Preached December 15, 1991, evening service First Baptist Church Garrett, Indiana
When a fracas breaks out at your house, which works best to resolve it, decrees or dialogue? Some of us are quick to issue decrees. A cartoon showed a husband and wife sitting together in the office of a marriage counselor. The husband is speaking, and says, "Now that I've told you my side of the story, let me tell you hers." Here, and elsewhere, he is a decree giver.
But if you like to give decrees, it helps to be named Caesar, because kings issue decrees most effectively. And this is the way the story of Christmas begins. "Now, in those days a decree went out from Caesar Augustus..." (Luke 2:1). What was the nature of this decree? That all the world should be enrolled, i.e. counted. Caesar wanted a census taken. Was this to satisfy his natural curiosity? Did Caesar one day idly think, "I wonder how many people are in the Empire?"
Not likely. Taking a census in ancient times always meant a tax increase. Caesar was considering a reclassification and reevaluation of real estate, in effect, and he needed to know how many potential tax payers there were out there. And so, in those days, just as a carpenter named Joseph & a maiden named Mary were trying to get their marriage plans straightened out, "...a decree went out from Caesar Augustus that all the world should be enrolled."
Strange that right at the time Caesar issued his decree, God decided that decrees weren't very effective. In earlier times, God had depended on decrees to reach his people. Thru the law He had commanded and through the prophets He had exhorted. But when people still did not really know Him or love Him, God abandoned decrees and sent a baby to be part of a family, and later, to create a new fellowship of his own--a community, a family of God, a church. From decree to dialogue, from command to community.
Doesn't this make sense? At home, decrees don't finally work. Good marriages don't live by the law and prophets! They live by grace, by dialogue and by love. The marriage vows don't have to be rehearsed regularly, but compassion does, and love does, and tenderness does. Decree givers, like kings, may be grudgingly obeyed, but they are seldom loved.
I. THEN IF GOD CHOSE TO DRAW PEOPLE TO HIMSELF BY DIALOGUE RATHER THAN BY DECREE, DOESN'T IT FOLLOW THAT THE CHURCH SHOULD ADOPT THE SAME STRATEGY IN DOING ITS WORK?
Last summer in Indianapolis, I heard a fine address by an expert in church growth and health. His name is Kennon Callahan, and what he said about the church is worth sharing.
A. WHY DO PEOPLE COME TO CHURCH AND SUPPORT IT, ANYWAY?
Callahan said that there are 5 motivational resources the church has to work with, 5 motives that cause people like us to support a cause. They are community, compassion, reasonability, commitment & challenge. Which is most important? Hundreds of surveys have been taken among church folk, including those at the heart of the church's life and those less active folk along the margins and those who are prospects for church membership. Which of these 5 do you personally feel are most powerful in drawing your participation in the church? Again, they are compassion, community, reasonability, challenge and commitment.
A considerable majority of church folk pick two as by far the most important. They are compassion and community. That is what they want to find in the church--what draws them --compassion and community. But a considerable number of folk do not agree. They pick challenge and commitment as the 2 most effective motivational resources the church has. And note this remarkable fact!
Those who routinely pick challenge and commitment as most important tend to be the lay leaders of the church. Most clergy types also pick challenge and commitment as being their most important resources in promoting the church. We've got to challenge the people continually to get their support--we've got to get commitment!
So, says Mr. Callahan, the church faces a unique situation. Its lay leaders and clergy usually emerge from the challenge /commitment types, while the majority of present & prospective church folk rank compassion and community number one.
Callahan points out that the challenge/commitment strategy worked very well 20-30 years ago, when most of our churches took present form. Church growth in the 50s and early 60s was phenomenal, because most of our prospects were already church-going people moving from towns and rural areas into the city. They were already committed, and so they responded to the challenge of church membership and church programs.
B. BUT THE CHURCH SITUATION TODAY IS RADICALLY DIFFERENT FROM WHAT IT WAS 30 YEARS AGO.
The rural and small town churches have done with their emptying into the city. The church today, Callahan maintains, is virtually on a mission field right here at home. With the rapid secularization of our American society, with the changing of family values and structures, with the demise of the taken-for-granted-role of religion, the scene has changed. The church is virtually back where it started in the 1st century. We cannot take for granted that the prospective member has been raised with a Sunday School background, or indeed, in a Christian setting at all.
The church today is on a mission field. And what strategy works best on a mission field? When our missionaries first went out into primitive areas and established churches among people who had no Christian background, what strategy did they use?
Challenge and commitment? No, challenge and commitment works best among already veteran Christians! Those missionaries went out into those primitive areas and they fed the hungry and doctored and nursed the sick and educated the illiterate and formed loving communities of caring people, and they flourished!
Our country may not look like a mission field, Callahan says, but dig deep under the skin of most metropolitan areas and you'll find it so. The vast majority of people in our community right here have no active church membership. They are, for all practical purposes, unchurched. And what will speak to them? Not challenge. Not commitment. What is more likely to draw them is the prospect for community and the evidence of compassion.
II. SHOULDN'T THIS, THEN, BE THE STRATEGY OF THE CHURCH TODAY?
Forget the decrees. That's what people are too used to hearing from the church. What decree was Caesar issuing now and how much would the tax go up? Is it pledge time again? Has the steeple fallen off? It took awhile for them to realize that the only real purpose of the call was to say, "You are a part of this family of God, and we care about you."
Community and compassion are the best products the church has to offer, because these are things the secular, brittle world does not supply. It is especially appealing to marginal or unchurched people today. If you hear a person say that what we in the church need today is more commitment, more challenge, you can be sure that he or she is a veteran, well-scarred Christian. But if you ask that same person what drew him or her to the church in the first place, it was probably the experience of community they remember--a Sunday School class, a youth group, a volleyball league, a project, a group. That's what got them in. And they (or should I say "we," because clergy are the foremost culprits here), we tend to forget the part community and compassion played, and issue one ringing challenge after another for more commitment.
Callahan suggests that this applies to every aspect of the church's life. How, for example, do you get someone to teach the 5th grade class? We tend to say, "Listen, your church needs you! We challenge you to take this job for just one year. Show your commitment to the Lord by signing up." Now, maybe someone who has been in the church for 20 years will grudgingly give in--but most lay folk, especially recent or prospective Christians, don't play that tune.
Why not something like this? "Here are the names of 15 fifth graders. Let me tell you about them, because some of them have real problems. They need someone to come in and love them, and they need someone to love and to learn from. Do you think you would be interested in growing with them this year?" You hear the difference? Compassion and community are the appeals here, not challenge and commitment.
Or what about the church's Stewardship Drive? Our tradition is to fill the church knee-deep with challenge and commitment. Do your part! Show your commitment! We challenge you to give generously, to grow, to tithe, to carry your part of the load. Challenge! Commitment! And what happens? Those who respond to this appeal give gladly and generously, but they seldom total more than half the church membership. What about the other half who did not respond to the challenge and commitment strategy? We challenge them harder, louder, more forcefully. We increase the challenge and usually generate grudging and small gifts along with a good measure of resentment.
People give much more gladly and generously out of compassion and community than from challenge. Let a little child get stuck down in an oil well shaft, or let an earthquake strike, or for goodness sakes, let three whales get stuck in the ice off Alaska, and see how people give. A chance to show compassion to this world through the church, a chance to grow an open and loving community so joyous that we want to pay for it--that's how we ought to do it.
One of the biggest crimes the church commits, Callahan says, is the famous "July Letter" most churches send out. It usually says three things: 1.) Our church has gotten a little behind in its bills. 2.) Utility bills have been unusually high. 3.) Could you send a little more to help out?" And that's just what they do--send a little money. People live upward or downward according to our expectation of them.
So why not in July something like this? "Dear friend, Our church is doing good work in the name of the Lord. Lives and destinies of many people are being helped. Because of our church, some are finding brand new beginnings in their lives. Thank you for your generosity and your help." You don't even have to ask for money. People give to a winning cause, not a sinking ship.
BASICALLY, PEOPLE LOOK FOR THREE THINGS FROM THEIR CHURCH. THEY ARE HELP, HOME AND HOPE.
Help--that means compassion. Home--that means community, a feeling of being where we belong in God's family. Hope--the conviction that this is all leading us somewhere you and I want to be someday.
That's what I want this church to be, and it takes constant attention on our part to make it work. Community! That's why groups within the church are so important. I see the strong camaraderie of a group such as the 50/50 class in our church as a prime example. Now mostly retired folk, this group has studied together and played together and grieved together and eaten together and danced together for 55 years, and yet they are open to new folks joining them. There are many other such groups here, but this is the one of longest duration. And this type of experience of community is absolutely essential in any church. It is what wins folks to the cause. Community!
And that's why a ministry of compassionate service is so important, too. We are not here just to serve ourselves, but to reach out with our money, and our energy to those who need us. Some are our own folk who are homeless. Some are in Kansas City, some in the Philippines, in Zaire, in China. Some are hungry, some desperately sick. And that's why we're here! Compassion!
Dr. Callahan tells of sitting in a church one day looking at a stained glass window depicting Christ at the door knocking. You know the picture. Jesus standing at a closed door, knocking on the door. The usual interpretation is that he is waiting for someone to open the door so that he might go in and dwell with them. But it occurred to him that another interpretation was better. Jesus stands at the door waiting for someone to open this door so that he might invite them out into his life of compassion and service.
If we want people drawn to this church--and more importantly --if we want this church to be true to its calling, let there be both rich open community here and a generous, reaching out compassion. Community! Compassion! Will you join me in helping bring this about?
