Moving Beyond Church Growth: An Alternative Vision for Congregations

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Fortress Press, Dec 1, 2001 - Religion - 156 pages
Character development for communities of faith Mark Olson believes that trying to meet unrealistic expectations for church growth, along with expectations that pastors be all things to all people, has resulted in low morale, even burnout, among clergy and dissension within congregations.Olson's book argues that church-growth models exemplify and exacerbate the tendencies of the modern age and Constantinian Christianity, holding the church hostage to technique and marketing. These assumptions set up pastors and churches for disappointment and failure. But they also, in his opinion, miss an opportunity to envision a faithful alternative to the consumeristic church.Olson's valuable book calls church leaders to faithful, bold, and courageous rethinking of congregational life and witness in substance, purpose, and style. His own 20 years of ministry in rural, suburban, and urban congregations inform an alternative rooted deeply in the past and anchored in strong leadership and worship, but also profoundly compassionate and engaged in the surrounding community. In this model, pastors' primary responsibilities are not to fix everything and everybody but to enable people to be present to each other and to provide hope.

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Contents

Putting the Pieces Together Toward a Definition of Church Growth
11
Echoes of an Ancient Conflict
24
A Congregational Faith Audit
43
Deprogramming the Church
49
Reclaiming the Sabbath One Text at a Time
56
Drawing the Line Reflections on Church Growth and Worship
63
To Be a Change Agent Be a Traditional Pastor with a Twist
71
Congregational Conflict Sacred Violence
79
Each Congregation One Pastor
86
Recovering the Ministerium A Congregation for Pastors
100
Faithful Community A Creation Myth
117
The Island of Faithfulness
139
Afterword
150
Notes
152
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Page 45 - And on the day called Sunday, all who live in cities or in the country gather together to one place, and the memoirs of the apostles or the writings of the prophets are read, as long as time permits; then, when the reader has ceased, the president verbally instructs, and exhorts to the imitation of these good things.
Page 128 - Paris, just now; but we don't want the incendiary's pillar of a cloud by day and a pillar of fire by night...
Page 45 - ... thanksgiving, as much as he can, and the people sing out their assent saying the amen. There is a distribution of the things over which thanks have been said and each person participates, and these things are sent by the deacons to those who are not present. Those who are prosperous and who desire to do so, give what they wish, according to each one's own choice, and the collection is deposited with the presider. He aids orphans and widows, those who are in want through disease or through another...
Page 46 - Sunday, he appeared to his apostles and disciples, and taught them these things which we have given to you also for your consideration.
Page 154 - Leaders, whatever their professions of harmony, do not shun conflict; they confront it, exploit it, ultimately embody it. Standing at the points of contact among latent conflict groups, they can take various roles, sometimes acting directly for their followers, sometimes bargaining with others, sometimes overriding certain motives of followers and summoning others into play.
Page 45 - And on the day named after the sun all, whether they live in the city or the countryside, are gathered together in unity. Then the records of the apostles or the writings of the prophets are read for as long as there is time. When the reader has concluded, the presider in a discourse admonishes and invites us into the pattern of these good things. Then we all stand together and offer prayer. And, as we said before, when we have concluded the prayer, bread is set out to eat, together with wine and...
Page 154 - Robert G. Hamerton-Kelly, Sacred Violence: Paul's Hermeneutic of the Cross (Minneapolis: Fortress Row, 1992), 21.
Page 46 - God, having transformed darkness and matter, made the world. On the same day Jesus Christ our savior rose from the dead.

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