How to change a church

The preacher stepped to the pulpit with dignity and passion. Articulate, persuasive and enthusiastic, he was preaching his trial sermon at Old First Church, and giving it his best shot.

At one point, he got particularly fired up. He raised his voice as both hands shot high in the air, letting his gestures punctuate his point.

"If called, I will lead this church into the 20th century!" he said.

A hush fell over the crowd. Everyone felt a little embarrassed for him in making this gaffe at such a crucial point in his message. All cheering for him to do his best, they cringed at this obvious mistake.

None were more embarrassed than the would-be pastor's wife. In fact, she couldn't contain her embarrassment and spoke softy to her husband. Yet, most everyone could hear as she said, "Psst! Honey, you mean, '21st century.' You said '20th century.'"

"We're going to take this one century at a time!" he quickly replied. 

The point to change

This story illustrates a basic principle of change. Many church leaders are deeply convicted that their church needs to change and they want to do that, yet don't know to implement change. This story illustrates a one-word principle that has two applications. If you want to change your church, do so slowly.

The two applications of slow change work like this:

The point is not a contemporary church

The point is not to change the church into a contemporary church, or into any particular kind of church. It is not to change the church from "this" to "that." Instead, the point is that the church is alive. Living things grow and change. Growing relationships change. Change isn't about moving to some ideal style. It's just that the nature of life demands it. 

As obvious as this point is, I am always surprised how often this principle is violated. I am so often in churches that have not changed a bit in at least 30 years. They feel like the church I attended in high school, which even then already felt old fashioned.

Growth demands change. Relationships change. Living things change.

Don't change too fast

One of the reasons why churches don't change is because they tried it once and it didn't go well. So, they quit. They didn't slow down the rate of change. They stopped altogether.

Mark Twain tells a story about a cat that sits on a hot stove. "You can be sure of one thing. It will never sit on a hot stove again. In fact, it may not sit on any stove ever again." The application for church life may be: if a pastor ever tries to change his church, you can be sure of one thing. He will never try that change again. In fact, he may not try any change again.

We change too fast—or try to—and it doesn't work, so we quit changing altogether.

Don't try to change too fast. The key word on how to change a church is slowly.

Don't ever stop changing

This principle of constant, incremental, ongoing and forever change is not only my opinion. Jim Collins has a whole chapter about it in his book, "Good to Great."

He asks the reader to imagine an enormous flywheel--a great rock on a huge, wooden rod. A large work force pushes against the rock for a whole shift and, owing to the enormous mass of the rock, are only able to move it one foot. The next crew comes in, and, building on the work of the first crew, they move the rock two feet. After a few days, each crew is moving the rock a quarter of a turn, then half a turn, then a full revolution in one shift, then a full revolution per hour and so forth. Each shift builds on the momentum of the last and is able to push the rock faster and faster and faster until finally it is whirling so that a whole shift could miss a turn and its momentum would still have it spinning like a top.

The whirling flywheel is a picture of success. It pictures all the effort necessary to create success. It also shows how success tends to breed success. Now, imagine someone sees this whirling flywheel and says, "Which push was the key push that created this success? Which was the key push?"

The question itself makes the point and needs no answer. There is no one thing that creates success for a business, for an individual or for a church. It is the successive effort of thousands and thousands of pushes--those thousands of efforts to change that wheel just a bit that create the enormous, unstoppable, whirling momentum.

It is so easy to look at a vibrant, growing church and ask the wrong question: "What was the change that created all this?"

There was no one great change. Instead, thousands and thousands of individual, heroic efforts by ordinary people over a long period of time made it possible. Gradual, slight, incremental change, if consistently delivered, can result in monumental change over a period of time. 

Three inches a week

A pastor was fired once for moving the pulpit from the side of the stage, as it is in some churches, to the center of the stage. He moved the pulpit and the church promptly fired him.

About a year later, he visited the church. To his shock, the pulpit was resting in the middle of the stage—the very place where he had tried to move the pulpit, only to be fired for doing so.

Overcome with curiosity, he waited for a private moment afterwards and asked the pastor, "How did you get the church to go along with moving this pulpit to the center? They fired me for trying. How did you do it?"

"Three inches a week," the pastor replied. "They never noticed."

Want to know how to change your church? Three inches a week. Gradual, incremental, forever change is the sign of life.

How do you change your church? Slowly.

Josh Hunt is the author of "You Can Double Your Class in Two Years or Less" and speaks nationally on church growth and adult education. You can contact him at http://www.joshhunt.com.