Page 945 – Christianity Today (2024)

I stare at this morning’s passage in Luke. The angel has just said to Mary, “God has a surprise for you” (MSG, 1:29-33). I’m reading The Message transliteration, and its words sound fresh to my ears.

I’m practicing lectio divina, an ancient form of Scripture-reading long used by Benedictine monks to encounter the Bible anew. It can be translated as “divine reading,” a way of listening for God’s voice in the text of Scripture.

When I’m talking to people about lectio divina, I usually describe an image of the heart as a metal detector hovering above the words. I ask God to help my heart go beep beep beep when I hit the word or phrase that God wants me to see in some new, valuable way. Maybe it’s a message I need to take from the passage. Maybe it’s just a moment to tell me that I’m not forgotten, that I am God’s beloved. Either way, on good days, I come to this time listening.

There it is: God has a surprise for you.

In my experience, God’s surprises are almost always complicated. Last year during Advent, God interrupted my typical pregnancy with news that my life was about to change. It happened about as quickly as with Mary.

My annunciation, though, did not include a blast of light or an angelic being. Instead, my announcement came on my cell phone while I pushed my son Brooks in his stroller to gymnastics class four blocks away.

I’d been waiting for test results from a genetic counselor following my 20-week appointment. A physical marker during the ultrasound led doctors to believe my sweet baby in-utero had a 1 in 476 chance of having Down syndrome.

This was my third baby. I’d walked with enough friends through these sorts of physical markers, through these random statistics. I’d watched them cry and wring their hands and worry until the tests results came back normal. Not me, I decided. I’m not going to worry about this.

I took a new blood test to alleviate any potential anxiety as soon as possible. When the phone rang during that walk, I picked up the call. I wanted to get the news out of the way so we could go into the Christmas season without any fear hanging over our heads.

I said hello. You know how it goes when an angel arrives in glory, marking you as God’s own beloved one? It’s terrifying. In this metaphor, the genetic counselor playing the part of the archangel Gabriel does not tell me, “Do not be afraid.” And she does not say, “I bring you good news of great joy!”

She said, “The results came back positive.” And I stopped breathing.

Did she say positive? Does positive mean he has Down syndrome? Maybe positive is good? Maybe positive means he’s fine. My thoughts swam past my consciousness at the same time, like words on pieces of paper floating in a jar of oil.

Okay, I said.

“That means the blood results show that your baby has an extra 21st chromosome.”

Okay, I said.

“So there’s a 99.75 percent chance that your baby will have Down syndrome.”

The light changed. I crossed the street, pushing the stroller, holding the phone to my ear. Okay, okay, okay, okay, okay. A little less lovely than Mary’s response: “Let it be with me just as you say” (Luke 1:38).

I hung up. No angel escaping heavenward, just my hands shaking all the way to the gym. I took deep breaths, unbuckled my three-year-old and asked him to take his shoes off. I unzipped his hoodie. Folded it. Lay it on the shoes, a pile on the bleacher. Brooks lined up with his instructor. Okay, okay, okay, okay.

Two weeks later my obstetrician would look in my eyes while I asked, “But it’s possible my baby doesn’t have Down syndrome, right? It’s possible because the test isn’t 100 percent certain.” She’d lean closer and say it again, “Micha, it’s very likely he will. Most likely, your baby will have Down syndrome.”

God has a surprise for you. It was complicated for Mary, wasn’t it? God’s surprises are almost always complicated. And beautiful.

As with all annunciations, when the angel disappears, we turn and walk into our changed lives. How do you face the acquaintance at your kid’s school who asks the next day—smile on her face—how the pregnancy is going? How is Mary supposed to answer the giggling young women at the town well who ask how she’s feeling about her future with the super cute Joseph? Uncertain, Mary thinks, holding back her morning sickness.

What do we say? Well, yesterday an angel arrived and called me blessed among women. So that changes everything.

The Holy Spirit will come upon you,

the power of the Highest will hover over you (Luke 1:35).

I hear the beep of my metal detector heart over that word hover. To have God’s hovering over me: That’s what I had longed for in the days of grief and growing, my baby’s beautiful stretching inside of me. I hoped I would become the woman God already believed I was: capable of receiving this gift, in all its beauty, in all its danger.

Mary sings, “His mercy flows in wave after wave.” Surely she believed that, even later, as her contractions pulled her under the current, in wave after suffocating wave of labor.

Wave after wave the mercy flowed for me. Each morning after the angel’s visit I opened my eyes and prayed with Mary, “I receive my child.” Let it be done to me as you have said.

One year later, I whisper Mary’s story out loud in the dark of early morning. My seven-month-old baby lies on the floor, king of tummy time. He investigates his rubber giraffe with his mouth, intermittingly blowing raspberries. This child is my great joy. And though every fear that shook my body one year ago still remains, that fear has no power when set beside the all-consuming sweetness of my child’s life.

It is Advent, the season of waiting. We wait for the mercy, mercy that sometimes hides in the powerful waves that threaten to pull us under. Blessed woman, the Scripture says, who believed what God said, believed every word would come true!

Micha ("MY-cah") Boyett is a writer, blogger, and sometimes poet. A former youth minister, she's passionate about monasticism and ancient Christian spiritual practices and how they inform the contemporary life of faith. She is the author of Found: A Story Questions, Grace, and Everyday Prayer. Boyett and her husband live in San Francisco with their three boys. Follow her on Twitter or Facebook, and find her blog at michaboyett.com.

Micha wrote about her pregnancy with her third son in a post for Her.meneutics: ‘As Long as the Baby’s Healthy’… But What if He’s Not?

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There are two ways to dispose of a bomb. You can detonate it and check for damages after the charge goes off. Or, you can patiently dismantle it with zero body count. In twenty plus years of pastoral leadership, I have learned a couple of things. Organizational culture change is a minefield. And, leaders who last are those who specialize in bomb disposal.

Few things are as emotionally charged as your current organizational culture. If you don’t believe me, make an abrupt change and see what happens. Remember, culture exists for one reason. Those you lead have accepted a way of being or doing. Right or wrong, people get attached to these processes. Repetition in praxis brings a sense of security. We are built to gravitate towards security.

As leader you are charged with engineering the cultural DNA of your organization. This is your number one job as a leader. I would argue that your organizational culture is more important than your vision and goals. Culture is organic in nature and affects not only the spirit in which all things are done, but also the means in which they are accomplished. I know many ministries that are exceeding their set goals while leaving a trail of bodies in their wake due to an unhealthy ministry or leadership culture.

Two years ago when I took the Lead Pastor position at a near century-old church, I knew I had my work cut out for me. The mean age of the congregation was close to 60. Two members had been at the church 70 years. Like many churches in need of renewal, they wanted changes that brought about desired results. Young families, youth, and a renewed emphasis on outreach were just a few. But the million-dollar question was, “Did they want the culture shift necessary to see those changes happen?” It’s now 24 months later and our church has about tripled in size, and while some of those I inherited have moved on, they have done so with all their limbs intact and a congregational blessing. Here’s how we did it …

Change Culture Not Things

One of the most explosive errors that a leader can make is to mistake changing things for changing culture. Changing things is easy and offers quick emotional payoff for leaders. It also can cause immediate angst. Changing culture takes time and gives less instant satisfaction to leaders. You can change lots of outward things and still maintain a dysfunctional culture. Healthy change requires healthy culture. You can make most any change you want if you do it within a safe and healthy culture.

Like many of you reading this article, I can walk into an organization and immediately see where the leaks are and diagnose what needs patching. A non-existent childcare check-in system, pixelated PowerPoints, and a ramshackle newcomer follow-up system were just a few of our soft spots. These things were easy to spot. Discerning culture can take months. This is because culture is systemic and takes more than a couple interactions with a few people to understand.

One of the first things I realized about my new church culture was that many in leadership had difficulty staying in their own lane. Part of this had to do with the long transition period it lingered in before pulling the trigger on my candidacy. Prolonged leadership by committee had not only diluted effective function, but also caused too many people to be involved in situations or conflicts that had nothing to do with them or their position. The upside of this culture was that many people were deeply invested into the success of the organization. The key was maintaining that positive while extricating the negative.

To change this culture, I began asking people who came to me with a concern or dilemma outside of their ministry scope or relational responsibility, “Why are you sharing this with me?” and “Do you feel that this is in your lane?” It was not long before people began to ask him or herself that question before taking action on something. This was a huge positive change, but not one you could see immediately. Today my staff regularly ask themselves before taking action on something, “Is this in my lane.” It’s become part of our developing healthy culture.

Value The Past

Future change is much easier to accomplish when it is tied to your past. Tethering your future vision to your organization's past history builds into your current followers a greater sense of purpose and trust while allowing them to be part of a larger story. This is something biblical writers understood. The progressive biblical narrative is always tied to a comprehensive understanding of its past.

One of the first things I did after coming to the church was to learn its history, believing that there might be dormant callings which God was ready to renew. I listened to a sermon or two from every previous pastor we had on record. The first being a 1979 tape from Pastor Don Loomer. I looked through the dusty photo albums, learned about former successful ministries at the church and went down to the historical society to research the chronological significance of our building. I discovered that our Fellowship Hall was the first church structure built in La Jolla. I often reference those who came before us, tying their story into ours and challenging our people to build upon our spiritual historicity. This has paid tremendous dividends in gathering people around our current calling and vision.

I paid special attention to anything I could find that spoke to the visions and purposes of those congregations who had come before us, believing that they had something to say to us today. For example, when I felt led to launch a weekly prayer gathering, I spoke of the World Day Of Prayer our fellowship hosted in 1932. What I have discovered is that tying our “now” to our “then” gives our longstanding members a sense of security while motivating our newcomers to be part of something significant.

Move the Piano Slowly

A mentor of mine was once a pastor in traditional New England. Coming from easy going California, he had a lot to learn. In preparation for his new position, he interviewed the outgoing Sr. Pastor of the longest standing church in the area. The old pastor told him one thing, “Move the piano slowly.”

Apparently, years earlier, he had decided on his first Sunday morning to move the piano to face the congregation rather than the way it had been positioned for decades. On Monday morning an elder met him at the front door and informed him that nothing regarding the decorum could be changed without out a meeting and vote of the Elder board. His decision to rearrange the piano was voted down at the next board meeting.

For the next eight years of his tenure this pastor bumped the piano with his hip each time he passed it on stage. Slowly and unbeknownst to the congregation, he nudged it into his desired position. Today it would take a vote to move it back or another 8 years.

One of the common errors of the modern church in the West is the inability to allow anything to change slowly through process and evolution. We want quick action and rapid success and we often pay the price of organizational discontent. Is this always the way of God? Granted, glaciers move slowly, but they don’t explode and rarely kill anyone. And they’ll never be pushed back.

Navigating the minefield of faith-based organizational culture shift can put you in the Hurt Locker of emotional chaos. In order to defuse the emotionally charged turmoil that is a product of most all change it will take patience, nerves of steel and a soft touch. The key is remembering that people are more important than the product you desire to produce. The question is, are we willing to be as gentle in fostering change as God is with us?

Adam Stadtmiller is pastor of LaJolla Christian Fellowship in LaJolla, California.

This June, CT drew attention to veterans’ experiences in the cover story “Formed by War.” To continue the discourse sparked by that story, alongside the Centurions Guild, CT is hosting an online series called Ponder Christian Soldiers. (Read the introduction to the series here, the second installment here, and the third, here.) The following essay is from US Army chaplain Terry Cobban, who reflects on Emmanuel, "God with us," in the midst of horrific physical pain incurred on the field.

Four-leaf clover, rabbit’s foot, lucky penny—all things people keep on hand for luck. In the military, the list includes the chaplain. “The chaplain’s with us, nothing bad’s gonna happen,” is a sentiment many chaplains are familiar with. It is a nice sentiment, but it's false. Most chaplains are not so naïve as to believe it. Bad things happen even when chaplains are present.

Fortunately, it’s during the tragedies—accidents, attacks, miscalculations that result in the loss of life—that Jesus can meet us and draw us into an ever more intimate relationship with the Father. I know this firsthand.

On December 20, 2007, I was with my unit in Iraq, north of Baghdad. During a return convey to our Forward Operating Base, we stopped to visit a local leader. A group of us went into the leader’s compound, and when it came time to leave, he insisted on showing us a nearby market. We obliged and made ready to go.

Our commander sent two of our troops into the broad avenue onto which the compound opened. We waited for the all-clear before proceeding one at a time out of the gate and into the street. I stepped over the gate and into the street—and I don’t remember the next 20 minutes. It’s not that the memories are blurry or conflated; they simply don't exist.

Eyewitnesses later told me what had happened. Once our group was in the street, a man wearing a long, flowing thawb walked up to us and detonated the vest strapped to his chest. The explosion immediately rendered me unconscious and threw me 20 feet. The percussion of the blast ruptured both of my eardrums. Shrapnel destroyed two ear bones in my right ear, ripped away my right deltoid, and dug into my right thigh and calf. One of the holes in my thigh was the size of a golf ball. My face was singed; my eyelashes and eyebrows were burned away. Second- and third-degree burns covered my right arm and leg.

I had been three feet away from the man. Of the nine casualties, one died instantly. Of the eight remaining alive, I was the most severely wounded.

A Christmas Gift Absent the Bow

I remember regaining consciousness during parts of the medevac flight to the local military hospital and a brief stay at Landstuhl Regional Medical Center in Germany. From there I traveled to Walter Reed Hospital in Washington, D.C., then to an Army medical center at my home base of Ft. Lewis, Washington. I arrived December 24, wrapped like a Christmas gift absent the bow.

Over the next month in the hospital I was prepped for skin grafts, started physical and occupational therapy, was poked and prodded—all while I recovered strength to get out of bed. Due to the exceptional care of hospital staff, including one particular social worker, I was able to leave the hospital at the end of January 2008 for a month of convalescence at home.

While God was with me throughout the whole ordeal, I would learn on that first Sunday in February 2008 just how personally Jesus identified with my brokenness.

Stubbornly I made my way to the church that my family and I had been attending before my deployment. Mustering up strength, I limped my way in from the parking lot. The short walk left me peppered with sweat. I made it to the sanctuary and all the way to the front, plopping into a pew. The short distance felt like a marathon.

When I turned my gaze to the altar, my heart sank. It was Communion Sunday. During Communion, church members walked forward to receive the bread and dip it in the cup. This is one Communion to sit out, I thought.

When the time came, however, I found myself standing in the aisle, inching forward step by step. Thank God that I had sat close, close enough to hear the words said to each one as they approached the bread and the cup. “The body of Christ, broken for you. The blood of Christ shed for the remission of sin.” These words rang in my near-deaf ears.

Then, as Elijah must have experienced in the cave on Mount Horeb (1 Kings 19), a still, small voice rose gently within my mind. “Terry, I know,” Jesus said. “I know what it’s like for people to want to kill you. I know what it's like for them to tear flesh from your body. I know.”

By the time I reached the bread, I was weeping, not “sweating” around the eyes, but pouring forth tears. When I reached the cup, the pastor—who had not been at that church for long and knew of me only through my wife—saw my tears. He placed his hand behind my neck, drew our foreheads together, and said, “Chaplain, let me pray for you.”

As an officer in the military, if I’m not called “sir,” I’m “chaplain,” the more personable of the two. It serves in place of a first name. When the pastor addressed me as “chaplain,” I sensed Jesus calling me by my name. I cried audibly as I limped back to my seat.

Even to this day, when I return to that church or recount the story, I am overwhelmed by the real, intimate presence of Jesus, my Lord, who knows what it is like to suffer. His brokenness in me helps me become, more perfectly, a child of God (2 Cor. 4:10). I can trust him, because he knows.

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We want to invite conversation about the experiences of veterans. If you have a story to share, or a question to ask, direct those to Centurions Guild founder Logan Isaac at logan[at]centurionsguild.org.

Multiracial churches—congregations in which less than 80 percent belong to a single racial group—are supposed to demonstrate the unity of the church for the sake of the gospel.

They’re also supposed to bring “common understanding of issues across race, which can in turn lead to real change in racial issues,” according to Michael O. Emerson, sociologist and provost at North Park University in Chicago.

And at first, they did. Early versions of multiracial congregations saw white attitudes changing to resemble those of minorities like African Americans or Latinos, Emerson said. Whites in multiracial congregations thought differently than whites in primarily white congregations.

But that’s less the case now, according to two studies published in religious journals this year.

The first study looked at what congregants think are important factors in explaining socioeconomic differences between blacks and whites. Racial discrimination? Inadequate access to quality education? Blacks’ lack of motivation or willpower?

The study found that 72 percent of African Americans in predominantly black churches believe that the reasons for racial inequality are structural, rather than an individual’s lack of motivation. But only about half (53%) of African Americans in multiracial churches believe the same thing.

The percentage closely tracks with whites and Hispanics in multiracial congregations, 54 percent of whom believe racial inequality is structural.

“The typical African American outside of the multiracial congregation is fairly aware that there are structural issues in place that continue to perpetuate inequality,” Kevin Dougherty, a Baylor sociology professor and one of the study’s authors, told CT. “But African Americans within multiracial churches don’t report that same level of structural awareness.”

Instead of the predominantly white majority changing its views, Dougherty said, “it appears that African Americans start to think more like whites about the origins of inequality.”

“Racial divisions are almost constant across any context, and to find they aren’t is surprising,” Ryon Cobb, the study’s lead author, told CT. “Race and inequality thoughts are subject to the context in which people worship.”

People who attend multiracial congregations view structural inequality with almost the same amount of skepticism as those in mostly white churches, where 56 percent of whites, 55 percent of Hispanics, and 49 percent of blacks believe inequality is structural.

“Currently, in the aggregate, multiracial congregations are doing exactly what pastors of color tell me they fear—that they will serve merely as a tool into white assimilation,” Emerson said. “The end result is this: Multiracial congregations are ‘underachieving,’ or to put it another way, not living up to their promise.”

One reason is that multiethnic churches are often megachurches, Emerson said. Large churches have grown both in numbers and in diversity—evangelical churches with more than 1,000 weekly attendees were five times more likely to be diverse in 2007 than they were in 1998, according to Emerson’s research.

“Among such congregations, research finds that nearly one-third are multiracial,” he said. “Large congregations [find it] difficult to make massive personal change in people. Attendees of these congregations can select to be in like-minded groups (rather than with diverse groups), limit involvement more readily to simply attending worship services, and typically have less personal contact from pastors.”

The numbers back him up. The same researchers ran another survey on megachurches, again asking whether socioeconomic differences between blacks and whites were due to discrimination, lack of educational opportunities, or a lack of black willpower.

“Even controlling for religious affiliation, size is related to attitudes toward racial inequality,” Dougherty said. “The bigger the congregation, the less likely you are to see that racial discrimination is a source of inequality.”

That may be a good thing, said Mark DeYmaz, president of Mosaix Global Network. “Assuming these minorities are having a positive interaction with the church, that would inform their belief in this regard,” he said. In a healthy, truly diverse church, the structures of racism are eliminated, he said. And so it makes sense that congregants would be more likely to believe that disparity is caused by individual choices.

“I think that’s totally encouraging,” he said. “That’s what everybody wants.”

However, he said, the studies left out one enormous factor that could account for the similarity of opinion: economics.

“It’s one thing to create large, suburban, wealthy churches filled with people like us,” DeYmaz said. It’s far more challenging, but just as important, to pursue financial as well as racial diversity, he said.

Large, diverse churches can be attractive to financially successful, well-educated minorities, said Trinity Grace Church pastor Bryan Loritts. Blacks who pursue higher education are likely on diverse or predominantly white university campuses, taught by mostly white professors.

“That type of person is going to be comfortable in environments that are ethnically diverse,” he said.

Those minorities are more likely to blame individual choices for disparity, since they successfully navigated and overcame structural inequalities to achieve their success, DeYmaz said.

“The end zone answer is that absolutely there are structural reasons” behind the economic disparity between blacks and whites, Loritts said. But “a healthy church would have divergent viewpoints on which we can enter into dialogue.”

Churches can facilitate those conversations by preaching the beauty of the Cross and reminding people that their highest allegiance isn’t to their ethnicity or their culture, but to Jesus, he said. Purposefully desegregated small groups can also be safe places for members to learn about challenges facing other races.

Racial issues need serious, critical discussion from the church, Emerson said. “We now need to study and focus on congregations that are not simply demographically diverse … but those which are reflecting a new Christ community.”

Today's megachurches have fewer seats but fill them more often. They take in more money, yet giving has declined. More than ever take Communion weekly, while fewer than ever partner with other churches. They have less conflict than smaller churches, yet lose more staff and tithes when flareups occur.

These are among the many findings of the fifth national survey of America’s largest Protestant churches, released today by Leadership Network and the Hartford Institute for Religion Research.

Five years ago, the typical megachurch sanctuary had 1,500 seats for worship. Today, that figure is down to 1,200 seats.

But those seats are filling up more often—megachurches now average five services per weekend. And almost two-thirds (62%) hold meetings in multiple locations, up from 46 percent in 2010.

The survey, sponsored by The Beck Group, includes responses from more than 200 congregations with 1,800-plus attendees. While the responses were self-reported and not independently verified, the survey gives a nuanced look at the state of megachurches, said Scott Thumma, survey co-author and professor of sociology of religion at Hartford Seminary.

Many people assume that megachurches are wildly successful while small churches struggle, he said. But it’s not that simple.

“Megachurches are still vital,” said Thumma. “But even they are affected by societal and cultural changes.”

Among those cultural changes: the decline in weekly churchgoing.

In 2005, almost all (96%) of the people attending megachurches came every week, according to the researchers’ previous survey. By 2015, that figure dropped to 82 percent.

Giving has slowed as well. In 2005, megachurches reported a median income of $4.6 million. In 2015, the number grew slightly to $4.7 million. But that’s actually a decline, according to the report.

“Had they kept pace, they would currently be reporting a median of $6.5 million to maintain a commensurate giving level plus inflation,” the report said.

One driver of higher giving: greater emphasis on global missions. Congregations that claimed global missions as "our church's specialty" averaged $1,960 giving per capita, while congregations that only reported "some" emphasis on global missions averaged $1,249 giving per capita.

Yet even in the face of overall stagnant giving, megachurches believe they are healthier today than 10 years ago.

Most of the churches in the survey (88%) reported growth in attendance from 2009 to 2014. About 1 in 10 (11%) reported declines.

Newer megachurches—those founded since 1990—tended to grow faster than older churches, with an enormous average growth rate of 91 percent over 5 years, compared with a growth rate of 39 percent in churches founded before 1990. Younger megachurches also had more people under 35 (23%) than older churches (16%).

Unsurprisingly, those older churches tended to have more middle-aged worshipers ages 35 to 49 (44%) than newer churches (29%). Members of older churches gave more per capita ($1,865) than members of newer churches ($1,368), had a higher rate of member involvement (83% vs. 79%), and had higher average weekend worship attendance totals (3,766 vs. 3,369).

One challenge for all megachurches is how to appeal to younger people, said Thumma. That’s in part because megachurches excel at attracting married people. As a result, only about a third of younger megachurch members are single, compared with two-thirds of that age group in the national population, Thumma told CT.

Attracting young adults seems to hang on intentionality. In congregations that don’t emphasize engaging young adults, 13 percent of attendees are 18–34 years old. In congregations that make young adults a top priority, 20 percent of attendees are 18–34.

Meanwhile, innovation—long associated with megachurches—is on the decline. While more than half of churches (54%) strongly agreed that they were willing to meet new challenges in 2010, closer to one-third (37%) said the same thing in 2015.

One potential reason: older pastors, who often grew their megachurches by using innovative practices, are now more resistant to change. Only 1 in 4 churches (27%) with a pastor ages 61 or older said they would describe their worship as “innovative.” In fact, pastors in their 40s were the most likely to say “innovative” describes their worship (44%), compared with those under 40 (42%) or in their 50s (35%).

Pastor performance seems to peak once they’ve been at a church for about 15 years. Nearly all megachurches (91%) where the pastor has been in place for 15 to 19 years claim to be spiritually vital and active. Three-quarters (77%) said the church has a clear mission and vision.

Those numbers start to drop if the pastor stays longer. Only three-quarters of megachurches (74%) with a pastor in place more than 20 years said the church is spiritually vital. Less than half (43%) said the church has a clear mission and purpose.

Clarity of mission is a hallmark of megachurches: 79 percent have a clear purpose, compared with 41 percent of all congregations. More than half (51%) of those surveyed also strongly agree that their megachurch congregation is spiritually alive and vital, compared to 29 percent of all congregations.

That spiritual vitality can be traced to another hallmark of megachurches: small groups. Megachurches that were strongly intentional about maximizing the number and variety of small groups reported the most activity (77% high spiritual vitality), compared with those who were unsure about small groups (37% high spiritual vitality) or were not intentional about small groups (27% high spiritual vitality).

Small groups are also a way for big churches to hold their congregations accountable, which in turn leads to greater engagement, the survey found. Churches that placed no emphasis on holding members accountable for participation and faithful living reported two-thirds of their members (64%) were actively involved. By comparison, churches that believed accountability was an important and regular practice reported nearly all of their members (96%) were actively involved.

The survey also found:

• Megachurches have a conflicted relationship with traditional worship elements. One in five (18%) feature an organ during worship, down from 28 percent in 2010. About a third (35%) have choirs, down from 43 percent in 2010. On the other hand, more megachurches took Communion during every worship service in 2015 (57%) than in 2010 (51%).

• About 22 percent of megachurches were involved in worship services with other Christian groups in the past year, compared with 38 percent in 2005. Ecumenical cooperation for educational or fellowship activities was also down (30% vs. 46%), as was ecumenical community service activities (46% vs. 61%).

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• Megachurches said they were less likely to experience conflict than smaller congregations (43% vs. 38%), but are more likely to lose staff (12% vs. 5%) or donations (9% vs. 6%) when they do. Smaller congregations are reportedly more likely to lose members than megachurches (29% vs. 24%).

• ​More than 4 in 10 megachurch pastors (43%) said they do not have a good plan in place for succession.

On the day when bullets flew and bombs detonated in Paris, plunging the City of Light into darkness, I was visiting the most populous Muslim nation in the world. First in Indonesia, and then in Malaysia and Hong Kong while on a publisher-sponsored speaking tour, I heard breaking news in snatches only if the hotel carried CNN or BBC in English.

I felt oddly distant from the mood that must have descended like a shroud of fear over the US and other Western countries. I flashed back to the somber days following September 11, 2001. I searched the Internet for the precise sites of the atrocities in Paris: on my travels to that splendid city, had I visited that restaurant, that stadium, that concert hall? I help support a missionary couple who have planted two churches, and reside as the only non-Muslims in an apartment building in a Parisian suburb—what must they be feeling at such a time?

Though I received email requests to write an immediate response to the events, while keeping a busy schedule in a foreign culture half a world away, I felt ill-equipped. Only later did I gain some perspective, in part by reflecting on a lecture I had heard from J. Dudley Woodberry, a specialist in Islam at Fuller Theological Seminary. Is the Muslim my enemy or my brother? Woodberry asked. His answer: both.

Islamic extremists in ISIS and Al Qaeda relish the label of enemy. After the recent attacks against Russia and France, and the execution of hostages from Norway and China, nations around the world face a universal threat. In a reprise of previous centuries when Muslims surrounded Europe, some extremists today plot a global conquest. They kill and maim civilians in London, Paris, and New York; torture and decapitate Christians in Libya and Iraq; burn churches in Egypt; persecute Jesus-followers in places like Iran, Pakistan, and the Philippines.

Yet, as Woodberry reminded his audience, Muslims are also our brothers. When I spoke at a church in Hong Kong, a Muslim imam attended, and each time he approached me afterwards with words of appreciation. Muslims share many values with Christians, such as a disciplined life and an emphasis on charity and care for the poor. They accept much of the Christian Bible as a sacred text—though they look to the Koran as a more complete, final revelation. Muslims use the Psalms as a prayer book. And the Koran includes 93 references to Jesus, presenting him as a prophet second only to Muhammad, a Messiah who will return someday to restore justice on earth.

I have met people in the restrictive Islamic societies of the Middle East who remain culturally Muslim yet follow Jesus. In those countries, conversion from Islam is illegal, and brings swift retribution—banishment and possibly death—from the convert's family. So the new Christian does not, for example, change his name from Muhammad to Peter, and he continues to pray five times a day and even attend mosque, where he privately worships Jesus the Messiah.

Almost all Muslims have the goal of winning the world for their faith, though only the more extreme groups, like ISIS, resort to violent means. (Let's admit that Christians have a similar goal. We, too, represent a conversionist faith, and many ministries strive to "win the world for Christ.") I must say, blowing up people and what they cherish is a most perverted form of evangelism, far more likely to turn people away from Islam. A decade ago the lower castes in India had considered converting en masse to Islam until the Taliban famously demolished the Afghan World Heritage Site statues of the Buddha, a revered figure to Indians.

At various times Christians also have used coercion. Charlemagne ordered a death penalty for Saxons who would not convert, and in 1492 Spain decreed that all Jews convert to Christianity or be expelled. Priests in the American West sometimes chained Native Americans to church pews to enforce church attendance. Over time, Christians learned that the faith grows best from the bottom up rather than being imposed from the top down. In the words of Miroslav Volf, "Imposition stands starkly at odds with the basic character of the Christian faith, which is at its heart about self-giving—God's self-giving and human self-giving—and not about self-imposing."

Tellingly, in his last miracle on earth Jesus healed the ear of an "enemy" whom his own disciple had wounded. Those who wish to remain faithful to Jesus must bear witness as he did, not by compelling assent but by presenting the gospel as a true answer to basic thirst.

A friend of mine who grew up in Palestine observes that those of us in the West will always view Muslims as the enemy unless they renounce violence and coercion. He wrote me, "Although the Qur'an calls Muslims descendants of Abraham, it rejects the dignity of Jews and Christians, calling them pigs (for Jews) and infidels (for Christians). They are to be forced to convert, otherwise subject to taxation, enslaved and/or destroyed. Unless these ominous sections are excised from the Muslim 'sacred texts,' there is no hope for reconciliation."

Yet on my trip, I read daily editorials in Malaysian and Indonesian newspapers denouncing the Paris attacks and other acts of extremism. Islamic nations acknowledge the threat: after all, many more Muslims than non-Muslims have died at the hands of terrorists. These two Asian countries are charting a middle way, favoring their Muslim majorities while officially guaranteeing the rights of minorities from other faiths.

Officially, I say. Christians in Malaysia told me of evangelism techniques that, while nonviolent, are still coercive. Muslim men actively seek out Christian women to marry (they can have up to four wives), forcing them to convert and bear them Muslim children. Aggressive imams offer money to illiterate Christian villagers if they sign a document with an X; when they show up for church the next week, an officer informs them they have now registered as Muslims, a designation that cannot legally be changed. And Christians in Malaysia find it almost impossible to get permission to build a church, or even repair an aging building.

Indonesia has more freedom but also, in some regions, more direct persecution. As one Christian in Malaysia said, "We're so blessed, because in Indonesia they're burning churches and killing Christians, but here we just have to put up with discrimination and restrictions on our activities." In Indonesia, where Christians are actually dying for their faith, another said, "We're very blessed, because in Malaysia they can't freely publish the gospel. Here, we still can." Indeed, I spoke at a Christian book exhibition in Jakarta held in the atrium of a public mall.

I wrote in Vanishing Grace about an important insight I learned from a Muslim scholar who said to me, "I have read the entire Koran and can find in it no guidance on how Muslims should live as a minority in a society. I have read the entire New Testament and can find in it no guidance on how Christians should live as a majority." He put his finger on a central difference between the two faiths. One, born at Pentecost, thrives cross-culturally and even counter-culturally, often coexisting with oppressive governments. The other, geographically anchored in Mecca, was founded simultaneously as a religion and a state.

As we talked, he pointed out that Islam seeks to unify religion and law, culture and politics. The courts enforce religious (Sharia) law, and in strict Muslim nations the mullahs, not the politicians, hold the real power. In contrast, the Muslim man reminded me, Christianity works best as a minority faith, a counter-culture. A recent book by Lee Beach, The Church in Exile, shows that throughout much of the Old Testament and all of the New Testament, God's people operate as a minority within a surrounding culture that may well prove hostile. Beach calls for the church to establish "communities of engaged nonconformity" to show the world a better way to live—not by coercion, but by persuasion and example.

Historically, when Christians have reached a majority they too fall to the temptations of power in ways that are clearly anti-gospel. The blending of church and state may work for a time, but it inevitably provokes a backlash, such as that seen in secular Europe today, where you find little nostalgia for Christendom.

Ajith Fernando, a writer and theologian from Sri Lanka, has this explanation for the recent turn toward violence: "Muslims believe their culture is superior because they think its features were dictated by God and reported verbatim in the Qur'an. So the Muslim extremists are humiliated over these defeats and some of them are responding by hitting out violently in anger. The Western leaders say they are fighting evil. The Muslim extremists feel that the West is evil and that they must protect righteousness by battling the West. So they hit targets that they associate with the West."

Americans and Europeans understand the difference between a committed Christian who accepts Jesus as a model for living and a cultural Christian who happens to live in a nation with a Christian heritage, but not everyone elsewhere can make that distinction. Much of the world, in fact, draws conclusions about Christians by watching MTV, online p*rnography, and movies glorifying violence. To them, celebrities like Miley Cyrus, Charlie Sheen, and Kim Kardashian (or, more confusingly, her transgender step-father) personify "the Christian West" as much as Billy Graham and Pope Francis do.

It seems the entire world has now arrayed itself against ISIS, a relatively small group of zealots who welcome the opposition. Do they represent the death throes of a distorted theology or the beginning of yet another long-term ideological conflict? Post-Christian Europe can muster a police response but no real ideology to counter its attackers. As a German friend told me, "We are baffled by people willing to blow themselves up for a cause in which they believe. Most of us find it difficult to articulate what we are living for, much less what we might be willing to die for."

Jesus came as God's messenger of love, and chose to serve rather than to dominate, to die rather than to kill. Such a time as this calls for a vigorous faith from his followers, "communities of engaged nonconformity."

Can we respect and dignify the majority of Muslims while simultaneously striving to root out the extremist minority? Can we resist the temptation toward vigilantism and prejudice against all Muslims? Can we not only accept them as neighbors but love them, as Jesus commanded? Can we live in a way that demonstrates to the Muslim world that "the Christian West" does not equal decadence, just as "the Muslim world" does not equal extremism? Can we maintain our cherished values of freedom and justice while under assault from forces that undermine them?

ISIS has proved how a dedicated minority of zealots can disrupt the world. What can Christians do to show the troubled world another, better way?

Philip Yancey is the author of many books, including Soul Survivor: How Thirteen Unlikely Mentors Helped My Faith Survive the Church. This essay was posted on his blog site on November 28, 2015.

Copyright © 2015 by the author or Christianity Today/Books & Culture magazine.Click here for reprint information on Books & Culture.

When did the church become its own worst enemy? At a recent gathering of ministers, a few expressed their sense of failure over the difficulty of the work. But the majority said most of their hurts came from the words and expectations of fellow Christians.

One missionary shared how, when she confessed her depression, the head of her sending committee told her just to get over it. A small-groups pastor grieved how he was told that he’s too relational and that he should just focus on keeping his small-groups system running. A lead pastor shared his constant pressure to be the one with all the answers. A worship leader told how ever higher expectations and long work hours left her so worn out, she wondered if she even believed anymore.

When most of our ministry pain comes from the unrealistic or unfair expectations of other believers and the structure of Christian industry, something is wrong.

Without a doubt, our work is difficult. How hard it is to help someone understand and hold onto faith, how heart-breaking it is to watch people make bad decisions and struggle with the brokenness of life. But when most of our ministry pain comes from the unrealistic or unfair expectations of other believers and the structure of Christian industry, something is wrong.

What are we looking for when we hire a Christian worker? As hiring committees, what is our goal? To find someone who follows God well and can help our community to follow? Or is it something else?

There are natural challenges of ministry work. We have been promised that the world will reject our testimony, that there are spiritual forces at work to undermine our efforts, that temptations will keep us and our flock from following well. Our call is to bring a message to an unhearing world, to pray for change in human hearts, and to walk with people through the challenges of faithfulness. That’s a weighty call, indeed, an impossible call. We shouldn’t be surprised if the impossibility of it all makes our stomach lurch with dread.

I’ve seen it on the faces of many lay-leader boards. They feel the weight of this impossible task. The puzzle of how to move forward furrows their brows and grays their temples. Many of these lay leaders work in industries where there are fixes for the problems: technologies, systems, best practices. They bring that habit into the hiring and management of church staff.

What I’ve seen happen in this situation over and over again is that a human made of flesh is then dropped into a system that doesn’t quite fit, and as the wheels of that system start cranking, human flesh is pinched. The church machine forces them to produce what no human can consistently produce. There is no time for them to love or contemplate or rest.

When human flesh is expected to function among the cogs of an industry, it draws blood. It leads to broken marriages, depression, burnout, spiritual darkness. If we’re honest, when we expect a human to function like a cog, we’re hoping to eliminate our own sense of inability, to alleviate the dread of all the questions and mysteries. We expect a person to give us answers, to manage problems so we won’t have to keep seeking, to keep listening, to keep following. We won’t have to feel the abyss within ourselves, that gnawing sense that comes with ongoing wrestling and waiting. Quick answers and clear solutions are the preference.

The reality is that ministry will always feel impossible. Ministry will always leave us in over our heads, raise more questions than it answers, open more cans of worms than we can control. If we think ministry is just managing systems, processes, and programs, we have misunderstood ministry. Because if ministry is helping people find and follow then God, ministry is about the mess of real human life and the mystery of a real, living God, neither of which is manageable.

But there is hope. Because while systems and procedures don’t have room for the mess of ministry, humans do. In Scripture, the church is never compared to a factory or a machine. It’s compared to a family and to a garden, places familiar with messiness, places where there is room for mystery and for rest.

So what do reasonable expectations in ministry look like? For me, it starts with resting in the deep peace that God is in all things and can use all things to grow his people and his church. If one pastor’s sickness or tiredness or weakness can impede God’s work, we have a pretty small vision of God’s power.

The Bible says that God’s strength is shown in weakness. So, when a children’s pastor gets behind in the administrative part of her work because she’s weeping with parents whose child is seriously ill, will we affirm that? Would it be okay to cancel an event or delegate her work to allow that to happen? When a minister has devoted himself so fully to his work that his marriage needs attention, will we trust that God can take care of both their marriage and His own Bride?

When we, as Christian leaders, start to feel the pinch of unrealistic expectations, how will we respond? Is the only response to fight back in defensiveness? Or even as the pinch becomes more painful, is there an opportunity to lead and pastor our people? Our counter-cultural call as ministers of the gospel is to set aside the expectations of industry and to embrace the impossibility of our work and our need for grace. Our call is to step into the mess and mystery with our people, to cry with them as they suffer, to pray with them, to call out to God from our sense of inadequacy and to trust that He will lead us through.

From these ancient practices of ministry, we can turn to those for whom the weight of ministry is foreign and disciple them in the ways of our God. When we learn comfort in the mystery and find our place in the long tradition of ministry “best practices” like prayer and longing, waiting and hoping, listening and following, there is a way forward.

It allows us to recognize the pinch for what it is—a sign of un-health, an opportunity to guide our people toward truth. It allows us to (with much prayer) kindly and patiently guide our lay leadership in the ways of this work. We may have to make it a regular refrain in our meetings: “Our first call is not to fix but to pray.” And when we, as church leaders, feel ourselves putting the pinch on our staff, it’s an opportunity to repent and come back to our true call to mess and mystery.

Mandy Smith is lead pastor of University Christian Church in Cincinnati, Ohio.

This is part 5 of The Spiritual Lives of Entrepreneurs Series. Continue to watch the whole series: Part 1: The Spiritual Lives of Entrepreneurs. Part 2: Work as Formation, Part 3: Do Well and Do Good, Part 4: Big Things Could Happen and Part 5: Rest and Sabbath.

This is part 4 of The Spiritual Lives of Entrepreneurs Series. Continue to watch the whole series: Part 1: The Spiritual Lives of Entrepreneurs. Part 2: Work as Formation, Part 3: Do Well and Do Good, Part 4: Big Things Could Happen and Part 5: Rest and Sabbath.

This is part 3 of The Spiritual Lives of Entrepreneurs Series. Continue to watch the whole series: Part 1: The Spiritual Lives of Entrepreneurs. Part 2: Work as Formation, Part 3: Do Well and Do Good, Part 4: Big Things Could Happen and Part 5: Rest and Sabbath.