Simpler Steps Ahead

I have been reading a book that I am almost done with called "Simple Church." The book has a premise behind it and that is to provide a simple process for people in church to become more mature and committed.

In a sense, the book advocates developing a "map"...a ministry map that shows the simple steps that you have in place that a person needs to take to move from simply attending your church on Sunday to becoming a fully-committed and mature Christian who is involved in a ministry.

As I thought about our current set-up it isn't so much a "map" per say as it would be more like a corn maze. People come in and can even get lost and some get frustrated and work their way backwards to where they started and leave. And a small percentage unbelievably find fulfillment in ministry.

So I am in the process of trying to change that. Some of the steps I intend to take in this is #1) Have a retreat where we discuss how to make our process simpler. #2) Get the leadership on the same page as to what needs to happen for us. #3) With their help, eliminate all that is not necessary in our church in helping people become the mature Christian we want them to become.

I think this is going to be a time-consuming process. I don't see it happening overnight. Nor do I think all of it will be pleasant (especially if we have to eliminate some long standing ministries that have just been around for a long time but aren't moving people to maturity).

Ultimately I want to move our church closer to what I believe Christ is calling us to be. We can't just simply be existing to have services each week. We need to be laser-beam focused on transforming peoples lives into the likeness of Christ.

And I want it to be real clear how we expect that to happen. It isn't going to happen by just listening to sermons on Sunday. We need clear steps for people to take.

Realistically I would like to see those steps be centered around our core value words (Influencing, Connecting, Devoting and Helping). Four steps. Four steps to maturity. I don't know though. Thus the reason for the retreat. I want help in trying to figure this out.