Understanding Change in Church

Churches are undergoing a radical change! I am confident in such a statement because Churches are always undergoing change. No sooner will have one change been initiated than another will fill its void: for all of time it will be safe to print the words “church is changing.” One could become hung up on the particularistic nature of change. That is we could analyze endlessly the newest change and what it is bringing to the table, but this is patently unnecessary, and limiting. Because whatever particular change is being discussed will only last until the next change! The larger, and largely ignored, question is: why do Churches change? And can we categorize and understand those whys in a systematic manner?

Clearly, such a project is beyond the scope of a blog, but the beginnings of questioning it are not. Examine any particular church movement. One recent example is mega-church phenomenon. It is now giving way to an emergent church. Why? Some might argue that changes occur do to worldview shifts. Many might argue that the mega-church is the pinnacle of the modernist movement and the emergent is the new postmodern times finally coming to fruit. This, quite frankly, is analytic drivel! It’s a post hoc attempt to justify change as opposed to truly understand it in any meaningful way. The era of modernism may indeed have been in many eras of life been surpassed by postmodernism, yet postmodernism is passing away and in its place is arising neomoderism. Postmodernism is a dead topic used by the Church a generation too late to explain a change which would have occurred regardless of worldview.

The driving force in American culture is consumerism. We buy things. We are entertained. And if we get bored with those two we build things – big things. The mega-churches were the natural result of making church consumer minded. The unchurched were our target sales group and we pitched Vegas shows to them with some success given the number whom attend those churches. The only difference between a mega-church and a mall is that the church helps you with parking. A trend at which malls everywhere should be looking. There is nothing inherently “modern” about consumerism. It is a cultural phenomenon. What about those newest groups that grow funny beards and call themselves Emergent? Are they the escape of consumerism? No, they are merely the newest form of it.

Look at ads. What does Nike sell? Shoes or an attitude? Attitude, but, by the way to get that attitude you are going to need our shoes. Consumerism has changed and emergent churches are the first churches to import the trend. They are selling “spirituality” for the newest generation like the mega-churches sold “church” to the boomers. Neither is particularly Biblical, but that is kind of beside the point when you are trying to sell something. In the case of our newest church ‘movement’ it is spirituality. Is it radically different from selling church? No. But changes are rarely radical.

What does this tell us about change then? For one it shows that church institutions mimic successful institutions around them. There are historical reasons why the Catholic Church has a hierarchical structure. Neither is it a surprise that New World churches would be congregational. Now, in an age when the newest forms of power are wielded from sources of economic position, it is no surprise to see the CEO model Church. And just like Silicon Valley and Toyota revamped organizational structure to sell attitude, so too is the emergent church mimicking this newest organizational model. If we want to understand the future changes in the church we should look at the successful organizations of today. Because ten years from now, some minister or congregation will be barrowing the idea and church will ‘change’ once again.