Developing Church Culture

1. Developing Church Culture Every Church needs one and has one

2. God’s Appeal • I appeal to you therefore, brethren, by the mercies of God, to present your bodies as a living sacrifice, holy and acceptable to God, which is your spiritual worship. Do not be conformed to this world but be transformed by the renewal of your mind, that you may prove what is the will of God, what is good and acceptable and perfect. Rom. XII 1-2.

3. Culture without action • If anyone considers himself religious and yet does not keep a tight rein on his tongue, he deceives himself and his religion is worthless. Religion that God our Father accepts as pure and faultless is this: to look after orphans and widows in their distress and to keep oneself from being polluted by the world. James 1:26.

4. Questions • How do we engage without bending to culture • How to Penetrate: Understanding • Parenting can be an issue • Problem for the church is how to reveal but not conform.

5. Design or Default? No such thing as a church without a culture. • You are either leading, following, or inherited it. • Does it match up with your values? • Is it Conflict with the leaders? • Can your Church Culture accommodate changes (Stress within and outside)

6. Defintion of Church Culture • The Collective consciousness • a set of learned beliefs, values and behaviors: the way of life shared by the members of a society.

7. Components of Culture • Values: comprise ideas about what in life seems important. They guide the rest of the culture. • Norms consist of expectations of how people will behave in various situations. Each culture has methods that enforce its norms. • People learn culture

8. There is no culture of one • Process of learning one's culture is called  enculturation • Every church has a personality, the packaging of the shared way of life. • Church Culture changes as the presentation of the Gospel changes. People alway responds to packaging.

9. The modern Dilemna • Do people reject the Gospel and church, because of the packaging and presentation. • Values and packaging: Syncretism or Contextualization. • Do we have to give up to be effective?

10. The need for understanding • A Shared biblical way of life can only be seen in a loving, clear Church family. They demonstrate a present/future culture • The Church is the only institution that reveals reality. • We must never blend but we must adapt to be relevant. The question is not being effective but being relevant

11. Wisdom is justified by her children • We are not here to attract, but to reveal. A real Lord, A real People, an alternative Culture. • Visionaries, relevant in all areas to the area that is being served. • 90% of people say they would not go to a church that is packaging todays presentation.

12. What are we trying to create? • How do we bring others into the culture that has been or is trying to be created? • New people need an adjustment period • Some move on • A model where Jesus would like to live among us!

13. Leadership the key • Leadership is keepers of the DNA and Culture • Example of Nehemiah. Reason that we must be diligent to be keepers of culture. Enemies of God, the flesh, and culture of this world always wanting to get a place in God’s city. • Nehemiah 13:6 Nehemiah was gone for 13 years, He had things set in order. • Vs 1-31Keepers of the culture. Vs 4,7 The enemies of God are always looking for a way to get a room in His house.

14. Stages of Change • Before anything else, leaders must build and give an understanding. • The key to most changes is Leadership. • The biggest challenge and resistance is fear.

15. Final thoughts • No culture can live, if it attempts to be exclusive • A culture is made or destroyed by its articulate voices