In a recent post, I wrestled with a quote from Dallas Willard that pointed to how easy it is to measure the effectiveness of ministry by the reactions that people have, rather than by trying to discern whether God delights in our work.
Since writing the post I have felt like I pointed to a legitimate concern, but failed to risk offering any thoughts about how to actually measure effective ministry. In response to the initial post, John Meunier wrote:
This is a huge theological issue, Kevin. All the forces in the world are lined up in favor of doing things to win the approval and praise of other people. I’m not sure how we help shelter pastors and churches from those forces and help them discern where they diverge from God’s purposes. But it is necessary.
Over the past few days, John’s comment has rattled around in my head. And I think the issue is broader than just whether a pastor primarily seeks to delight God or the folks in the pews with her sermon. For all who call themselves Christians, it is easier to seek the approval of others than God. Moreover, it is hard to measure whether God approves of our efforts. It is hard. But, as John said, “it is necessary.”
While, I suspect that faithful vibrant faith communities do typical grow, I am not convinced that growth is a guarantee of faithfulness and a seal of God’s approval. If growth in attendance were all that mattered, one of the most important aspects of church planting would be asking people what it would take for them to come to church for one hour a week, and then doing whatever that was. To push this to the point of the obviously ridiculous, you could grow a church by paying people to come for one hour a week. But no matter how large the church, a “congregation” of people who attend only because they are paid are employees, not Christians! And the growth of this “church” would not be a sign of a faithful or vibrant Christian community.
So if attendance is not enough, how do you measure faithful ministry?
Here are my initial (and very much continuing to develop) thoughts:
My first thought is that it isn’t easy, but I think I would know it when I see it.
Our lives, the churches we worship in, serve, and try to lead are all different. There are many things that they have in common. But, individual churches are more like snowflakes than cut-out cookies. So, it is difficult for me to describe in advance what faithfulness looks like. And yet, I still feel like it is readily recognizable.
Here is the most concrete thought I have had as I have thought about this post: church leaders who want to be faithful to God had better be people who rely on the means of grace. I know this sounds obvious. And yet, how many pastors really rely on prayer, searching the scriptures, communion, fasting, or Christian conferencing (searching conversation with fellow Christians) when making “real” decisions in ministry? If you are a pastor, think about a major decision you have recently made. How did you go about making the decision? What role did the means of grace play in actually making the decision? Were they of central importance, or peripheral – even nonexistent?
If John is right that, “All the forces in the world are lined up in favor of doing things to win the approval and praise of other people”, my guess is that the antidote is practicing the means of grace. I would go so far as to put it this way: If someone does not consistently practice the disciplines of prayer, searching the scriptures, communion, fasting, and Christian conferencing, we should expect their ministry to be realigned towards meeting the felt needs of the people in the pews, or to succumbing to the pressures of the world. On the other hand, I also think we should expect that someone who cultivates these Christian practices will become more sensitive to the promptings of the Holy Spirit, and able to make wise decisions as unexpected situations inevitably arise.
I admit this is basic. But is this where we are living? Are you practicing the means of grace? Are you seeking God and God’s will for your life? Am I? Perhaps this suggests a bit different call to action. Lord, help us seek and find you!
Kevin M. Watson 
Excellent article. Thank you!
Interesting that you should the question of faithfulness at this time, Kevin. I recently read an article in Good News by George Hunter on the UM Call to Action. He points out that the Call says nothing about theology or spiritual formation. We tend to measure success in the church by data-driven analyses that stem from (usually) social science methods rather than theological convictions.
If we are to assess/gauge effective ministry, wouldn’t one want to look at the output? Wesley writes a lot about the markings of one moving on to christian perfection and those whose lives testify to the witness and workings of the spirit in their lives. In what ways are we as church leaders helping our congregations to know what those fruits look like?
And if we don’t rely on the means of grace in our decision making or our discipleship making, then what do we rely on? What’s our barometer?
Thanks for this post!
Cindy – Thanks for the kind words!
Steve – Thanks for pointing to Hunter’s critique of the CTA.
Sophia – Thank you for the profound questions, and it is great to hear from you here!
I think the next step in the thought process I have been exploring in the past few posts would be to try to be more concrete about what faithful fruit looks like. The logic I followed in this post would suggest that church leaders would come to recognize the Spirit’s presence and guidance as they are formed and shaped by the means of grace.
Kevin – Good thoughts. This is something that I think about a good deal with Resurrection Online. My first response was is using the means of grace the way to measure faithfulness in the leader. This lead me to wonder, is there a difference between faithful and effective ministry? My first response is to say that there is, however when I pushed myself to consider what the difference is I wasn’t sure. Would faithful leadership necessarily be fruitful?
Andrew – Thanks for your response to my post. I am not sure that there is necessarily a difference between faithful and effective ministry; however, I think it entirely depends on how you define effective ministry. The reason I shifted from talking about effective ministry to faithful ministry in my post is that I think it is an open question whether conversations about “effective ministry” are actually primarily valuing faithfulness. In other words, I think effective ministry is often validated as effective precisely because the ministry is validated by people. (My point is not that people are irrelevant, obviously Christian ministry would not be faithful if it was not directed towards people.)
What I am trying to get at here is that I think the primary focus is different in talking about “effective ministry” and “faithful ministry.” In effective ministry, the focus primarily seems to be on people and their reactions. In faithful ministry, as I am trying to use it, the focus is on God and trying to allow God’s values to be the primary engine of our ministry. My prayer would be that a faithful ministry would be seen to be effective by those who were “measuring” it. However, I think it is entirely possible that the church leaders could overlook a place of deep faithfulness.
Your final question is another great one! I think faithful leadership would necessarily be fruitful, but perhaps not in ways that fit a one size fits all measure of fruitfulness. If a fruitful congregation is defined as a congregation that grows by a certain percentage every year, it seems obvious to me that a faithful congregation could fail to be fruitful – by that standard.
I feel like I am talking in circles a bit… I hope some of this makes sense. Do you have further reactions?
Oh, one more thing, going with the above example: I think a “fruitful’ congregation would not necessarily be faithful. I.e. a congregation could grow by the required percentage without preaching the gospel and helping people become disciples of Jesus Christ.
In the past few years I have increasingly appreciated two resources.
The first was the team from Duke that Bishop Hayes brought to our annual clergy retreat, perhaps in 2009, to lead us in exploring excellence in ministry. One exercise was particularly enlightening. We were to journal for a time on the occasion in ministry when we completed a task successfully–knowing intuitively how to approach it, feeling energized by its challenges, working hard without tiring. Then we spent three minutes reading the entry to two other persons. At the end they described the gifts they heard us revealing–which in my small group were both easily named by the listeners and claim as valid by the reader. We were told these were our “birthright gifts” and that we should structure our ministry as much as possible to make use of them in the majority of our work. (We were also told that most of us would discount these gifts and place highest value on those gifts that had been given to someone else.). T
The other resource is Parker Palmer’s writing on vocation, summarized succinctly in his short book, “Let Your Life Speak.” This is not a matter of letting our lives speak FOR us but rather TO us, much in the way the exercise above facilitates. Palmer’s says that even if we choose the most noble role model possible and seek to imitate that person, we will still fail to be the person God created us to be and thus will fall short of excellence. Palmer quotes Rabbi Zusya: “In the coming world, they will not ask me ‘Why were you not Moses?’ They will ask me, ‘Why were you not Zusya?'”
Excellence in ministry is possible only when we are doing what we are truly called to do. In fact, when we are doing that, I think it is actually difficult to fail.
Kevin – I think that you are right – fruitful, (at least by some measurements) is not necessarily faithful. As a rather timely aside, I received a copy today of Bearing Fruit: Ministry with Real Results by Lovett Weems and Tom Berlin. Our senior staff at Resurrection are reading it to discuss at our semi-annual retreat next Tuesday.
I believe that indeed you are right to point out that it may be difficult to determine what is truly a measure of fruitfulness across a wide variety of situations.
Ruth–great point about our ‘excellence’ in ministry being possibly ONLY when we are living out our call in our particular context–not trying to copy someone else’s model of success.
It does indeed come back to what measurements we use to gauge effectiveness. Is it participation in various ministries/small groups? Attendance in worship? An engaged congregation?
I think we can agree that fruitfulness and faithfulness can go hand in hand. If we are faithful to being the church that God is calling us to be, there will be fruit. Sometimes, though, it doesn’t look like fruitfulness in the eyes of many folks simply because success is traditionally measured in what percent a congregation’s membership grew year over year and because the growth that does occur isn’t necessarily seen in immediate spikes.
Ruth–I’m reading Palmer’s book now 🙂
Great conversations, all. Other resources we should be adding to our libraries?
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