For a New Generation

A Practical Guide for Revitalizing Your Church

Lee D. Kricher

• Publisher: Zondervan
• Year: 2016
• eBook ISBN:
  9780310525233
• Topic: Theology & Religion
• Subtopic: Christian Church

A New Generation Church is a church with attendees whose average age is at least as young as the average age of the community in which the church exists. Any church can become a New Generation Church that reaches and continues to reach the next generation.

The Psalmist writes:

We will not hide these truths from our children; we will tell the next generation about the glorious deeds of the Lord, about his power and his mighty wonders. (Psalm 78:4 NLT)

No Christian would purposely hide the timeless truths of Christianity from the next generation. But often we do, not because of the substance of our church, but because of the approach of our church.

For A New Generation is not about changing your church’s statement of faith or core beliefs. It is about evaluating and changing, as needed, your church’s programs, ministries and practices in order to more effectively connect with and stay connected with the next generation.

Written for both church leaders and members, For a New Generation presents 5 practical strategies that will lay a foundation for a church to thrive for generations to come. It is based on the assumption that accepting the status quo is the greatest threat to your church’s core mission and, perhaps, to the long-term survival of your church.

CHAPTER 1

WAITING FOR THINGS TO COME BACK AROUND

Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, is known as the Steel City. Pittsburgh was America’s leading steel manufacturer for over a century, providing steel that helped to build the nation from the Empire State Building to the Golden Gate Bridge. Unpredictably, because of the changing world economy, most of the steel mills in Pittsburgh were shut down by the late 1980s. Pittsburgh has since experienced a remarkable transformation and has become a world leader in technology, education, and health care, but the years at the end of the steel era were traumatic ones.

I recall a conversation I had during that time with a steelworker in his midthirties. He had been laid off by Homestead Steel Works, one of the many steel mills that had ceased operations. The mill where he had worked was to be torn down to make way for a water park and a shopping plaza. When I asked him what he planned to do for a living, he replied, “I am not changing careers. My grandfather was a steelworker, my father was a steelworker, and I am a steelworker. I’m waiting for things to come back around.”

No matter how hard we might wish, some things will never … go back to the way they were.

That never happened. The changes in the steel industry were not temporary. Unfortunately, no matter how hard we might wish, some things will never come back around. Some things will never go back to the way they were.

REALITIES THAT CANNOT BE IGNORED

When I was growing up in the eastern suburbs of Philadelphia, I attended church every weekend. There was never a question of whether or not we would go. It was expected. It was the right thing to do—a social obligation, of sorts. Most of my friends felt the same way. Yet now, just one generation later, very few young adults feel any sense of obligation to attend church. Some have never attended a church before. Others don’t even think about it. It’s not even on their radar. The change in cultural expectations is so dramatic that it is hard for many of us to process.

Most of us don’t need statistics to be convinced that things have changed, but research can help us see why we need to take action. Findings by the Barna Group reported in the book Churchless confirm that the United States has seen a significant decline in church attendance: “The number of unchurched adults in the United States has increased by more than 30 percent in the past decade. As of 2014, the estimated number of unchurched adults stood at 114 million. Add to that the roughly 42 million children and teenagers who are unchurched and you have 156 million US residents who are not engaged with a Christian church.”¹

Even more disconcerting is the Barna Group’s finding that the younger a person is, the less likely he or she is to attend church services.² Pew Research Center’s 2014 Religious Landscape Study confirms this trend, finding that one-third of Americans under age thirty have no religious affiliation.³ I have talked with church leaders and members who acknowledge these trends and lament with one another about the absence of young people at church. Some express nostalgia about the past and hope and pray that young people will start attending church again. They are waiting for things to come back around.

After spending several decades studying local churches that had ceased to exist, Thom S. Rainer in Autopsy of a Deceased Church wrote, “The most pervasive and common thread of our autopsies was that the deceased churches lived for a long time with the past as hero. They held on more tightly with each progressive year. They often clung to things of the past with desperation and fear. And when any internal or external force tried to change the past, they responded with anger and resolution: ‘We will die before we change.’ And they did.”⁴

Obviously, some young adults prefer to attend churches that are similar in approach to the churches their parents or grandparents attended. And many churches that have instituted little change to their approach are healthy and growing. Thus, a leader or member of a church in decline may be tempted to hope that young people will suddenly start returning to their church without any changes having to be made. That would be unwise.

Each church must wrestle with its own realities. As a church leader or member, you must pay close attention to the message the children and young adults of your church and community are sending to you. They will not picket out in front of the church or send letters to the church board, but they will send a clear message. The way the next generation tells you that your church has lost touch with them is simple—they stop coming.

The way the next generation tells you that your church has lost touch with them is simple—they stop coming.

Rainer proposes a course of action for leaders of dying churches, churches that are not making the kinds of changes they need to make to survive. In what he refers to as “death with dignity,” Rainer challenges these leaders to consider options such as selling the church property and giving the funds to another church. “What can you do in the last days of your congregation to make sure that your church’s death can actually make a difference for the good for the Kingdom?”⁵

If it is too late for your church to turn things around, perhaps you would be wise to plan for such death with dignity. In some cases that may be the only option available. But for most churches, an alternative is available. Instead of surrendering to the idea that your church will cease to exist as a significant influence in your community, you can take action. You can come to grips with the fact that the world is changing and that you cannot approach church the same way as you did in the past and expect to see a sudden influx of children and young adults. You can decide to make the changes necessary to build a church that will effectively reach and continue to reach the next generation.

AN UNEXPECTED INVITATION

In early 2003 I was contacted by a member of the board of directors of what is now called Amplify Church. At the time, my wife, Linda, and I were living in Atlanta, and I was regional vice president for an international leadership development and executive coaching firm. We loved Atlanta, both the climate and our friends. The board member called me because I was the founding pastor of the church and had served as pastor during the late 1970s and 1980s. He knew that my wife and I were concerned about the health of the church and its future. Still, as he described the steep decline of the church and asked if I would consider becoming a candidate for the open senior pastor position, my answer was easy—I said no.

But the church didn’t give up that easily. Over the next several months the phone calls kept coming. I was encouraged multiple times to pray about taking the position, something I did not want to do. I had not been in full-time ministry for more than a decade, and I had little interest in returning at that time. I was fifty years old, and the next ten years promised to be the best earning years of my career. A two-thirds cut in pay to go back into ministry as the pastor of a dying church had little appeal.

Financial considerations aside, the bigger problem was that I had no confidence that I had what it took to turn the church around. I had a difficult time as it was trying to get my two teenage daughters to attend church with us! For years, every Sunday morning our home turned into a battlefield as both of our daughters refused to get in the car to go to church because they believed it was boring and irrelevant. Every Sunday morning, I acted like a crazy man and threatened them loudly enough for the neighbors to hear until they finally got into the car. Each week we arrived at church late and left early. I had just enough time at church to ask for forgiveness for how I had acted that morning. Given my experience with my own family, I had little confidence that I could motivate anyone to go to church.

One thing did intrigue me enough, though, to at least consider the request from Pittsburgh. A little more than a year earlier, we had been invited to attend North Point Community Church. I had heard it was a contemporary church, so I assumed that it was not very spiritual, but we accepted the invitation and attended a service. One of our daughters was off at college, but I convinced our other daughter to join us.

The experience was very different from what I had expected. The music was youthful and upbeat, but all generations were well represented among the congregation. The message by the pastor, Andy Stanley, was not only engaging—it had a depth that I did not expect. It challenged me in a way I had not been challenged in years. But I almost went into shock after the service ended. My daughter was walking beside me and made a call to her best friend on her cell phone before we even exited the building. I heard her say, “You are coming to church with me next week.”

My experience at North Point Community Church opened my mind and heart to the idea of serving as a pastor again. As we attended North Point, I witnessed lives that were genuinely changed, including mine. I began inviting work colleagues and friends to attend church with us. I knew that people of all ages would find the church to be engaging and relevant to their lives. One thing was clearly evident: the people of North Point Community Church had a mindset that they would do whatever it would take to reach the next generation.

“IT’S TIME TO KICK BACK”

After much prayer and consideration, I let the board of directors of Amplify Church know that I would candidate for the open position of senior pastor. My experience at North Point had cracked open the door of possibilities. I also had a lingering sense of obligation that I could not just watch the church I had helped to start go down the tubes.

According to the church by-laws, a congregational vote was needed to choose the person who would fill the open position of pastor. I was advised that it would be wise for me to hide my intentions to lead the church into a season of major change until after the congregational vote. But I felt that this would be deceptive. Instead, I chose to be crystal clear up front about the need for radical, strategic change. I spoke about this in the messages I shared prior to the congregational vote. I made it clear that those who did not want significant change should vote no.

I also tried to be candid about why it was so important for the church to reconnect with the next generation. I cast a vision of a church that was no longer in a state of decline, that would once again be filled with people from every generation, and that would once again make a difference in our city. I ended my message before the congregational vote with these words: “The devil has kicked this church around long enough. It’s time to kick back.”

I would have been at peace if there were not enough votes for me to be called as the new pastor. We would have continued with our life in Atlanta, and I would have slept peacefully knowing that I had responded to God’s promptings and had at least thrown my hat into the ring. The result was that more than 90 percent of those voting voted yes. When all was said and done, I was installed as pastor of Amplify Church in September 2003.

STRATEGY #1: ADOPT A NEW MINDSET

I knew that we had a lot of work to do. First of all, I sensed that any plan for effective change in our church had to start with the congregation adopting a new mindset. In his letter to the church of Rome, Paul encouraged the Romans to “be transformed by the renewing of your mind” (Romans 12:2). Personal transformation always begins with a change in mindset. The same is true of organizational transformation. In fact, the other four strategies for building a new generation church all hinge on this first strategy.

The most important change of mindset needed at Amplify Church was apparent. We had been building our church around this unspoken assumption: “If it was good enough for me, it is good enough for our children.” Now we had to stop assuming. We had to turn that statement into a question. We needed to start building our church around one key question: “What will it take to reach our children?”

This was a formidable challenge for the people of our church. Though they had voted me in as their new pastor, most of the people who were currently attending the church were there because they were okay with how things were. For the most part, they felt that young people should come to the church as it was, no changes needed. Discussions about the lack of young people in our church usually focused on what was wrong with the next generation rather than on how we needed to change as a church. People were waiting, hoping and praying that things would come back around. I knew we would never change unless we adopted a new mindset.

We needed to start building our church around one key question: What will it take to reach our children?

THE FASTEST DYING CHURCH IN THE CITY

I took on the role of pastor knowing that we had many challenges to face. Our rapidly declining attendance and giving were big problems. Unfortunate but not shocking was the fact that almost all of those who voted no for me to become pastor immediately left the church. It didn’t help matters that several people who left were proclaiming that the changes I was proposing would “kick the Holy Spirit out of the church.” I remember thinking at the time that if the Holy Spirit had been leading this church, he had been doing a really bad job. But I didn’t say that. Still, I couldn’t help but feel defensive at the criticism.

Our church building was in terrible shape. We had fewer than two hundred people supporting a fifty-thousand-square-foot facility on twenty acres of land. Many things had to be replaced. Several heating and air-conditioning units were not functioning. Replacing just one of them would cost us more than a month of offerings. The entire roof had to be replaced as well. A recent rainstorm had filled the grand piano with water through one of the many leaks. The parking lots were gravel and mud. In the middle of one of the parking lots was a block building with no roof and half-finished concrete block walls. Construction had started ten ...

Table of contents

• Cover Page
• Title Page
• Copyright Page
• Dedication
• Contents
• Foreword
• Introduction
• 1. Waiting for Things to Come Back Around
• 2. Missing the Whale
• 3. Barking Dogs
• 4. Silver Vega
• 5. Don’t Be Like Joshua
• Conclusion
• Afterword
• Appendix: Two-Year Strategy Worksheet
• Notes