The Shallow Waters of Success
Recently I took an assessment that proved that I have defied an earlier assessment and learned that our church is in a category that only 30% of American churches share: we’re growing.
Not only that, but our church is in the top 10% of American churches based on size and is nearing the top 10 in size among other churches within our denomination in the state. After 8 years of existence, we’ve grown to almost 3 times the size that our original church planting assessment predicted.
You could say that we’re successful.
You wouldn’t be wrong.
[Tweet “Our metrics encourage us to stay shallow, but our mission requires us to go deep.”]But what I’m finding is that the waters of success are shallow and I crave the adventures that seem to call out from deeper waters. It seems that most of the things we measure encourage us to stay shallow, but most of the things that we’re meant to do require us to go deep.
Look, maybe I’m just waxing nostalgic because today is the one year anniversary of my father-in-law’s passing and that’s got the B99 and me thinking more about legacies and stuff, but I don’t think it’s just that. I believe that there is a call inside all of us to do something bigger than us. And that will never happen in the shallows.
[Tweet “There’s a call inside all of us to do something bigger than us.”]Shallow water measurements are the easy things: seating capacity and budgets, Sunday attendance and baptisms. The shallow water marks are what typically get pastors and churches things like Next Level awards and, if the marks are big enough, speaking engagements and book deals. There’s not necessarily anything wrong with any of that; at least that’s not what I’m trying to convey here. What I want to say is that I’m no longer satisfied with any of it, and I don’t think I realized it until I actually achieved it.
Now that I’m staring straight at the numbers that show the kind of growth many pastors crave, it feels a little hollow. It feels like the way we celebrate church growth is kind of like celebrating shipbuilding without actually ever putting the ships out to sea. As the old quote goes, that’s not what ships are for.
[Tweet “A ship in harbor is safe, but that’s not what ships are for. – John A. Shedd”]I certainly don’t have all the answers, and on some days I wonder if I have any except for Jesus. But I do know this: I’m pushing away from the celebrations of safe shallow water exploits. Somewhere out past the breakers is a place where my feet will no longer touch the bottom and where I will find a significance to my faith that can only come from trusting the One who is already out there, calling me to Him.
Maybe I’m the only one who has grown tired of doing old things better and being celebrated for it? Maybe I’m the only one who reads bold declarations from God like the one in Isaiah 43:19 (“See, I am doing a new thing! Now it springs up; do you not perceive it?”) and wants to actually see the new thing? Maybe I am, but I doubt it.
[Tweet “If God is doing a new thing, we need to stop trying to do the old thing better.”]My guess is that there are multitudes of people who want to see the new thing that God is doing in His church and through His church. If you’re one of them, let’s push out to the deep together and dream of new expressions, new adventures, new vision, and new depths more than next levels.
This matters because the answer to God’s question about why we don’t perceive the new thing is simple: the new things lie in places much deeper and much riskier than the shallow waters of success.
Let’s send these ships we’ve built out to find them.
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