he intends to engage long-term, and also devotes a percentage of his time to shepherding responsibilities.
3. Greater emphasis on city-wide unity and the active headship of Christ.
We’ll operate our various ministries with a greater awareness that Christ only has one Body over which he is the active head.
I love how some of the new city-wide movements, like City to City, work together among various traditions - Baptist, Presbyterian, charismatic, Anglican, etc. - to share resources, plant churches and to make disciples.
4. Networks of trusted relationships will eclipse denominations.
This won’t happen quickly. But when a Presbyterian leader begins to get to know and trust and pray with his fellow Anglican and charismatic leaders, it will become natural for them to begin to strategize together, to share resources with each other and to take counsel and find accountability among themselves. Life flows through trust relationships. If denominational activity doesn’t include regular and honest fellowship, loyalties will shift.
5. Cultural hostility and persecution will likely increase.
This will require the Christian community to learn to live in exile as Israel did when God sent them to Babylon. Our minority status will help distinguish the faithful from the nominal, and also force us to work together across denominational lines.
Preparation
So, how do we prepare for the church’s future?
1. Brace yourself.
The upheaval may not be pleasant. God gave instructions to Jeremiah, in a tumultuous time in Israel’s history, “to pluck up and to break down, to destroy and to overthrow, to build and to plant” (Jer. 1:10). We like building and planting, but there may also be some plucking up and breaking down before we get to the building and planting.
2. Walk humbly. Give yourself to serve others.
Doing that, you won’t have time to be angry and agitated. We will overcome with a posture of “a non-anxious presence” rooted in confidence in the Lord Jesus who commanded us, “Don’t be anxious!”
3. Ask God to show you your team and what is the position you are to play.
Look for your group and your circle. Your group are those you meet with and worship with regularly. Your circle is a larger number of those special relationships you are linked with in mission and care.
And knowing that it is God who changes times and seasons (Dan. 2:21), be ever looking to him and watch as you pray “Thy kingdom come!”
Footnotes:
* See Bob Mumford’s Stepping Over the Threshold, for instance, and Phyllis Tickle’s The Great Emergence.
** Rome’s fall has traditionally been marked as 476 when Emperor Romulus was deposed by the barbarian Odoacer.
*** Episcopal Bishop Mark Dyer (1930-2014) was the first to use the phrase regarding the 500 year cycle of church history.
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