When something seems to be working, we should stick with it unless or
until God gives a new direction. It seems that in our "information saturated"
culture, many Churches and ministries are jumping around from one 'new
thing' to the next even though what they have been doing for quite a while
has been fruitful and blessed.
I'm not making a case for never changing our 'packaging' or even some of
of our strategies; but in the fundamentals of our DNA (or Totems as defined
by my friend Robert Lewis in his book "Culture Shift") hold the line!
I recently visited Saddleback Church in Lake Forest, CA, a place I've been
to many times in the past; but not in last few years. There are a number of
'packaging' changes; minor tweaks in how things are done, but fundamentally
Rick Warren and his team just keep doing what has worked for the past 32
years.
Saddleback has gone 'multi-site' instead of building a huge auditorium
on its Lake Forest campus, but the worship, teaching, and core values have
not changed much at all. There are more 'hip' places all around in SoCal,
but I doubt that there are many that are more fruitful.
The same could be said for our personal devotional life, our way of serving
the Lord, where we are committed to a mission and so on. Faithfulness
over the long pull is the key to abiding fruit in ministry, in a Church, and
most important, in a life..
Blessings!
Jay
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