| Stories and New Identity at Weeping Willow Church by David Sawyer, Ph.D. |
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| David Sawyer / Conflict and Organizations |
| Friday, 14 November 2008 12:38 |
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When Pastor Wendy arrived at Weeping Willow Church, she had been briefed about the tumultuous departure of her predecessor. The judicatory had stepped in and negotiated a termination agreement that left the congregation both devastated and financially strapped. Beyond that, what she immediately noticed was that the congregation was nearly un-responsive in worship. Preaching and leading worship in that sanctuary felt like the pews were occupied by a bunch of cardboard cutouts. Three other observations followed. First, the church staff were all part time and, ironically, partly competent. The church board was still shell-shocked from the pastor’s departure and felt clueless about how to carry on. And finally, when she inquired about the church’s finances, Wendy discovered that, although the treasurer submitted regular financial reports, no one on the board knew how to read the spreadsheet.
It would have been easy to assume that the fight with the former pastor was the big issue in the church, and to address the conflict directly. Being more systems savvy, however, Wendy also noticed that the community where the church was located had an unusual quality to it. First, the federal highway that had once gone through the center of town had been rerouted to a bypass at the edge of town. The downtown street on which the church sat had diverted to ethnic groceries, pay-day cash agencies and used car dealers. The businesses at the edge of town were faring no better, however, where the mall was closed and the multiplex movie theater was boarded up. These economic changes had obviously been happening at the same time the previous pastor’s tenure had exploded. Wendy was reminded once again that location and context were keys to understanding the culture of a congregation. This scenario of change and decline in the community was a familiar one, in fact. Wendy knew that many congregations resorted to fighting with one another or with the pastor in order to distract themselves from the dire implications of a slumping community.
For the church board, the AI process provided new energy and confidence. Wendy continued to work with the board members to learn how to be leaders and how to work together as a board. Over a period of several months they became a much more effective working group. In the larger congregational gathering, conversations on the AI questions led to growing energy in the room as everyone began smiling and enjoying the interactions. The stories she heard were full of goodwill and hope. From the first question there were stories about the congregation’s engagement with community through the neighborhood community service organization, and about their excitement in serving Hispanic neighbors, including a small group of regular attenders who listened to the worship service in Spanish translation through hearing devices in the pews. Other stories recounted the joy the congregation took in the renewal of worship that had taken place when they remodeled the chancel in the worship space and included more contemporary elements in their blended worship services. The values that emerged from the conversations were the importance of the fellowship and commonality they experienced in their life together as a congregation. The values also echoed the strengths by holding out their Hispanic Ministries as a major core value. Pastor Wendy was glad to notice that the congregation did not mention the building as one of their strengths or values. In fact the building, not very well constructed over fifty years earlier, was now a millstone around the congregation’s neck. It was in poor repair, and it was not really suitable for a congregation with a large number of elderly members. Following on the stories and values, the preferred future expressed by most of the members was that the congregation would be able to stay together to enjoy each other’s company, and as a group, to be of service to others in their community. This was clearly their identity and it gave them a sense of what God was calling them to be and to do. With these insights, they were able to imagine their life beyond and perhaps even without their building. For Weeping Willow Church, the next steps were to explore the possibilities of shared ministry with neighboring congregations of the same denominations. Conversations were started and some activities were shared with two other smaller congregations, but there was not enough energy in the project to sustain any action. Then someone wondered out loud whether there might be any benefit to talking to the denomination’s retirement community which had a campus not far from the Weeping Willow Church building. From tentative phone conversations, to full fledged negotiations over a period of several months, a new strategy for the future of Weeping Willow emerged. The retirement community invited the congregation to meet in the chapel of its senior apartments complex, and to share office and meeting space as needed. After careful and prayerful discussions, the congregation accepted the invitation and put their church building on the real estate market. Eventually the building was sold providing the church with a nice dowry to bring to the marriage with the seniors homes corporation. The result was that Weeping Willow could flourish as an intact congregation and sustain its relationship with its pastor. Besides being liberated from building maintenance, two other side benefits were immediately obvious. First was the built-in source of new members from the residents of the retirement home, many of whom were of the same denomination. The second was a renewed and ongoing ministry to the staff of the retirement community, many of whom were Hispanics. The congregation was able to continue and expand its offering of classes in English as a second language and citizenship in both English and Spanish. Reflecting back on the changes in the congregation, Pastor Wendy rejoiced that she had chosen to appreciatively seek the stories of the congregation and help them discern their identity and their hope. Clearly she was adept at connecting with a congregation at the heart level. She had helped them build their confidence to the point where they could actually imagine taking dramatic steps to change their form and location. If you asked her what “genius” of hers had led them to this change, she would have said, quite honestly, “we did it together.” Without diminishing the importance of context and--as the realtors say--“location, location, location,” this story highlights the significance of “vocation, vocation, vocation.” Through a clear sense of identity, drawn from appreciative listening to the deep stories of a congregation, a calling can be discerned and the future can come into view. Wendy took as her leadership model at Weeping Willow the role of the listener instead of the more common visioner. It seems unlikely that she or any leader would have envisioned the outcome in advance without such careful and prayerful openness to new possibilities. This case suggests that looking at the context, understanding the larger system, and listening carefully to stories may be a better path to helping congregations change than strong visionary or interventional leadership.
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