[18 May 2008]

Acts 2: 38-47

This week I went to a Presbytery meeting addressed by the Rev Martin Baker the Assembly Executive Secretary. Martin’s job is to provide leadership to the whole Presbyterian Church in New Zealand. He told us what we are already aware of namely that the Presbyterian Church in New Zealand is continuing to shrink. People are attending church less frequently and numbers are declining – the figures he presented us show there has been a 20% decline in worshippers in Presbyterian Churches in NZ over the last ten years. As Martin confessed to me later that this figure is masked by the reality that we now have several new large Korean churches that have added new members to the statistics. Without the Korean input the situation would be much worse. We know this here in Christchurch because the largest Presbyterian congregation in Christchurch is now the Korean Presbyterian Church in Packe Street. St Mark’s is now number three in the size stakes.

Congregations like ours have many good and faithful worshippers, but the reality is that over many years we have not been drawing new people into discipleship with Jesus. If you look at adult baptisms and confirmations you will know these are rituals we observe only infrequently. Nationwide this is also true and again without the Korean input the numbers of people who are making a decision to follow Jesus are very low indeed. For many of us the difficult and heartfelt sadness is that our very children and grandchildren are part of this reality. For myself as a youth group leader I have sadly watched as a number of young people have chosen to attend congregations with more dynamic presence.

There were however two hopeful messages that Martin brought us. While there has been significant decline in numbers there has been a considerable increase in capital investments held by churches. Some churches may not have many worshippers but they have money in the bank. There are resources to do new things if people are willing to use them. The second hopeful message that Martin shared with us was that there are a small number of congregations that are consistently growing, and it is this message that I want to dwell on. I immediately want to ask why? I think as Christians we have become used to the idea that our faith and our church is increasingly irrelevant in our society and while we hold this vision and mindset we are doomed. When we simply accept that declining churches is how it will be, then that is how it will be. But if we believe it could be different, and if we are interested in making it different we will. Some churches are showing that this can be done!

For some time I have been interested in some research carried out by Diana Butler Bass in the United States. Diana observed the phenomenon that we have observed here in NZ. That is that mainline protestant churches are in decline. She was told that some churches were growing but these were all fundamentalist conservative churches, but as she looked harder she discovered this was not necessarily the case. She found there were moderate churches like we are here at St Mark’s that were growing too, so she decided to find out if there were any reasons.

Diana acknowledged that as she explored this reality she often felt isolated. The public perception of churches promulgated by the media is that it is only fundamentalist churches that cut any ice and that mainstream churches are quant but on the downhill slide to oblivion. You only need to look at how mainstream clergy are perceived in the media to see this and how often they are portrayed in movies and other places as drippy, half witted, irrelevant twits who have nothing positive to say about life and the way we live our lives. The alternatives that we see are the Brian Tamaki’s of the world with their personal bodyguards and fine homes peddling clear cut judgmental messages of what is right and wrong. Many of us cringe at both images. Diana felt like she was a voice crying in the wilderness, something many of us feel. When people asked her what she was researching she typically responded, “The other Christians, the ones you don’t get to hear about in the media. The quiet ones.” She says, “a few years ago not many people knew what she meant but now I am hearing more often, ‘that’s me, I’m one of those”. She is discovering that there are more of these silent ones, moderate ones, than she first anticipated. There are good Christians practicing a faith that is open and generous, intellectual and thoughtful, personal but not private, and convinced that God is deeply concerned about how things are in the world. She has discovered that many of these Christians are beginning to find their voice and to be proud of their particular brand of Christianity. They are tired of being lumped together with Christians who are narrow and judgmental and interested only in personal matters of morality like sexual orientation. They are awakening from the label of quiet ones and want to proclaim another way of being Christian that affirms people and is open to finding God in many unlikely places. She along with others has adopted a new name for such Christians and such churches. She calls them the emerging church, or sometimes the re-emerging ones.

I stand with Diana. I am tired of living in the shadow of endless decline and being told that the only form of Christianity that speaks to people is the fundamentalist brand. I believe at the heart of congregations like our own God is moving and we need to more confidently be ourselves and rejoice in the moderate open, life giving faith we proclaim.

Diana tells many stories from her research about how some traditional congregations are finding a new vitality. Typical is Calvin Presbyterian church in Zelienople Pennsylvania. Located in one of the most conservative presbyteries in the country Calvin stands out as a church that has been gently growing over recent years. Shaun one of the members says, ‘we are certainly not a conservative church, but we don’t carry a liberal label well either because we have a strong emphasis on prayer and spirituality.’ Calvin emphasizes acceptance rather than doctrinal purity, diversity rather than uniformity. They resist labels and members readily confess that people seeking black and white answers would not be comfortable at Calvin. Members hold a variety of views. Just slightly bigger than St Mark’s with 220 worshippers on Sunday they have six staff members employed to facilitate their work and a vision which is: to be a spiritual family sharing the gospel of Jesus Christ and discerning God’s purpose and will through sincere commitment to worship, prayer, fellowship, teaching, and mission. It is this last part of the vision statement that Diana believes is the reason for their growth…. A sincere commitment to worship, prayer, fellowship, teaching, and mission. Faith for people of Calvin is not primarily about what we believe but about what we do – our practice. It’s not about fitting people into some narrow view of a statement of faith but inviting people to practice ways that will open their lives to a spiritual reality and presence called God.

In her research Diana Butler Bass has shown that churches that are serious about spiritual practices are often growing churches because there is a hunger to know God in our community. From her intensive study of about 50 growing churches she believes there are ten practices in particular which are important. I want to share them quickly with you – interestingly you will find most of these practices mentioned or implied in the verses we read from Acts about the early church :

Hospitality – particularly offering hospitality to the stranger in our community

Discernment – listening and working to discover the leading of God in our lives and in our decision making

Healing – which is discovering harmony and wholeness in our lives

Contemplation and prayer – some church growth enthusiasts think we have to entertain people with loud music but I think we desperately need more silence and less busyness in our lives so we can focus our precious energy better.

Testimony – sharing our real stories of faith naturally with all the warts and all.

Community Building – in a way where diversity is accepted and valued

Working for Justice for all life – both for people and for all creation

Worship – through which people experience the presence of God

Reflection and asking questions – so that we may grow in our understanding of faith

Beauty – music can do something spiritual for us, so can art – they are creative means by which God can mystically speak to our hearts.

All of these practices are present here at St Mark’s some more strongly so, some not well recognized. Over the next few weeks I plan to speak about some of them and encourage you to take at least one of them seriously in your life. As we celebrated last week at Pentecost each of us is gifted by God in a way that will build up the body of Christ. If we all are able to find our gifts and use them in the practices Diana has drawn our attention to well our congregation will blossom.

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