Many years ago, I developed a relationship with an older church member who resided in a local Baptist retirement community. This friend taught me how to make kitchen clocks using skillets. One of the first questions he asked was, “How do we find the center of the skillet?†Well, my mathematical aptitude on that issue was on the level of throwing darts at a target—hoping that I would come close. After I was told how it should be done, he taught me how to drill the skillet, how to protect it from rust, how to find the proper positions of the numbers, how to paint it, how to make many clocks in a production line, etc.
So after purchasing my materials, I began to make clocks. One afternoon I began making several clocks. I drilled through several skillets, but ran into one skillet that was harder that any I had experienced. I drilled, and drilled, and drilled. Smoke ran up the drill bit! I kept pouring oil on the bit. I nearly stood on the drill to exert as much pressure on it as I could. Finally, after about ten minutes of drilling, the drill bit popped through the skillet. It was at that moment, and not a second before, that I realize that I had been drilling in reverse! Stupid, yes, but the truth! I’m proud of the fact that I can drill though a kitchen skillet in reverse! It can be done.
Sometimes it is difficult to see the forest for the trees. Sometimes, like this story, we get so focused on something, that we miss the obvious. Much of life is that way. The details of “everydayness†and “sameness†often preclude a wider view. The same is true of Christian education and church life. We are often focused on specific church responsibilities that demand our attention. If we aren’t careful some areas of church life can become dominant over others resulting in a lack of balance. A healthy spiritual diet requires balance. Bible study, discipleship, worship and music, fellowship and missions, theology and doctrine, church history, spirituality, and ethics are all important to a faith-
shaping, educationally-sensitive, Christian community.
Many churches seek to provide effective balance through the leadership of a Church Council. The leaders of the major organizations of the church meet on a regular basis. Church Councils exist primarily to carry out the functions of calendaring and administrative oversight. While these functions are important, they are not congruent with how churches effectively manage issues that provide effectiveness in faith formation. Effectiveness in faith formation requires attention to issues beyond calendaring and administrative concerns. A broader perspective is necessary.
A better model for providing effective leadership in the church, in my opinion, is through a Christian Education Council. Christian education is not a priority of Church Councils. Rarely does a Church Council meeting have a teaching/learning element to it. How can a church be led towards faith formation by leaders who do not give attention to how faith is formed? Failure to address the formational needs of the community of faith promotes the function of maintaining the status quo with little thought given to how our practices are providing effective faith formation. We become so focused on calendaring and administration that we don’t recognize the need to address deeper and more significant issues.
A Christian Education Council will focus on things a Church Council never will consider, because the nature of its purpose is to be sensitive to the educational and formational influences within communal life. In other words, the function of the Council is more than just drilling. The function is to examine the tools of faith formation (structures, procedures, processes) to make sure they are congruent with the task at hand (faith formation, not just coordination and calendaring), and in proper working order—that is, moving in the right direction (working towards the intended goal and not against it)!
Call it what you want–Church Council or Christian Education Council. The issue isn’t the name. The issue is the function! Get that right, and the effectiveness of the team will be obvious.
I continue to be surprised at how many congregations have neither a church council or a Christian education committee (board, team, council, whatever). Often, that’s a big part of the reason they get stuck at certain points. And you are right, Marty, one of the hardest things for the leaders of those congregations to get clear about is about the FUNCTION that those groups serve for the congregation.