Apr
8
2009
Postmodernism Wall?
Author: pastoroffishingMy church, a congregation that is a restart upon an existing congregation from a previous Mennonite church. We see this transition in a congregation that dates back to the late 1800′s. The replant created this open heart surgery of sorts to how the church operates. In some ways the improvements were good, and in some ways bad. I will let you into my world to see two examples of how we fight with the attitudes of modernity and post-modernism.
It was within the first few months of attending here that I saw a severe problem within the church body. It was this shallow form of friendship. People were not shallow themselves but rather were not engaging their spiritual walks with each other at a deeper level. Almost a sense of distrust to go deeper. I had seen it before growing up in the Mennonite church. The culture of being close at the time of need, but not on a daily basis. Remembering back from my childhood this was how my parents and their friends were. Even just recently I had a parent ask me if they should be truthful about their past sins if their children ask. Its almost a false sense of real.
Combating this type of problem took some radical behavior on my part. I stood up during a prayer and share time to introduce myself to the congregation and told a little bit about myself. In turn I invited any men that wanted to be my friend to see me after church. Two men came and to this day are good friends of mine. I had to break the mold and step outside the norm for that church to try and climb over “the wall”. The tearing down of structure and going to a more fluid church has had its negative effects. Now our church lacks structure and order amongst its ministries. With the move towards a more post-modern mindset we see this lack of structure and hierarchy to be very flawed. The modern church era hung its hat on the concepts of creating this elaborate ministry structure that ended up becoming such an institutional monster that it needed to be fed constantly. With big monsters come big waste and we see many volunteers get chewed up and spit out with burnout. At the same time the lack of structure creates this nebulous feeling of who’s in charge. Exceptions become hard to control because none are set.
These two examples show how there needs to be a balance between the two extremes. What is happening right now is my time is being taken up by tearing down this wall. Creating a structure that is similar to the church of Acts. A church that has expectations of its leadership yet flexible to handle the curve balls that are thrown. I am spending time just to meld the old and new into a cohesive force to be reckoned with. It seems to make sense why so many churches just close their doors. This transition is one that is difficult and harrowing at times. It is through all this that we will grow stronger and create a church that will have a generational impact on our town.
