A second step is to be conscious of the values of our society that affect our understanding of ourselves. We are all affected by the values that infuse our society. Our society offers certain standards of beauty and many young people have been devastated because they didn’t meet up to that standard. Our society places such a value on dollars that many gifted members of society feel unappreciated because they are paid low salaries. Look at teachers as an example. While we know that excellent teachers are critical to the development of our young people, because society places such a high value on salaries, many of them feel under appreciated.
That is a long introduction to the fact that churches also feel the pressure of values that society holds. How many pastors have felt the pressure when someone asks them what size a church they serve? Let me alter your perspective. If you knew, for certain, that God intended you to be a church of 75 people so that you could demonstrate to the world that in this particular situation, small is better, would that alter your feelings about the size of your church?
Ask the session and clergy to try over a couple of meetings to identify some of values of our society that might be in tension with the values of faith and therefore affect the congregation negatively. Be general at first. What are the messages of success, the values of prosperity and the importance of popularity that might run counter to the way of Jesus? Move to more specific pressures. How might the pressure on families for their children to participate on sports teams or the fears of our shaky economy impinge on church life?
What you are trying to do is understand the context in which you are seeking to live out the Gospel faith. In some instances that may even suggest new avenues for ministry.
Tomorrow the third step.
