Delivery Culture vs. Development Culture
In my post on the costs of consumerism, I noted that the data is in regarding the current state of the American church and it’s not pretty. Among the results reported were the following:
While the number of admirers of Jesus is growing, the number of attenders at church is shrinking.
Those who do attend come to receive spiritual goods and services that meet their needs rather than to be equipped to meet the needs of others.
Instead of creating disciples being released on mission to the world, the result is consumers being created to escape from the world.
Delivery Culture
One way to describe this is as a Delivery Culture. It can be illustrated this way:
In this culture, the leaders (typically the paid professionals on staff) are tasked to deliver the teaching, care, and programs that bring people to the church and retain people within the church.
They do so to honor an unwritten, but no less true, social contract:
“If the leaders provide adequately for me, I will attend, give, and serve.”
The result is that the church attenders are retained and the church budget is maintained. The leadership is gratified and the membership is satisfied.
However, there is a hidden and insidious dark side to this.
A delivery culture leads to dependency.
A Delivery Culture leads to dependency. Its social contract says: “If the leaders provide adequately for me, I will attend, give, and serve.”
Rather than the saints being “equipped for service” (Eph. 4:12) they are conditioned for complacency. Instead of being discipled to go out and be the church, they are being made reliant upon the church.
Bottom line? God is disappointed. Attenders remain dependent. And a lost world stays unreached.
Development Culture
In contrast, there is what could be termed a Development Culture. It can also be illustrated:
In this culture, the leaders are tasked with discipling people in being the church rather than simply attracting them to church. Their purpose is to equip, empower and deploy the saints into the world in order to accomplish the Great Commission of Jesus.
The social contract of the Development Culture is totally different:
“If the leaders equip me, I will take responsibility for my growth, invest in others, and work to advance the Kingdom.”
The results are also totally different.
A development culture leads to empowerment.
A development culture leads to empowerment. Its social contract is: “If the leaders equip me, I will take responsibility for my growth, invest in others, and work to advance the Kingdom.”
Attenders recognize that they have been called to a mission. And thus, they attend with the mindset of being prepared not being protected, of being deployed not being dependent.
An Entrenched System
One would think that such a simple analysis would result in an easy choice. Not so. The delivery system is firmly entrenched.
A matter of literacy.
For one thing, it goes back hundreds of years. Early on, in the days when pastors were among the most educated in the community and the common folks were unable to read or write, a dependency was formed. The pastor was consistently learned from and leaned on.
A matter of expertise
Moreover, as the years passed by and education was no longer an issue, expertise became the issue. “Better let the professionals do the job of ministry. After all, they’ve been trained for it and will be better at it.”
So, when further needs surface in a church, the typical response is to simply hire more staff. While volunteers might well assist in small ways, it’s the job of the staff to do the real ministry.
A matter of education
There’s another challenge that continues to fuel this. Most pastors have been thoroughly (often exclusively) schooled in leading and facilitating a delivery culture.
Seminary courses abound in the how to’s of sermon preparation, pastoral care, and creative programming. There’s nothing wrong with learning these things. They are important and necessary in the Development Culture!
The problem is that little value is assigned to development – the idea of discipling people to make disciples who make disciples.
A matter of metrics
A final challenge is that, in most denominations (and in our culture in general), affirmation is given for the results that a delivery system provides. The typical metrics are Sunday attendance, annual budget, and number of staff.
Those churches that excel at such things are considered to be success stories. With that comes admiration and adulation (which can be quite addictive) which leads to emulation.
To be sure, the better you are at delivery, the bigger your church will grow. Goods and services are attractive by nature.
It all depends on what you’re looking for.
If you want growth in attenders, choose the delivery culture.
If you want growth in disciples, choose the development culture.
If you want growth in attenders, choose the Delivery Culture. If you want growth in disciples, choose the Development Culture.
In making your choice, you need to keep the following in mind:
Delivery is fast, development is slow.
Delivery is easy, development is hard.
Delivery offers immediate gratification, development provided ultimate gratification.
As a leader, you have to decide which culture you want to cultivate. That choice will determine the trajectory of your ministry.
Make no mistake. Recent history reflects gravitation toward the delivery culture. Rampant consumerism expects a continuation of the delivery culture. Popular metrics call for the perpetuation of the delivery culture.
And if, in fact, development is harder and slower…if immediate gratification won’t be realized and corporate confusion might be realized…why rock the boat?
I guess it all depends on how you spell success. And in whose eyes you want to be successful.
If development is harder and slower… why rock the boat? I guess it all depends on how you spell success. And in whose eyes you want to be successful.
While that’s not the last question you’ll face in making your deliberations, it has to be the first question you face.
I would be curious to hear your reflections on this. After all, we’re all in this together. So let’s learn from one another.
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