It’s a Messy World

It’s always important to consider the other side of the argument. As you have probably guessed from a number of articles that I have written I am a fan of ‘church growth’. But it never hurts to look at the other side of the argument to help keep one’s opinions informed and sharp.
Some critics of the Church Growth movement in the UK are now saying things like…
“If you think Christianity is about bums on seats, by all means launch a recruitment drive…I don’t think God is sitting there counting, or that we ‘win’ if we do better than the Muslims…”
(This comment is made regarding a recruitment drive to get more young people interested in Ordination.) The commentator, Dr Poole, then goes on to say: “…I think we win if we bring about the Kingdom here on earth. Bums on seats may help with that but they may not. The metric is about what salt and light are doing and not how big the salt store is or the lamps is…”
I get what Dr Poole is saying: it is the nature of salt to bring flavour (i.e. a quality) rather than to bring more salt (i.e. quantity) – or to paraphrase his statement – a pinch a salt can go a long way…
The debate then goes a little deeper. Another commentator worries that we are simply moving the deck chairs around on the deck of the Titanic. In referring to the ‘church growth movement’ in general he states:
“To me (this) sounds like an attempt to recover a waning Christendom paradigm: a vision of the Church as culturally and socially normative. What it feels like to me is the C of E being reshaped to have another crack at the old vision rather than embracing a new one…”
Hmmm, strong words indeed. But the point must be made: many Christian commentators are arguing that the days of Christendom and the Empire are over – let’s get real about Christianity’s influence in the Post-Modern world! (The point being made is here Is not that Christianity is in danger of disappearing so much as the trappings of Empire that were once thought to be indispensable to the Christian message. Christianity, they argue, needs to disassociate itself from this old ‘paradigm’ and re-imagine its role in the world afresh.)
I can’t entirely agree with this stance. Modern life (or ‘Post-Modern’ life if you must) is messy. In theory the number of people bringing children for baptism at St Peter’s should have dwindled if ‘the-end-of-Christendom’ camp was correct in its analysis of the place of Christianity in today’s world. But numbers of baptisms are growing! The situation quite simply is a messy one. And will continue to be.
I’m very happy with the mess. I pray that we will always be ‘salty’ – people who make a qualitative difference in society and the world at large. But I also pray that I will be an obedient servant to the ‘divine commission’ to go forth and make disciples of all.
You might call this have a ‘bob each way’ – I call it living in a messy world. It’s a world I’m happy to be in.

Church Times, 21 Oct 2016, p. 5