A Door Set Open, by Peter Steinke

Chapter 9 – A Different Future

1.  Steinke begins with a laundry list…“responses that proved beneficial to congregations in the throes of change.”  Laundry, he says, is everywhere.  At the top of his laundry list is “the need for mature and motivated leaders in the congregation.”  Such leadership relies on differentiation…“a process in which a person’s functioning is guided by a direction, supported by beliefs and values, and monitored by thoughtful behaviors rather than emotional reactivity.” 

Edwin Friedman “believed that mature functioning in a leader incites reactivity in the least mature. It is simply not possible to lead successfully through self-differentiation without inciting reactivity. The capacity of a leader to be aware of, to reflect upon, and to work through people’s reactivity may be the most important aspect of leadership. It is ‘the key to the kingdom.’”  “The challenge of change for leaders is to keep one’s eye on the ball (stay focused), take the heat (remain nonreactive), stay connected (talk and listen), and get a good night’s sleep.”

Well, now…that can’t be so hard!  But why is it?  What support can congregations offer its leaders to maintain healthy self-differentiation?

2.  Change is difficult.  “Today’s church should not be looking outside itself or seeking the quick fix. First, a massive educational task is at hand. What do I mean? Church leaders have to reeducate people as to the purpose of the church. The purpose of the local church is not primarily to be one’s church home or extended family, though it can be at times. And it is not to survive by obtaining more people for its support base. Its purpose is to invite people to be part of the true mission of the church. Reception into the church is only a threshold to involvement in its mission. The task of the church is not to accumulate attendees. The church is a school for developing agents of the new creation from among those who are the beneficiaries of God’s grace.”

What do you see as St. Mark’s primary purpose?  What is your role in clarifying and carrying out that role?

3.  Steinke believes change comes from the ground up and by reframing the issues at hand in congregations.  He draws from Jim Collin’s business background.  “Business, he claims, is focused on profit; the social sector, on the other hand, is based on service. Performance assessment in the social realm, therefore, is not dependent on financial returns or resources. The question for those in the social sector is, ‘How effectively do we deliver on our mission and make a distinctive impact?’ To make a special impact, Collins says, social organizations must reframe; that is, they must focus on outputs (services), not inputs (receipts).”  “I think congregations encounter an emotional barrier in highlighting the inputs as what really counts and regarding the outputs as secondary or optional.”

How do we discern an appropriate and healthy balance of outputs and inputs?  How do we define each of these today?

4.  “Churches have a strong tendency to keep difficult things under the table. Little changes because conflict-laden things are hidden. Of course, then, some laundry never gets done.”  Steinke illustrates this with Kohlrieser’s story of the fishermen in Sicily, whose instructions were, “Put the fish on the table.”  That’s the difficult, but necessary, starting place for addressing change. 

“As with the Jews, Christians base their hope through a memory system. “Remember Jesus Christ, raised from the dead” (2 Tim. 2:8a). Hope is grounded in God’s faithfulness and promises. With hope grounded in the expectation of a new world when all is forgiven, all is set free, all is restored, the future is different.”

As we “put our fish on the table” before God, we receive forgiveness and share in the hope of the resurrection.  How does this Christian hope transform our present and shape our future?  How does it create “a door set open” so that you and I can make a difference?