800 Presbyterians 'a new Reformation' By Parker T. Williamson The Layman Online Tuesday, August 22, 2006 ATLANTA – Heralded by fanfare, an organization called "Presbyterian Global Fellowship" is calling for "a new Reformation." Brokenhearted over the diminished state of their denomination, Presbyterians from four continents came to Atlanta seeking a new beginning, "a new way of being the church," said Rev. Vic Pentz, Peachtree Presbyterian Church's senior minister. Sounding brass, a full pedaled organ, cymbal, timpani, grand piano, guitar, bells, bongos, a full-chancel choir and 800 blown-out-of-their-pews Presbyterians from 42 states praised the Lord at Peachtree. All Hail the Power of Jesus' Name ricocheted through this Deep South neighborhood and, via Internet streaming, into Christian communities and homes around the world as the Presbyterian Global Fellowship launched its vision. Rev. Joan Gray, moderator of the Presbyterian Church (USA), predicted, "Years from now, we will look back on this weekend and say something happened here that God used to change the church and the whole world." To those who had come to one of Atlanta's wealthiest neighborhoods and the denomination's largest church, Gray said, "I charge you to lean not on yourselves, to not be satisfied with what you can do in your human strength, to get rid of a 'can-do spirit,' and look to Jesus who said, 'I am the vine and you are the branches.' Lead from your knees and dream big, and whatever you do, do it in the spirit of Jesus Christ." A 'missional' church The "new thing" driving PGF is its desire for congregations that call themselves "Presbyterian" to become "missional" churches. A missional church is one whose members are "internally strong and externally focused," according to Rev. Scott Weimer, senior minister of Atlanta's North Avenue Presbyterian Church and one of PGF's organizers. At several points during the group's worship services, Weimer asked members of the congregation to face the sanctuary windows. "We are not here for the sake of ourselves," he said, "but for the sake of the world outside these walls. Out there is our mission field, and we must go there with the gospel of Jesus Christ." Just as God entered the world in Jesus Christ, so he calls his followers to take Jesus into the world around them, said Rev. Stephen Hayner, professor of evangelism at Columbia Theological Seminary and a former president of Intervarsity Christian Fellowship. "In the first centuries, the Holy Spirit pushed Jesus' followers out of their comfort zones and into the Greek and Roman worlds – and beyond," said Hayner. Hayner said that as the church became more accepted in the culture, it "began to be less of a movement and more of an institution." Along with this shift came a very different focus. People began to think of "going to church as if God's primary activity had moved indoors." This "clubhouse" way of viewing the church led to the creation of a program-focused organization whose leadership became professional and hierarchical. In this context, missions were seen as an activity designed to lure or compel people to come in. Hayner said that this focus worked fairly well until "about 200 years ago" when a great decline in the institutional church began. Church leaders responded to the decline by trying to make the "clubhouse" more attractive. Institutionalists devised better programs, reorganization, expanded bureaucracies, strategic planning, modern marketing techniques, and even a revised theology "to make it more 'acceptable' to the world." "This way of thinking about how to 'do church better' hasn't worked," said Hayner, who pointed out that the church in the United States is rapidly losing ground, and of the 25 largest denominations, the Presbyterian Church (USA) is now shrinking the fastest. "The bottom line is that people are no longer inspired by or attracted to institutional religion," he said. Hayner observed that in other, non-Western parts of the world, Christians are getting it right. "The global church has grown more in the 20th century than in all the previous 19 centuries combined," he said. Hayner spotlighted Africa's 90 million new Christians, a huge growth curve in Latin America, 50 million in India and an estimated 85 million in China. "What can we learn from the parts of the global church that are growing rather than declining? he asked. Hayner described common characteristics of growing churches: 1) They see the primary purpose of the church as joining God's mission in the world, rather than focusing on what happens in their clubhouses. Hayner said our call is to go into the very neighborhoods where we live and work, "let our hearts be broken by the things that break God's heart," and join God's work in those very places. 2) They see the whole world as the arena of God's work. "Missional churches walk into the world with expectation and with boldness," he said. 3) They see their life together as preparation for joining God in mission. Hayner said that Christians should see their congregational life as a staging and "equipping" area for their members' missionary activity outside, not as an end in itself. 4) They see their leaders as "equippers" more than "chaplains." Hayner urged pastors to shed "the old way of doing church" in which the pastor builds up the institution by getting people to do "church work." "Leadership is helping everyone to turn their faces toward the world," he said. "Mission is not a program of the church," said Hayner. "It is its essence." He referred to the insights of church historian George Marsden, who said that healthy churches have three defining characteristics: 1) They are confessional – "they know what they believe." 2) They are conversional or transformational – "their hearts are aflame with the reality of the Spirit of Jesus living within them." 3) They are missional – "they keep their faces toward the world." Hayner said that when PGF organizers came together they began to "dream about a missional, distinctively Presbyterian church," and they covenanted with one another to pursue that dream and see if it was "a God thing." 'Put up or shut up' Pentz compared the crisis facing today's church with Elijah's confrontation with the prophets of Baal. "'You call on your god and I'll call on mine,' said Elijah to the false prophets … The world is calling on us Christians to put up or shut up. What difference does Jesus Christ mean in our lives and in the world? Today we have got to put ourselves on display, out in the open in a demonstration of Christian dynamism. The world is saying, 'Show us something real. Show us how the gospel is real in your hearts, and if you can't do that, then forget it.'" Living the Word "Jesus did not call the world to go to church. He called the church to go to the world," said Rev. Scott Dudley, senior pastor at First Presbyterian Church in Bellevue, Wash. "When we go, we don't argue with them," he said. "There are all kinds of religions out there and plenty of spin control. Words don't work. Our words must be more than words. They must be the Word that became flesh. We must give them the experience of Jesus." Dudley described evangelism as "doing things that cause people to ask those questions whose only answer is Jesus." Evangelism is a very practical activity, he said. Christians must go to people, be where they are and experience life as they experience it. It is in that connection that Christians demonstrate the presence of Jesus and earn the right to speak of him when the moment is ripe. Dudley listed seven characteristics of evangelistic churches: 1) Change the address of "church." Dudley likened Christians to "antibodies" scattered into offices, schools, business and neighborhood encounters. "God wants us to partner with him to redeem the world where the people are." 2) "Bless" the city of which you are a part. "Nudge your pastor to get to know the mayor, superintendent of schools, city council." Discover the needs and develop ministries to meet them. 3) Measure success differently. Measurement criteria should not be so much on the growth of the church institution, but on the impact that the church is making on the community. 4) Give people non-threatening taste of what it means to be missional. "People get freaked out if they are told to go out and witness." Instead, send them to tutor in a low-income neighborhood school. 5) Add missional components to existing church programs. Add a mission project to your church's capital fund campaign, for example, or develop a community project for your Bible study group. 6) Help people assess their talents for a particular ministry. Encourage them and help them make the connection between their talents and mission opportunities outside the church. "Pastors, your job is not to be professionals but coaches." 7) Invite people into "an adventure with Jesus," rather than imposing an "obligation" on them with a "guilt trip." "We say what we have been saved from, but often forget what we are saved for." "Church is not an indoor sport," said Dudley. "At the end of the day, people want a vision that is more than just making the church run better. Jesus' most frequent promise was that if we lose our life, we will find it. That is as true for the church as it is for us as persons." God is at work in the world Rev. Roberta Hestenes, who has taught at Fuller Seminary, served as president of Eastern College in Pennsylvania., staffed World Vision International and most recently served as pastor of Solana Beach Presbyterian Church in California, urged PGF participants not to lose heart. Centering her message on II Corinthians 4, she noted that Paul began and ended this section of his letter with counsel against discouragement. She said that in this chapter of "perhaps the most human of Paul's letters," Paul recognizes the temptation to lose heart. This happens, Hestenes said, because "the god of this world has blinded the eyes of believers" provoking them to feelings of futility. Hestenes granted that Christians must be realistic and take note of resistance to the gospel and unbelief – "name it," she said – but unbelief should always be seen in the context of God's sovereignty. She encouraged her listeners to pay attention to abundant evidence of what God is doing in the world. "Remember 1949, the year that the Western church was expelled from China," she said. She recalled the years of invasion, atrocities, war, the "long march," Marxism, the persecution of Christians. "Now we see the story of an incredible God and the light of Jesus Christ that has been shining where we saw darkness … Today there are 30-100 million Christians out in the provinces." Hestines listed four challenges to the church which she believes also constitute opportunities: 1) Globalization, 2) changing demographics and mobility, (3) resurgent global religions and their mobility, (4) churches becoming more externally focused. Churches, she said, are moving from supporting missions and missionaries as a program to a rediscovery that the whole people of God are sent into the world to be missionaries. Hestenes noted that many Presbyterian congregations are dispatching mission teams to other parts of the world, and she applauded this trend, not only for what it can do for those to whom the mission teams are sent, but for the transformation that such experiences can bring to the lives of team members. She tempered her endorsement of mission teams with a word of warning to those who "use the poor" by participating in such trips as a form of tourism without making any subsequent, sacrificial change in their giving habits. Inside/outside Observing the spectacular worship celebrations at PGF's first event and the obvious delight experienced by Presbyterian participants, many of whom say they have been starved for such gatherings in the midst of a moribund denomination, it is clear that those who came to Atlanta placed a high value on what was happening "inside the box." PGF leaders noted the joy that was evident at the gathering, but they insisted that an event like this is designed not to be a resting place, but a launching pad. "You can't put soda pop in a jet engine and expect it to fly," said Pentz. Once that plane has been properly fueled, it is expected to go somewhere. Thus in his last liturgical act at Peachtree, Scott Weimer had the people turn toward the windows. "Be internally strong and externally focused," he said. "Go!"

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