 Pastor's Message
A Different Path to Church Growth
We’ve had a lot of discussion about Church Growth over the last several years. The following story from Scott Peck’s book, The Different Drum, provides an interesting perspective on how to truly grow a church.
It seems that a monastery had fallen on hard times. There were only five old monks left--- the abbot and four brothers, all over seventy in age. In the woods near the monastery was a hut that was visited from time to time by a rabbi from a nearby town. One day the abbot was led to come to the rabbi to ask his advice for their dying monastery.
The rabbi responded that he had no advice to give. But he did leave the abbot with this strange message: "The only thing I can tell you is that the Messiah is one of you."
When the abbot returned to the monastery, his fellow monks gathered around him to ask, "Well, what did the rabbi say?"
"He couldn't help," the abbot answered. "We just wept and read the Torah together. The only thing he did say, just as I was leaving, was that the Messiah is one of us. I don't know what he meant."
In the days and weeks and months that followed, the old monks pondered this and wondered whether there was any possible significance to the rabbi's words. The Messiah is one of us? Could he possibly have meant one of us monks here at the monastery? If that's the case, which one? If he meant anyone, he probably meant Father Abbot, our leader for more than a generation.
On the other hand, he might have meant Brother Thomas. Certainly Brother Thomas is a holy man.
Certainly he could not have meant Brother Eldred! Eldred gets crotchety at times. But come to think of it, even though he is a thorn in people's sides, when you look back on it, Eldred is virtually always right. Often very right.
And surely not Brother Phillip. Phillip is so passive, a real nobody. But then, almost mysteriously, he has a gift for somehow always being there when you need him. He just magically appears by your side. Maybe Phillip is the Messiah.
Of course the rabbi didn't mean me. I'm just an ordinary person. Yet supposing he did? Suppose I am the Messiah? O God, not me. I couldn't be that much for You, could I?
As they contemplated in this manner, the old monks began to treat each other with extraordinary respect on the off chance that one among them might be the Messiah. And on the off, off chance that each monk himself might be the Messiah, they began to treat themselves with extraordinary respect.
Because the forest in which it was situated was beautiful, it so happened that people still occasionally came to visit the monastery to picnic on its tiny lawn, to wander along some of its paths, even now and then to go into the dilapidated chapel to meditate. As they did so, without even being conscious of it, they sensed this aura of extraordinary respect that now began to surround the five old monks and seemed to permeate the entire place. There was something strangely attractive, even compelling, about it. Hardly knowing why, they began to come back to the monastery more frequently to picnic, to play, to pray. They began to bring their friends to show them this special place. And their friends brought their friends.
Then it happened that some of the younger men who came to visit the monastery started to talk more and more with the old monks. After a while one asked if he could join them. Then another. And another. So within a few years the monastery had once again become a thriving order and, thanks to the rabbi's gift, a vibrant center of light and spirituality in the realm.
Maybe the way to grow a church is not through lots of ad campaigns, special events and programs to which we can invite our friends. Maybe the best way is for us to become so spiritually vibrant as a faith community, so filled with concern for one another and for the world around us, that others will look at us and say, “See how they love one another!”
Even if it’s not a great church growth strategy, it surely will make us grow in the eyes of God. And that surely would be worth the effort.
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