Featured speaker Rev. Dr. Lovett H. Weems Jr. offered a swift kick in the pants to the Detroit Conference at the 2010 Annual Conference — but it wasn’t without a heavy dose of love and some hearty laughter mixed in.
Weems, a distinguished Professor of Church Leadership and the Director of the Lewis Center for Church Leadership of Wesley Theological Seminary in Washington D.C., taught three sessions at the conference, focusing on individual leadership, church leadership and the present realities of the ever-changing church.
Through his wisdom and humor Weems proved he has probably forgotten more stories and concepts about ministry than many people will learn and experience in an entire lifetime.
Constructing the railroad of multiple leadership
Weems greeted laity on the first day of conference by showing them how the Transcontinental Railroad and basic anatomy relate to their adventures in church leadership.
Drawing on the teachings of 1Corinthians 12:14-20, which refers to the ‘many parts of one body,’ Weems said people have five senses to help them experience things, but often times one takes over and dominates when necessary, similar to church leadership.
He also referred to the book Nothing Like It in the World: The Men Who Built the Transcontinental Railroad, 1863-1869 by Stephen Ambrose to help laity understand that great achievements often take the hard work of many, even if only a few people get credit.
After writing the book, Ambrose admitted it was difficult to decide whom to focus on, because everyone from Abraham Lincoln to congressmen to engineers to laborers had an incredible impact on the revolutionary project.
Weems said in the end Ambrose decided to write about all of them because “without each one doing their part the Transcontinental Railroad would have never happened.”
Likewise Weems suggested, it is essential for lay members to realize their own strengths and step up when called, while taking a back seat when it is someone else’s turn.
“People think if they have a pie and more people come to share the pie, they will get a smaller piece. But power is expandable so the more pie other people have, the more pie you have.”
Ask yourself this
His second lecture of conference centered around five key questions congregations aught to ask themselves.
Weems said Bishop Francis Asbury, one of the first two bishops of the Methodist Episcopal Church, found out that in America it is often best to ask questions and allow time for them to be answered — and the same can be said for churches.
The first question Weems advised churches to ask is “Who are we?”
He said renewal will never come from forgetting where we came from, and even though John Wesley’s ministry was revolutionary for its time he was still grounded in the history and theological ideas of the Church of England.
“Change is not becoming something we have never been, but change is becoming more of some of the things we’ve always been and more of things we have yet to become,” Weems said.
The second question posed was “What is our mission?”
He joked that when he became the seminary president at Saint Paul School of Theology, plenty of people immediately came to him with problems — and they were even nice enough to come equipped with solutions — but the mission of a church isn’t just to fix problems. He said it is to make people well or better by using an ultimate mission.
“The most important words in the church when describing something it is doing are ‘So that,” because then you will see why each thing exists and what purpose it serves.”
The third question to the crowd was “Who are the people?”
He said one of the reasons the ‘Wesleyism’ took off initially was because preachers and leaders had no boundaries for whom they should focus on getting their message to, because everyone mattered.
Weems said the church has to do a better job of serving metropolitan areas and the poor, among a number of evolving demographics.
Building on that, he asked “Who are our neighbors and what are their needs?”
“I’d like your church to do not only a financial audit, but also a missions audit. I want you to ask one question: “If your church ceased to exist, who would miss it other than its members,” he said.
He ended the session by encouraging churches to ask themselves what their visions for the near future should be, through careful discernment and prayer. He believes that a bridge from the past to the future is a solid path to travel.
Only babies like to be changed
Weems was not mincing words in his final session at the conference.
“I’d like to give you here in the Detroit Conference some ways to facilitate change that won’t lead you to commit suicide,” he said.
Weems said the only types of changes most churches and leaders like to make seem to be receiving pay raises and having to decide where to spend the extra funds.
Change should not have such negative connotations attached to it though, Weems argued, because the God we worship in the present is also the God of the future.
“We can never claim theologically that the current state of affairs is synonymous with God’s ultimate will,” Weems said, noting that there is always a “next step” and “another chapter.”
He said too many churches have an unspoken mission statement that says “we want to remain as good as we are,” but such a mindset is not theologically accurate because “we are never at a place where God cannot do more.”
To help illustrate that point Weems went on to talk about four things churches need to do to facilitate positive change: Help define reality, refrain specific interests in light of the whole, seek community and change, and advance the plot of your congregation’s story.
To give a Biblical face to what he meant when he said “help define reality” he referenced the story of Nehemia, who was revered for being attentive to the Lord and helping rebuild the walls of Jerusalem.
“Nehemia wasn’t interested in wall building, he was interesting in God’s work. And it just so happened that it included building a wall at that time,” Weems said.
Weems also said that special interests should be looked at in light of the mission of the church of the whole and church groups and committees must work together, instead as strictly separate entities.
Rev. Adam Hamilton of the Church of the Resurrection, home of upwards of 20,000 attendees at holiday service, once told Weems that he remembers how in the early ’90s a member once remarked “I think we’re the perfect size.”
At the time there were around 40 people meeting for services in a funeral home.
At the conclusion of his almost hour-long talk Weems cautioned churches to pace themselves as change took place and stay motivated to do God’s work, no how difficult the task might seem.
“Change is external, but transition is internal….you can make plans for a change in one day, like you become a parent one day, but parenthood is a transition.”
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