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No congregation aspires to close.  When a church’s founding members first gather as a new church, they dream of great things.  Maybe it was just 30 years ago or maybe it was 130 years ago, but those first members surely imagined classrooms filled with children and sanctuaries filled with people praising God with glorious worship.  They imagined making a difference.

But churches eventually close.  Every single church eventually closes.*

The oldest church still active in the United States is 388 years old.  But consider all the congregations who have closed in the past 300 years.

As for our First Century sisters and brothers, note that The Church in Ephesus has closed.  The Church in Philippi has closed.  The Church is Rome is obviously open, but it no longer exists in its earliest forms.

Last Sunday I was honored to be with a congregation as it closed. They worshiped together for the last time.

Although tears were shed, the overwhelming feelings expressed were joy, hope, and gratitude.  It was one of the best Easter celebrations I’ve ever experienced.

As  congregations continue to close in the coming years, how do we encourage them to close well? Here are a few pro tips I’ve observed from churches who have closed faithfully:

• Don’t wait too long.  Most dying churches wait until the point when a) only a handful of people remain, b) there’s no money left to pay utility bills, c) there hasn’t been a new visitor cross the threshold for many years, d) there hasn’t been a baptism for a long time, and/or e) most of the budget comes from rental income.
• Create a legacy that honors the historic ministry of the congregation.  Before the coffers run out, make a prayerful act to fund those ministries that have special significance to the church.  If some of the last members are now residents of a retirement community, for example, consider making a contribution to that retirement community.
• Honor the last members in meaningful ways.  At last Sunday’s closing worship service, the American flag from the sanctuary was given to the oldest veteran in the congregation.  A basketball from the weekend basketball team was given to a faithful team member.
• Thank the pastor well.  She/he has labored extra hours during an especially emotional time.

Congregations who make the spiritually mature decision to close – because it’s time – are to be appreciated and honored.  It’s not a sign of failure.  It’s a sign of faithfulness.  And it’s an excellent opportunity to allow resurrection to happen.

*Note: While individual congregations come and go, The Church of Jesus Christ will always be with us.

My dad was in real estate and there are certain bits of property advice I remember intermingled with the usual fatherly advice you might get about driving or being safe on a Friday night.

• Avoid flat roofs.  They are more likely to leak.
• Make sure the soil perks.  Flooding is a mess.
• Buy the smallest house in the best neighborhood.  Property appreciates.

These are not necessarily true today because there are new ways to drain water. And real estate is not necessarily the best investment.  And so it goes – too – with church property, and business properties in general.  Conventional wisdom changes with the times.

Check out this article about the shifts in brick-and-mortar retail properties.  Like everything else, retail businesses are shifting but one size doesn’t fit all.  The same is true for churches.

For one thing, we don’t necessarily need to own a church building.

It depends on your communities context and mission.  But basically, note whether or not your church building fits your current mission.

• Do you still have an “education wing” which was a popular addition after World War II that might be dated now?  (Lots of classrooms.  No children.)
• Do you have a kitchen that can accommodate huge church suppers even though you don’t host huge church suppers anymore?  (Or is your kitchen tiny and you are serving large community groups?)
• Do your hallways, stair steps, and bathrooms still reflect the abilities of your founding members when they were 30 or 40-somethings?  (But today, you need an elevator and wider doors/bathroom stalls.)

Building decisions must be based on mission.  (How can we use our building to serve the neighborhood and what do the neighbors need?)  But sometimes we base our decisions on money (We don’t have any) or stuck thinking (Nobody in our church needs an elevator so we don’t need to install one.)  Or maybe we want service to be all about us while there are community partners who could work with us – financially and otherwise – to serve collaboratively.

Although people seeking spiritual community and purpose  are more than “consumers” or “targets” Entrepreneur article notes something interesting here:

“According to the U.S. Census, 92 percent of purchases continue to be made off-line. And, contrary to popular belief, as many as 82 percent of millennials say on surveys that they prefer to shop in a brick-and-mortar store.”

People want a connection.  Maybe we don’t need a connection when we buy a sweatshirt.  Or maybe we do.

But we definitely need to connect when we want to help refugees or make sense out of a national tragedy or find comfort after a  personal loss.  We definitely want to connect on the big things – at least eventually.

And so we need to innovate the way people find us and the way we serve them. Sometimes we need buildings and sometimes we need something else.

Today is the first day of school in Newtown, Connecticut and  – perhaps as you are reading this post – the students of Sandy Hook Elementary School will  be gathering in their beautiful new building for the first time. The former building was razed in 2013 and  I assume you remember why.

The new school has two inside “tree houses” overlooking the forest outside. The roof undulates over glass and wood. The lobby is decorated with aluminum tree sculptures.  Native plants will be watered outside by a landscape bioswale.  The new school points to life and living.

There is art work in the hallway that says: “Be kind.”

What the people of Newtown, CT  – and all of us – are witnessing today is resurrection. Our church buildings could learn from this.

As I’ve shared before, the Arlington Presbyterian Church building in Arlington, VA is being razed so that affordable housing  can be erected, with space for the church to meet as well.  The new complex will be called Gilliam Place in memory of a church member whose name has adorned the church’s clothing bank for over 30 years. This is not bad news.  This is life-giving news.

In the United States of America alone, religious denominations and independent congregations own millions and millions of dollars worth of real estate.  Some of those church buildings are in disrepair to the point of being uninhabitable.  Many church buildings are on the market.  Many more should be.

The only reason for any church to have a building is to use it as a tool for ministry. Our church buildings exist to declare resurrection.

They are not club houses or museums.  They exist to serve the neighborhood and beyond.  They endure to harbor those who need spiritual nourishment, food, shelter, counseling, support, education, friendship, and a place to connect with God and other human beings.

Yesterday I was honored to be with a congregation who made the faithful and selfless decision to sell their building to the school next door (who needed more space) and then to close.  The members made a spiritually mature move to offer resurrection to other ministries in their community by sharing some of their assets with neighboring churches and other  organizations.  It felt like a death because it was a death.  But after death, many of us believe in resurrection.

Or do we?

Do we believe that there can be resurrection even after a horrific crime?  After a congregation no longer has the energy to start something completely new?  After a neighborhood changes or an act of nature destroys property?

This is the hope of our faith:  that there is always resurrection even in the darkest times.  Our job as followers of Jesus is to work for resurrection for as long as we can.  It’s so easy to forget this.

Image sources.

Many years ago I was visiting a parishioner in a nursing home facility who could not communicate except through grunts. It must have been enormously frustrating. Her mind was clear.  She had a graduate school education.  But she could not speak or move her limbs.  This was a permanent condition she would endure for the rest of her earthly life.

After trying to talk with her and clearly upsetting her because I couldn’t understand anything she was trying to say, I prayed with her and then I left. I went home to my safe and easy life.

I distinctly remember feeling relief.  I could simply walk away.  I also remember feeling pangs of guilt because she could not walk away.  It was her reality and she could not escape it.

So, just last week, I talked with a stranger – a straight white man about my age  – who told me that:

• He was tired of being called racist.
• He was tired of being called sexist.
• He was tired of being called homophobic.
• He was not going to talk about those things anymore with anybody.

On the spot, I was speechless.  Later, I wished I’d said, “congratulations” to this man.  He can just walk away.  What an enormous privilege.

His daily life does not involve enduring flagrant racism.  It’s assumed he is always supposed to be wherever he is.

His daily life never includes cat calls or inappropriate stares.    His daily life probably doesn’t include name-calling if he happens to be holding his partner’s hand in public.  He doesn’t have to talk about daily injustices and he doesn’t even have to think about them because they don’t belong to him.  He can just walk away and not think about such unpleasantness any more.

The thing is, however, that – as followers of Jesus – we cannot walk away.  We have been commissioned – not only to think about injustice but to oppose it actively in Jesus’ name.

I get that things are changing for straight white men.  It’s not assumed that you are the smartest, most skilled, most important people in the room anymore. What you might be experiencing now is what people of color and women and LGBTQ people have known as their daily reality.

I don’t say this because I hate straight white men.  Five of my favorite people on the planet are straight white men.  I’m crazy about them.  (But they also get that they’ve had clear advantages throughout their lives.)

We who say we believe that “the Word became flesh and blood and moved into the neighborhood” in the words of Eugene Peterson know that we can’t just walk away when we see people suffering.  We can’t save them (and they already have a Savior anyway, whether they realize it or not.)  But we can stand with all who experience injustice, especially when we don’t have to.

“If the David were to be tilted 15 degrees, his ankles would fail.”

I haven’t been to Italy for many years, but this news came to me as a terrible shock:  Michelangelo’s perfect sculpture of David is cracking.  Or at least the ankles are cracked – those smooth and sinewy ankles of  brilliantly chiseled Carraran marble.

Apparently, because of natural tremors or traffic jolts, David has shifted his weight throughout the years which has brought uneven balance to his ankles.  You can read more in this article by Sam Anderson in the NY Times.

Human ankles serve two purposes:

• Dorsiflexion  – the ability to flex the toes backward towards the leg.
• Plantarflexion – the ability to flex the toes downward the sole of the foot.

Ankles help us walk and keep our balance.  Without strong ankles, we fall.

If the Church is Christ’s body in the world, we need to consider the ankles.  I, for one, usually think about body parts like the hands and feet, the eyes and ears, the mouth and voice when I ponder the body of Christ.  I don’t wonder much about the ankles.

If we are off balance as a congregation, if we are a bit shaky moving forward, I wonder if it’s because we need to work on our flexibility.  I wonder if we need to strengthen our ankles.  What might that look like for the Church?

Image source here.

[Note of thanks:  My three go-to sources for inspiration about The Church these days – besides the Bible of course – are:  1) The Atlantic  – which is the best periodical in the world, 2- Fast Company – which I have to read with a highlighter so I won’t forget any of the sparks, and 3- one of my clergy colleagues.  He knows who he is.  Thanks to all.]

The cover story for the September issue of Fast Company  is “Apple’s Moment of Truth.”  While some Apple people are freaking out over stagnation in iPhone sales and a slide in revenue, Tim Cook is a believer.  The article declares that “Apple’s future may look very different from it’s past.”

Oh.  My.  God.

The past was pretty great.  What does this mean?

In a nutshell Apple (Tim Cook) has decided:

1. To make more mistakes than they used to make.
2. To admit it when they make mistakes and then change.
3. To make innovation incremental – but steadily so.
4. To “learn on the fly.”  To learn from every detail of a project – not just from the end result.
5. To get over your embarrassed self.  (It’s more embarrassing never to try anything new than to fail after trying.)
6. To ask – always – before making a decision, “How important is this?”
7. To be less secretive.  (We become blind in the thick of our own decision-making processes.  We need feedback from people who are not at the table.)
8. To embrace the fact that he is not Steve Jobs (and that’s a good thing.)

We in Church World are facing a moment of truth.  I won’t go there today in terms of sweeping, institutional thoughts.  But I would like to address our individual congregations.

Church Leaders:  you are facing Moments of Truth.  

Some of you faced those moments years ago, as I wrote here, and you did not choose wisely.  You unwittingly voted to close your church – maybe not immediately but probably sooner than later.

Here’s what I mean:

• Your congregation received an enormous bequest and you choose to depend on that money rather than pledged financial support from church members.
• Your congregation has several choices for your new pastor and you choose the safe one.  
• Your congregation has a stockpile of money in the bank and you chose not to invest it in building improvements so that your ministry could expand or create a new ministry someplace else.
• Your congregation is diminished in size and you chose to allow every possible group willing to pay rent regardless of their deeper purpose to use your church building.
• Your congregation has the opportunity to house a ministry that would have positively impacted a new and different group of neighbors and you chose not to because you don’t want strangers in the building.

Any worthwhile meeting of your church’s governing board includes A Moment of Truth that defines who you are.  Are you – as a church – actually a social club?  Are you God’s hands in the neighborhood?  Are you directed by what is holy and life-giving?  Or are you directed by fear and pain-avoidance?  Are you more interested in pleasing the crankiest members or in pleasing God?

Happy Thursday.

The world is feeling especially crazy these days.  I won’t elaborate here because you know exactly what I’m talking about.  And in the throes of all this death – the death of institutions and social structures, not to mention innocents – what do you see?

(It’s the question God asks of the prophet Jeremiah in this one of this Sunday’s lectionary readings.  Jeremiah sees an almond tree and a tilted pot of boiling water.)

When I talk with anxious church folks, this is what they tell me they see:

• Ghosts of loved ones past.  Memories of days when everybody went to church wearing their best clothes.  That good, old-time religion.
• Empty pews. Uncommitted young families.  Buildings in need of serious maintenance.
• Relationships with people they might never have known without the Church.  Conversations about what the community really needs.

What we see determines not only what a congregation is feeling, but it also impacts where a congregation is going.  What do you see?  Does it make us sad or excited or wistful or angry?

Do we get excited about seeing diverse people in our neighborhood?  Do we get excited when someone wants to try new forms of worship?  Do we feel inspired when we (finally) discern what God is calling our church to offer in our particular communities?

Do we see opportunity or crises?

Do we see the future or the past?

Jeremiah saw something  blooming and something boiling – both symbols that Something Was Happening.

What do you see?  And why?  (It’s a real question.)

Image of an almond tree in bloom.

It’s a Tuesday in August and the world needs your help.  Here is a simple tool to transform the planet today: Prayer.

Not original in concept, but here’s an original way to do it simply and powerfully.

Download this is a must-have app created by Christopher Lim.  It’s free.  It’s ingenious.  It’s called Ceaseless.

It’s an easy discipline for praying for three people in your phone contact list each day.

“We are already praying for over 137,000 friends.  By joining, you can help us personally pray for everyone on earth.”

I met Chris Lim last week at a conference and he is onto something life-changing.  Download this thing.

Totally worth it.

Chris Lim is the founder of Theo Tech.

I often cover my eyes during the scary parts of movies.  I always cover my eyes during the gory parts. Thank goodness I have HH to tell me when I can open my eyes again.

We who live in the United States of America often leave out the scary parts of our history.  We almost always leave out the gory parts.

Talk of being “the greatest country in the world” is heard more frequently during the Olympics and election season.  National holidays – especially the ones honoring veterans and those who’ve died during military service  – move us to cheer.  USA!  USA!

I love my country.  But we are not the greatest in every way.  Some nations offer better health care.  Others offer better education.  We are – disturbingly – first in prisons.  And then there is the systemic racism.

As much as some of us want to leave out the scary parts of our nation’s history, it’s essential that we own it, that we not leave out the scary parts.  My family – historically – owned slaves and I was always told that my ancestors were, themselves, poor and that they treated slaves well.  Maybe they did and maybe they didn’t.  The myth of happy slaves is just that.  An enslaved person is an enslaved person – even if they are “well fed.”

The Church has some unspeakably scary parts too.  We in the Western Church are corporately responsible for perpetuating slavery, for turning our backs on racial-ethnic minorities, for shaming the divorced and remarried, for condemning LGBTQ people – sometimes to the point of taking their own lives or contributing to violence against them.  This is part of our history.  It’s scary for many reasons including the fact that it shines a light on who we have been and who we are now.

Lord, have mercy.  Christ have mercy.  Lord, have mercy.

The world, our nation, our church, and the totality of human history all involve both the glorious and the excruciating, both good and evil.  When we turn away from the scary parts we allow them to continue.  We cannot fight what we do not acknowledge.

And so, as hard as it is, let’s not look away at the sight of evil.  We need to know what we are up against.

Note:  The Underground Railroad by Colson Whitehead is a great read that includes some scary parts.  I strongly recommend it.

The most trusted brands in the United States, according to a 2015 study of 38,000 people are Coca Cola (for soft drinks), Kellogg’s (for breakfast cereal), Campbell’s (for canned soup), and General Electric (for “bringing good things to life“?)

Christian denominations have brands too.  Some involve tag lines like . . .

• The United Church of Christ: “God is Still Speaking”
• The United Methodist Church:  “Open Hearts. Open Minds. Open Doors.”
• The Evangelical Lutheran Church:  “God’s Work.  Our Hands.”

My denomination and many others have no official tag-line but we certainly have unofficial branding/free association descriptors:

• The Presbyterian Church USA:  Elders.  Decent and orderly.  Really smart.  (I added that one for fun.)
• The Episcopal Church: Henry VIII’s divorces.  Good liturgy.  Rich.  (I also added that one for fun.)
• Southern Baptists:  Bible Belt. Teetotalers. Baptism by immersion.
• Roman Catholic:  Smells and bells.  The Pope.  Stuff we read about in the newspapers that could be said about many denominations.
• Greek Orthodox:  Smells and bells.  The Patriarch.  Different Christmas and Easter from other Christians.

Sadly our brand as  The Church is not considered very trustworthy. There are many reasons why this is true – many of them involving child abuse, financial abuse, hypocrisy, and a tendency not to resemble Jesus on most days.

So what do we do about our trust issue?  This article sparked my attention yesterday.  It’s about for profit business brands but maybe we in Church World can learn something from it.  According to its author, Jason Demers:

1. “Corporate brands are faceless.”  When our denominations look and feel like corporations to the average parishioner, it’s easy to blame bureaucracies for congregational problems.  As a person who is newly awash in the work of my denomination’s corporate headquarters, I can honestly say that there are many, many people who work at my denomination’s headquarters who are among the most dedicated, faithful, and creative people I know.  They do amazing things and offer enormous gifts.  The average person in the congregation has no idea who they are or what they do or what I do – for that matter – in a “mid-council judicatory.”  This doesn’t sound like anything Jesus died for.  And how can we possibly trust a distant entity about whom we know nothing personally – in a spiritual community that values personal relationships?
2. “Advertising is seen as manipulative.”  When we see people as “targets” whom we hope will become “members” we deserve to be distrusted.  We exist as the Church to show the love of God that we have experienced to human beings.  We do not exist to perpetuate an institution.  Unless we actually do exist to perpetuate an institution. Yuck.
3. “Brands have an agenda.”  We churches want to make ourselves sound friendly, welcoming, purposeful, fun, and enriching whether we are or not.  Why?  See #2.  Are we trying to get people into the door?  Or are we trying to serve them because that’s what God has told us to do?
4. “Brands offer little in the way of validation.”  If we really want people to connect with us, a pithy tag line or a nice church sign isn’t going to do it.  Word of mouth is a much more meaningful way to connect with people.  I visit a church because someone has invited me personally.  They tell me that they’ve found authentic community there or they’ve found a way to serve the neighbors or they’ve met Jesus or they’ve found meaning for their lives.
5. “Money is on the line.”  Church friends: how many times have you heard someone say that “the church just wants my money”? People do give money  – when they can – to organizations and projects that are valuable to us.  I give financially to things that add to my quality of life (NPR) but I also give to things that serve the common good.  I am happy to pay for taxes for good schools even though I no longer have kids in school because I want all kids to have an excellent education.  I give to congregations who make a difference in their neighborhoods.  I do not give to congregations who serve only themselves and I hope you don’t either.

Trust issues are among our biggest challenges for the 21st Century Church.  But trust is nurtured when we are real.

When we share our own real brokenness, when we recognize that maybe we are not really as friendly as we think we are (but we are honestly open to figuring out how to be more hospitable), when we truly serve the community not to “get new members” but simply to follow Jesus . . . that’s when we begin to deserve the trust of strangers and friends alike.

What if we simply tried to better resemble the way of Jesus?