This is part two of a series begun yesterday. To see part one, click here.
Some churches do a remarkable job of creating culture that new people can easily adopt as their own. Whether intentionally or intuitively, they skillfully assimilate new members. Yesterday, we examined the first three components of church culture: Language, Icons, and Celebrations; today, we’ll examine four additional key factors:
Relationships – Churches who create culture effectively have natural avenues for people to forge relationships with others like themselves. Small groups are the most obvious example of this. Serving teams also provide great opportunities for relationships. A less obvious example is multiple services. Saturday night services tend to draw a different crowd than Sunday morning services. The 8:30 a.m. Sunday crowd looks very different than the 1:00 p.m. Sunday crowd. Each service seems to have a subculture of its own within the larger culture of the church. A church with 5 smaller weekend services provides more natural opportunities for people to become friends than a church with one huge weekend service.
Borders – Nations are defined by their borders, and so are churches. Boundaries come from a clear sense of corporate identity. Some churches have ministries for everything. These churches have a harder time intentionally creating culture because they are spread so thin. Churches who focus on 5 or 6 ministries find it easier to create culture. They choose to say “yes” to a few things and “no” to many other good ministry ideas because they know who they are and who God is calling them to be.
When borders aren’t clear, the culture creates its own borders. This is why it’s important for church leaders to be proactive in establishing borders. If leaders don’t intentionally create boundaries, the people of the church will eventually create borders haphazardly. Marking the borders helps everyone in the organization better understand who your church is and what your church does.
Fashion – Yep, I am referring to clothes. Fashion plays a huge role in culture. Many church leaders think that fashion is a no-brainer. Think about the specific people God has designed your church to reach. Those are the people you should dress for.
Fashion is probably not the deepest issue for your church, but it does matter. It deserves more than a passing thought. The people you desire to reach think about what they are going to wear, so church leaders should think about it, too.
Values – Every strong culture has a shared value set. This goes way beyond writing a set of core values and putting them on the wall. Talking about values is not enough; they must be modeled. If you say you value small groups, everyone on your staff should be in a group. If you say you value worship, then your leaders must set the standard as passionate worshipers. If you say you value evangelism, you must preach the gospel clearly and consistently. If you value newcomers, you’d better be prepared for guests every time your doors are open. Values that are preached fall on deaf ears, but values that are lived are noticed. When your staff and leaders exhibit your church values, everyone gets the message.
Some of the values that should matter to our churches are evangelism, life-transformation, growth, families, trust, leadership, holiness, excellence, honesty, and faith. Sadly, in the absence of those values, too many churches have started to value things like traditions, potluck dinners, caution, control, politics, mediocrity (in the name of “good enough”), and smallness.
The bottom line is this: culture can be created strategically, or it can happen on its own. When leaders don’t think, plan, prepare, and build culture intentionally, they will eventually find themselves in churches with self-focused, member-satisfying, God-dishonoring cultures. As such, creating culture is, without a doubt, one of the most important aspects of Christian leadership.
