Restore™: Our Conflict Management Consulting and Organizational Intelligence

Conflict is a part of life. It is something we have in common; we’ve all experienced it. And we have all developed individual patterns of response to conflict. Some of those patterns are productive and lead to increased authenticity in relationships. Some of those patterns are destructive and can lead to divisiveness.

Congregations, like all organizations, develop patterns for handling conflict as well. Those patterns can deepen respect and love for those with different views or they can create an environment from which a disturbing amount of conflict emanates. When the deeply conflicted environment is allowed to go unchecked over time, it has the power to distort facts, destroy relationships, divide communities, and deviate our course from our mission and vision. It can keep congregations from becoming what they are called to be in Christ.

The good news is that congregations can learn to manage conflict more effectively. But getting there requires the first step of understanding WHY the congregation finds itself in conflict, dealing with the current reality (however harsh or hard to examine), learning new skills for getting to better solutions, and gaining genuine closure. All of this must happen through an intentional process of seeking to understand, seeking forgiveness, and seeking restoration.

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This requires a steady non-anxious look in the mirror. It begins with organizational intelligence which allows the congregational leadership, in a systematic way, to look at the health of the church as an organization. This is accomplished through soliciting input, using the Congregation Assessment Tool (CAT), from every voice in the body-none louder than another, none more influential than another. And it requires an examination and understanding of the culture of the church. All too often, it is the organizational culture that is at the root of conflict.

Through its work with close to 3,000 congregations across the country, Holy Cow! Consulting has a clear understanding of both the dead ends where congregations too often find themselves and best practices for congregations that can lead to vitality. For a congregation in deep conflict, most often, nothing in the church is going to improve until that conflict is identified, mediated, and reconciled. The conflicted congregation needs all of these steps in order to escape the cycle of poorly managed conflict that frequently depresses the whole system and leads to loss of morale, clarity of purpose and membership.

We can help and want to work with you. If your Congregation Assessment Tool (CAT) results indicate growing or significant conflict, we have the skills and processes to help move you to the other side through a customized but intentional process of education, practice, and reconciliation.

Would you like more information?

Organizational Intelligence as a Fearless Moral Inventory

In one of her lectures, Dr. Roberta Hestenes challenged her students “not to witness for Jesus until you are fun to be with.” She got a laugh with that quip, but there is a profound, practical truth for churches at the heart of it. The quality of the experience that members of a church share is the most decisive factor in the mission of a church, and outweighs the combined impact of all the programs, projects, and personal abilities resident within the congregation.

The research backs that up. Nearly 90% of churches with poor climate are experiencing losses in worship attendance and no program of “inviting people to church” will be effective until the climate improves. Whatever their particular theological perspective, the witness of churches to Jesus will be muted until their congregations are communities of purpose, peace, openness, leadership, followship, and joy.

In more liturgical traditions, Lent is a season during which individuals are invited to explore the shadows within their lives that are impeding spiritual progress. As Hal Elrod put it, “Let today be the day you give up who you’ve been for who you can become.” We can expect to hear many challenging sermons addressed to us as individuals inviting us to become more aware of our tendencies to fall short of the abundant life Jesus has promised us.

Organizational intelligence takes the experience of Lent to a whole different level. Instead of focusing on the shadows within individuals, organizational intelligence explores the shadows within congregations as a whole: tendencies to be conflict-prone, inwardly focused, shallow, ritualized, unfocused, rigid, inhospitable, chaotic, and uninspired. Only as these shadows are identified, owned, and addressed can a congregation become what God has called it to be.-

While it may sound strange for an entire congregation to engage in the spiritual work of self-reflection and even repentance, it is actually an old idea. Most of Paul’s letters were addressed to congregations. In the book of Revelation, the Risen Christ addresses congregations as systems, including the church at Laodicea, which suffers from being neither hot nor cold (read “on the fence”). When Jesus says he stands at the door and knocks, it is not into individual hearts that he seeks entrance, but an entire church.

In contrast to the New Testament, most of the church’s liturgy is focused on individuals. Prayers of confession typically address individual failures, not the sins of a congregation as a whole. The Lord’s Prayer is corporate, but most members would be hard pressed to name a corporate trespass of a particular congregation when they say “forgive us our trespasses.” Rarely is the passing of the peace linked to a congregational tendency to duke it out. Creeds are “I” statements. Much of the hymnody is individualistic as well. Amazing grace saves wretches like me, not like us.

“They’ll know we are Christians by our love” hits the mark, as long as it is not sentimentalized and used superficially to distract from the ways that congregations are not loving to one another nor to the stranger who enters their communities. In many
churches, nearly 25% of members indicate they are disturbed by the level of conflict within their congregation. In a world starving for hope, only 17% of members believe they live in faith communities where members are comfortable sharing faith stories. These are not simply the shadows of individuals but entire communities. Churches will not grow and flourish as long as these are unexplored and untouched by the light of God’s grace.

All twelve step programs have, as their fourth step, the exercise of making a fearless moral inventory. In many ways, organizational intelligence is precisely that same exercise engaged at the congregational level. It builds on the previous steps of acknowledging powerlessness, believing in God’s ability to help us, and turning our lives over to God. Congregational sobriety is freedom from the internal demons that unconsciously sabotage its best intentions. Only when it has done that penitential work can it finally get to the twelfth step: carrying its message to others.

– J. Russell Crabtree

Skating together – OI and embracing congregational diversity

I had a bit of an unexpected long drive last night from Milwaukee to Columbus. Along the way, I heard a TED talk about community and order. The speaker talked about how if you pitched the concept of the old style roller rink to some friends for the first time it would sound something like this “I want to buy a large warehouse, lay the floor with concrete. Then I am going to add some hard rails on the sides and have people without certification, training or helmets skate around the floor just in one direction. There will be no pattern just one direction to skate. To music. It will be great.”

It sounds ridiculous when you think of it like that. But, when you actually go roller skating in a skating rink it works. Somehow we come together in this community of skaters, skate in one direction, and it is all to music. Some us skate fast and have to move around others. Some of us fall and make the person behind us fall. We then brush ourselves off and get back to skating. At the end of the day, it is great.

This weekend I had the opportunity to work with a congregation in Wisconsin. Their descriptive map from the Congregation Assessment Tool (CAT) looked like this:

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On paper, they have people who are more conservative in their theology (scripture is the literal word of God, conversion is the first step in forming a betters society, etc.) and people who are more progressive in their theology. This congregation has people that are more adaptable to change and those who need more intentional steps to help them move towards change. Like the roller rink idea, on paper, it might seem like having this community work together may end up in a large pile up of stalemates and divisiveness – skaters in all directions with a hard floor beneath.

Instead, as we worked through all the congregation’s data, we kept this diversity in front of us for a large part of the conversation. There is work to do. This congregation has experienced some tough set-backs. However, the leadership kept naming their diverse congregation as a strength and coming back to it as a focal point. This type of thoughtful leadership, with a deep care towards their level of internal diversity, will aid the congregation through their time of pastoral transition. It will also help determine what gifts and skills their next pastor needs to have as well as what strengths and growth edges the leadership needs to focus on while they are in transition.

When Paul wrote I Corinthians he appealed to the church community in Corinth who was experiencing a divisiveness in their leadership and in their thinking. He wrote “I appeal to you, brothers and sisters, in the name of our Lord Jesus Christ, that all of you agree with one another in what you say and that there be no divisions among you, but that you be perfectly united in mind and thought.” 1 Corinthians 1:10.

What I heard yesterday from the leadership of this congregation was exactly this. They have fully claimed being a congregation that has folks from differing theologies, adaptability levels and places on the descriptive map. When they come together in the name of Christ, when they work and worship together with all of the different thoughts, beliefs and ways of moving in community it works. It is an unexpected unity. For me this was a great reminder that if we all keep our eyes on Christ and work towards our preferred future of ourselves in our congregations, we really can skate quite beautifully – even if you throw in an occasional fall now and again.

-Emily Swanson

What do we mean by Satisfaction and why do congregations need it?

When taking the Congregation Assessment Tool, we measure how satisfied members are in each congregation. While we might know generally what makes us happy, this look at satisfaction digs deeper. When we talk about satisfaction we are talking about that sense of peaceful contentment when we sit in the pews with each other and work alongside each other – it is that feeling of belonging, and lack of discord. It is important to understand why we look at this to measure the vitality of congregations.

The word “satisfaction” or “satisfy” gets mixed reviews in the Bible. The Psalms speak of satisfaction as a way that God connects to his people. In Psalm 90:14, the writer entreats “Satisfy us in the morning with your loving kindness that we may rejoice and be glad all our days.” Psalms 145:16 expands this thought to include other creatures: “You open your hand, and satisfy the desire of every living thing.”

Other passages are not so sanguine. Paul sees the desire to satisfy others as an obstacle. “For do I now seek to satisfy men or God?” he asks in Galatians. As a tool of political expediency, we stray into the realm of the demonic. Mark tells us that “Pilate, wishing to satisfy the mob, released Barabbas for them, and after scourging Jesus handed Him over for crucifixion.”

In our experience, satisfaction in a church is rarely achieved by appealing to the mob, primarily because there are multiple mobs. In truth, we find that what satisfies one mob often alienates another. Satisfaction is achieved by fulfilling a mission that does not ignore human desires but transcends them. It succinctly answers the question “why do we do what we do the way we do it?” This is the satisfaction that is coveted as a primary goal in life to be achieved through a direct, frontal assault on the rest of the universe. It is its own reward.Also importantly, there is another kind of satisfaction that is a by-product of other activities, like happiness is a by-product and can never be achieved by “trying to be happy.” Churches that land in the transformation quadrant are generally filled with members who have clarity about a mission that transcends them and draws them into an alternative reality where the Gospel is plausible and compelling…and satisfying.

The Conflicted Congregation

All congregations have conflict. So, the question really isn’t “is there conflict?” – we know it is there. The real question is “how do you manage the conflict you have?” Or put another way, is this congregation a place where people can say “I was wrong and I am sorry” and receive an open and loving response in return. High levels of conflict that remain unmanaged or unhealed in congregations can be painful for everyone. They often result in a loss of missional focus, a loss of membership, burnt-out leadership, a loss of the sense of family, and a deterioration in our spiritual life together as a congregation.

The questions that bring conflict to light in the Congregation Assessment Tool (CAT) ask whether folks are feeling there is a disturbing amount of conflict, if they move through conflict by mutual effort, if there is a healthy tolerance of differing beliefs and opinions, and if there is frequently a small group of people that oppose how the majority wants to move forward. Sometimes these questions in the CAT will reveal that a congregation has become extremely conflicted. When we review the data with these congregations there are often tears, as well as the frustration of feeling so stuck in the conflict, and many times, deep sighs and a statement that “it is nice to just finally admit that there is conflict out loud.” We always say to these congregations this is your story today but it doesn’t have to be your story tomorrow with the warning that the road ahead will take commitment and intentional steps.

In 2015, a congregation in New England took the CAT while in a pastoral transition. When it was compared to other 1,500 churches in our database, their dashboard indicated that there were in the 11% in conflict, meaning that 89% of the other congregations in our database were managing their conflict better. This high level of unmanaged conflict had bleed into everything – leaving them with low hospitality scores (8%, or 92% of the other churches were more hospitable), low morale (24%), and affecting all of the other performance areas where we want them to be doing well.

After working through the review of their data with the support of their Synod, this congregation had to decide what to do. Prayerfully, they chose to own the data, recognizing that it was time to deal with their conflict and started their new story.

This congregation realized that during this time of pastoral transition they would need help to clearly address and respond to the conflict. They couldn’t rush forward to call a new pastor without serious self-reflection and initial steps. They instead hired a skilled Intentional Interim who led a series of cottage meetings, openly discussed concerns, and directly addressed what had become “the two sides” engaging conversation and reconciliation.

The congregational leadership then prepared an honest profile to call a new pastor. They were better able to articulate both the skills needed in their next pastor and the challenges they still faced as a congregation. The congregation was transparent about the tremendous steps they’d taken with the strong leadership of their interim, acknowledging that there was still work to be done in moving forward.

When they found their new permanent pastoral leadership, that person came with the experience they needed – because the congregation knew exactly what they truly needed and were honest with their pastoral candidates. Their new pastor brought experience, strong mediation and communication skills, and a great deal of enthusiasm and energy for ministry. Together, they continue to face some challenges but the match is strong and the foundation for moving forward was strongly set with their Intentional Interim.

This same congregation ran the CAT again and we sent them their new reports two weeks ago. This is their new dashboard – their morale is in the 79%, conflict levels are at the 55%, and look at the hostility score moving up: west barnstable 2017

This is a congregation that has made enormous strides in the last two years. If you asked this congregation, their middle judicatory team, or their pastors, I am sure they would say it has been a lot of work. But their ability to say “this is our story today but it wouldn’t and it can’t be our story tomorrow” has allowed God to move them closer towards true healing.

I would like to extend my gratitude to both the congregation and the New England Synod for allowing us to share in this work. When we see the data tell this kind of story we jump out of our chairs at Holy Cow! Consulting because this is why we do what we do – not so that congregations can have a lot of numbers and statistics, but instead, so that congregations can see where they truly are now so they can become and move to who they are called to be.

-Emily Swanson, President of Holy Cow! Consulting

Assessment as a Spiritual Journey

All truth is God’s truth. That God is loving and gracious, that e=mc2, and that curious tendency of all children to giggle at hiding in plain sight with just their eyes covered, all these are expressions of God’s truth. The process of discovering God’s truth, in any of its many forms, always has an element of revelation to it as if one were being shown something. Using the vernacular of our day, our own personal discoveries have the quality of “a light coming on.” This is also the language used by Jesus as he describes the discovery of God’s nature and purposes in the world. “He who follows me will not walk in darkness, but will have the light of life.”

The process of discovering the perspectives, experiences, and aspirations of a church is also one of revelation and has the revelatory quality of moving from darkness into light. In response, it is not uncommon for people to speak of “a light coming on” in the experience as they come to understand aspects of the entire body that they could not possibly have known from the relatively small number of interactions that characterizes the day to day relationships in most organizations. This process of reality moving out of the shadows and into the light is a spiritual journey.

As a spiritual journey, it has all the elements one would expect.
There are insights that evoke a liberating “aha” as connections
are uncovered that were not intuitively obvious. Some aspects of
the process tell us nothing new, but they express what we do
know using language that enables us to get a firmer grasp.

Sometimes the need for healing is revealed in the relational
wounds that come to light, often painful and occasionally urgent.
There are the common resistances that we all experience, the sense of inferiority or shame or fear that tempts us to retreat
back into the perceived safety of the darkness. We often find ourselves in denial struggling with what it will mean to embrace these truths which can often feel like loss. So, we engage with an air dismissiveness and return to our unfruitful behaviors which led us here in the first place.

Finally, there is the concrete action that must root itself in the earth of any spiritual journey and express itself in fruit for the Kingdom of God. The fulfillment of a spiritual journey ultimately hinges, not on the research design, but upon the spiritual practice that surrounds it. Without this spiritual practice, insights degenerate into trivia, wounds are probed but not healed, resistances harden into defensiveness and denial, and the promised new life fails to materialize as an incarnate reality. King David’s greatest loss of life was not to an enemy but to his own inability to manage information and keep it disentangled from his own ego.

For these reasons, it is critical that an evidence-based discernment process be interwoven with a robust spiritual practice including prayer, reflection, confession, devotions, study, and worship. Because an assessment generates a symbolic narrative, that is, a corporate story told through the symbol of numbers, we must ponder several questions:

How do we deal with our stories? While the individual contribution to the assessment is confidential, the corporate story will be quite public.
How might the disclosure of our corporate story bring insight, healing, and renewal?
In the past, how have we dealt with surprises, with things we thought were true but we discovered were not?
In that same past, how have we dealt with our wounds, our resistances, and our tendency to intellectualize as an escape from change?
What Scriptures help us reflect on truth, listening to God, trusting God’s plan for us and facing change?
How do we find access to the grace of God in this process of discovery so that our journey might be one expressive of Jesus, full of grace and truth?

When we take the time to answer these questions and weave our data with the story of our congregation, then prayerfully we can move forward with hope.

Organizational Intelligence and the development of Evidence Based Congregational Membership

One of the things that we frequently discuss with a congregation’s leadership is the idea of now we have the data, but what do we do with it. It is here that the conversation turns to not just being leaders but having an evidence-based leadership – encouraging leaders to engage in a discernment process that integrates organizational intelligence into their leadership decision making. This is important for the leadership as they move forward. But, leaders are not the only ones in a congregation cannot work alone.

Organizational intelligence makes something else possible: an evidence-based membership. An evidence-based membership is one that has learned how to integrate organizational intelligence into their behaviors.

Let’s look at why this is so important through the following example:

A church takes the CAT and discovers that it is in the Recovery Quadrant. In addition, a lack of flexibility appears to be the primary factor inhibiting their vitality. In a politically-based membership, leaders try to win support for developing a more adaptable culture through their own relational cache. This is a top-down approach that inevitably invites polarization around the local configuration of relational networks.

In an evidence-based membership, the entire congregation confronts its own lack of flexibility, understands the trajectory of that organizational culture, and wrestles with the likely consequences of choosing to become more adaptable or remain settled. The focus of the discernment process shifts from how folks relate to a particular leader or leadership team to how they are going to deal with their own corporate and individual behavior.

The implications of this shift are profound and include:

Specifying clearer, more concrete changes in behavior for members who are committed to developing a more vital congregation.
Relieving pressure on young clergy who are thrust into systems with politically-based memberships that repeatedly cycle through conflicts that have little to do with him/her.
Developing change processes that are also bottom-up rather than cascading all change down from the top.

Developing an evidence-based membership requires all the steps of developing an evidence-based leadership, beginning with helping them understand that their biggest problem is that they don’t know what they don’t know.

We are not suggesting that OI will or should eliminate the need for the political and relationally based components of leadership. These types of components will still exist but having an evidence-based membership frees leaders from spending all their time and energy answering WHY so that they can invest their leadership into WHAT’S NEXT.

Telling the Story of the Transformational Congregation

When we call a congregation a Transformational Congregation, we are talking about a congregation with high energy and satisfaction looking particularly at how members themselves are experiencing the church rather than imposing our own external definition. In our work we have found that just as healthy organizations have certain characteristics ingrained in their corporate culture, healthy or transformational congregations have certain characteristics ingrained in their culture.

We typically find that transformational congregations have the following characteristics:

Inspiring and engaging Worship.
Flexibility (the ability to change to meet the needs of the congregation)
Conviction that church has given new meaning to life.
Inviting, friendly body of people with good relational skills.
Open, responsive decision making process (not thwarted by the same small group of people)
Opportunities for service in the church and the world that fit a person’s gifts and passions.

A transformational congregation has strategic options that other congregations may not because it does not have to spend a lot of time on internal issues, like managing conflict or regaining trust in the leadership of the congregation. Instead, it can focus on more external things such as numeric growth, program expansion (ministries, facilities, education), replication (church planting, mentor), and external impact (local, regional, international).

It is important to note that a congregation with scores in the Transformational Quadrant does not guarantee that it is growing, expanding, replicating or impacting. Instead the congregation must choose the right strategies. In fact, the shadow side of the Transformational Quadrant is that congregations can use the information to avoid taking further risks that growth may require. It takes as much work for a transformational congregation to continue to have that high energy and satisfaction, keeping the momentum moving forward, as it does for the reinvention congregation in the low energy and satisfaction quadrant to reinvent itself.

We hear a lot about the struggles facing our congregations in every denomination, in every geographical area, in every community. But, at Holy Cow! Consulting, we also get to hear some pretty phenomenal stories of congregations doing great work and really transforming lives. There are churches of less then 50 people in their average Sunday attendance that are transformational. There are transformational churches in rural areas, in metropolitan areas, in the middle of prairies or the D.C. beltway. There are transformational churches making strides every day and we think we should be celebrating those stories.

Over the next year, Holy Cow! Consulting will be spending some time on this blog telling the stories of these transformational churches from all over the country. We are hoping these stories will serve as a way to inspire and a way to give hope as we all determine what the Lord is asking of us as congregations.

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Clergy-Focus, the Critical Clergy System and how the Middle Judicatory can help

Clergy: Power and Vulnerability

With the exception of family-sized congregations, clergy are generally the individuals who hold the most power in a local parish. Depending upon the polity, this includes the political, relational, moral, and platform dimensions of power. The introduction of organizational intelligence (OI) into a system has the consequence of making the clergy person one of the most vulnerable, because he or she is the only person in the system where perceptions are individually focused. This combination of power and vulnerability merits sensitivity on the part of OI interpretive and application consultants.

Since most middle judicatories are charged with particular oversight of their clergy, it is desirable for these bodies to prepare resources for clergy in congregations that are utilizing OI, especially if they are using OI systematically as an information system. This is particularly true for clergy-focused systems.

The technical definition of a clergy-focused system can be found elsewhere. Here it will suffice to say that a clergy-focused system is one where members tend to evaluate the vitality of the church through the lens of perceived clergy performance. A clergy-critical system is one where members perceive that an improvement in the pastor-congregation relationship is the decisive factor in improving the vitality of the church.

Implications for a Clergy-Focused System

The fact that a system is clergy-focused can have a number of different implications and possible trajectories:

A “front and center” clergy person who can parley his/her relational capital into ministry and is a good fit for the congregation. The middle judicatory can help the clergy person/church leadership manage any narcissistic risks.
An overfunctioning clergy person who is paying a psychic price for success. The middle judicatory can help the clergy person/church leadership manage tendencies to burn-out or flame-out.

Implications for a Clergy-Critical System

A clergy-critical system is essentially a clergy-focused system where things are not going well. Again, there are a number of different implications and possible trajectories:

A pastor who is exercising the necessary leadership to shift the culture of a congregation. The middle judicatory can help the clergy person/church leadership by publicly and privately standing with them. This usually occurs within the first several years of clergy tenure.
A pastor who is no longer, or never was a good fit for the congregation. The middle judicatory can help the clergy person/church leadership in a process of discernment regarding the pastoral relationship.
A leadership team that is beginning to engage in a project (strategic planning, leadership development, financial campaign) that avoids the clergy issue. The middle judicatory can help the clergy person/church leadership avoid the costs of those failure paths by keeping the system focused on the primary issue. Are they being led to (a) shift the church culture, (b) work on the pastoral relationship, or (c) dissolve the pastoral relationship?

In many cases, these will not be easy conversations. However, many issues in clergy-
focused or clergy-critical systems will not improve with time. Sometimes they will devolve into full-fledged crises of one kind or another in which no one wins and options are diminished.

Reg images ardless of where the congregation is, whether a clergy-focused or a clergy-critical system, there are important roles and conversations that the Middle Judicatory can be a part of – both in the short and long term. Those early conversations on the part of middle judicatories can avoid painful, costly interventions down the road. These conversations and efforts can also aid clergy who may feel the weight of the congregation on their shoulders – before that weight becomes too much to bear alone.

From Holy Cow! Consulting and Crow’s Feet Consulting

A picture of health- Vitality and Somatic Knowing

images One of the points of conversation in the broader faith community is my definition of a vital (what I call “transformational”) congregation. Most definitions of a vital congregation follow what I would call a conceptual-behavioral approach. A conceptual-behavioral approach establishes a set of externally developed metrics that focus on customs, beliefs, and values against which the congregation is evaluated. For example, some groups would define a vital congregation as one which meets in a worshiping space that is free of symbols, holds an evangelical set of beliefs, and values individual
conversion. The middle judicatory of a mainline denomination may have a very different set of customs, beliefs, and values, usually skewed to benefit the denomination itself.

The weakness of the conceptual-behavioral approach is that it fails to take into account the actual experience of the members in faith communities. Neither concepts nor behaviors create meaning. Most of us have been in situations where someone argues for ideas that leave us wondering what they have to do with real life. In addition, we have participated in ritualized behaviors after which we have felt that we were simply going through motions. In other words, the conceptual-behavioral approach fails to establish meaning, and faith communities are generators of meaning if they are anything.

The alternative approach that we have taken with organizational intelligence is what folks are now calling somatic-knowing, that is, knowledge that is attained through the experience of the body. A somatic-knowing approach probes the emotional states that arise from the actual experiences of members. Specifically, organizational intelligence defines a vital congregation by looking at two dimensions of somatic knowing: satisfaction (the experience of fullness and wholeness) and energy (the experience of excitement and purpose). Fullness, wholeness, excitement, and purpose generate meaning in a way that custom, beliefs, and values alone cannot.

This definition of vitality solves a problem that denominations and religious systems have struggled with for years, namely, how to reach consensus on the particular customs, beliefs, and values that constitute vitality. In the conceptual-behavioral approach, any group of thirty different leaders will develop thirty different lists that are then to be applied as external standards to the faith communities under their shepherding.

The fallacy of this approach can be seen in reflecting upon the behavior of a healthy individual. A healthy individual has many different ways of expressing that health. He could be a runner, a biker, a swimmer. She can serve as a doctor, a lawyer, a barista, or a construction worker. He could have many casual friends, or a few close ones. She could earn a million dollars a year and give a hundred thousand to charity. He could live on social security and volunteer in a local food pantry. Health has so many options.

Similarly, a vital congregation has many different ways of expressing that health. Some are going to be noisy and boisterous in worship. Some are going to be quiet and reflective. Some are going to focus a large percentage of their resources on international mission. Some are going to excel at equipping individuals to understand their work as vocation. Some are going to be led by a pastoral team. Some are going to have a strong, central leader. Some are going to meet in a warehouse. Some are going to meet in a school. Some are going to meet in exquisitely appointed sanctuaries.

Healthy churches have options. In fact, one of the characteristics of healthy churches is that they capitalize on opportunities in ways that are creative and unique.

Unhealthy churches, like unhealthy individuals have restricted options. I broke my ankle skydiving, and the injury limited many of my options that required physical activity. In fact, if you look at persons who have broken their ankles, they all look pretty much the same. They have a cast on their leg. They keep their leg elevated. They use crutches. They don’t move very fast.

The same is true with churches. While healthy churches look very different from one another, struggling churches look very much the same. Conflicted. Settled. Inwardly focused. Fixated on scarcity. Here’s the thing: if you look at these churches through a customs, beliefs, and values lens, they may be holding up fairly well. However, if you look at them through the lens of somatic knowing – fullness, wholeness, excitement, and purpose – their corporate lives are starved for meaning.

Do I worry that congregations with high levels of somatic knowing – fullness, wholeness, excitement, and purpose – have simply abandoned all interest in customs, beliefs, and values? Not really. That’s like asking if I worry that a healthy person might not be eating right, exercising, or getting enough sleep. Vital congregations, like vital individuals, tend to be paying attention to the habits of mind and behavior that contributed to their health in the first place.

Russ Crabtree
Founder of Holy Cow! Consulting

Tag: Congregation Assessment Tool (CAT)