7 Key Questions to Avoid Romanticizing the 2019 Church

POINT OF THE POST...

Some of you are on the verge of destroying the future of your church. I realize that sounds like one of those silly, bold statements people make to get your attention. Perhaps it is. Possibly restarting the ministry of your past is exactly what your community needs today. I doubt it. I'm skeptical because: 1. The pandemic changed things in our world and our communities.  2. Much of what we were doing in 2019 wasn't working in 2019.  The fastest way to destroy a church is to build a ministry on an outdated model. And that's what too many church leaders are doing today. Taking old methods and deploying them in this new time. The reason: We remember our 2019 ministry models with rose-colored glasses. It's human nature to romanticize the past, but in the case of church leadership, attempting to implement a ministry model that wasn't working in 2019 in 2021 is a death wish. In this NEW POST, I give leaders 7 Key Questions to Avoid Romanticizing the 2019 Church. Answering these questions will help you more accurately remember the past while making decisions in your present.

Some of you are on the verge of destroying the future of your church.

I realize that sounds like one of those silly, bold statements people make to get your attention. Perhaps it is. Possibly restarting the ministry of your past is exactly what your community needs today.

I doubt it.

I’m skeptical because:

  1. The pandemic changed things in our world and our communities. 
  2. Much of what we were doing in 2019 wasn’t working in 2019. 

The fastest way to destroy a church is to build a ministry on an outdated model. And that’s what too many church leaders are doing today. Taking old methods and deploying them in this new time.

And I understand why.

The past year and a half have been unbelievably difficult. There were no easy decisions, yet decisions had to be made. There were few spaces to find agreement, so we found ourselves fighting more than pastoring. And we couldn’t do the majority of what we used to do, leaving us floundering and feeling off mission.

These present difficulties cause us all to desire simpler times — times like in the past. And there is our potential destruction. We tend to prefer the past because we rarely remember the past accurately. We live with selective memory — we tend to remember the past as better than it was, especially when the present isn’t so great.

And hence our problem. When you consider your church of 2019, what comes to mind?

Full rooms? Up-and-to-the-right charts? Successful small groups? Booming kid ministries? Amazing student camps?

I’m sure some of that is true. Or perhaps that was true a few weeks here and there. But 2019 might not be as wonderful as we want to remember it. Our minds cannot be fully trusted with our past. Our memories tend to pull bits and pieces from the past to construct a complete picture that isn’t necessarily accurate. We think we remember the past accurately. But “memory doesn’t really work like that,” said Anne Wilson, a professor of psychology at Wilfrid Laurier University whose research broadly focuses on memory, time, and identity. “We reconstruct what happened in the past on the basis of little bits and pieces of memory. We’re acting like archaeologists — picking up the pieces and putting them back together.”

Here’s the point for us church leaders:

If you’re trying to restart a partially successful 2019 ministry model in 2021, odds are 2021 won’t be as great as it could and should be.

Not to come across as “Debbie Downer,” but the vast majority of churches weren’t thriving in 2019. In fact, most churches were experiencing a decline. Some of these declines were rapid! The pandemic didn’t create this trend, but it accelerated it. What wasn’t working in 2019 will not magically work in 2021. Worse, restarting a 2019 ministry in 2021 might destroy your church once and for all.

We need to ask ourselves some hard questions. As we ponder the “good-ole days,” consider this:

  1. Was the past as marvelous as we remember it?
  2. What should we learn from our church’s memory lane?
  3. What wasn’t working as well as we wanted back then?
  4. In the past, what was growing and thriving? Use metrics, not just memories, to evaluate?
  5. How can we reset our church rather than restart what wasn’t working?
  6. How can we use the pandemic as an opportunity, not an obstacle?
  7. What metrics should we track today to help us more accurately remember this moment in the future?

For the vast majority, the pandemic was the most challenging leadership season we’ve faced. But, it’s equally full of new opportunities. Let’s rise to the challenge. Let’s not simply restart the struggling ministries of 2019 with the hope they’ll work better in 2021. Remember, hope isn’t a strategy. Instead, let’s challenge our memories of 2019, celebrate the good, and fix the bad.

There’s never been a better time to make things better and make better things. While you may remember the past with rose-colored glasses, your congregation doesn’t remember much about the ministry model and execution specifics. Now’s the perfect time to change what you wanted (needed) to change two years ago.

How can I help?

Coaching ministry and marketplace leaders through change, transition, and transformation is why I created Transformation Solutions. Go right now to mytransformationsolutions.com and sign up for a free, 30-minute conversation to decide if working together works for you.

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