Andy Rowell

Category: Leadership Journal’s Out of Ur blog

  • Why are adults in their 20’s not connecting into local churches?

    Today, I wanted to refer you to two new posts about why young adults are not enjoying and sticking with their parents’ churches.  Below I have also talked about how I connected as a college student to a local church and my advice to passionate (and disillusioned) people in their 20’s.  Cunningham_2

    The first post I want to draw your attention to is on Chris Monroe’s Paradoxology "Desert Pastor" blog.  Here Chris interviews Sarah Cunningham, author of the brand new book, Dear Church: Letters from a Disillusioned Generation, (Zondervan, August 2006).  (In the comment I asked Sarah about what unique challenges Christian college students face when choosing a church.  Look there and see what she says in response.  She says she went to Taylor’s leadership conference as a college student!)  See also the website for the book at http://www.dearchurch.com/ and her myspace page. 

    The second post is at Leadership Journal’s Out of Ur blog.  Brian McLaren has a post entitled:

    Family Faith Feud: Why are young adults not finding their places in their parents’ church?Brian_mclaren_1

    At Taylor University, our desire is to better and better instill in students a love for the local church.

    When I was at Taylor, I was inspired to get involved in a small local church when one of my professors told me: "Be part of a small church.  Just showing up and singing loud will be a blessing to them."  So I did.  I was involved in a little country church of about 30 people.  I had the opportunity to give the pastoral prayer weekly, sing loudly, eat lots of good home-cooking, preach a couple of horrible sermons and give lots of hugs to elderly ladies.  We had a group of 5-10 of us who would go together: wake each other up, pile in the car, turn up the worship music to "prepare," drive home, and eat meals in the Dining Commons together afterward.

    But this isn’t the only way.  A large church can be great as well.  I think it is fine for students to church hop and shop for 4-5 weeks.  (Sleeping in does not count).  But then pick one (they all have flaws) and go to it every week and get involved.  And it is much more fun if you can get some friends to go with you. 

    If a young adult is very passionate about their way of "doing church" (and disillusioned with the local churches they find), perhaps they can channel that passion into helping with a youth group, a campus ministry, or a small church.  In this way, they can experiment with things they are passionate about like: "excellence," "emerging church movement" ideas, or ancient-future spiritual formation practices.  What I am saying is that it is hard as a college student to have a huge impact on the overall functioning of a large church.   But you can channel your passions into different venues where you can give them a trial run and make a huge impact for the kingdom. 

  • Let’s empower daredevil creative (and informed and trained) church planters

    Thanks Steve Addison for this delightful and challenging piece entitled:

    Fallow Fields: 20 ways to waste time while not planting churches at Leadership Journal's Out of Ur blog.482033_90209043

    Ouch!  He shames us by pointing out a whole bunch of ways we slow down and kill church planting.   

    May we all not sleep well tonight because we are appropriately disturbed about the excuses we make for not planting churches! Some people point out that one of the most common ways to pray in the Psalms is "Help!" That is how I'm praying tonight: "Lord, help us to do better!"

    Addison rightly urges risk and prudence in his comments about church planting. He has obviously seen thoughtless investment and lots of talk with no action.

    I was inspired on the risk side by Brian McLaren saying in his Princeton Theological Seminary address entitled "The Church Emerging & Mainline Theological Education." He told a predominantly mainline audience that they should throw their money at creative, pioneering efforts. He said that instead of selling old urban church buildings to raise the endowment to pay for denominational officials, we should be giving that church property to the most creative out of the box folks we can find. They may "fail" but they probably won't truly "fail." (For some people not lasting five years is a "failure." But it is not when we consider the outreach that has taken place. It is only a failure when someone loses their marriage in the process!  So let's take care of the person). 

    Let's invest in these creative pioneers who will cultivate fresh ministry models. And if there are wise people like Steve Addison who can help us select the right people and guide them away from common pitfalls, that is all the better!

  • Being a pastor’s wife is sometimes the only way a woman can be involved in church leadership

    Another outstanding piece from Lauren Winner at Leadership Journal's Out of Ur blog.   Laurenwinner1a

    Married to the Ministry: has the pastor’s wife’s role changed for better or worse?

    She says that some women who were not allowed to pastor themselves, married pastors and thus found some fulfillment by engaging in the limited amount of pastoral work expected of a pastor's wife.

    I have also seen extremely competent pastorally gifted women who have found their way into roles as "administrative assistant" or church secretary. In another setting, these competent gifted women may have considered seminary and become outstanding pastors themselves. Interestingly, according to 2005-2006 report by the Association of Theological Schools, there are almost as many "Black" women pursuing their Masters of Divinity degree these days as men (2,366 Men and 2,330 Women). However, for "White", the numbers are still quite far apart: 16,268 Men and 6,791 Women.

    Other pastorally gifted women have gone into "Christian Education," chaplaincy, or counseling as the acceptable approximations for church ministry. And others struggle wondering what to do with their pastoral gifting when they haven't met the right man and what to do with their time when they are struggling with infertility. (See the journeys of Carolyn Custis James and Gretchen Gaebelein Hull as told in their books).

    Sadly for many of our young women growing up in evangelical churches, becoming the pastor's wife still seems like their best shot at being involved in church ministry. The number one nonfiction book on the Christian Bestsellers List for September 2006 is Captivating by John and Stasi Eldredge. As a professor at Taylor University, an evangelical Christian college, I can tell you that young Christian women are reading it in droves. Unfortunately as Agnieszka Tennant points out in her Christianity Today article "What (Not All) Women Want: The finicky femininity of Captivating by John and Stasi Eldredge", the Eldredge's advocate a "tame idea of beauty" – one exemplified by "Pioneer women [who] brought china teacups into the wilderness." There are other ways of being beautiful. I know because I have a pastor's wife who has her MDiv just like me. I'm thrilled to be a pastor's husband.

    Lauren Winner is great.  My wife Amy uses her book Real Sex in the Personal Foundations for Ministry course.  Lauren came to Taylor this spring to speak as well.  She is married to a friend of ours from Regent College.

    See my post about Captivating here.