Participants at Alt7 — a conference geared toward clergy under 40 years old — came together to share stories, spend time in worship, and learn from a variety of workshop presentations.
Jan Edmiston, pastor of Fairlington Church in the Washington, D.C. area and member of Presbymergent, opened her session entitled “Moving a Traditional Church into the 21st Century (in ten easy steps)” by admitting “I am a church addict. I love the church.” The veteran pastor cautioned the younger clergy that bringing change to the church takes time — lots of time.
“Most of our churches that are dying are obsessed with the ABCs: Attendance, Building and Cash,” she said. “Let me tell you right now, when you focus on those three, you are sabotaging yourself.”
Participants had opportunity to tell how long their churches had been in existence. They represented churches of wide-ranging ages. “Our church was founded on a land grant from the king, to the family of Stevenson, who still take up two pages in the directory,” said one pastor. one participant. “We chartered in December of 2008,” said Moderator Bruce Reyes-Chow.
Edmiston offered those who wished to foster healthy, vibrant churches an alternative to the traditional focus on the ABCs of church: Neighbors, Organization, and a Paradigm Shift. “Meet the neighbors, send people out into the neighborhood and have them observe—what do they see?” asked Edmiston.
Rethink your organization, she challenged. “Our elders don’t run anything. They are literally the spiritual leaders in the church,” said Edmiston, who sees her role as training them to be ministers. “Think of all of the important moments to share with people that we have as pastors — we should not be the only ones who get to share them,” she suggested. This teaching is a key component of being the church. “This is what makes a church a church instead of just another club that has some spiritual component,” she said, wondering if many of our churches are not more like faith-based social organizations.
The paradigm shift needed is to begin to ask whether the church exists for those already in the congregation, or those who are not yet there.
To illustrate how an institution might make these types of shifts, Edmiston highlighted the Wegmans Grocery Store chain.
“How does the church you serve differ from the one you grew up in?” she’s asked clergy. Often there are not that many noticeable differences.
As a contrast, Edmiston offered the example of Wegmans. “Wegmans has movie nights twice a week, allowing kids to watch a movie while parents are shopping or attending a wine tasting,” she said. A grocery store, they are intentionally seeking ways to reach their community, to serve their community.
“People want so much to have community,” she shared, “but they don’t realize you can get it at church because the church has gotten a bad name, so they are going to Wegmans for it.”
Edmiston also encouraged the clergy gathered to get out of the library and into the world. “Don’t write your sermon in a library — write it at a coffee shop.”
After Edmiston prepared sermons at a local Starbucks for several weeks, staff members began to ask her if she was a counselor without an office. “They kept seeing people come up to me and talk to me, so they wanted to know why,” she explained. These were not people from her church, but simply those who saw her there writing, with her Bible, and approached her to strike up conversation.
Many churches say they want change, admits Edmiston, but when change begins to happen it is not always embraced. Her encouragement to the young clergy gathered at Montreat was to be ready, and willing, even when it can be difficult, to invest for the long term.
