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NOURISHING GRASS ROOTS:
COGENERATIVE VISION CULTIVATION FOR MISSIONAL MINISTRY
by
MICHAEL J. HUNTLEY
A Thesis Submitted to the Faculty of
Luther Seminary
In Partial Fulfillment of
The Requirements for the Degree of
DOCTOR OF MINISTRY
ST. PAUL, MINNESOTA
2011
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ABSTRACT
Nourishing Grass Roots:
Cogenerative Vision Cultivation for Missional Ministry
By
Michael J. Huntley
Examines impact of cultivating missional vision in a newly developed
congregation using Participatory Action Research. Encouraged cogenerative dialog in
shaping the process and the resultant shared vision for missional ministry. Used
qualitative/quantitative assessment. Theoretical insights: sociological dynamics of
community, vision for leading change, cultivating shared vision. Theological insights:
vision inspiring missional activity, components of missional vision, cultivating missional
vision. Cogeneratively cultivated and mutually discerned shared missional vision.
Congregants appropriated new perspectives for interacting with others within the
congregation and daily life, recognized need for shared vision in ministry, and discerned
ministry and vocational shared purpose and guiding principles.
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ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS
To the congregations that I currently serve, who wholeheartedly participated in
this research and who both graciously and sacrificially granted me the time and financial
assistance to complete this research and thesis, I humbly and sincerely thank you. For
your willingness to share personal thoughts and perspectives, and for your honest and
wholehearted participation, I am also indebted to the individuals who agreed to
participate in the individual and group interviews. For her many hours transcribing
interviews, I thank my sister, Michelle Happel.
For your keen insights and helpful remarks in writing this thesis, I am grateful for
the wisdom and editorial perspectives from my professors, Dr. Gary Simpson and Dr.
Alvin Luedke, as well as to my editor, Dr. Joy Blaylock. To my D.Min. cohort, I thank
you for your insights and accompaniment on this journey of learning and growth. More
specifically, to Brian Ballard, Brian Ford, and Jason Korthauer, my Accountabilibuddies
and good friends, I thank you for your edits, your humor, your ideas for deeper thinking,
your inspiration, and your companionship on this shared adventure in liminality.
Finally and most importantly, to my wife, Kim, and to my children, Adam and
Rachel, without whose loving support, understanding, and encouragement this thesis
would not have been possible, I declare my highest amount of appreciation. I am indebted
to you. I love you deeply!
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TABLE OF CONTENTS
ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS ............................................................................................... iii
LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS ............................................................................................. ix
LIST OF TABLES ............................................................................................................. xi
LIST OF ABBREVIATIONS ........................................................................................... xii
Chapter
1. INTRODUCTION TO THESIS ...................................................................................1
Introduction ..............................................................................................................3
Overview ............................................................................................................3
Research Question .............................................................................................4
Research Components ........................................................................................5
Outcome .......................................................................................................5
Intervention Influencing the Outcome .........................................................6
Outside Influences .......................................................................................7
Importance of Research .....................................................................................8
Other Questions Related to the Research Question ...........................................9
Literatures and Key Theories .................................................................................11
Sociological Dynamics of Community ............................................................11
The Efficacy of Vision for Leading and Bringing Change ..............................14
Cultivating Shared Vision ................................................................................15
Practical Considerations...................................................................................16
Biblical and Theological Perspectives ...................................................................16
Vision Inspiring Missional Activity.................................................................17
Components of Missional Vision ....................................................................20
Cultivating Missional Vision ...........................................................................22
Other Matters .........................................................................................................24
Ethical Concerns ..............................................................................................24
Definitions of Key Terms ................................................................................27
Summary ................................................................................................................30
2. LITERATURES AND KEY THEORIES ..................................................................31
Sociological Dynamics of Community ..................................................................33
Organizational Structures and Vision ..............................................................34
Organizational Life Cycle Theory ...................................................................38
Self-Forming, Bottom-Up Communities .........................................................41
Specific Organizational Considerations for Research .....................................43
Partial Ethnography and Congregational Background ..............................44
Transitioning From Top-Down to Bottom-Up Organizational
Structures .............................................................................................47
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Small versus Large Group Process ............................................................48
Increasing Need for Intimacy in Society .............................................48
Group Size ...........................................................................................50
The Efficacy of Vision for Leading and Bringing Change ....................................51
Vision and the Field Effect ..............................................................................52
Vision, Lovingly Shared, as a Uniting and Motivating Force .........................53
Cultivating Shared Vision ......................................................................................56
Components of a Vision Cultivation Process ..................................................56
Shared Vision ...................................................................................................57
Cultivating Vision: A Community Garden ......................................................59
Practical Considerations.........................................................................................61
Promise ............................................................................................................62
Tools ................................................................................................................63
Bargain .............................................................................................................64
Conclusion .............................................................................................................65
3. BIBLICAL AND THEOLOGICAL PERSPECTIVES ..............................................67
Casting versus Cultivating Missional Vision .........................................................68
Vision Casting in Exodus.................................................................................69
Aspects of Vision Casting in Exodus...............................................................72
Moving From Vision Casting to Vision Cultivation........................................75
Cultivating Missional Vision in Acts ...............................................................77
Aspects of Missional Vision in Acts ................................................................80
Components of Missional Vision ..........................................................................83
Trinitarian Facets of Missional Vision ............................................................83
The Social Trinitarian Model .....................................................................83
The Social Trinity in Missional Vision ......................................................88
Missio Dei and the Kingdom of God Aspects of Missional Vision .................89
The Missio Dei in God‘s Reign .................................................................89
The Missio Dei and the Reign of God in Missional Vision .......................93
Aspects of the Holy Spirit in the Church, Working in the
Vocation of Believers with Missional Vision ............................................94
Gifts of the Holy Spirit in the Vocation of Believers ................................94
Vocation and the Holy Spirit in Missional Vision .....................................97
Cultivating Missional Vision .................................................................................98
Vision in Scripture ...........................................................................................98
Peter and Paul ............................................................................................98
The Holy Spirit and the Body of Christ in God‘s Reign..........................100
Theology of Cultivating Missional Vision ....................................................103
Moving Beyond Community to Communitas ..........................................103
Missional, Cogenerative Leadership ........................................................105
A Practical Vision Cultivation Process ..........................................................107
Considerations for Christian Community in Cultivating Missional
Vision .......................................................................................................109
Jesus‘ Participation in Small and Large Groups ......................................109
Relationship Building through Small Groups ..........................................112
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Summary ..............................................................................................................113
4. RESEARCH METHODOLOGY AND DESIGN ....................................................114
Overview of Research Methodology ...................................................................115
Specific Research Methodologies ........................................................................116
Participatory Action Research .......................................................................116
Intervention ....................................................................................................119
Metrics for Observing Changes in Congregational Practices and
Perspectives..............................................................................................124
Quantitative Research Data Gathering ...........................................................126
Faith Maturity Scale .................................................................................126
Rationale for Breakdown of Survey Statements into Subgroups for
Analysis..............................................................................................127
Data Analysis ...........................................................................................129
Qualitative Research Data Gathering .............................................................130
Qualitative Interviews ..............................................................................130
Research Areas and Questions for Qualitative Interviews ......................133
Data Analysis ...........................................................................................138
Summary ..............................................................................................................138
5. RESULTS OF STUDY AND INTERPRETATION ................................................140
Narrative of Intervention and Its Impact ..............................................................141
Pre-Intervention Preparations ........................................................................142
Impacts of Intervention ..................................................................................142
Damascus Travelers .................................................................................143
Congregation Retreat ...............................................................................144
Council Work on Vision Elements ..........................................................145
Congregation Forums and Meeting .........................................................146
Unforeseen Events and Results ......................................................................147
Quantitative Survey Results .................................................................................148
Analysis of Responses to Individual Questions .............................................150
Techniques used for Quantitative Analysis .............................................150
Intervention Perspectives from Baseline Quantitative Data ....................152
Personal Faith, Beliefs, and Practices ................................................152
Perspectives in Relating to Others beyond the Congregation ............155
t-Test Results .................................................................................................157
Qualitative Interview Results ...............................................................................159
Developing a Shared Vision ..........................................................................161
Data Relating to Lack of Shared Vision Prior to Intervention.................162
Data Relating to the Components of Shared Practices and Vision ..........163
Two Perspectives: Invitational and Vocational .............................................164
Invitational Perspective ............................................................................165
Vocational Perspective.............................................................................166
Invitational/Vocational Interaction in the Group Interview.....................167
Changes in Perspectives and Vision for Life and Missional Activity ...........169
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Changes Evident in the Group Interview .................................................169
Changes Evident in the First Individual Interview ..................................170
Changes Evident in the Second Individual Interview ..............................171
Missional Praxis Bringing New Vision and Understanding ..........................173
Other Factors Influencing Research and the Outcome ..................................174
Mission Developer Perspectives ..............................................................175
Impact of Denominational Decisions Regarding Gay Clergy .................176
Financial Concerns...................................................................................177
Conclusion ...........................................................................................................177
6. CONCLUSIONS WITH THEOLOGICAL AND THEORETICAL
REFLECTION .....................................................................................................178
Impact of Theoretical and Theological Foundations ...........................................180
A Grass-Roots Process that Invites Participation in Cultivating Shared
Vision .......................................................................................................180
Grass Roots Rather Than Top-Down Vision Cultivation ........................180
The Ability of Vision, Lovingly Shared, to Unite and Motivate .............183
Social Trinitarian and Perichoretic Foundations of Vision Cultivation.........185
Vision and the Field Effect ............................................................................187
Impact of the Cultivation Process ........................................................................188
Promise, Tools, and Bargain ..........................................................................188
Inviting the Council into the Vision Cultivation Process ........................191
Working with the Discipleship Commission and Damascus
Travelers ............................................................................................191
Inviting the Congregation into the Vision Cultivation Process ...............192
Liminality and Communitas ..........................................................................193
Missional Vocation, the Holy Spirit, the Missio Dei, and God‘s Reign ........195
Possibilities for Further Research ........................................................................197
Unexpected Research Findings ............................................................................200
Cultivating Vision for the Process and the Role of the Holy Spirit
Throughout ...............................................................................................200
New Praxis Yielding New Perspectives ........................................................201
Benefits of Planning, Acting, and Reflecting ................................................202
Personal Reflections on this Research and Missional Leadership .......................203
EPILOGUE ......................................................................................................................208
New Beginnings ...................................................................................................208
Realizing Dreams .................................................................................................210
Moving into the Future ........................................................................................211
Appendix
A. PAR Intervention Timetable ................................................................................213
B. Quantitative Instrument; Faith Maturity Scale ....................................................216
C. Faith Maturity Scale participation Thank You Letter ..........................................219
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D. Quantitative Survey Results .................................................................................220
E. Qualitative Interview Research Topics and Questions ........................................253
F. Sunday School Missional Church Lesson Plan ...................................................255
G. Retreat/Wednesday Night Agenda and Session Plans .........................................259
H. Transitioning From Traditional to Missional Handout ........................................264
I. Damascus Travelers Information .........................................................................268
J. Prayer Labyrinth Handout....................................................................................277
K. June 14, 2010 Council Meeting Liminality/Communitas Handout .....................280
L. Handout Distributed at August 8, 2010 Congregational Forum ..........................282
M. Purpose Statement and Guiding Principles ..........................................................283
BIBLIOGRAPHY ............................................................................................................285
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LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS
5.1 Histogram for Question 2. 153
5.2 Histogram for Question 26 (reverse scored). 154
5.3 Histogram for Question 28. 156
Appendix A.1 PAR Intervention Timeline, February 14-August 29, 2010. 213
Appendix E.1 Response Count Histograms, Questions 1-6 (all ages). 232
Appendix E.2 Response Count Histograms, Questions 7-12 (all ages). 233
Appendix E.3 Response Count Histograms, Questions 13-18 (all ages). 234
Appendix E.4 Response Count Histograms, Questions 19-24 (all ages). 235
Appendix E.5 Response Count Histograms, Questions 25-30 (all ages). 236
Appendix E.6 Response Count Histograms, Questions 31-36 (all ages). 237
Appendix E.7 Response Count Histograms, Questions 37-38 (all ages). 238
Appendix E.8 Response Count Histograms, Questions 1-6 (18-59). 239
Appendix E.9 Response Count Histograms, Questions 7-12 (18-59). 240
Appendix E.10 Response Count Histograms, Questions 13-18 (18-59). 241
Appendix E.11 Response Count Histograms, Questions 19-24 (18-59). 242
Appendix E.12 Response Count Histograms, Questions 25-30 (18-59). 243
Appendix E.13 Response Count Histograms, Questions 31-36 (18-59). 244
Appendix E.14 Response Count Histograms, Questions 37-38 (18-59). 245
Appendix E.15 Response Count Histograms, Questions 1-6 (60+). 246
Appendix E.16 Response Count Histograms, Questions 7-12 (60+). 247
Appendix E.17 Response Count Histograms, Questions 13-18 (60+). 248
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Appendix E.18 Response Count Histograms, Questions 19-24 (60+). 249
Appendix E.19 Response Count Histograms, Questions 25-30 (60+). 250
Appendix E.20 Response Count Histograms, Questions 31-36 (60+). 251
Appendix E.21 Response Count Histograms, Questions 37-38 (60+). 252
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LIST OF TABLES
5.1 Count, Mean, and Standard Deviation Data by IOC (All Ages) 157
5.2 t-Test Results, by IOC Categories (Ages 18-59) 158
5.3 t-Test Results, Question 1 (All Ages) 159
5.4 t-Test Results, Questions 3 and 24 (Ages 18-59) 159
Appendix E.1 t-Test Results, Responses Averaged by Participant 220
Appendix E.2 t-Test Results, by IOC Categories (All ages) 220
Appendix E.3 t-Test Results, by IOC Categories (Ages 18-59) 220
Appendix E.4 t-Test Results, by IOC Categories (Ages 60+) 221
Appendix E.5 t-Test Results, by Question (All Ages) 221
Appendix E.6 t-Test Results, by Question (Ages 18-59) 222
Appendix E.7 t-Test Results, by Question (Ages 60+) 223
Appendix E.8 Count, Mean, and Standard Deviation Data by Age 224
Appendix E.9 Count, Mean, and Standard Deviation Data by IOC (All Ages) 224
Appendix E.10 Count, Mean, and Standard Deviation Data by IOC (18-59) 225
Appendix E.11 Count, Mean, and Standard Deviation Data by IOC (60+) 225
Appendix E.12 Interpretive Key 226
Appendix E.13 Baseline Data (All Ages) 226
Appendix E.14 Baseline Data (Ages 18-59) 227
Appendix E.15 Baseline Data (Ages 60+) 228
Appendix E.16 Endline Data (All Ages) 229
Appendix E.17 Endline Data (Ages 18-59) 230
Appendix E.18 Endline Data (Ages 60+) 231
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LIST OF ABBREVIATIONS
AR Action Research
D.Min. CML Doctorate in Ministry Congregational Mission and Leadership program at
Luther Seminary, St. Paul, Minnesota
DT Damascus Travelers
ELCA Evangelical Lutheran Church in America
ELW Evangelical Lutheran Worship (Pew ed.). This is the current hymnal in
use by congregations of the ELCA.
FMS Faith Maturity Scale
IOC (I)nner, (O)uter and (C)onnecting faith orientations, used as FMS analysis
categories
IRB Institutional Review Board
LCMS Lutheran Church Missouri Synod
n.d. No date
NRSV New Revised Standard Version
PAR Participatory Action Research
PDF Adobe Portable Document File format
QUAL Qualitative Research Methods
QUAN Quantitative Research Methods
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DEDICATION
For this reason I bow my knees before the Father, from whom every family in
heaven and on earth takes its name. I pray that, according to the riches of his
glory, he may grant that you may be strengthened in your inner being with power
through his Spirit, and that Christ may dwell in your hearts through faith, as you
are being rooted and grounded in love. I pray that you may have the power to
comprehend, with all the saints, what is the breadth and length and height and
depth, and to know the love of Christ that surpasses knowledge, so that you may
be filled with all the fullness of God. Now to him who by the power at work within
us is able to accomplish abundantly far more than all we can ask or imagine, to
him be glory in the church and in Christ Jesus to all generations, forever and
ever. Amen. (Ephesians 3:14-21, NRSV)
To my wife, Kim, and my children, Adam and Rachel. Your love, support, and
understanding inspire me and reflect God‘s grace and love.
Huntley
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CHAPTER 1
INTRODUCTION TO THESIS
What the [Central Pacific construction] crews did … [when they constructed an
unequaled ten miles of railroad and telegraph in one day] will be remembered as
long as this Republic lasts. White men born in America were there, along with
former slaves whose ancestors came from Africa, plus emigrants from all across
Europe, and more than three thousand [Chinese]. There were some Mexicans
with at least a touch of Native American blood in them, as well as French Indians
and at least a few Native Americans. Everyone was excited, ready to work, eager
to show what he could do. Even the Chinese, usually methodical and a bit
scornful of the American way of doing things, were stirred to a fever pitch. They
and all the others. We are the world, they said. They had come together at this
desolate place in the middle of Western North America to do what had never been
done before [or since].1
Within the incredible story of the construction of the Transcontinental Railroad
are numerous episodes that are truly amazing and seemingly impossible. Some would be
extremely difficult even with the best technology available today. One such story is the
feat that the Central Pacific accomplished, to win a $10,000 bet against the Union Pacific.
To win the bet, crews laid more than ten miles of track in the Transcontinental Railroad
in only one day.
On that day, working from sunup to sundown, 1,200 workers labored together
with a shared commitment to lay around 10.1 miles of track in a single day. The only task
they had completed before the beginning of the day was the survey work. Every other
task—grading, laying ties and rails, bending rails, affixing striker plates, spiking the rails,
1 Stephen E. Ambrose, Nothing Like It in the World: the Men Who Built the Transcontinental
Railroad, 1863-1869 (New York: Simon & Schuster, 2000), 349.
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tapping ties and rails, filling dirt between the ties, and setting the poles and wiring the
telegraph—was accomplished that one day for the 10.1 mile section of track. Each
worker had one specific part to play within the highly structured plan of attack. For
example, four workers labored tirelessly to lay rail after rail into place (totaling 125 tons)
at a continuous pace. The railroad advanced at a rate of one mile per hour. Each person
worked to do their singular task without stopping, as supplies were ferried forward from
five different supply trains using horses, carts, and hand tools. At lunchtime, when the
work crew had the opportunity to be replaced by a fresh labor force of an additional
1,200 workers, every single worker refused. They were steadfastly focused on setting a
new record. The record stands to this day.2
If they had done this simply to win a bet, it is unlikely that the 1,200 men from a
wide diversity of backgrounds would have worked as hard as they did to accomplish this
feat. If they were just working for a paycheck, it is also unlikely that they would have
accomplished this. After all, their pay was the same whether they did it in one day for
quadruple pay or in four days for the standard wage. No, there was something else at
work here. There was something personal and deeply important that inspired and brought
this incredibly diverse group of people, only a few years after the end of the Civil War, to
accomplish something that remains unequaled in history.
What is it that inspires 1,200 men from around the world to come together and
accomplish what everyone else at the time said was impossible? It was a shared vision
that they held passionately. They knew, could see, and believed to the core of their beings
2 Ibid., 349ff.
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that as they worked together, each with their own special contributions, that they could
do it.
What, on the other hand, keeps congregations from incarnating the grace-filled
hands, eyes, ears, mouth, and heart of Christ to one another and the world? What is
preventing this life-changing Good News of reconciliation between the Creator and
created human beings from reaching all of creation? Seemingly, it is a lack of shared
vision. Too often, we settle for a pale and incomplete version of community that falls
woefully short of the fullness of the community in Christ that God wants us to
experience. With this in mind, the research of this thesis sought to cultivate shared
missional vision in a newly developed congregation with a hope that people would
increasingly experience the true unity of community in Christ that Jesus died to create.
Introduction
Overview
This thesis describes research that utilized a process of mixed-methods
Participatory Action Research (PAR) to study the impact of cultivating missional vision
in the life of a newly developed congregation. In starting a mission congregation, there is
a strong emphasis on growth in numbers to achieve a critical mass to sustain it long term.
Living Water Lutheran Church,3 a congregation founded approximately nine years before
the beginning of the study, was the site for this research. They have been in permanent
facilities for around four years. As the pastor of this congregation, the researcher worked
to cultivate and foster missional vision in the congregation. This led to lives of personal
3 This is a pseudonym.
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and communal growth in faith that led people to live in service and witness to others in
daily life and vocation. The Researcher worked to foster this understanding and provide
motivation for action by working with congregation leaders, in Sunday School classes, at
a congregational retreat, in various meetings and forums, and in small groups to cultivate
shared missional vision with the congregation in and through specific events. This thesis
describes the research and the impact of these efforts.4
Research Question
The primary research question for this thesis is, ―How does cultivating shared
missional vision in a newly developed congregation impact the lives of congregants and
how they relate to others in the community?‖ In asking this question, the researcher used
concurrent quantitative and qualitative methods to establish a baseline for the
congregation in its understanding and activity of faith and mission. The researcher then
worked with the congregation and its leaders, in Sunday School classes, at a congregation
retreat in various meetings and forums, and in small groups, to cultivate missional vision
that inspires, encourages, and actively initiates spiritual growth with a missional view of
life and vocation. The researcher then gathered further quantitative and qualitative
endline data that, when compared with the baseline data, helped answer the research
question.
4 See appendix A, ―PAR Intervention Timetable,‖ for a full description of the intervention
timeline.
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Research Components
Outcome
The action taken in this research sought to shape a deeper understanding of
missional faith practices that members of the congregation would understand and embody
in daily life. The intent was that participants would discover new perspectives that that
they might live with a deeper understanding and personal practice of faith. This change in
perspectives would also yield a more missional approach to vocation and daily life
outside of the church, which would have an impact on persons that congregants interact
with on a daily basis. This research used concurrent mixed-methods quantitative and
other qualitative techniques to gather general and specific data about congregants‘ views
and practices of faith, mission, and evangelism.
The researcher utilized quantitative and qualitative methods before and after the
intervention to gather baseline and endline data to use in evaluating the effects of the
intervention. For the quantitative research, the congregation completed a survey via two
convenience samples.5 The researcher also conducted qualitative interviews with persons
randomly selected from two demographics within the congregation—one person who
participated in the initial quantitative survey, and one who participated in the Damascus
Travelers small groups. The researcher conducted a third interview with the congregation
council as a group. The intent of the qualitative interviews was to gain deeper and richer
data for analysis.
5 The researcher gathered the convenience sample from willing participants after worship on a
Sunday, both at the baseline and at the endline.
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Intervention Influencing the Outcome
The PAR intervention sought to cultivate missional vision through a series of
directed conversations, prayer, and Scripture study to discern and describe specific
statements of purpose and guiding principles that, over time, can continue to shape the
congregation‘s vision for ministry.6 The PAR intervention attempting to influence the
outcome and answer the research question was the cultivation and understanding of
missional vision for life and ministry in the congregation.
The context for the research is a congregation that began as a mission start ten or
more years prior to the research. The congregation signed the charter and officially
incorporated in 2001. As the congregation grew, they built a million-dollar facility and
completed construction in 2006. In 2008 the founding pastor retired, and the first pastor
called by the congregation after the departure of the mission developer took office in
early 2009.
In getting to know the congregation, the pastor found that there was a prevailing
view of mission and evangelism with a Church Growth7 mindset of gathering and feeding
people. In this key adolescent phase of development for the congregation, this
Participatory Action Research project sought to help the congregation move from
understanding evangelism and mission from a Christendom gather and feed mentality to
a more missional perspective to equip and send the priesthood of all believers in daily
6 Dave Daubert, Living Lutheran: Renewing Your Congregation, Lutheran voices (Minneapolis:
Augsburg Fortress, 2007), 46ff.
7 The Church Growth, for purposes of this discussion, is a movement that reached its zenith in the
1990‘s and focused on church growth through contemporary forms of worship and preaching targeted to
the ―unchurched‖ and demographics of persons desired to become new congregation members.
7
vocations. This work occurred during the intervention, while observing changes in the
congregation to assess the outcome.
Outside Influences
Prior to research, there was a potential for other outside influences to have an
unintentional impact on the outcome. The first influence is a lack of congregational
finances. The economy, along with an increase in expenses due to staff costs, worked
together to bring a state of financial difficulty for the congregation during the
intervention. Finances can derail a congregation from actively cultivating and working
toward articulating faithful, missional vision for ministry. Financial difficulties may have
had an impact on the outcome by providing motivation to embrace change and the vision
cultivation process more fully.
Another potential outside influence on the outcome was in the form of
denominational politics. After some denominational decisions prior to the start of
research, persons withdrew their membership from the congregation or actively visited
and sought other congregations to join. Worship attendance was down roughly 10-20% in
the immediate aftermath, and then it stabilized. Three families withdrew from the
congregation membership over the course of the intervention. This outside influence was
not only related to the impact of financial influences, but there was also a potential for it
to have an impact on the effectiveness of the intervention in changing the missional
mindset and activity of the congregation. Even so, its impact was also negligible on the
outcome.
During the course of research, an additional outside influence surfaced. The
mission developer had not completely terminated his relationship with the congregation
8
when he retired from full-time ministry. Instead, he held out the option of returning to the
congregation as a member with the permission of the successor pastor in the timeframe of
a year or so. During the course of the intervention, the mission developer realized that
this arrangement kept the congregation connected to the mission developer in a way that
hindered connection with the successor. Midway through the intervention, the mission
developer wrote a letter severing the relationship and removing the possibility of
returning soon, which quickly strengthened the congregations‘ ties to the successor
pastor. This allowed the intervention to have a stronger impact.
Importance of Research
Currently, a significant amount of research exists that discusses considerations in
starting or planting a new congregation. In addition, there is a growing body of work that
wrestles with concepts and implications of the missional church movement. These
writings discuss general theory, and there are even some resources for helping a
well-established congregation to cultivate missional vision and to become more
missional. There is scant work (if any) that has been done, however, on how a
congregation in the adolescent phase8 of development makes a turn in understanding
mission as being outwardly directed through the lives of congregants. This missional,
outward direction runs counter to the inward direction and connectivity with the mission
developer pastor that a fledgling congregation often experiences as it grows to become
financially independent.
8 In congregational life-cycle theory, this is the phase between birth/infancy and maturity; see
chapter 2, ―Organizational Life Cycle Theory.‖
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Unfortunately, some congregations do not make this turn from inward to outward
focus in ministry. It may be that this inward focus in the congregation‘s inception and
formative years sows the seeds for an established congregation who eventually declines
and struggles in a survival mode. The missional church movement has many who find the
Christendom model of planting congregations as inwardly focused franchises of the
denomination to be inadequate as we enter into this post-modern, post-Christendom era.
Infants and young children require a significant effort to nurture and sustain them
at a young age. This may or may not be true of mission-start congregations. It is true,
however, that an adolescent person needs to learn how to turn focus from one of
receiving care to one of living for others and contributing to society. This research
assumes that this is also true of a young congregation. The PAR intervention and
reflection seeks to contribute some insights into how that may happen in a newly
developed congregation. The intent is for this research to give benefit from information
derived from this study to the researcher, the congregation, and perhaps even other
congregations in a similar phase of organizational life. Another intention is to improve
the ministry of both the researcher and the congregation at Living Water by means of the
PAR intervention and research itself.
Other Questions Related to the Research Question
There are some questions to address related to conducting this research. The first
question is, ―How does one cultivate inspiring missional vision?‖ Some think it best that
a leader such as the pastor, supported by prayer and the community, ought to discern the
vision alone, and then cast it in the midst of the congregation. Others advocate a mutual
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process of discernment and agreement, through cogenerative, mutual conversation. This
research used a mutual cogenerative cultivation process.
Another question, following the determination of sound missional vision, asks,
―How do we inspire others to embrace the vision?‖ This research utilized a model that
cultivates vision in the midst of the congregation. This has the best chance, in the long
term, of inspiring more congregants to take ownership and make decisions using the
cultivated vision in a broader, shared leadership structure.
This raises another question; ―How do we train and equip congregational leaders
to participate cogeneratively with the pastor and congregation in embracing the vision
cultivation process?‖ Again, the effectiveness of the intervention relied, in large part,
upon the ability of the pastor and council to involve as much of the congregation as
possible in the vision cultivation and discernment. The desire was for as many people as
possible to invest in the process to increase the likelihood of the vision‘s applicability to
the congregation and encourage its widespread acceptance. Using Dave Daubert‘s Living
Lutheran9 as a rough outline, leaders received training on how to do this. Even so, the
researcher discovered that it is also important to cultivate vision for the process itself
among the congregants and leaders.
The final question is one relating to the broader applicability of the findings;
―How can others use what we learned in this research?‖ The hope is that others in similar
contexts can access and utilize some of the lessons learned in the course of this research
to make a turn toward more fulfilling and missional ministry.
9 Daubert, Living Lutheran: Renewing Your Congregation.
11
Literatures and Key Theories
Four insights yield helpful considerations in answering the research question. In
considering literature and disciplines from non-ecclesial sources, it is helpful to consider
concepts and insights in the areas of communal social dynamics, the use of vision in
leading and bringing change, cultivating shared vision, and practical considerations for
planning and implementing the intervention.
Sociological Dynamics of Community
Dynamics of community are helpful in considering the impact of this process on
the congregation‘s communal structures. One perspective for looking at the congregation
and shaping the intervention is organizational theory.
A key insight into congregational organization is, ―The church is. The church
does what it is. The church organizes what it does.‖10
This theory was an important
concept to remember in facilitating missional conversation during the intervention phase.
When planting a new congregation, the denominational authorities dictate that the
organization must use structures contained in the mandated Model Constitution for
Congregations.11
Using this approach, however, completely bypasses important
discernment as the congregation wrestles with identity (the church is) and ministry
activity (the church does what it is).
10
Craig Van Gelder, The Ministry of the Missional Church: a Community Led by the Spirit (Grand
Rapids: Baker Books, 2007), 17.
11 ―Model Constitution for Congregations of the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America‖
(Evangelical Lutheran Church in America (ELCA), 2009), http://www.elca.org/Who-We-Are/Our-Three-
Expressions/Churchwide-Organization/Office-of-the-Secretary/Congregation-Administration/Model-
Constitution-for-Congregations.aspx, (accessed June 29, 2010).
12
With this top-down model, congregations are given the organizational structure
(the church organizes what it does), which then shapes ministry activity and
congregational identity. In bypassing key discernment about the congregation‘s identity
and activity, this can prevent the congregation and its members from discerning and
accepting God‘s call for ministry and mission. The structures can shape and drive
ministry apart from the congregation‘s identity and God‘s call to mission. When this
happens, a congregation settles for something less than the fullness of its true potential.
When organizational leaders use similar top-down methods in vision casting, they
can discover or create problems in properly discerning vision for ministry. This lack of
cogenerative discernment can lead to problems in generating enthusiasm within the
congregation for embracing the vision. Instead, by cultivating missional vision using
cogenerative or bottom-up methods, congregants can take greater ownership in the
visioning process. Cultivating, rather than casting vision is more likely to yield vision
that better fits the congregation and the wider community.
In considering a grass-roots mission cultivation process, it was necessary to
consider local congregational characteristics. Living Water is a newly established
congregation, and from a life-cycle perspective, it seems to be transitioning from infancy
to adolescence. Living Water is transitioning from inward-directed initial growth to
outward-directed missional activity. Therefore, it was important to consider components
of community awareness and ways to help congregants discover how to share personal
faith in everyday conversations in cultivating missional vision.
Another aspect to consider about communal structures in contemporary society is
a trend toward communal self-forming in bottom-up structures. With the growing
13
influence of the Internet and social networks in society, our notions of community and
means for community formation are changing. With Wikipedia, blogs, social networking
sites, email, and other technological forms of connectivity, communal structures are
increasingly forming in a bottom-up fashion. This differs from traditional ways of
forming community through top-down organizational design. In this research, it was
important to provide ways for community to self-form in defining vision through a
grass-roots style of vision cultivation.
The specific characteristics and aspects of congregational life at Living Water
were important to consider in answering the research question. Living Water is a
relatively new congregation. It began through the ministry of a gifted and engaging
mission-developer pastor who canvassed the community and brought the congregation to
a point of construction, after which he retired from ministry. Living Water is an
extremely healthy congregation. They are now moving from initial mission development
to a sustained and established ministry presence in the community. In saying goodbye to
the mission developer, they are beginning to move from a communal structure that is
pastor-centered to a community of interwoven relationships. This movement in
communal structure and organization is essential for them to make as they intentionally
transition from a top-down pastor-centered structure to one that is egalitarian, making
decisions in a bottom-up fashion.
Making this transition helps nurture more intimacy in communal structures at
Living Water. In today‘s Internet-connected society, people are experiencing increasing
numbers of superficial relationships with fewer intimate relationships. This characteristic
is opposed to a desire for a congregation to have deeper, more perichoretic relationships
14
patterned after relationships Christians share through baptism into the triune God. This
desire for deeper and more personal relationships undergirds the rationale for forming
small groups in the vision cultivation process. In forming these groups and enhancing
personal, intimate relationships, congregants are already partially realizing the goal of
missional vision. It also helps create deeper relationships that nurture grass-roots
cultivated vision.
The Efficacy of Vision for Leading and Bringing Change
Without a shared concept, understanding and commitment for each person to
focus on their part of the construction process, and without a strong desire to complete
over ten miles of railroad and telegraph, it is doubtful that 1,200 people would have ever
worked together to accomplish this amazing feat. It was a shared vision and passion to do
so that united this sizable and diverse group of people to do what seemed impossible.
They even did it with carts, horses, and a few steam locomotives. Like an unseen force
that brings two magnets together with a common bond that is difficult to break apart,
vision can unite a diverse group of people in common purpose to accomplish things that
would otherwise be impossible.
In society, people have a variety of talents, gifts, dreams, and desires. Persons
seek to use their talents to bring their dreams to fruition or satisfy their desires. At times,
this can lead people to engage in destructive behavior as they seek their own ends. At
other times, with the appropriate methods of governance, people can come together to
accomplish beneficial goals. As diverse persons or groups of people describe and
appropriate shared vision, it is possible for groups to work together for the common good.
As vision is discerned and articulated, then lovingly embraced, community can form that
15
works for the benefit of individuals and society. Shared vision, cultivated in the midst of
the gathered group, is essential for this to happen.
Cultivating Shared Vision
This type of shared vision does not happen by accident; it comes through
intentionally relating with one another, sharing perspectives, and wrestling with questions
of faith and life. Four concepts help in cultivating a vision that individuals can share to
unite a diverse group of people. First, the process should be egalitarian, minimizing the
influence of those who would seek to subvert, control, or overshadow the contributions of
others. Second, the process should increase the relationships and interconnectedness of
the group. Third, the process should cogeneratively cultivate a shared vision, through
prayer, Bible study, and mutual conversation. Finally, the process must be open to
everyone in the organization, providing numerous opportunities for people to enter into
the conversation.
The PAR intervention utilized a vision cultivation process that sought to help
congregants discern and describe God‘s purpose for life and ministry, along with
principles that guide the congregants in making decisions in life and ministry. As these
two things—purpose and guiding principles—are lived with over time, the congregation
begins to appreciate God‘s vision for ministry.12
This vision gives the congregation
perspectives—vision—for making decisions and moving forward in ministry together.
The process of cultivation is similar to that of a community garden. In commercial
farming, a paid farmer works the land with other hired hands to maximize yield and
12
Daubert, Living Lutheran: Renewing Your Congregation, 46.
16
corporate profit. The farmer uses the plants and the land to maximize personal gain. In a
community garden, on the other hand, a community forms around the shared vision of
cultivating a garden, which provides food for the community. The relationship between
community and garden is one of mutual nurturing and benefit, as community forms in the
act of tending and lovingly caring for the garden as it bears food for the community.
Practical Considerations
In order for an effort to organize people to be effective, it must capture the interest
of the people in the group, it must have structures that facilitate the health and growth of
the organization, and it must inspire the group‘s members to participate energetically in
it. In seeking to organize a group, leaders can hold out promise to the members that will
encourage them to participate in the organization. Leaders also provide tools that
effectively facilitate participation and interaction as the members engage the organization
and receive the promised benefits. Finally, leaders inspire members to give of themselves
through a bargain that defines what they bring to the group and give to others in sharing
the promised benefits.13
The intervention, the PAR intervention contained these three
components in its planning stages to maximize the impact on Living Water and
encourage the widest participation by the members.
Biblical and Theological Perspectives
In addition to theoretical insights, Scripture along with theological constructs, also
yields helpful insights into implementing a strategy for answering the research question.
Specifically, biblical and theological perspectives yield insights into perspectives on
13 Clay Shirky, Here Comes Everybody: The Power of Organizing Without Organizations (New
York: Penguin Press, 2008), 260ff.
17
shared vision inspiring missional activity, constitutive components of missional vision,
and means for cultivating vision for mission.
Vision Inspiring Missional Activity
In considering what impact vision can have on communal action, it is helpful to
remember that vision is a way for an organization to view and perceive life from a shared
perspective. It is a way of viewing the world that allows people to make decisions
together in ways that take shape in a community as they live with God‘s mission in daily
life. In addition, the process of discerning vision—whether it is cast or cultivated—can
impact missional activity, even as shared vision can direct it.
In Exodus, God calls Moses to climb Mt. Sinai to receive God‘s vision for the
Hebrew people, whom God has recently freed from slavery in Egypt. With awesome and
fearsome displays of power, God commands Moses to order the people to stay away from
the mountain under penalty of death. Over the course of 40 days and nights, God gives
Moses the vision for the Hebrew people as they relate to one another and to God on their
journey to and occupancy of the land God promised to Abraham. Moses casts this vision,
and the people are to accept unquestioningly. It contains precepts that seemingly intend to
help God‘s people to continue to live peaceably and freely on their journey to the
promised land and after they occupy the land.
Meanwhile, as Moses receives the Law from God on Mt. Sinai, the people avert
their attention due to fear of other, immediate concerns. As a result, they convince Aaron
to take over as their leader, and they cast their gold into the form of a golden calf that
they may worship. Near the end of Moses‘ 40 days with God, the Lord commands Moses
to return to his people and exact a punishment for failing to wait to receive the vision for
18
communal life that Moses is to cast. As a result of their decision to reject God,
3,000 people are put to death and God sends a plague upon them.
Six aspects of the mission casting process are evident in this story in Exodus.
First, the success of the vision casting endeavor requires that the leader, Moses, be an
extremely talented and charismatic leader. Moses is to discern the vision from God and
bring it to the people in a hierarchical manner, and the people are to fearfully accept the
vision that their leader casts. This fear is necessary to motivate them to accept and
embody the vision even though fear is a short-term and fickle motivator. Although the
vision itself is missional, it is cast in such a manner that it objectifies and inherently
dehumanizes the people as they are forced to accept it.
In the person of Jesus Christ and in his ministry, however, God takes on human
flesh to walk among God‘s people mutually as they bear one another‘s burdens. In this,
Jesus cultivates missional vision mutually with the disciples. In the Sermon on the
Mount, for example, Jesus raises and affirms the Law while applying it anew to the
contemporary context. He then comes down from the mount to cultivate vision for God‘s
kingdom through conversations and daily life with the disciples and God‘s people.
Ultimately, instead of forcing God‘s people to bear the results of their rejection of God
and God‘s vision for daily life as God did through Moses, Jesus as God enfleshed bears
the worst of humanity‘s rejection by personally and physically bearing humanity‘s
rejection on the cross and overcoming it in the resurrection. This forms the foundation for
God to further bear the burdens of life and to cultivate missional vision mutually through
the Holy Spirit in the ministry of the disciples and beyond.
19
In the book of Acts, the apostles wrestled with questions about whether the
fledgling Christian movement would be one confined primarily within the Hebrew
community, or if it would be one that is universally inclusive of Jews and Gentiles. Peter,
for example, had a vision from God as he visited a Gentile centurion who later believed
the Gospel and entered the Christian community through baptism with his household.
Paul and Barnabas intentionally went out into Gentile communities proclaiming the
Gospel and baptizing converts. As the question came to the forefront among the early
Christian community, people gathered in Jerusalem to decide if this movement would
ultimately require converts to be subject to the specific provisions of the Law through
circumcision and a decision to follow the Mosaic Law, or if baptism and faith in Christ
were the sole criterion for admission to the Christian community. As they discussed this
together, God cultivated vision within the community for people to reach out in mission
to all. According to this new, shared, and missional vision, the Christian movement
would be universally welcoming and would extend beyond the Hebrew community.
Six aspects of missional vision are contained in this story in Acts. It is a new way
of looking at communal life. God reveals it and the community, together, discerns it. The
vision that God reveals is one that embraces the surrounding community, as the Christian
community listens to Scripture, tradition, voices in the community, and the Holy Spirit.
The Holy Spirit leads a process that includes people in the entire community, both lay
and apostles. The process is missional, as God awakens new perspectives in the
community and sends it forth to share the Gospel of Jesus Christ.
20
Components of Missional Vision
With roots in the Gospel in our Culture Network, the missional church movement
has particular theological emphases. In cultivating missional vision, these theological
concepts served as an initial framework in research for participants to use in
conversation. This helped bring forth concepts that are consistent with biblical principles
and that are theologically sound.
There were three components relevant to this research. The first is trinitarian
theology with emphasis on the perichoretic union of the three divine persons. The second
is an understanding of the missio Dei14
as a call to mission that invites everyone into
God‘s reconciling reign of care and redemption. The third is an understanding that Jesus
Christ is the center of this mission of reconciliation, which flows out through time and
space as the Holy Spirit works in and through the Church.
The first and foundational component of missional vision is from the social model
of the triune God. The three persons of God exist in a perfect, mutual, loving, and
interdwelling union. God‘s unity of three persons comes largely from a perfect and loving
union wherein God is one God, as the three persons act in concert with one another in one
divine will. As the three persons of the Trinity relate to one another and act with one will,
they do so in embracing creation, including humanity, in a gracious, caring, and
redeeming invitation to join the perichoretic15
fellowship. This restores a relationship of
mutual accompaniment between God and creation. The Father sends the Son and Spirit to
invite, gather, and draw us into this amazing fellowship as the Spirit unites us to the
14
Missio Dei is Latin for ―God‘s mission.‖
15 See chapter 3 for more on the concept of perichoresis.
21
humanity of Christ through baptism and faith. With this in mind, a missional vision
contains a call to go forth and connect with others to form relationships that embody
trinitarian fellowship, care, redemption and accompaniment that Christians graciously
experience through faith as the Holy Spirit unites us to Christ.
This sending is part of the missio Dei wherein God sends the Church into all of
creation. It includes God‘s loving action to redeem relationships and people broken by
sin. In doing this, God assaults the powers and principalities of darkness, sin, and
brokenness as God‘s Kingdom enters creation to reconcile us to our creator. The
reconciling reign of God is Good News, it is already breaking into history even as its
fullness has not come fully, it changes everything, it centers in Christ as King, and people
enter into it through the Spirit‘s work in the Church.
Finally, through the daily vocation and faithful activity of God‘s people, the Holy
Spirit does the work of Christ to reconcile the world to God. The Spirit gifts all of God‘s
people to do this work. As the people of God use their gifts and talents in ways shaped by
God‘s vision for life, God works in the world. God accomplishes the mission of care,
redemption, and reconciliation in and through these relationships. Just as the two natures
of Christ—humanity and divinity—dwell in a mutually interdwelling, perichoretic and
hypostatic union, so too the Holy Spirit and the Church dwell in a mutual, perichoretic,
and hypostatic union. In this way, the mutuality of God‘s kenotic self-giving lifts up a
fallen humanity to enter God‘s kingdom in the person of Jesus Christ. God‘s people then
go forth, embodying the mutuality of the ministry of the Spirit as the Church that
proclaims and brings God‘s kingdom into a world otherwise ruled by power and
darkness.
22
Cultivating Missional Vision
Having considered some aspects of the missional church movement that are
important aspects of missional vision, it is then helpful to consider some biblical and
theological considerations in cultivating this vision among God‘s people. This concept of
cultivating missional vision also necessitates a look at three practical considerations in
the light of Scripture.
An example of God cultivating vision for mission is in Jesus‘ ministry with
Simon Peter. Throughout Jesus‘ ministry, Peter was one of the first disciples to step
forward as a leader. On one such occasion, Peter made a startling confession that Jesus is
the ―Messiah, the Son of the living God‖ (Matthew 16:16). This confession earned him
praise from Jesus even as Jesus renamed Simon as Peter, calling him the Petra, or
foundation rock for Christ to build the Church. Sometimes, this leadership led Peter to
being embarrassed. For example, immediately after being named Peter,16
he showed the
incompleteness of his understanding of God‘s vision as he rebuked Jesus who said that he
must be betrayed and die in Jerusalem. Over time, however, God worked with Peter until
finally after the coming of the Holy Spirit at Pentecost, Peter could boldly proclaim the
Good News of Christ‘s death and resurrection. Even beyond that, however, God
continued to cultivate vision for mission in Peter.
God worked in this way with other apostles, such as Saul of Tarsus, whom Jesus
also renames as Paul. According to Paul, the Holy Spirit draws people together as one
Body of Christ. In gifting people for a variety of work and capabilities, the Spirit works
16
Cf. Matthew 16:21-23. All future Scripture citations are from the New Revised Standard
Version (NRSV).
23
through the diversity of God‘s people to accomplish the one missio Dei of realizing the
fullness of God‘s reconciling and redeeming reign. This means that it is important to
remember that the Spirit, not just shared vision, unites and works through the breadth of
Christ‘s Body of believers.
From a theological perspective, it is important to consider ways that God draws
persons together into community with shared vision. As members of Christ‘s Body
release control over circumstances and enter into the unsettling reign of God, they often
leave comfort zones to enter into wilderness experiences. As people leave comfort zones
of safety and self-control, God often creates a sense within community of comradery,
unity of vision, and shared purpose. Missional leaders encourage members of the
congregation to enter these moments and shape structures that cultivate and foster
missional vision and activity through shared, cogenerative experiences.
Another theological perspective that is important to consider in answering the
research question is the understanding of vision itself. For purposes of this PAR
intervention, vision is understood as being composed of a communal understanding of
God‘s purpose for the congregation, that they work to accomplish according to specific,
biblical guiding principles over time. In this way, congregants make decisions and act in
accordance with perspectives gleaned from God‘s vision for daily life. The fullness of
God‘s future becomes clear as people live and act with their understandings of this shared
vision.
A final practical consideration in cultivating missional vision is appropriate
congregational participation in large and small groups. During his ministry, Jesus
alternated between utilizing large groups for teaching and sharing information that
24
occasionally was confusing to the hearers, and utilizing small groups wherein he nurtured
deeper relationships and explained teachings that were confusing to the larger groups. It
is important to note that this movement between large and small groups was an important
part of Jesus‘ strategy for nurturing intimate and closer relationships in small groups as
he equipped the Apostles for future ministry. He did this even as he healed people,
taught, and embodied God‘s in-breaking Kingdom with larger groups. With this in mind,
the PAR intervention contained a mix of small and large group components. The
Damascus Travelers small groups, the congregational retreat, and the four Wednesday
night vision cultivation sessions acted to create and nurture close relationships for
conversation and the unleashing of missional imagination and cogenerative discernment.
Larger group discussions, such as the ones in forums and a congregational meeting, along
with material shared in sermons and Bible Studies, allowed for sharing information and
for decision-making in a forum appropriate to a larger group.
Other Matters
Ethical Concerns
With any social science research, the potential exists for harm to the participants
of the study. An Institutional Review Board (IRB) at Luther Seminary reviewed proposed
questionnaires and methods to ensure that risk to participants was low. Even so, there are
some things to consider with this type of research.
There are a number of ethical considerations in relating to people and
interviewing them for a research project. First, there is the issue of confidentiality. In
order to describe the data and give some explanation about the researcher‘s conclusions,
it is necessary to share a few details about the participants‘ responses. In the interests of
25
supporting categories and observation, it was necessary to share some of the participants‘
comments without attribution. This is because results without supporting data could be
suspect. It is necessary to support conclusions so that the reader can verify that they are
reasonable. On the other hand, if the researcher were to publish a transcript of the
interviews and show a full documentation of data supporting the conclusions and results,
then there would be no confidentiality at all. This could have precluded the ability to
gather data from a willing participant. Reporting of results in connection with this
research sought to find a balance between verifying the reliability of conclusions and
protecting the confidentiality of research participants.
Another problem is the fact that it may be possible to trace specific remarks or
results back to the originator, considering the size and field of research. In balancing a
need to provide enough information to give an idea of how reliable the data may be, and
in protecting the anonymity of the participants, the researcher kept the specific results as
minimal, general, and unattributable as possible.
A third ethical concern relates to the relationship between the interviewees and
the researcher. As a member of the PAR research community, the researcher needed to
take care not to damage or negatively influence relationships that existed before, during,
and after the research.
An additional concern is the fact that the researcher is a pastor, and as researcher,
community member, and pastor, there are a number of roles that enter into any specific
interview and the research in general. With that in mind, the researcher composed and
selected qualitative and quantitative questions with an attempt to be general and to avoid
unnecessary risk.
26
The researcher was sensitive to considerations of power that the researcher holds
as a pastor in the congregation. The researcher exercised great care to avoid problems
with issues relating to power. The final data had to be viewed questioning what
information came from the relationship as pastor with the interviewee. The researcher
will destroy all specific, attributable data, including interview recordings and transcripts,
three years after approval of the thesis.
Finally, there is also an ethical concern or consideration relating to any interview
itself. In the actual interview process, there are questions. Some of these questions may
even be probing questions. Any time one asks a question of another, their relationship
changes forever. There are degrees to this, of course, varying with the intensity or
intimacy of the question. For example, asking if one prefers paper or plastic bags at the
grocery store will alter the relationship (e.g., ―Aha, she likes plastic bags … not very
friendly to the environment!‖) but not in a way that would likely be noticeable or drastic.
On the other hand, asking questions that are more intimate in nature (e.g., asking about
past indiscretions, or asking if one has ever lied to the questioner) has the potential to
alter the relationship radically between the two parties. These questions will even alter
the relationship if the interviewee never answers them, because they have broached
subject and one cannot retreat from that fact. Furthermore, a question may not only alter
the relationship between the two parties involved, but it may also alter relationships with
external third parties. A married person asking another person on a date, for example, not
only alters the relationship between the two parties, but also alters the relationship
between one or both of the parties and their spouse(s). This ethical concern constantly
27
needed to be in the forefront of the researcher‘s mind, both in developing the questions
and in conducting the interviews.
Definitions of Key Terms
Communal/vocational ministry—is ministry of daily life, primarily outside of the
congregational or familial setting. Vocation, from the Latin word vocatio or call,
speaks to the fact that, as a member of the priesthood of believers, God calls all
baptized children to live and share faith and the Gospel in all aspects of daily life.
This relates to missional aspects of the Social Trinity concept.
Communitas—is an experience of ―communality and comradeship‖17
that forms a group
as it mutually experiences a shared incident and/or overcomes a common problem
or adversary. Communitas implies a depth of relationship and comradery that is
only forged through a shared experience of liminality.
Cultivating a missional vision—is work done to plant the Word and encourage leaders
and other members to listen together in discerning God‘s vision for life and
mission. When done properly, it utilizes a grass-roots process wherein the Spirit
speaks broadly and vision emerges from the wider group.
Dechurched persons—are those who have, for whatever reason, walked away from
organized religion for a significant period.
Liminality—derives from the Latin word limen, or threshold. A liminal experience is one
that requires a person or group to depart from the confines of safe and familiar
environs to enter into a more dangerous and uncertain experience of wilderness,
17
Alan Hirsch, The Forgotten Ways: Reactivating the Missional Church (Grand Rapids: Brazos
Press, 2006), 218.
28
transition or uncertainty. Often times, it refers to an unexpected experience that
draws one out of the comfort zone with others, who can respond by working
together in the period of change or transition to form bonds of comradery found in
communitas.18
Missional—is a school of thinking, with foundations in the Gospel in Our Culture
Network, which seeks to ground ecclesiology, theology, and life in a
trinitarian-based worldview. This worldview sees Christians as gathered,
nurtured, and sent as a priesthood of believers to bear the ministry of God‘s
caring, redeeming, and reconciling reign.
Newly developed congregation—is a congregation that is less than five years into its new
building with the first post-mission developer pastor, who is making the next step
with the congregation in life and ministry beyond initial formation. Using the
language of life-cycle theory, it is a congregation transitioning from infancy to
adolescence.
Participatory Action Research (PAR)—is a form of the social science Action Research
method performed by a researcher who is part of the community under research.
Action Research includes an intervention or action within the researched
community, with intent ―to improve the participants‘ situation.‖19
The researcher
studies the community and reports the results and conclusions regarding the
impact of the intervention.
18
Cf. Ibid., 220-21.
19 Davydd J. Greenwood and Morten Levin, Introduction to Action Research: Social Research for
Social Change, 2nd ed. (Thousand Oaks: Sage, 2007), 3.
29
Perichoresis—With respect to the Trinity, perichoresis refers to the mutual and reciprocal
interdwelling of the persons of the Trinity with one another. In a community
setting, perichoresis can be a form of circulating around the neighborhood, or
mutual conversation with an experience of mutually bearing one another‘s
burdens.
Qualitative research—―is a means for exploring and understanding the meaning
individuals or groups ascribe to a social or human problem. The process of
research involves emerging questions and procedures; collecting data in the
participants‘ setting; analyzing the data inductively, building from particulars to
general themes; and making interpretations of the meaning of the data.‖20
Quantitative research—―is a means for testing objective theories by examining the
relationship among variables. These variables can be measured, typically on
instruments, so that numbered data can be analyzed using statistical
procedures.‖21
While quantitative research is normally used in research methods
that posit a hypothesis that is evaluated using a number of variables, this PAR
research used quantitative techniques to evaluate the impact of the intervention on
the practices and perspectives of the congregation in answering the research
question. The researcher also used baseline quantitative data to gain perspectives
in evaluating overall congregation members‘ perspectives and attitudes to assist in
designing and conducting the PAR intervention.
20
John W. Creswell, Research Design: Qualitative, Quantitative, and Mixed Methods
Approaches, 3rd ed. (Thousand Oaks: Sage, 2009), 232.
21 Ibid., 233.
30
Social Trinity—is an understanding of the triune God that emphasizes the relationality of
the three persons of God who unite perpetually in a single, perichoretic, mutual,
interdwelling, sending, inviting, caring, and redeeming relationship of love.
Unchurched persons—are normally adults who have never been active in organized
religion or congregations.
Vocation—With roots in the Latin word vocatio, or calling, vocation is the embodiment
and daily living of the Priesthood of Believers as the Holy Spirit works in daily
life to gift believers and help them to share the love of Christ as a catalyst in the
fulfillment of God‘s caring, redeeming, and reconciling reign in the world.
Summary
The participatory action research that this thesis describes sought to answer the
question, ―How can cultivating missional vision in a newly developed congregation
impact the lives of congregants and how they relate to others in the community?‖ In
answering this question, the researcher intervened in a newly developed congregation to
cultivate missional vision. The researcher then reflected on the results gathered through
quantitative surveys and qualitative interviews.
This research relies upon theoretical and theological concepts both in designing
and conducting the research, and in drawing conclusions from the data. There are four
general areas for theoretical design and reflection in this research. The key theories
pertain to sociological dynamics of community, the efficacy of vision for leading and
bringing change, cultivating shared vision, and other practical considerations for
designing, conducting, and reflecting upon the research.
Huntley
31
CHAPTER 2
LITERATURES AND KEY THEORIES
Two are better than one, because they have a good reward for their toil. For if
they fall, one will lift up the other; but woe to one who is alone and falls and does
not have another to help. Again, if two lie together, they keep warm; but how can
one keep warm alone? And though one might prevail against another, two will
withstand one. A threefold cord is not quickly broken. (Ecclesiastes 4:9-12)
Royal, Illinois is a small town that consists of a couple of grain elevators at the
intersection of a railroad and County Road 20. With only a few dozen houses, the town
boasts a minimal population of around 300 people. Nonetheless, this small, rural
community quietly shares a heritage of a community that can accomplish great things
with shared vision.
Nearly a hundred years ago, the people of St. John Lutheran Church decided to
move their church building into town, to serve current and future generations of people in
the village of Royal better.1 Not everyone initially wanted to move the church building;
the vote to move prevailed by a narrow margin.2 Nonetheless, having made the decision,
the congregation came together and embraced the vision for a ministry within the village
of Royal. The people worked together for many long, hard hours to move their church
home. Carefully and lovingly, the men and boys of the congregation deconstructed the
church, brick by brick, and transported the bricks from the rural country church into the
1 Cf. St. John‘s official website, ―St. John Lutheran Church History‖, n.d.,
http://www.stjohnroyal.org/history.html, (accessed March 31, 2011).
2 Ibid.
32
village of Royal. There, the congregation‘s women and older men painstakingly cleaned
the mortar from the bricks, one by one, to provide the building blocks for a new St. John
Lutheran Church to serve the people of Royal. It was a shared labor of love. The church
still stands today, with 827 members and an average attendance of 195 people.3
Furthermore, this embodied example of people working together with shared
vision in a labor of love made an impact on the wider community of Royal. Several years
later, around the time of the town‘s centennial anniversary in 1982, people began to talk
to one another about the need for a larger community building that they could use for
special events. Royal is isolated on the Illinois prairie, and the town needed a large
building for public use. Through mutual conversation among the townspeople, vision of a
community building that they could use for special occasions emerged. United with
common vision and purpose, they worked together to construct a Community Building to
benefit the current and future people of Royal.
Yet how could this small, rural village of common farmers and townspeople
afford to build a structure large enough to meet their needs? Fortunately, for the people of
Royal, a brick apartment building an hour away in Champaign, Illinois needed to be
demolished. The owner promised to give the bricks to them for use in constructing a
community building. Inspired by the memories and example of the people of St. John
Lutheran, the community gathered the bricks from the demolished building, transported
them, and worked together to accomplish the arduous task of cleaning the mortar from
each individual brick. The people then built the new community building with these
3 This is from the official website of the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America, ―Find a
Congregation - Evangelical Lutheran Church in America‖, n.d., http://www.elca.org, (accessed March 31,
2011).
33
bricks, completing it within a year after the centennial. The building still stands today and
the people of Royal use it routinely for personal and public events at little or no cost.
In cultivating missional vision, it is important for a community to gather and unite
around a shared vision for life together. In order for the community to articulate and
embrace a shared way of viewing life and making decisions, it is important for them to
share a common vision or outlook that can unite the members of the community and
guide their journey together. A community will most fully embrace and embody this
vision when it is cogeneratively cultivated in the community, to reflect the breadth of
wisdom of the entire group, and to ensure that members of the community share and live
it in daily life.
Sociological Dynamics of Community
Society contains overlapping groups and sub-groups in community. These groups
have numerous dynamics in how they react to the environment they are in, how they
collectively function in acting and making decisions, and in the characteristics they share
in living together. In contemplating the effect of cultivating missional vision in a
congregation, it is important to consider sociological characteristics of organizations and
communities.
Being unique, all organizations act differently. Even so, organizations still bear
similarities in characteristics or attributes by virtue of being organizations.
Organizational theory is helpful in considering traits that most organized groups share.
Once formed, organizations can even take on human life-cycle traits as corporate entities.
Organizations form, they mature, and they can die. As a newly developed congregation
matures beyond inwardly-focused infancy, it is important to foster habits of cultivating
34
missional vision that encourage broad-based community participation, moving from an
inwardly-directed communal motion to an outwardly-directed one. Means of shaping
community that focus in a bottom-up structure, are more egalitarian, and contain
participative aspects are currently evolving from technology and the Internet. This is
important to consider in forming community and cultivating shared missional vision.
Organizational Structures and Vision
In order for a group to become an organization, it must form structures and
relationships for making decisions and working together as a cohesive group. In
organizational theory, as applied to congregations, the group functions in a healthy
manner to the extent that members work together with a clear understanding of whom
they are and why they exist. In working together, a congregation lives this identity and
acts cohesively to the extent that they share vision for ministry.
In other words, ―The church is. The church does what it is. The church organizes
what it does.‖4 This means that, as an organization, a congregation forms with a shared
and agreed-upon concept of identity and purpose. A congregation may perceive itself as a
Spirit-led perichoretic communion of believers that embodies Christ‘s presence5 through
which the caring, redeeming, and reconciling reign of God breaks into our world. A
congregation that understands itself in this way will act differently than one that
understands itself to be a place for believers to come for spiritual nourishment within a
Christian community. Both of these congregations will act and form organizational
structures differently, in line with actions that are based upon their understandings of
4 Van Gelder, The Ministry of the Missional Church: a Community Led by the Spirit, 17.
5 These concepts will be discussed in Chapter 3.
35
their individual identities. Put differently, the church has a specific identity, will act based
upon that shared understanding of its identity, and will create organizational structures to
support its shared action.
This is an important insight for work at Living Water. When planting a new
congregation, the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America (ELCA) requires the
organization to contain structures outlined in the mandated Model Constitution for
Congregations.6 Using this approach, however, completely bypasses conversation and
communal discernment with respect to the first two statements—―The church is, the
church does what it is.‖7 By constitutionally mandating church structures regardless of
congregational identity and action, denominations circumvent key communal
discernment of a congregation‘s identity, vision, activity, and mission. This can inhibit
the congregation from shaping missional structures. Instead, the Model Constitution
proscribes ecclesiological structures in a one-size-fits-all mentality, thereby forcing the
congregation, with varying degrees of success, to work within this generic structure.
In this top-down model, leadership within the organization often brings vision to
the organization in the form of vision casting. In this form of visioning, congregational
ministry may or may not flow from God‘s call for ministry and mission. With traditional
vision casting, a visionary or charismatic leader discerns and describes a future, then
brings that vision to the congregation. The leader then expends sizable effort to motivate
the congregation to work together to achieve the vision. In this model, the leader is under
significant pressure to be the expert who brings the full, complete, and inspiring vision to
6 ―Model Constitution for Congregations of the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America.‖
7 Van Gelder, The Ministry of the Missional Church: a Community Led by the Spirit, 17.
36
the congregation. The leader then expects the congregation to provide the resources, to
follow the person in charge, and to work together to accomplish the cast vision.
Another, perhaps better way, is to start first with methods that discern identity and
activity in mission with a bottom-up method of visioning in a congregation.8 With these
methods, a congregation utilizes this grass-roots method through shared vision
cultivation. With a grass-roots communal vision-cultivation model, the congregation
engages in dialog to mutually discern and define a shared vision for making sense of
events and for deciding how to act together. Instead of having the leader cast a future
vision for everyone to accomplish, a congregation can prayerfully work together to
discern and articulate a shared understanding of God‘s vision for ministry. Leadership in
this model nurtures relationships, facilitates healthy dialog, and fosters trust in the
congregation, as members work together to discern and embody the shared vision. Again,
instead of casting a vision and enticing people to invest in it and work for it, the Spirit-led
community mutually discerns and owns the vision. After vesting in the discernment
process, the community is more likely to embrace the shared vision and work together in
it. Vision discernment has the greatest likelihood of motivating congregants to change
behaviors and to begin to align behavior with the cultivated missional vision personally.9
The way an organization visions and organizes how it does, therefore, impacts its
identity. A top-down organization will begin to understand itself in terms of authority,
8 Dave Daubert, ―Vision Discerning vs. Vision Casting: How Shared Vision Can Raise Up
Communities of Leaders Rather Than Mere Leaders of Communities,‖ in The Missional Church and
Leadership Formation: Helping Congregations Develop Leadership Capacity, ed. Craig Van Gelder
(Grand Rapids: William B. Eerdmans Pub. Co., 2009), 148ff.
9 Ibid., 149ff.
37
operating from a position of power. Bottom-up organizations will begin to understand
themselves in terms that are more egalitarian.
This change in direction for visioning processes from top-down to bottom-up is
becoming increasingly necessary for twenty-first century congregations ostensibly
entering the post-Christendom era.10
At times, the one-size-fits-all organizational
structures of Christendom are hindering churches living in contemporary society.
Increasingly, post-Christendom congregations are realizing that they need to articulate
new understandings of church life and ecclesiology. Instead of forcing the Gospel into a
culture and focusing on survival, many congregations are working to form church
structures that are missional and that faithfully embody cultural tendencies according to
biblical principles. It is hard work to engage local contexts in grass-roots dialog, so that
church structures authentically embody biblical principles to serve the local community
better. It is far easier to take ecclesiastically approved organizational structures and force
local congregations to fit the mold in top-down fashion.
With this in mind, it is clear that congregations and church organizations would
do well to spend time considering their organization‘s call to ministry and their activity,
and then define how they will structure their organizations to support that ministry. In
order to do that, congregations and churches may need to reshape their understandings of
identity and ecclesiology. For a church or congregation to be truly missional, it is best to
10
For a fuller discussion of this insight, see Hirsch, The Forgotten Ways: Reactivating the
Missional Church. Hirsch compares various characteristics of the apostolic, Christendom, and emergent
church ecclesiologies. He contends that the reformation sowed seeds to separate the Constantinian church
and state marriage that are coming to fruition today. He advocates a grass-roots ecclesiology that allows
community to form biologically, without rigid, hierarchical structures. This research contends that
something in the middle—a flexible, bottom-up congregational structure—would be a helpful improvement
in supporting congregational ministry and mission.
38
base organizational structures and ecclesiology upon theological constructs, and to
consider theoretical insights, so that activity can most effectively flow from the
congregation‘s identity. Once this happens, the congregation can live together,
corporately, and can begin to take on characteristics of a coherent and healthy living
organism.
Organizational Life Cycle Theory
Life Cycle Theory likens the behavior of organizations to that of living
organisms.11
In this theory, an organization lives together and adopts characteristics
similar to those of individual persons, moving over time through individual biological life
stages—birth, infancy, adolescence, prime, maturity, aristocracy, bureaucracy, and death.
This theory holds that congregations tend to follow this trajectory from birth, upward to
maturity, then downward toward death unless rebirth occurs. This happens by ―tapping
again the life sources inherent in the birth story of the congregation … or in discovering a
new sense of mission in a changed context.‖12
This means that all congregations are in
various phases of life, with varying phase-dependent gene structures of energizing (E),
programs (P), administration (A), and inclusion (I).13
A newly established congregation, like Living Water, will need to make
adjustments as it advances through these life stages in moving beyond mission status and
11
Martin F. Saarinen, The Life Cycle of a Congregation (Bethesda: The Alban Institute, 2001
1986), 3.
12 Ibid., 7.
13 Ibid., 4-5.
39
becoming an established congregation. As it grows and becomes more firmly established,
the congregation advances from infancy through adolescence and beyond.
Infant congregations on mission status receive support in large part from the
wider church. ―The Infant congregation inherits a high level of enthusiasm but develops a
strong need for survival. This contributes to a ‗y‘all come‘ attitude (high I), which is open
and inclusive.‖14
The infant congregation focuses primarily on gaining new members and
growing in numbers to reach a size that is large enough to be self-sustaining and
financially independent.
As with a human growing from infancy through adolescence to maturity, it is
important to begin to turn a strong inward focus to more of an outward focus. Some
congregations, for example, never move beyond the inwardly focused growth phase, and
end up in perpetual survival mode. Healthy, thriving congregations, on the other hand,
have a stronger outward focus. A congregation successfully moves from infancy through
adolescence and beyond as it shifts its focus from inwardly directed growth or survival to
outwardly directed ministry and service to the wider community.15
Helping a congregation to begin to move from infancy to adolescence and from
inward focus to outward focus can happen by ―building a sense of community among its
members, a consensus on mission, and an outline of functions, goals, and programs.‖16
In
other words, leadership in this phase needs to help a congregation to discover its own
personality, much as one would do with an adolescent person. In doing this, it is
14
Ibid., 9.
15 Ibid., 10.
16 Ibid., 16.
40
important ―to build a conscious intentionality out of the undifferentiated energy of the
congregation.‖ 17
In helping a congregation move from infancy to adolescence and beyond, a leader
may encounter the phenomenon of the founder’s dilemma. Successful mission starts
require strong leadership, ability, and high energy from the mission developer. Later,
however, the same personal attributes that were helpful to a mission developer in forming
and establishing the congregation become a problem. ―The aura of the [founding]
pastor‘s presence surrounds all that the congregation is and does.‖18
To move to
adolescence, the congregation needs to discover its own identity beyond the mission
developer intentionally.19
Then, the congregation can move to adjust its vision to behold
the local community and beyond. This requires leadership to work with the congregation
to help members discover their gifts and to provide opportunities to serve and minister
collectively. To do this, leadership must intentionally work to decentralize planning and
implementations of ministry to equip, train, and allow members to work together in
shared ministry.
In other words, reshaping the organization and its structures is necessary for a
congregation that moves from the top-down, pastor-centered and pastor-dependent phase
of infancy. As it moves toward adolescence and maturity, it is critical for a newly formed
congregation to become more independent and inclusive in making decisions. In order to
do this effectively, a congregation can adopt structures that are more egalitarian and
17
Ibid.
18 Ibid., 17.
19 Ibid., 18.
41
bottom-up in an effort to encourage greater participation in the congregation‘s action and
decision-making. Recent technological innovations with the Internet and information
technologies are creating and shaping new, more egalitarian ways for community to form
and do this.
Self-Forming, Bottom-Up Communities
The growing influence of the Internet and social networks in society is changing
notions of what community is and how it forms. Social networks, such as Facebook and
MySpace, give people the ability to post and publish written material for the world to
read instantly. These networks, along with universally collaborative academic ventures
such as Wikipedia, are radically altering the scope and manner of social interactions. The
ways that community forms apart from concrete, traditional modern organizations is
changing society and societal structures in many ways.
The widespread use of weblogs, or blogs, for example, is one technological
development that is altering how people communicate and influencing forms of
communal structures. With blogs, the art of public communication is moving toward
mass amateurization.
This kind of thing has happened before, with scribes and the advent of the
printing press in the 1500‘s. Prior to the invention of the printing press, professional
scribes wrote every publication by hand. These thoroughly trained monastic scribes
developed writing into an art form. The specialization and time requirements of
reproducing books drew sizable compensation for the scribes, and they penned the few,
costly books primarily for the richest citizens. After the invention of the printing press,
however, the expertise of the scribes in making copies was not required. Instead, one
42
capable person without theological training could set the type and churn out many more
copies in a day than the meticulous scribes could by hand. With the printing press, many
more people could now write and publish to a much wider audience.20
The Internet has had the same effect to a greater degree. Whereas modern
publishing had expenses in publishing printed material (even though they were
significantly less than costs for the scribes‘ copies), sharing written material via the
Internet costs almost nothing. This means that anyone with a computer and Internet
connection—a condition that is increasingly becoming ubiquitous—can write and publish
anything to a potential audience of billions of people. This has had the effect of
democratizing communication—publishing and reading—and is moving us toward a
complete equality of access to global communication for everyone. Freedom of speech is
becoming universal. This is changing the nature of community and communal
structures.21
Another aspect of these new communal structures is that collaboration can
become an almost open-ended process. As Internet users invert traditional publishing
steps by first publishing writings, then allowing the readers to filter and edit the material,
the Internet-based collaboration process becomes increasingly fluid. With the Internet,
the ability to publish any thought for dissemination to a wide audience also gives an
opportunity for a wide audience to respond and to edit the material in perpetuity. This
characteristic is the opposite of traditional publishing media conventions where editors
thoroughly pour over material before publishing it. With this so-called publish then filter
20
Shirky, Here Comes Everybody, 66-69.
21 Ibid., 61-66.
43
process, anyone can publish anything to an enormous audience of persons who could
simultaneously be readers and editors. 22
Blogs, for example, provide an opportunity for folks to reflect and receive
responses to what they publish. In collaborative writing endeavors such as Wikipedia, the
ability to edit is almost universal. Almost anyone can update or edit an article, post a new
article, delete sections of an established article, or restore previous editions of a
maliciously redacted article. This has the potential to bring more reliable results than the
traditional top-down method. With publish then filter, a person who knows about a topic
but cannot write well can still publish the information. Then a person who has no
knowledge of an article‘s topic but has an excellent grasp of language can edit and
strengthen the article, a talented speller can make spelling corrections, etc. This widening
of opportunity for people to collaborate without ever meeting or coordinating is a new
form of egalitarian, bottom-up, and self-forming community.23
Specific Organizational Considerations for Research
In designing a PAR intervention for the newly formed Living Water congregation,
therefore, it was necessary to consider these organizational concerns. First, the
intervention had to account for the needs of a newly developed congregation moving
beyond infancy, it needed to nurture egalitarian, grass-roots organizational structure, and
it sought to cultivate a Spirit-led, communally-discerned vision for ministry together. In
applying these concepts at Living Water, it is first necessary to consider the specific
context for the intervention.
22 Ibid., 81ff.
23 Ibid.
44
Partial Ethnography and Congregational Background
Living Water Lutheran Church formed several years ago when a layperson who
felt a passion for planting a congregation in a growing area contacted the bishop and
synod staff and asked to start a new congregation. After conversing with the bishop and
other synod staffers, he met with a bishop‘s assistant and several local pastors. Finding
considerable interest in forming a new congregation in the local area, the layperson found
other persons in the area who were interested in starting an ELCA congregation. They
canvased the local neighborhoods together, leaving flyers and inviting residents to be part
of this new congregation.
A few years later, having achieved numbers approaching two-dozen people, the
ELCA sent a highly gifted and experienced mission developer to plant a new
congregation. He invited the original core group to join with him, and they did. In
canvassing numerous area towns and neighborhoods and visiting tens of thousands of
people by going door to door, the congregation grew enough to sign a charter as an
official congregation in 2001. Construction on a million-dollar building began in 2004
and reached completion in 2006. The new members of the congregation were from varied
backgrounds. Several were disaffected members of the Lutheran Church Missouri Synod
(LCMS) congregations in two local towns. Others were transplanted former ELCA (or
predecessor bodies‘) members who had been part of other local congregations. Still
others were unchurched or dechurched24
persons. The mission developer, giving
opportunity to channel resources to growing the ministry, accepted payment below
24
Unchurched refers to persons, normally adult, who have never been active in organized religion
or congregations. Dechurched persons are those who have, for whatever reason, walked away from
organized religion for a significant period.
45
adjudicatory compensation guidelines and waived healthcare benefits due to Medicare
coverage for himself and for his wife. His wife also served in an unpaid position as the
full-time Parish Administrator.
The mission developer retired in early 2008, and when he and the Parish
Administrator left the congregation, they left a major void in the leadership of the
congregation. Whether it stemmed from a Christendom top-down leadership mindset or
from the practical need to establish a healthy congregation that many mission developers
experience, the perception of several members of Living Water is that the couple made
almost all congregational decisions, major and minor. They also did the majority of the
day-to-day chores. A highly gifted and capable Parish Administrator followed them and
they hired an additional Administrative Assistant. Following the retirement of the mission
developer, the congregation called an Interim Pastor, who was a significant source of
conflict and consternation among the congregation members. In early 2009, the
congregation called their first full-time post mission-developer pastor. This pastor is also
the researcher for this PAR effort and the author of this thesis.
After the mission developer and the Parish Administrator left, Living Water began
to have some problems. Some members left when the mission developer left, while others
left later due to concerns about the interim pastor. The congregation called the next pastor
quickly in an effort to get a new permanent pastor, possibly stemming from a desire to
restore equilibrium and a sense of security. The newly called pastor has sought to utilize a
more communally based form of decision-making and vision discernment. Even so, there
has still been a sense of unease for some because of the differences in ministry styles.
This is because it is a change from the mission developer‘s top-down method of vision
46
casting, which is common practice during the mission development phase. The newly
called pastor considers this change beneficial, because:
Vision, then, must emerge from this engagement with the context rather than be
foreseen and laid over it. Gadamer points out how significantly our ability to see
and articulate our vision is shaped by the limits of our experiences and the
worldview from which we have come. If we take this insight to its logical end, the
reality of vision is always shaped by the limits placed on vision by those charged
with seeing and articulating it. Traditional models of leadership often fail to
account for this: the result can be leaders who are effective in the short-term work
of advancing a cause but who struggle with long-term effectiveness.
When the driving force behind the vision departs from the scene—for whatever
reason—the community is at risk of losing the vision altogether. Within the
Evangelical Lutheran Church in America we often witness this in what we call the
―after pastor‖ effect in mission development and redevelopment: this is a system
that has had relatively good health and missional effectiveness on the surface but
suddenly goes into decline when the leader leaves. The sense of vision, the gifts
and ownership of ministry, and the ability to sustain it apart from the gifts of the
leader are inadequate to overcome the centrist approach to leadership that served
the system but did not equip it for ongoing work when the one who was the
keeper of the vision departed.25
As it stands today, the congregation is exceptionally healthy, with its strength of
community, lack of cliques, and depth of perichoretic mutual burden bearing and
ministry. Things have gone well with the newly called pastor in ministry and pastoral
relationships.
Other stressors, however, have been present in this first year of ministry. These
stressors come from several sources, including financial difficulties, anxiety over recent
denominational decisions, and the loss of a significant number of members because of
these decisions or the ministry of the interim minister. Even so, people are increasingly
ready to leave these things behind in order to move forward in ministry, with hope and
25
Daubert, ―Vision Discerning vs. Vision Casting: How Shared Vision Can Raise Up
Communities of Leaders Rather Than Mere Leaders of Communities,‖ 161.
47
excitement for potential in shared ministry, both within the congregation and in the wider
community.
Transitioning From Top-Down to Bottom-Up Organizational Structures
For a congregation, then, to move beyond infancy and pastor-directed ministry to
congregation-based shared ministry, it is important to find ways to help congregants to
examine their identity as members of the Body of Christ, and to move from
inward-focused building actions to outward-focused evangelical activity. In the
organizational theory of ―The church is, the church does what it is, the church organizes
what it does,‖26
there is a strong emphasis on considering congregational identity issues
with respect to the first element—the church is. It is necessary to discern the
congregation‘s identity before bringing change in what the church does and how it
organizes that activity, to move from inward-focused to outward-focused activity.
The process of discerning missional vision seeks to do that specifically, with an
emphasis on the missio or sent aspect of church life. The fact that community in the
Internet-era is formed through egalitarian, voluntary collaboration that originates from
the grass roots—as opposed to the top-down expert strategies of the modern era—also
provides opportunities, habits and tools to enhance and encourage this type of voluntary
participation. In the PAR intervention, various small group opportunities played an
important role in developing an interconnected web of congregant relationships, to help
transition from a top-down to a grass-roots organizational structure. It was also important
26
Van Gelder, The Ministry of the Missional Church: a Community Led by the Spirit, 17.
48
to provide several opportunities and means for congregants to engage and connect with
the vision cultivation process.
Small versus Large Group Process
In order to begin to cultivate cohesive vision in a group such as a congregation, it
is essential to create space and an environment that will facilitate healthy and mutual
conversation in the context of caring and respectful relationships. It is impossible to
guarantee that people will form such relationships, since using force or rules to require
people to communicate mutually and freely would inherently curb or destroy the
opportunity for such free and mutual relationships. Even so, it should be possible to set a
stage that fosters healthy relationship building, both with guidelines that give healthy
boundaries shape, and space for this type of conversation, and by nurturing caring
relationships between participants as they fill that space.
Increasing Need for Intimacy in Society
A group must have a level of cohesiveness in order to build relationships capable
of healthy dialog about difficult issues. It is helpful to nurture and create such
relationships in an effort to discern and describe a shared vision, and to work together to
achieve it. Any work that seeks to cultivate a missional vision will have an effect on a
group only insofar as the group is cohesive with strong relationships. It will also only be
effective if the participants embrace the vision, appropriate it, and assimilate it into their
personal and communal lives.
In order for the PAR intervention for this thesis project to have the greatest
impact, therefore, it contained elements intended to function through strong interpersonal
relationships. The concept of cultivating missional vision has, in fact, an included goal of
49
strengthening and building relationships within the congregation and with the
community.
This fits a growing need in the United States, because research shows that
Americans are more lonely and disconnected now than they have been for decades.
According to recent research, Americans are growing increasingly more isolated socially.
More of us have fewer close friends or confidants with whom we may discuss personal
matters than Americans have had in the past. Even as communication via Internet and
cell phones increases, intimate social ties are shrinking, and are becoming nonexistent for
far too many people. In fact, in difficult times, many people have to suffer with their
problems alone.27
Research that relies upon the relationships and cohesiveness of a group cannot
take for granted the existence of a network that is strong enough to bring interest in
participation, as well as a desire to work together to engage one another in healthy dialog
in discerning a shared vision. In order to be effective and even as part of the ultimate
goal, this PAR intervention needed to encourage the growth and strengthening of
interpersonal relationships. This occurred both within larger groups, and through the
formation of small groups, both of which have different possibilities for shaping and
nurturing relationships and conversation.
27
Shankar Vedantam, ―Social Isolation Growing in U.S., Study Says The Number of People Who
Say They Have No One to Confide In Has Risen,‖ Washington Post (Washington, DC, 2006). The
newspaper article references an article published by Duke University researchers: Miller McPherson, Lynn
Smith-Lovin, , and , Matthew E. Brashears, ―Social Isolation in America: Changes in Core Discussion
Networks Over Two Decades,‖ American Sociological Review 71, no. 3 (2006): 353-375.
50
Group Size
The size of a group can foster or hinder healthy dialog. Groups of varying sizes
have differing strengths and weaknesses, and can provide opportunities for various kinds
of conversation. Small groups are better suited for fostering relationships, and for more
intimate conversation and deliberation. Small group leaders, then, need training to
facilitate conversation and help group members to participate authentically and fully in
conversation. Small groups encourage intimate, heart-felt conversation.28
Large groups, on the other hand, are better suited for conveying information,
drawing expert opinion from group members, or for experts to share information with a
wide audience efficiently.29
Thus, for sharing information, teaching, and other activities
that aim at increasing knowledge, it is better to use a lecture format with a larger group.
For example, if the goal of a Bible study is primarily to foster relationships and to
draw forth perspectives from everyone involved, it is better to have a small group that
encourages participants to discuss and share feelings and matters of the heart. If, on the
other hand, the goal of the Bible study is to impart information and to teach biblical
stories and theological concepts, then it is much more desirable to pool resources and
bring in a talented scholar who can teach a large group of people.30
It is also important to note that leadership within any group is a key element to
nurturing healthy interactions. Within small groups especially, the leader is an important
part of nurturing a healthy and enriching small-group experience. For purposes of the
28
Richard P. Schowalter, Igniting a New Generation of Believers, Ministry for the Third
Millennium (Nashville: Abingdon Press, 1995), 100.
29 Ibid.
30 Ibid., 103ff.
51
PAR research, therefore, it was important to spend time at the beginning of the small
group experience to train persons to facilitate conversation within the clusters. Training
participants to lead discussion and facilitate conversation among small-group participants
was essential to ensure healthy and successful small-group interaction.
In both large and small groups, there must be a force of vision and purpose to
unite the group and foster unity in purpose and meaning. One way for this to happen is
through communal, shared vision for ministry.
The Efficacy of Vision for Leading and Bringing Change
A shared purpose or vision unites an organization, whether it consists of large or
small groups. Having this shared vision unites a group as an organization. Specifically, a
group is ―an assemblage of persons or objects gathered or located together; an
aggregation.‖31
An organization, on the other hand, is ―something that has been
organized or made into an ordered whole,‖ or ―a group of persons organized for a
particular purpose; an association.‖32
In other words, a group consists of individuals that may not have any other
association or shared purpose aside from being members of the same group. This differs
from an organization, which is a group with a shared purpose which orders and organizes
it. The organization‘s vision draws people together to work in an organized fashion,
accomplish goals, etc. An organization without shared purpose or vision often times will
deteriorate into a disorganized group that may fragment or disintegrate.
31
The American Heritage Dictionary of the English Language, 4th ed. (Boston: Houghton Mifflin,
2004).
32 Ibid.
52
This understanding of the necessity for a congregation to share missional vision
and perspectives is a key component of the rationale for carrying out the PAR
intervention at Living Water. The shared vision, constituted by articulating purpose and
guiding principles that the group can use in making decisions and in living out a shared
faith, is essential for organizing the congregation with a shared ministry. Vision can be
considered from at least two perspectives; comparing the effect of vision on an
organization to the electromagnetic effect, and the effect of bringing a group together in
an act of love as a uniting force.
Vision and the Field Effect
Margaret Wheatley uses a metaphor for the effect of vision on an organization by
pointing to the field effect, such as that caused by an electromagnetic force.33
According
to electromagnetic theory, a changing magnetic field near a conductor causes electrons in
the wire to move. Moving a magnet along a wire will induce an electronic current within
the wire. This is how a generator works; a length of looped wire spins in close proximity
to a set of magnets, which generates an electric current. The converse of this is also
true—current moving in a wire induces a magnetic field. A motor works like a generator,
but in reverse; an electrical current applied to a length of looped wire in close proximity
to a set of magnets causes the spindle to react by turning.
Wheatley contends that shared vision acts upon a group of people in similar
fashion. Shared vision organizes a group invisibly to accomplish a shared purpose.
33
Margaret J Wheatley, Leadership and the New Science: Discovering Order in a Chaotic World,
2nd ed. (San Francisco: Berrett-Koehler Publishers, 1999), 49ff.
53
We would start by recognizing that in creating a vision, we are creating a power,
not a place, an influence, not a destination. This field metaphor would help us
understand that we need congruency in the air, visionary messages matched by
visionary behaviors.34
The shared vision and purpose unites the group to form an organization. As it
permeates the organization, the unseen force of vision has the effect of bringing various,
seemingly disconnected actions into concert to accomplish the shared purpose and
vocation of the organization.35
Shared vision, therefore, is essential to a group being able
to organize, to answer God‘s call to ministry, and to achieve a shared purpose with love.
Vision, Lovingly Shared, as a Uniting and Motivating Force
While it is important for a group united with shared purpose to have an interest in
working together to achieve the shared purpose, it also needs an additional component.
The group must share motivation to accomplish the purpose. They must have a stake in
the success of the group. That interest must also be stronger than personal concerns in
order for the individuals to be motivated to sacrifice personal desires in furthering the
purposes of the larger organization.
Biologist Garrett Hardin describes the Tragedy of the Commons,36
which is a
tendency that groups have against pursuing shared goals through collective action. This
occurs when people have a stronger incentive to damage the public good for personal
gain than they have to nurture it through personal discipline.
34
Ibid., 55-56.
35 Ibid.
36 Shirky, Here Comes Everybody, 51-53.
54
An example of the Tragedy of the Commons is that of a group of shepherds who
utilize a shared pasture. The individual shepherds have competing interests; feed your
own sheep versus preserving the pasture for everyone. The self-serving interest is for
each to overgraze one‘s sheep secretly in order to maximize profit by selling the fattest
sheep at the market. On the other hand, the shepherds share a communal interest to
observe restraint, lest they all overgraze the pasture and destroy it. In this example,
everyone benefits communally and individually by sharing the pasture fairly, thereby
maximizing the community‘s profits as a whole.
This only happens, however, if everyone exercises discipline and restraint in
grazing the sheep. Everyone suffers if even one shepherd selfishly overgrazes the shared
pasture. When one or two shepherds decide to let their sheep greedily eat more than they
should, they are increasing their own profits considerably. They do so, however, at the
expense of the other shepherds and their flocks. This means that the disciplined,
benevolent actions of the conscientious shepherds will cause them to suffer as they fund
the profits of the greedy ones who decide to act selfishly. This creates a pressure or
incentive for everyone, through greed, suspicion, and mistrust, to destroy the shared
pasture or public sphere selfishly, in furtherance of each person‘s own individual
interests. This is the Tragedy of the Commons.37
Two of the ways that governance has sought to mitigate this tendency is through
dividing resources, and mutual coercion, mutually agreed upon.38
Using the former
method with the shepherd example, the shepherds could divide the pasture into equally
37
Ibid.
38 Ibid. This phrase originated with Hardin along with the Tragedy of the Commons concept.
55
sized and equally resourced properties that each shepherd individually owns. Now, each
shepherd has an incentive to care properly for his or her own piece of the pasture, while
defending it from illicit use by the others.
Using the mutual coercion, mutually agreed upon method, the shepherds give
authority to a mutually selected third party to arbitrate and regulate individual shepherds‘
use of the shared land in furthering the greater public interest. Again, in the shepherd
example, this would be like electing a government who would fairly enforce mutuality
and sharing to prevent the shepherds from overgrazing their flocks within the shared
pasture.
Put differently, this means that collective action by an organization requires
sacrifice or loss by some of the members of the organization. To avoid the Tragedy of the
Commons, individuals must agree to forsake a personal gain for the betterment of the
larger organization or society. When individual members or a sub-group makes decisions
that benefit the larger organization, some members will lose. As the size of the group
increases, it becomes increasingly likely that the group will make decisions that cause
larger numbers of members not to get what they want. ―For a group to take collective
action, it must have some shared vision strong enough to bind the group together, despite
periodic decisions that will inevitably displease at least some members.‖39
Either this
vision can be enforced through power (as in the previous examples of dividing resources
or binding oversight) or it can be accepted willingly through mutual agreement and love.
This is a goal of the vision cultivation process. Vision unites a group to form an
organization, but it will only do so to the point that the group willingly adopts the vision
39
Ibid., 53.
56
as a means for shared discernment, decision-making, and action. Unlike the business
world, which uses compensation to motivate employees to embrace a shared vision,
congregations do not have the power to require members to work together in shared
ministry. Instead, individuals must decide to embrace a shared missional vision willingly
and work together with it. This means that love, in a decision to sacrifice personal
ambitions willingly in favor of the shared missional vision, is the only practical means to
achieve congregational unity and shared ministry. A vision cultivation process that seeks
to draw people together to discern and define a shared organizational vision is, therefore,
preferable to one that casts a vision in a top-down fashion that commands the
organization to adopt it. The cultivation process must seek to involve people in an act of
love that, together, brings forth missional vision that inspires as many people as possible
to share it.
Cultivating Shared Vision
Components of a Vision Cultivation Process
In seeking to embark upon a process of living with a shared missional vision in a
congregation, it is important to utilize a process that includes the following
characteristics:
1. The process must be egalitarian in nature. It must foster a shared process of
discerning and describing the vision so that the congregation will embrace it
widely.
2. It should increase interconnectedness, fostering community and a relational
network that can work together with a shared vision.
57
3. The process must cogeneratively cultivate a shared vision. In order for the
congregation to embrace the vision, it must grow from the members together
through prayer, Bible study, and mutual conversation. Cultivated shared vision
normally contains unexpected and unforeseen elements that emerge from the
collective effort and conversation of the participants.
4. The cultivation process needs to have multiple entry points and opportunities for
people to form community that allow for a variety of personalities and means of
joining and forming community. This allows for maximum participation and
helps build community.
Shared Vision
The Participatory Action Research (PAR) intervention utilized a form of the
visioning process Dave Daubert describes in Living Lutheran: Renewing Your
Congregation.40
This process did not to use the conventional top-down, leader-dominated
method of casting a vision for the future of the organization. In fact, it used a different
understanding of vision.
For many, vision has been like a picture of a place that is far away and in the
future which the organization works to enter into and achieve. This understanding of
vision requires a few—or even one—gifted and perceptive individual(s) to accurately
perceive and articulate the future vision to the organization. With this understanding, the
task of leadership is to cast the vision and then motivate the organization to achieve it.
40
Daubert, Living Lutheran: Renewing Your Congregation, 91-95.
58
This can have the effect of making the vision something that seems unachievable in the
short term and even somewhat unlikely in the long term.
Alternatively, with a grass-roots method of vision cultivation, vision becomes a
way for the organization to interpret events and make decisions in the present. Instead of
understanding vision in terms of a picture of a future reality, shared vision becomes a
shared way of currently viewing reality and making decisions together. This type of
vision cultivation is more like helping an organization to discover a new and shared set of
eyeballs or lenses through which the organization and its members perceive reality and
choose how to act in the present. This has the effect of making an immediate impact on
the organization as they live into an unforeseen future through living with the shared
vision.41
The process for an organization to discern a shared vision is, in a sense, never
complete. Even so, the vision contains specific elements. In grass-roots vision cultivation:
Vision = Purpose + Guiding Principles + Time42
With this understanding, the organization lives with a shared vision, as it lives
together and makes decisions in accordance with common guiding principles and works
together with common purpose. Over time, the organization lives into the future, slowly
discovering an unimagined future in the midst of living together and making decisions
with the shared purpose according to the guiding principles.
This understanding of vision contains all of the components of a vision cultivation
process. It is egalitarian and increases interconnectedness. It allows members of the
41
This is based upon concepts in Daubert, Living Lutheran: Renewing Your Congregation.
42 Ibid., 46.
59
organization to act according to conscience and encourages them to work together with
others in shared purpose with common guiding principles. It allows multiple entry points,
because the future goal is something that the organization continuously discerns as
members come and go over time. Finally, the process for discerning the shared vision
utilizes a cultivation process that allows vision to grow cogeneratively from within the
organization.
Cultivating Vision: A Community Garden
The process an organization uses in working together to cultivate vision has a
direct impact on the result derived from the process. A faulty process normally yields an
undesirable result, and a healthy process has the best chances for yielding a beneficial
outcome. This means that an organization that seeks to live together with shared vision
needs to discern and define that vision in a manner that cogeneratively cultivates shared
vision. In an organization that seeks to deliberate and act in ways that are egalitarian, that
increases interconnectedness, and that allows multiple entry points, the process of
cogeneratively cultivating shared vision inherently builds organizational habits of
working together with shared vision.
This concept of cultivating organizational vision is similar to the concept of a
shared community garden. In commercial farming, the emphasis is on maximizing crop
yield to maximize profit. The farmer, with perhaps a few paid helpers, works extensive
pieces of land using machines, chemicals, and modern techniques to get the land to
produce sizable crops that the farmer sells for profit. The land and the act of farming
become a means for the farmer‘s financial ends.
60
In a community garden, however, the wider community shares the garden. As
people come to work the land and tend the plants, they work together with a shared vision
for tending and nurturing a garden that the community can enjoy as they share the yielded
crop. In this way, the work of gardening and sharing the crop has the desirable side effect
of forming and nurturing human community. The crop feeds the individuals who
personally and carefully worked together to nurture the plants that yield the produce.
With a community garden, the garden and the community, together, both become the
ends and the means for living together. The people in the community share common
bonds as far as each person embraces the shared garden and participates in nurturing it
and receiving the crop. Even the plants themselves become part of a symbiotic
relationship with the people in the community, as people nurture life in the plants through
tending the garden, and the plants nurture life in the community by yielding food for it.
This concept of a community garden is a major philosophical foundation for the
process of cultivating missional vision in this PAR intervention. The intervention
embodies this concept by encouraging the congregation to form relationships and to
discern shared missional vision cogeneratively.
There were several entry points and opportunities for community to form,43
including small group discipleship, a congregational retreat, Wednesday night meetings,
deliberation on shared vision posted publicly with invitation for all to contribute, etc.
Throughout the process, the researcher communicated ideas and results publicly in
various ways, with invitation for dialog and widespread participation in the discernment
and decision-making.
43
Cf. previous discussion about self-forming, bottom-up communities.
61
The congregation formally embraced the shared vision in a congregational
meeting. This cultivated and shared vision will be central in moving forward in common
ministry at Living Water. It is also an open-ended process, with the possibility for
revising and growing the vision in the future. In this way, both the individuals and the
congregation nurture one another in a symbiotic relationship, rather than one becoming
the means for the other‘s ends. As members nurture the health of the congregation, the
congregation nurtures the growth and well-being of the members and the wider
community.
The extent, however, that the vision and cultivation process make an impact on
the congregation is dependent upon the depth and quality of congregational participation.
A process of cultivating vision must happen in a way that inspires people to participate as
fully as possible.
Practical Considerations
In order for an effort to organize people to work, it must capture the interest of the
people in the group, it must have a structure that facilitates the organization, and it must
inspire the group‘s members to participate. An organization cannot exist without
members and membership is impossible without an organization.44
In organizing a group,
leaders hold out promise for the benefit of the members and community to embrace and
enjoy as they mutually participate in the organization. Leaders provide tools that allow
the members to interact in ways that bring the promised benefits. Finally, leaders
44
Shirky, Here Comes Everybody, 263. This concept of promise, tools, and bargain undergirds his
understanding of new ways that society chooses to organize as our connectivity via the Internet continues
to influence and change how we interact.
62
encourage members to accept a bargain that encourages full participation by the
members.45
Promise
In order for people to agree to prioritize a new demand on their time and energy
over existing ones, the promise they hear in the invitation to participate must clearly
communicate something that they will perceive as being a worthwhile priority. In any
effort to encourage participation, persons must see a clear benefit in doing so. The
promise must be something that strikes a balance between being mundane and excessive.
It must contain explicit promises, and may include some implicit ones. One should be
able to articulate it succinctly in a way that encourages enthusiasm for participation.46
With respect to literature and key theories presented in this chapter for research,
the researcher made two key promises in conducting the PAR intervention. First, the
members of Living Water heard the promise of an opportunity to live out their faith
together, in ways that would encourage deeper relationships in the midst of an organized,
relational community. The researcher encouraged relationship building through more
intimate, small group experiences as well as more public, congregational activities.
Second, an implicit promise in the research was that individuals‘ faith would
grow as Living Water engaged in the process of vision discernment and in living
faithfully together with the resultant shared missional vision. This promise also included
the assertion that living together in the shared force field of missional vision would
45
Ibid., 260ff.
46 Ibid.
63
encourage deepening of relationships with stronger, lay-led missional activity in daily life
in the congregation and community.
Tools
The second practical area to consider in planning the intervention pertained to
tools the researcher used to implement the intervention. Different tools are appropriate
for different situations. Small groups are better at fostering conversation; thus, they are
better suited to help groups to converge on a single perspective. Larger groups, on the
other hand, give a wider pool of people who can bring expertise to a problem. They allow
loosely connected or even unconnected people to pool knowledge without having to
agree on anything in particular.47
In planning various aspects of the vision cultivation
process it was necessary to tailor the tools used to foster interaction, along with the sizes
of the groups, to help achieve the best possible outcome for the desired aspects of the
PAR intervention.
With this in mind, the Damascus Travelers were a key component in building
relationships that encouraged members of Living Water to converge on a shared
understanding of vision for ministry.48
These small group components were present at the
congregational retreat, as well as before and after the retreat. The intervention also
utilized large group conversation involving the entire congregation to allow people to
bring their expertise to bear on the vision‘s basic building blocks that surfaced in the
smaller groups, in the congregational retreat, and during the Wednesday night meetings.
47
Ibid., 266-77.
48 See appendix I for specifics on the content of the Damascus Travelers readings and discussion
questions.
64
The congregation council conversed as a small group and worked together to converge on
set purpose and time statements. These statements then fed back into conversation at a
congregational forum where members‘ wisdom could surface and impact the shared
vision. The small-group congregation council then discussed and integrated the
congregation‘s perspectives into the final statements. They brought these final statements
back to the larger congregation for approval and adoption. In this way, the benefits of
larger and smaller groups interacted to serve as tools to refine and define shared vision
that bubbled up from the congregation, encouraging greater acceptance and use.
Bargain
Whereas the promise provides an opportunity for members to understand what
benefits they receive from participating in an organization, and the tools provide means
for meaningful interaction, the bargain describes the activity that the organization asks
for or expects from the members. Participants have to agree to the bargain, and it must
become a part of the relationship and interaction between the individual members and the
group. Again, the group needs to have the members participating even as members need a
group in which they may participate. If the promise states the responsibilities of the
organization to the individual, then the bargain states the responsibilities of the member
to the group. The researcher designed the tools to maximize and augment the fullest
possible interrelationship between the organization and its members. The bargain
encouraged and inspired members to interact with one another to discern the shared
65
missional vision cogeneratively. The researcher worked to tailor the tools to assist with
this need.49
For the PAR intervention, the bargain took the form of an expectation that the
vision cultivation process participation would be constructive, authentic, and lively.
Again, the small group aspect helped foster accountability of individual members and
encourage a greater level of participation. In addition, participants that shared public
comments included their names with their remarks to encourage constructive
participation. By requiring people to take responsibility for their statements, conversation
remained relatively civil and constructive. Finally, allowing members the freedom to
choose the level of their participation invited healthy interaction and a greater likelihood
that the members would appropriate the congregational vision, to varying degrees, as
their own.
Conclusion
For a congregation to cultivate missional vision, it is important for individuals to
form structures of organization that draw them together in a shared vision and purpose.
There are various aspects of a complex community, such as the one at Living Water
Lutheran Church, that require care in implementing and living with shared vision for
ministry. This vision, lovingly shared, can bring God‘s people together with a set of
principles to guide them in making decisions and working together in shared ministry.
The principles of this vision, as a missional vision, are founded theologically in a biblical
and theological understanding of the relational and perichoretic triune God. Through
49
Shirky, Here Comes Everybody, 270ff.
66
living with this vision, God draws people into the caring, redeeming, and reconciling
reign of Christ‘s kingdom.
Huntley
67
CHAPTER 3
BIBLICAL AND THEOLOGICAL PERSPECTIVES
Some people brought a blind man to Jesus and begged him to touch him. He took
the blind man by the hand and led him out of the village; and when he had put
saliva on his eyes and laid his hands on him, he asked him, ―Can you see
anything?‖ And the man looked up and said, ―I can see people, but they look like
trees, walking.‖ Then Jesus laid his hands on his eyes again; and he looked
intently and his sight was restored, and he saw everything clearly.
(Mark 8:23b-25)
In this section of Mark‘s gospel account, Jesus is miraculously feeding and
healing people, even as the Pharisees and religious leaders confront Jesus about his
authority. The disciples, also, do not understand why Jesus is doing these things, as he
makes his journey to Jerusalem and the cross. Along the way, ―some people‖ bring this
blind man to Jesus and beg him to heal the man. Ultimately, Jesus does heal him but it
takes two healing attempts to restore the man‘s vision completely.
This man‘s blindness is similar to the cultural cataracts of the disciples, the
Pharisees, and the crowd, each of whose preconceived notions blind them to the true
mission of Jesus Christ. Jesus tells the disciples repeatedly that he is on his way to
Jerusalem to die and rise again from the dead. Yet, like the blind man whose vision only
partially clears with Jesus‘ first touch, the disciples and others do not understand or
accept the purpose and scope of Jesus‘ mission. Nonetheless, Jesus repeatedly tells the
disciples about his pending death as they journey to Jerusalem.
With these repeated spiritual touches, Jesus is cultivating missional vision among
the disciples. With what he says and does, Jesus is cultivating a way of looking at the
68
world and at daily life that sees and perceives God‘s in-breaking kingdom. Jesus
repeatedly encourages the disciples to see it as well. As they live with Jesus, see him die,
experience the risen Christ, and share these experiences with others in the days after the
ascension, the disciples continue on a path of increasing clarity of vision as the Holy
Spirit works to cultivate vision for God‘s reconciling activity in the world.
In answering the research question, ―How does cultivating shared missional
vision in a newly developed congregation impact the lives of congregants and how they
relate to others in the community?‖ the researcher worked to cultivate missional vision
among the people of Living Water Lutheran Church. The hope is that congregants grew
and will continue to grow in their understanding of God‘s missional vision, and that this
will impact the lives of congregants and how they interact with the community. In
working to achieve this, leadership cultivated missional vision specifically by working
with people and shaping systems that helped and encouraged people to see life through
eyes of faith.
Casting versus Cultivating Missional Vision
In considering what it means to have missional vision, it is helpful to remember
that vision is a way of viewing and perceiving life with a shared perspective. It is a way
of viewing the world that allows people to make decisions together in light of a shared
understanding of God‘s call to life and mission. Rather than casting a prepackaged vision
or goal to reach, the cultivation process seeks to nurture a new vision that, through the
work of the Holy Spirit, helps a congregation to see the world and make communal
decisions in God-inspired ways.
69
Chapter 2 discusses the concept of moving from understanding vision as
something that the leader casts to something that the community discerns. Vision is
something that leaders cultivate among people. It is something that equips them to make
decisions from a shared missional perspective in praxis and vocation. Instead of a leader
going off to define vision then coming back to cast it and convince everyone to achieve
it, vision is cultivated in the midst of God‘s people, as together they listen and discern a
shared new way of living in the world.1
Even so, in Scripture, there are examples of both vision casting and vision
cultivation, as God and other leaders interact with God‘s people. Moses, for example,
received and cast God‘s vision for life among the Hebrew people after God freed them
from slavery in Egypt. On the other hand, the apostles cultivated vision, with God‘s
guidance and inspiration, for the life of the new Christian community in the world.
Examining both means for visioning yields insight into the concepts of vision casting and
cultivation.
Vision Casting in Exodus
In casting a vision, a leader or small group of leaders often withdraw(s) from the
community for a time of prayer and discernment. Together, the leader or leaders seek to
define a vision for an ideal goal or situation that the people are to work together to attain.
After discerning the vision, the leader returns to describe the vision to the people. The
expectation is that they will, as faithful followers of God and God‘s appointed leader,
embrace the cast vision and work together to achieve it.
1 Daubert, ―Vision Discerning vs. Vision Casting: How Shared Vision Can Raise Up Communities
of Leaders Rather Than Mere Leaders of Communities,‖ 147-71.
70
An example of this occurs in Exodus 19, when the Hebrew people arrive at Mt.
Sinai after God has freed them from oppression under Pharaoh in Egypt. Upon arriving at
Mt. Sinai, God tells the people to wash their clothes and prepare for him to come to the
mountain (Exodus 19:10). God then instructs Moses to climb the mountain alone so that
God may speak with him, saying, ―You shall set limits for the people all around, saying,
‗Be careful not to go up the mountain or to touch the edge of it. Any who touch the
mountain shall be put to death‘‖ (Exodus 19:12).
In doing this, God is casting the vision for communal life of the Hebrew people
after freeing them from slavery in Egypt. God is also casting vision for communal life for
the journey to the promised land of Canaan and for daily life after they arrive. To do this,
God first speaks to the people and gives them the Ten Commandments. As the people
hear the power in God‘s voice, accompanied with a dark cloud, thunder, and lightning,
they are afraid and they tremble before God‘s power. After this, Moses climbs the
mountain to receive God‘s vision fully. As Scripture describes it,
When all the people witnessed the thunder and lightning, the sound of the
trumpet, and the mountain smoking, they were afraid, trembled, and stood at a
distance, and said to Moses, ―You speak to us, and we will listen; but do not let
God speak to us, or we will die.‖ Moses said to the people, ―Do not be afraid; for
God has come only to test you and to put the fear of him upon you so that you do
not sin.‖ Then the people stood at a distance, while Moses drew near to the thick
darkness where God was. (Exodus 20:18-21)
While the exact sequence of events is unclear, it appears that Moses remains on
the mountain for forty days and nights receiving the vision from God as recorded in
chapters 20-31 of Exodus. This vision includes various components. God‘s people are to
be a light to the nations and a priestly kingdom.2 There are limits for retribution that
2 Exodus 19:5-6.
71
victims can exact from the perpetrator,3 limits on profiting from the poor,
4 and
requirements for justice irrespective of financial class.5 There are requirements to treat
the least in society, such as widows, orphans, and resident aliens, with dignity and special
consideration.6 The vision includes administrative components, such as a requirement to
have a census.7 God gives Moses numerous proscriptions for annual festivals
8 and the
temple cult.9 While the Law God gives to Moses contains numerous proscriptions and
prohibitions, the overall theme and intent of the Law seems to be an emphasis on
fostering shalom; peace with God, peace with others, and peace with self.
While on the top of Mt. Sinai, however, God tells Moses that fear has driven the
people to forsake God. The people convince Aaron to lead them to worship other gods.
―Come, make gods for us,‖ they tell him, ―who shall go before us; as for this Moses, the
man who brought us up out of the land of Egypt, we do not know what has become of
him‖ (Exodus 32:1). They gather the people‘s gold, some of which they had plundered as
God liberated them from slavery in Egypt, in order to melt it down and cast it into an
image of a calf. Aaron then proclaims a worship festival and they make plans to offer
sacrifices and burnt offerings before the golden calf. As a result, God angrily threatens to
destroy the ―stiff-necked‖ Hebrew people and ―make a great nation‖ of Moses (Exodus
3 Exodus 21:12ff.
4 Exodus 22:25ff.
5 Exodus 23:1ff.
6 Exodus 22:21ff.
7 Exodus 30:11ff.
8 Exodus 23:14ff.
9 Exodus 25ff.
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32:9-10). Moses pleads on behalf of the people, making the case that if God destroyed
them then it would be an unfavorable witness to the people of Egypt. Because of Moses‘
plea, God ―changed his mind about the disaster that he planned to bring on his people‖
(Exodus 32:14).
Upon his return from the mountaintop, Moses enters the people‘s revelry bearing
the two stone tablets inscribed with the Ten Commandments. After listening to Aaron‘s
fallacious recounting of the circumstances surrounding the calf‘s construction, Moses
angrily destroys the golden calf and the two stone tablets inscribed with the Ten
Commandments. As punishment for rejecting God and the cast vision, Moses commands
the leaders to kill about three thousand people, and God brings a plague upon them.
Ultimately, Moses returns to the mountain to receive a replacement set of slabs. When he
returns again, the people are ready to receive the vision that Moses casts and follow the
precepts of the Law.
Aspects of Vision Casting in Exodus
In this story of God speaking to Moses, who discerns and casts the vision for
God‘s people to embrace and embody, six aspects provide insights into problems
stemming from reliance upon vision casting to motivate and form community. These
aspects include:
A requirement for an extremely talented and charismatic leader to discern and
cast the vision. Dave Daubert refers to this as the Great Man or Woman concept.10
Vision casting requires a leader who has the ability to discern and cast a vision,
10
Daubert, ―Vision Discerning vs. Vision Casting: How Shared Vision Can Raise Up
Communities of Leaders Rather Than Mere Leaders of Communities,‖ 149.
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while motivating people to accept and follow it. Only a small percentage of
leaders actually have this ability.11
Not only that, but vision casting can be
beneficial only if the leader is conscientious and constructive. Due to its reliance
on power and charisma, vision casting is prone to manipulation should the
followers place their trust in an unscrupulous leader.
Vision casting is inherently exclusive and hierarchical. In the Exodus story,
Moses sets off a boundary around Mt. Sinai that the people may not cross.12
In
this case, discerning the vision is an activity reserved for the elite.
Fear is an important component of respect, which is required for the people to
follow the leader in vision casting. Prior to Moses‘ assent of Mt. Sinai, God uses
an awesome exhibition of power to awaken fear in the people, in the hopes that
the fear will inspire them to accept and embrace of the cast vision.13
This fear does not sustain long-term acceptance of the cast vision, however, as the
fear necessary to motivate the people to continue to embody the cast vision is a
short-term and fickle motivator. Shortly after Moses and the cloud, lightning, and
thunder depart, the people begin to fear other, more immediate things. Because of
these proximate fears, they abandon God and Moses while seeking to receive
protection and providence from other gods. Since fear does not engage the will
beyond the extent of the exercise of power, their allegiance and acceptance of the
vision wanes when the powerful display subsides and the charismatic leader
11
Ibid.
12 Cf. Exodus 19.
13 Exodus 20:20.
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withdraws. Consequently, while the people may accept the cast vision initially,
they do not embrace it or appropriate it as their own in the long term. It is only
after God‘s power and the leadership of Moses return that they accept the vision,
albeit under the pain of plague and death.
On the positive side, the vision itself is missional, considering cultural mores of
the time. Nonetheless, even though the cast vision is missional and inclusive, the
exclusive nature of the process sows the seeds for subsequent rejection of the
vision among God‘s people. In later Old Testament experiences, God sends
prophets to remind the people to live according to the Law of Moses, God exiles
the people to Babylon because they have rejected the Law, etc. Even so, as Jesus
also states in Matthew 5:17-18, the Law itself is good even if the people do not
embrace it consistently. Since coercion and fear are the foundations of the process
for discerning, describing, and embracing the vision of the Law, it does not
inspire the people to accept it in the long term in shaping a just and compassionate
society. This inherently undermines the content of the vision and Law.
Finally, by not engaging the people in the discernment process, the casting
process inherently objectifies the people. Instead of being treated as partners in
ministry, Moses comes down from the mountain with an expectation that they
will accept and embody the cast vision without question. There is no dialog. The
people are not really allowed to appropriate the vision for themselves. They are to
accept either the vision or punishment, like animals that are commanded to obey
the master‘s instructions. In the vision casting process, they are not permitted to
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help shape the vision or to decide to embrace the vision, join the community, or
love God and one another freely.
Moving From Vision Casting to Vision Cultivation
In casting vision for communal life as God‘s people, Moses brings a vision that he
discerns from God and casts among the Hebrew people. God‘s extreme power,
accompanied by violent and even deadly enforcement, is required to compel the people to
accept it. Unfortunately, this acceptance seems to last as long as the fear of retribution.
When other more fearful or enticing circumstances arise, the Hebrew people forsake the
Mosaic Law to reject God and even embrace other gods in worship. Repeatedly, God
either calls the Hebrew people to return to the ideal of the law14
or punishes them when
they forsake it.
In the person of Jesus Christ, God reverses strategies for wooing the Hebrew
people to embrace and embody God‘s vision for a community founded in grace, mercy,
and love. While it is an oversimplification to state that Jesus‘ vision of the kingdom of
God15
is an updated form of the Mosaic Law, it nonetheless contains similar foundational
principles for living in community. Jesus‘ Sermon on the Mount, for example, is
reminiscent of the giving of the Law on Mt. Sinai, and it focuses on fulfilling the intent of
the Mosaic Law. At the beginning of this address, Jesus notes, ―Do not think that I have
come to abolish the law or the prophets; I have come not to abolish but to fulfill. For truly
I tell you, until heaven and earth pass away, not one letter, not one stroke of a letter, will
14
Cf. ―Happy are those who do not follow the advice of the wicked, or take the path that sinners
tread, or sit in the seat of scoffers; but their delight is in the law of the Lord, and on his law they meditate
day and night‖ (Psalm 1:1-2), among many other exhortations and calls to embrace the Mosaic Law.
15 Matthew refers to this as the kingdom of heaven.
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pass from the law until all is accomplished‖ (Matthew 5:17-18). He then repeatedly goes
on to lift up various aspects of the Law, saying ―You have heard that it was said …‖
(Matthew 5:21, for example) after which he gives a new contemporary application,
saying ―But I say to you …‖ (Matthew 5:22). Again, it is not a precise retelling or
reframing of the original Law of Moses, but the underlying themes of justice and shalom
are present in Jesus‘ remarks on the Sermon on the Mount.
There is a key difference, however, between the Mosaic Law and the Sermon on
the Mount—that being the visioning process. Again, in Exodus, God speaks to Moses
who brings the Law to the Hebrew people in a top-down fashion. After rejecting God and
his vision for shalom, the people bear the pain of their sin and brokenness. On the other
hand, in the Gospel accounts, God humbles himself to take on human flesh and become
one of us. God walks among the people, speaking and listening, as Jesus and the disciples
mutually bear the burdens of life. Most strikingly, instead of violently enforcing the
Law‘s precepts, God in Christ bears the pain and separation of sin and humanity‘s
rejection of God. In the passion of Christ, God bears that brokenness, heals it, and
overcomes it, thereby redeeming humanity from the dark powers of sin and separation.
Jesus then returns to the Father, and God‘s Holy Spirit descends upon and enters into
God‘s people to dwell inside of them to continue the work of redeeming them and
healing the divisions that humanity‘s sin causes.
Furthermore, in contrast to Moses‘ vision casting that objectifies and bends the
wills of God‘s people to accept the Law, the mutuality of the indwelling Spirit respects
the personhood of God‘s people by inviting them to respond to God‘s grace in faith. This
is a key component of any vision cultivation process, as it engages folks in mutual dialog
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and discernment, nurturing and deepening relationships with God and one another from
the grass roots. God‘s activity in the community, cultivating missional vision, is evident
in Acts as the disciples wrestle with the question of how to invite and incorporate
Gentiles into the community of believers.
Cultivating Missional Vision in Acts
In the early Church, there was a question about whether Gentiles would be subject
to the Hebrew Law16
—that is, to be circumcised and obey the specific provisions of the
Law—in order to be members of the Church. At one point, an angel of God visits a
centurion named Cornelius ―who feared God with all his household‖ (Acts 10:2) and tells
him to send for Simon Peter. Cornelius then sends for Peter, who travels to see Cornelius.
Along the way, God speaks to Peter in a vision and reveals the fact that nothing in
creation is unclean. In other words, God tells Peter to move beyond the specific legal
demands of the Mosaic Law to accept Cornelius as he is without requiring him or his
household to accept circumcision and the specific demands of the Law. As Peter
contemplates the vision, Cornelius‘s men arrive. At the direction of the Holy Spirit, Peter
talks with them. The next day, Peter goes with them to Cornelius‘s house. After arriving,
Peter does something a good, practicing Hebrew person would normally not do; he enters
the unclean house of a Gentile centurion. As Peter is sharing the Gospel of Jesus Christ,
the Holy Spirit descends upon Cornelius and his whole household, just as the Spirit did
on the day of Pentecost. This surprises the circumcised believers who were with Peter at
16
In the discussion of vision in Acts, the term Law refers to the Law of Moses as interpreted by
and expanded upon in the Pharisaic tradition.
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the time. Peter gives instructions for everyone in Cornelius‘s household to be baptized,
and he stays with them for several days.
After this, Peter returns to Jerusalem, where the ―circumcised believers criticized
him, saying, ‗Why did you go to uncircumcised men and eat with them?‘‖ (Acts 11:2-3).
Peter recounts to them all that has happened, from the vision where God spoke to him, to
the pouring out of the Holy Spirit with Cornelius and his household coming to faith and
being baptized. At the end of the story, Peter asks, ―If then God gave them the same gift
that he gave us when we believed in the Lord Jesus Christ, who was I that I could hinder
God?‖ (Acts 11:17). As the story continues, ―When they heard this, they were silenced.
And they praised God, saying, ‗Then God has given even to the Gentiles the repentance
that leads to life‘‖ (Acts 11:18). For those talking with Peter, the matter of whether or not
Gentiles are welcomed into Christ‘s Church, without a requirement to be circumcised and
to observe the specific precepts in the Mosaic Law, is settled. Through mutual
conversation, the community discerned the voice of the Holy Spirit saying that faithful
Gentiles are welcome in the Christian community as Gentiles.
Even so, this did not settle the matter universally in the early Church. In the next
two chapters of Acts, Paul and Barnabas travel to various cities as they proclaim the
Gospel, and they find receptive audiences that include both Gentiles and Jews.
Everywhere they go, however, a group of people in the crowd continually stirs up
opposition to the inclusion of Gentiles among the ranks of Christian believers. This is a
recurring problem for Paul and Barnabas.
Finally, the apostles call a meeting in Jerusalem, and they appoint Paul and
Barnabas to go there to refute those teaching that, ―Unless you are circumcised according
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to the custom of Moses, you cannot be saved‖ (Acts 15:1). At this meeting, there was
lively debate among the gathered people. Some advocated for circumcision and the
requirement for all believers to follow the specific precepts of the Law. Paul and
Barnabas, on the other hand, held that in numerous places many Gentiles were coming to
faith in Christ and that God was doing amazing miracles among the uncircumcised
Gentile Christians. Peter then described the vision where God spoke to him, and he
shared the fact that although he had previously advocated for circumcision and observing
the specific precepts of the Law, God had brought him to a new understanding regarding
Gentile circumcision. Finally, James spoke and shared a new interpretation of Scripture
from Amos.
In a decision that shaped the makeup and practices of the Church forever, the
people who assembled at Jerusalem decided to articulate a vision for ministry that
allowed Gentiles to become Christians, with some minor instructions regarding food
sacrificed to idols and sexual immorality. Gentiles would have to forsake their
pre-existing gods and religious worship to embrace Christ and the Church unreservedly,
yet they would not have to accept circumcision or be required to live according to the
specific precepts of the Law.
In moving forward, the Church now had a new vision for life together. Previously,
the Christian movement was primarily a movement within the Hebrew people who lived
outwardly by the specifics of the Law. As the Holy Spirit spoke to various people as they
discussed events and their various experiences, the community gathered, conversed, and
discerned together a new way of looking at life together in the Church. As they
articulated this new, shared, missional vision, one that included expanding the movement
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to draw all people into a Christ-centered (rather than a Law-centered) set of faith
practices, they cultivated a new vision for life together. The new vision, founded on the
original themes of mercy and shalom in the Law, is now lived by praxis of servanthood
and sacrifice in the kingdom of God founded in the person of Jesus Christ. As they now
live with this new, shared, missional vision for ministry together, God reveals and forms
an unimagined future for the Church as millions of people came to faith in Christ by
God‘s grace.
Aspects of Missional Vision in Acts
God, then, cultivated missional vision in the early Christian community. In this,
God moved the community beyond understanding the Church to be an inward-looking
Hebraic reform movement. Instead, they had a new and shared vision of a ministry of
God‘s care and redemption wherein God is seeking to restore relationships and form a
community founded in mercy and shalom with and among all people. This new,
missional vision contains the following six key elements:
First, it is a new way of looking at life together. Rather than continuing to have
circumcision as a key factor for inclusion in the community of faith, God revealed
a new way. Now, faith in Christ and baptism into Christ is the foundation for
community. In this way, the newly discerned vision requires a radical
reorientation of understanding in the community that makes the movement
universally inclusive in its invitation to redeem and restore relationships in Christ.
Second, God reveals missional vision to Peter, Barnabas, James, and others.
Vision for ministry has God as its exclusive source, and the people grasped,
understood, and articulated it in the community of faith.
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It is communally discerned, which is the third key element. The process does not
simply seek to find something for everyone‘s agreement. Instead, people in the
community prayerfully seek God‘s vision so that, together, they can faithfully
articulate vision that God reveals. In Acts, God simultaneously revealed the new
vision for inclusion of Gentiles to several different people in ministry across a
wide area. When they came together to discuss it, they realized that the Holy
Spirit had been speaking to them individually yet simultaneously. As they wrote
in the statement describing the new missional vision, ―it has seemed good to the
Holy Spirit and to us to impose on you no further burden than these essentials‖
(Acts 15:28). The vision was revealed by God and communally discerned.17
Fourth, the discernment process embraced the surrounding community and
culture with mutuality as the apostles listened attentively to Scripture, tradition,
voices outside the Church, and the voice of the Holy Spirit. The process of vision
discernment included voices from observing God at work in the world, ―And God,
who knows the human heart, testified to them by giving them the Holy Spirit, just
as he did to us‖ (Acts 15:8). Peter acts by mutually accompanying Gentiles in
listening to God‘s voice when Peter accepts the invitation from Cornelius to visit
this Gentile centurion. In fact, this encounter sets Peter on a path to a new
understanding of Gentile inclusion in the Church.18
The vision discernment
process also included the biblical voice when James quoted Scripture from Amos.
It included the voice of personal experience. As Peter says, ―Now therefore why
17
Cf. Van Gelder, The Ministry of the Missional Church: a Community Led by the Spirit, 104ff.
18 Cf. Acts 10.
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are you putting God to the test by placing on the neck of the disciples a yoke that
neither our ancestors nor we have been able to bear? On the contrary, we believe
that we will be saved through the grace of the Lord Jesus, just as they will‖ (Acts
15:10-11). As the people gathered prayerfully to discern God‘s missional vision,
they listened to all voices as they sought direction from the Holy Spirit.
Fifth, the Holy Spirit led the process of discernment throughout its entirety. In
understanding and perceiving this new God-given vision, the Holy Spirit led them
throughout the entire vision-discernment process.
Finally, the process involved the entire community—lay people and leaders—as
they listened to the Holy Spirit and discerned this new, missional vision. The
vision was cultivated in a bottom-up fashion rather than having the leader(s) cast a
vision for life together in a top-down fashion. In the assembled group, everyone
had the opportunity to speak and engage in the process of discerning and
describing what this new missional vision would be.
In this process of discerning missional vision in Acts, a key event was the vision
that Peter had on the rooftop on the way to Cornelius‘s house. This vision of, ―What God
has made clean, you must not call profane‖ (Acts 10:15), had a large impact on the
discernment process. While Peter did not cast the new communal vision on his own, the
vision God gave him served as a starting point that the Holy Spirit confirmed and
expanded upon in the lives of others in the community. In similar fashion, theological
components from the missional church movement served that purpose in the
vision-cultivation process at Living Water Lutheran Church.
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Components of Missional Vision
The work that people in the missional church movement have done was
foundational in the conversation throughout the vision cultivation process. With roots in
the Gospel in our Culture Network, the missional church movement has specific
characteristics. These include but are not limited to:19
Trinitarian theology, with the social model of the Trinity. The persons of the
Trinity dwell in perichoretic union with one another, and reach out to build
perichoretic relationships with us.
The missio Dei is a call and a mission to redeem all of creation that draws us into
the fullness of God‘s caring, redemptive, and reconciling reign (i.e. the Kingdom
of God). Caring for creation, redeeming humans in bondage to sin and darkness,
creating new relationships, and reconciling strained ones are signs of the
in-breaking Reign or Kingdom of God.
This mission of reconciliation comes to fruition in the person and life of Jesus
Christ, and extends throughout time and space by the work of the Holy Spirit
through the church‘s ministry and vocation in the world.
Trinitarian Facets of Missional Vision
The Social Trinitarian Model
God‘s essence as three divine Persons in union as one infinite God is impossible
for created beings to understand. Like the prisoners in Plato‘s cave analogy who have an
19
Some of these characteristics are based upon work by Craig Van Gelder, ―Rethinking
Denominations and Denominationalism in Light of a Missional Ecclesiology,‖ Word & World 25, no. 1
(2005): 30.
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incomplete perception of reality because their entire understanding of it is formed by
watching shadows on a cave wall, we as finite and created beings cannot even begin to
perceive or understand the infinite reality of God. This means that any attempt to
understand, model, symbolize, or describe God will fall woefully short even if it is
accurate. Nonetheless, it is important to try to understand and describe the One in whose
image we are made, because in doing so, we can learn and understand more about the
human race.
With this in mind, even though the social model of trinitarian theology is
incomplete in describing the fullness of the triune God, it is nonetheless the first and
foundational component of missional vision. Some trinitarian theologies consider the
Trinity starting from a position of the oneness or unity of God, and ask, how can this one
God exist in three persons? Such theologies often focus on the essence and authority of
God. They can also border on modalism, as they focus somewhat on the essence and
God-ness of each person of the Trinity at the expense of the differentiation and
relationality of the three Persons. The social model, on the other hand, begins by
considering the three Persons of God, asking, how can these three persons exist as one
God? The social model emphasizes the unity of the Trinity through the relationality and
mutual indwelling of the three Persons with one another. This model is more helpful as a
foundation for the relational emphasis of vision within the missional church movement.
More specifically, the social trinitarian model recognizes God as ―the one divine
Being who eternally exists as three distinct centers of consciousness, equal in nature,
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genuinely personal in relationships, and each mutually indwelling the other.‖20
Thus, the
three persons (hypostases) of the Trinity are distinct and bounded, yet they unite as one
both in essence (ousia) and in perichoretic, interpenetrating, and mutually indwelling
relationships.
This concept of perichoresis is essential to understanding the unity of the three
persons of the Trinity. Relationships that are mutually loving, giving, sacrificing,
reciprocal, equal, and inter-dwelling have potential to be perichoretic. One example of
perichoresis is that of a village, wherein the inhabitants take to the streets daily at a set
time to circulate around the neighborhood, mutually listening and sharing, bearing one
another‘s burdens, and relating to one another.21
The depth of relationality, then, of the
three Persons of the Trinity is essential to understanding God, creation, and in particular,
humans created in the image of God. The unity of the three Persons of the Trinity exists,
in part, in their common, perichoretic bond as the three Persons of the Trinity who share
one divine will, essence, and common bond.
Perichoresis, therefore, contains an element of mutual accompaniment. In the
Trinity, no hypostasis or person is greater or lesser than the others are. Even when the
Father sends Jesus and/or the Holy Spirit, there is a sense of mutuality and
accompaniment in the sending. For example, even as the Father sends Jesus, the Father
remains with him. As Jesus says, ―The Father and I are one‖ (John 10:30).
Furthermore, the mutuality of these perichoretic relationships extends beyond the
triune Godhead. In the Garden of Eden in Genesis, Adam and Eve seemingly had a
20 J. Scott Horrell, ―Toward a Biblical Model of the Social Trinity: Avoiding Equivocation of
Nature and Order,‖ Journal of the Evangelical Theological Society 47, no. 3 (2004): 399.
21 I am grateful for this analogy from one of my professors, Dr. Gary Simpson.
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relationship with God marked by mutuality as they accompanied one another in the
garden. Yet sin marred that relationship and almost broke it. The relationship remained,
however, thanks to God‘s work to bring them back into perichoretic fellowship. After
disobeying God, Adam and Eve hid while God walked in the garden ―at the time of the
evening breeze,‖ looking for them and calling out, ―Where are you?‖ (Genesis 3:8-9).
This question echoes throughout Scripture and history as God constantly cares for
creation and redeems humanity from the dark power of sin, wooing and calling us back
into this deep and loving relationship.
This broken relationship between God and humanity persists throughout history
until the death and resurrection of Christ. When Christ dies, the perfect and perichoretic
relationships that the Son has with the Father and the Spirit are broken. Death, after all, is
the ultimate in separation and broken relationships. Nonetheless, when Christ rises from
the dead, the relationships between the Son and the Father, and the Son and the Spirit are
restored.
With a relationship of faith in Christ through the Holy Spirit, God extends that
restoration to redeem us from our brokenness and restore us to fellowship with God. In
the Incarnate Christ who is simultaneously fully God and fully human, God repairs this
broken relationship with humanity, and God restores a relationship of perichoresis and
mutual accompaniment. In the person of Christ, God kenotically22
humbles himself to
reach down, embrace our humanity, redeem us, bear our sin, and draw us up to restore
what was lost in Eden. In the person of Jesus Christ, humanity and divinity are
22
Cf. Philippians 2:7.
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hypostatically united, thereby restoring a relationship of mutual burden bearing and
ministry.23
On the cross, Jesus loves us and redeems us by taking our pain and brokenness
upon himself and defeating the powers of darkness and division. At Pentecost, the Holy
Spirit enters into a hypostatic union with the church that mirrors the Christological
hypostatic union of divinity and humanity.24
In other words, as Jesus bears our sin and
redeems us from it, and as the Holy Spirit unites believers to the resurrected Christ
through faith and baptism, God reconciles humanity with God and with one another. God
thereby heals our sinful brokenness.
In this way, the sending of the Son and the Spirit in mission25
is a natural
outgrowth of the mutual and perichoretic nature of the social Trinity. The missional
Trinity is a natural outpouring of the social Trinity as the Father sends the Son and the
Spirit to reach out to humanity in our sin and separation from God and one another. In
this, God redeems humanity from the brokenness of sin and reconciles us to God and to
one another. God restores the perichoretic unity that God created us to share with him.26
By extension, God gathers and unites the church with and one another by the Holy Spirit
through baptism and faith in Christ. God then sends the church, as the earthly Body of
Christ, to reach out in sacrificial love to connect with others in God‘s perichoretic
23
Cf. Matthew 11:28-29 and John 20:21.
24 This is why, for example, Paul can refer to the Church as the Body of Christ in such places as
1 Corinthians 12:27 and Ephesians 2:14.
25 The root word of mission is missio, the Latin word for ―sent.‖
26 Cf. 2 Corinthians 5:17-21.
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ministry of accompaniment, burden-bearing, redemption, and reconciliation. This belief
is a key aspect of true missional vision.
The Social Trinity in Missional Vision
In cultivating missional vision at Living Water, therefore, it is essential for the
congregation to understand the need for participating in the redemptive, missional, and
mutual perichoretic aspects of God‘s being. The congregation in relationship with God is
sent to join in God‘s work to free people from bondage to the dark powers of sin and to
share the freeing, reconciling Gospel. In this, God works to form and nurture faithful,
equal, free, loving, and mutual relationships with God and with one another.
In this way, Christian community can sacramentally be a living icon of the reality
of the social Trinity. As John Navone writes,
The Father who eternally pours himself out in selfless, self-giving love is seen in
the icon of the triune God, in the human self-giving love of his Son, pouring out
their Holy Spirit to draw all humankind together within the loving reciprocity of
the triune communion. The Son who eternally welcomes the selfless, self-giving
love/life of his Father is seen in the icon of those who welcome that same
love/life, the Holy Spirit of the triune communion recognized in the mutual love
of the disciples (John 13:35). The Holy Spirit of the Father and Son is ―seen‖ in
the self-giving and welcoming love that forms the body of Christ, the icon of the
triune communion.27
As people live both the perichoretic and missional aspects of the Trinity, they
embody the sacrificing, selfless love of Christ. This is the path to wholeness, peace with
justice, and a gracious society. This understanding was foundational both in the process
of cultivating missional vision and in the result. As a community works together to live
27
John J. Navone, Self-Giving and Sharing: the Trinity and Human Fulfillment (Collegeville:
Liturgical Press, 1989), 121.
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perichoretically and reach out to connect with others, God‘s mission is accomplished,
furthering the coming of the fullness of God‘s reign throughout creation.
Missio Dei and the Kingdom of God Aspects of Missional Vision
The Missio Dei in God’s Reign
According to the social model of the Trinity, God exists as three persons, Father,
Son, and Holy Spirit, in perichoretic and mutually interdwelling relationships. The Holy
Spirit and the Son are sent into the world in the missio Dei, which is Latin for the sending
of God. As a derivative of the word missio, the mission of the Church is the sentness of
the Church. The purpose of God‘s mission (sending) into the world is to care for creation,
redeem people ravaged by sin, and reconcile relationships between God and humanity.
The Father sends the Son and the Spirit into the world to free people from
darkness and restore relationships broken by sinful humanity. The Son and the Spirit are
working to restore humanity‘s relationships with God, which we have broken by relying
upon other gods or powers. God‘s mission also includes the healing of our relationships
with one another, where we have damaged our relationships by using and mistreating one
another for selfish or unloving ends. God sends the Son and the Spirit to heal this
brokenness and restore right relationships. Specifically, as Paul writes:
So if anyone is in Christ, there is a new creation: everything old has passed away;
see, everything has become new! All this is from God, who reconciled us to
himself through Christ, and has given us the ministry of reconciliation; that is, in
Christ God was reconciling the world to himself, not counting their trespasses
against them, and entrusting the message of reconciliation to us. So we are
ambassadors for Christ, since God is making his appeal through us; we entreat
you on behalf of Christ, be reconciled to God. For our sake he made him to be sin
who knew no sin, so that in him we might become the righteousness of God.
(2 Corinthians 5:17-21).
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The ―righteousness of God,‖ in this case, is a restoration of right relationships.
Understood in this way, righteousness is living in healthy and loving relationships with
God and with one another that are unmarred by the brokenness of sin. This caring,
redeeming, and reconciling mission of God, the missio Dei, thus includes restoring what
is broken in order to unite the church in the Holy Spirit as Christ‘s Body present in the
world. The missio Dei, by extension, includes the sending of the Church into the world as
the very presence of God working further to connect with people and with God. The
concept of missio Dei recognizes that God is already at work in the world, both inside
and outside of the church. 28
God sends the Church to participate with Christ in
proclaiming and experiencing the close proximity of God‘s kingdom. Put differently, as
the Church participates in communion with God through the Holy Spirit, God also sends
it—just as the Son and the Spirit, who are in perfect communion with God the Father, are
sent—to participate in the ministry of reconciliation that God is already doing in the
world. This is something that we do because this is who God is. ―God is a missionary
God.‖29
In carrying out the missio Dei, therefore, God directly assaults the powers and
principalities of darkness, sin and brokenness by taking them upon himself and defeating
them in the cross and resurrection of Jesus Christ. This is the Kingdom of God, or the
redemptive reign of God, entering into creation to overcome the dark powers and
principalities. God‘s reign is overcoming earthly powers of darkness, hopelessness,
28
Cf. Romans 1:19ff., where Paul argues that the divinity of the Creator is ―plain‖ to everyone by
observing creation.
29 David Jacobus Bosch, Transforming Mission: Paradigm Shifts in Theology of Mission,
American Society of Missiology Series 16 (Maryknoll: Orbis Books, 1991), 390.
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bondage to decay, and brokenness, even as it has not yet reached its ultimate fulfillment.
As the self-emptying power of God‘s reign enters into a world that is overwhelmed by
powers that seek to use strength to gain humanity‘s allegiance apart from God, struggle
and strife ensues. Even so, the once for all victory of Christ, who never succumbed to the
temptations of using power apart from God‘s will, has defeated these dark powers and
continues to bring the fullness of God‘s reign lovingly to all of creation. This is the
―redemptive reign of God‖ that, through Christ, cares for and brings ―back to right
relationship all that was lost in the fall,‖ and enters into all aspects of human and created
reality.30
This reign, or kingdom, is broad and defined, although not rigidly so. It is also not
a vague concept or an imagined utopia, but it clearly exists and has specific traits. God‘s
caring, redeeming, and reconciling reign includes, but is not limited to, the following
characteristics:31
1. It is Good News. It is God‘s work in the world to redeem humanity and to create,
restore and reconcile relationships broken by sin. God‘s reign comes, restoring
order to the chaos of lives and relationships broken by sin. In this, God calls
people to repent, to change, and to recognize the lordship of Jesus. More
specifically,
30
Van Gelder, The Ministry of the Missional Church: a Community Led by the Spirit, 110.
31 The list that follows is adapted from Mariasusai Dhavamony, The Kingdom of God and World
Religions, vol. 31, Documenta Missionalia (Roma: Editrice Pontificia Università Gregoriana, 2004), 12-30.
92
It is repeatedly insisted in the Gospels that the members of Christ‘s Kingdom are
those that ... have fed the hungry, clothed the naked, shown mercy to the prisoner
and outcast—who have, in short, done the works of Christ (Matt. 25:31-46).32
2. It is already breaking into history, yet its fulfillment is eschatological and
universal. During his ministry, Jesus went about healing people and freeing them
from unclean spirits, yet the fullness of God‘s saving reign will be realized when
Christ returns in the second coming.
3. God‘s reign, as described in the Sermon on the Mount, changes everything. For
example, murder in God‘s Kingdom is redefined as hatred from the heart, adultery
is redefined as lust, etc.33
4. The kingdom is centered in Christ, who is king of all. ―It is significant to note that
the Kingdom is promised to those who attach themselves to the person of Jesus
and that to be his disciple means to be in the Kingdom of God. (Mk. 10:17-31, Lk.
9:57-62).‖34
Christ‘s kingship is founded in his self-emptying incarnation, death
and resurrection. ―Christ‘s reign over the world is established through his victory
on the Cross over his enemies, over all powers that brought rebellion and disorder
in the world.‖35
Through the humble giving of himself, God in Christ restores
order to chaos under Jesus‘ authority and reign.
32
(sic). John Bright, The Kingdom of God, the Biblical Concept and Its Meaning for the Church
(Nashville: Abingdon-Cokesbury Press, 1953), 221.
33 Dhavamony, The Kingdom of God and World Religions, 31:16-17.
34 Ibid., 31:19.
35 Ibid., 31:20.
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5. God‘s reign is being actualized in and through the Spirit’s work in the Church, of
which Christ is King and head. 36
During Christ‘s earthly ministry, Jesus as God
in the flesh embodies the reconciling presence of God and humanity. Having
emptied himself37
to take on human form, God in Christ reaches out to call
disciples who grow in faith and their relationships with God, who then go out to
bear the good news that God‘s reconciling reign is near. After the crucifixion,
resurrection, and ascension of Christ, the Spirit comes and joins with the church
in a hypostatic union that embodies the union of God and humanity in Christ. In
this way, God is present in the baptized to accompany the church to mutually
proclaim and enter the kingdom of God.
The Missio Dei and the Reign of God in Missional Vision
Thus, bringing the fullness of the caring, redeeming, and reconciling reign of God
is the mission of Jesus Christ on earth, and the mission of the Holy Spirit in and through
the church. In cultivating missional vision, the congregation prayerfully asked questions
of God as to the call and purpose that God has for the individuals, the congregation and
for the community.
In listening to Scripture and in listening to the Spirit, God calls us to be Christ‘s
hands, bearing the caring, redeeming, and reconciling reign of God into our families,
church, and world. This reign, centered in Christ, is a call to embody the Kingdom
actively, as it is already breaking into our midst yet has not reached its fullness. This
36
Ibid., 31:23-24.
37 Cf. Philippians 2:5ff.
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work of bearing God‘s reconciling reign is the work of the Holy Spirit living in the lives
and working through the vocations of the people of God.
Aspects of the Holy Spirit in the Church, Working in the
Vocation of Believers with Missional Vision
Gifts of the Holy Spirit in the Vocation of Believers
The Holy Spirit, in the faithful, daily vocation and ministry of the Church, carries
forth the work of Christ in reconciling the world to God through faith. The Holy Spirit
incarnates the Word of God in the sacraments and in the proclamation, witness, and
service of the Church in the world.38
The Spirit works in the world incarnate in the
church, to carry the reconciling Word in a dance of gathering and sending. In gathering to
receive the incarnate Word in Holy Communion, the Spirit goes out in the people of God
to:
Go from worship gatherings to share communion with the sick and homebound,
to invite others to the next celebration of the Eucharist, to fill grocery bags in food
pantries, to advocate for legislation that will reduce the number of hungry people,
to refuse to cross picket lines where workers are striking to be able to feed their
families, etc.39
Thus, the Holy Spirit brings the caring, redeeming, and reconciling reign and
Word of God, incarnate in the ministry and daily vocation of the priesthood of believers.
This work is the vocation, derived from the Latin word vocatio—calling—of God‘s
people in daily activity. In their daily vocations, God‘s people labor with God and see the
caring, redeeming, and reconciling reign of God come to its fullness. As the Psalmist
38
John F. Hoffmeyer, ―The Missional Trinity,‖ Dialog 40, no. 2 (2001): 110-111.
39 Ibid., 110.
95
writes, ―Unless the Lord builds the house, those who build it labor in vain‖
(Psalm 127:1).
Members of the priesthood of believers are not alone in their efforts to answer
God‘s call in daily vocations to work with God in bearing the caring, redeeming, and
reconciling reign of God. The Spirit gifts all of God‘s people with charismata, or divine
gifts, through which God works in and through people to bless others. These gifts are
widely distributed throughout the people of God in a ―symmetrical and decentralized
distribution of power‖ that allows the church to more faithfully ―correspond to the
trinitarian communion.‖40
As members of the Church collaborate with one another and
with the world perichoretically, they experience the ―reciprocal and symmetrical‖41
charismata in a way that reflects the reality of the Trinity missionally for the good of all.
Through these charismata, or gifts, God works in the daily vocation of the priesthood of
believers to bring the caring, redeeming, and reconciling reign of God to its fullness.
This happens, for example, when Jesus asks Peter to allow him to teach from
Peter‘s boat (Luke 5:1-11). Jesus is teaching a large crowd beside a lake. When the crowd
becomes so large that it presses upon him, Jesus climbs into Peter‘s boat and pushes out
into the lake. After teaching for a while, Jesus then tells Peter to ―Put out into the deep
water and let down your nets for a catch‖ (Luke 5:4). Peter protests, because these
professional fishers have been working all night without catching any fish. Nonetheless,
Peter relents, and puts his nets down in the area Jesus indicates. Astonishingly, Peter
pulls in nets that are so full of fish that they are about to break. There are so many fish
40 Miroslav Volf, After Our Likeness: the Church as the Image of the Trinity, Sacra Doctrina
(Grand Rapids: William B. Eerdmans Pub. Co., 1998), 236.
41 Ibid.
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that when the fishers bring them into Peter‘s and another‘s boat, the two boats nearly
sink. Peter, along with coworkers James and John, fall at Jesus‘s feet and acknowledge
their sinfulness. Jesus then famously tells them, ―Do not be afraid; from now on you will
be catching people‖ (Luke 5:10).
As the priesthood of believers, God gifts and forms the church to embody and live
the caring, redeeming, and reconciling reign of God in daily life. Throughout the night,
Peter, James, and John were working at their occupation, occupying their time with trying
to catch fish and earn a living. Jesus comes along, and tells them to do exactly what they
have done all night and probably for years—let down their nets to catch some fish. The
only difference is that, in this case, Jesus says, ―Put out into the deep water and let down
your nets for a catch‖ (Luke 5:4). After casting his nets in the place that Jesus told him to,
Peter now catches an excessive number of fish. Now, the occupations of Peter, James,
and John become vocations, or callings.42
Their charismata, used in accordance with
Christ‘s calling, not only yield an incredible harvest of fish, but they also become the
foundation for their further life and new-found ministry as Jesus now calls them to ―be
catching people‖ (Luke 5:10).
In this way, by using charismata in the vocation of God‘s calling, God calls the
church to embody God‘s kingdom as servants. The Holy Spirit leads the church into the
world to connect with others, bearing the Good News of Jesus Christ.43
The vocational
42
A vocation is a holy calling, a living out of God‘s voice in one‘s life. The root word of vocation
is vocatio, which is Latin for ―a call‖ or ―summons.‖ The root of vocatio is voc-, or ―voice.‖ Random
House, Random House Webster’s Unabridged Dictionary, Second Edition, 2nd ed. (Random House
Reference, 2002), 2129.
43 Darrell L. Guder and Lois Barrett, eds., Missional Church: a Vision for the Sending of the
Church in North America, The Gospel and Our Culture Series (Grand Rapids: William B. Eerdmans Pub.
Co., 1998), 102-08.
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work of the missional church is for each person, baptized into the triune God, to listen
prayerfully, live faithfully, and embody boldly God‘s call in praxis, through the
charismata, or gifts, of the Holy Spirit.
Vocation and the Holy Spirit in Missional Vision
In cultivating missional vision at Living Water, it was important to cultivate a
healthy concept of the call and vocation of each person as a member of the priesthood of
believers. Current habits in Christian life, however, can serve as an impediment to doing
this. Traditionally, members of congregations attend church and act passively, being fed
with Scripture lessons, the pastor‘s sermons, and the sacraments. After years of
participating in church life in this way, many Christians are shaped to have a passive—or
perhaps, inactive—life of faith. Instead, the church needs to transform this monolog into
a dialog, where people learn to confront the earthly powers that are at work in their
vocations and daily lives. Setting the laity free to actively live and share their faith daily
would have the effect of unleashing God‘s caring, redeeming, and reconciling reign more
fully in the world.44
It is essential, therefore, for a vision cultivation process to include a strong
emphasis on helping folks to revise understandings of calling and ministry. During a
missional vision cultivation process, it is necessary to encourage participants in various
settings, formats, and groups to see ministry in what may be an unfamiliar light.
Laypersons are the front-line ministers of the Gospel. As Braaten points out,
44
Carl E. Braaten, The Apostolic Imperative: Nature and Aim of the Church’s Mission and
Ministry (Minneapolis: Augsburg Publishing House, 1985), 192.
98
Often, however, the laity gets the impression from their pastoral leaders that the
big battle is for bigger budgets, higher attendance, increased membership,
efficient kitchens and other status symbols. The modern tragedy of the church has
been the fallacy of a misplaced emphasis on itself, inevitably downgrading the
dignity of the secular ministries of laity in the world. 45
In cultivating missional vision, then, it was important to help folks to look at life
in the church from a new perspective. Instead of viewing the pastor as the chief
evangelist, the idea that ―Pastors are servants of the servants of God in the world‖ 46
was
a major component of and impetus for cultivating missional vision.
Cultivating Missional Vision
Within this community of a priesthood of believers enlivened and gifted by the
Holy Spirit to live the missio Dei of God‘s reign of reconciliation with the social Trinity,
God also calls leaders to specific ministries within the church and the world. Missional
leaders encourage conversation among God‘s people, as the Holy Spirit cogeneratively
brings forth shared vision for ministry.
Vision in Scripture
Peter and Paul
In the New Testament, Jesus renames Simon as Peter when Simon confesses
Jesus as Messiah.47
Jesus then goes on to communicate God‘s vision for the Messiah as
one of ―great suffering,‖ death, and then being raised.48
This does not match with Peter‘s
45
Ibid.
46 Ibid.
47 Cf. Matthew 16:16 and parallels.
48 Cf. Matthew 16:21 and parallels.
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vision for what being the Messiah means, so he takes Jesus aside and rebukes him. Jesus
then turns to Peter and famously says, ―Get behind me, Satan! You are a stumbling-block
to me; for you are setting your mind not on divine things but on human things‖ (Matthew
16:23). Peter does not have the fullness of vision, and when he acts upon his incomplete
vision, Jesus strongly repudiates him. Later, Peter meekly denies knowing Jesus, as
Christ is beaten and tried unjustly. Even after finding the empty tomb, Peter returns to
hide in a locked room with the other disciples. It is only after the resurrection, Jesus‘
post-resurrection appearances, and the pouring out of the Holy Spirit at Pentecost that
Peter seems to view reality with God‘s missional vision. Peter then reaches out to the
community and boldly proclaims the Gospel. Through this bold proclamation, God brings
people to faith, to Baptism, and to the Eucharistic fellowship.49
After the Holy Spirit
clarifies Peter‘s vision, he steps out and boldly witnesses to God‘s reconciling activity.
Before that, Peter lacks faith so that he both actively50
and passively51
opposes God‘s
work.
Similar things happen with Saul of Tarsus, who persecutes the church until Jesus
confronts him and gives him first blindness, then clarity of vision.52
At first, Paul sees
through the eyes of law and power, and he viciously and murderously works to safeguard
the traditional understanding of Judaism and the practice of the Pharisaic Law. It is only
after Christ encounters Saul and asks him why he is persecuting Christians that Saul‘s
49
Cf. Acts 2:14ff.
50 Cf. Matthew 16:22 and parallels.
51 Cf. Matthew 26:69ff. and parallels.
52 Cf. Acts 9.
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vision changes. In fact, Saul‘s lack of Godly vision becomes physically evident in his
temporary blindness. Saul, whose name God now changes to Paul, then begins to
perceive life with a vision that sees things through the prism of God‘s gracious love as
Jesus bears it with the humiliation and suffering of the cross. He also sees clearly that all
people—slave and free, male and female, Jew and Greek (Galatians 3:28)—are called
and invited to enter into God‘s kingdom by grace apart from circumcision and works of
law.
The Holy Spirit and the Body of Christ in God’s Reign
For Paul, people answer this call and invitation to enter into God‘s kingdom of
grace as, in baptism and through faith, people become members of the Body of Christ on
earth. As Paul begins to discuss the idea of the Body of Christ in his first letter to the
church at Corinth, Paul starts with a conversation about gifts of the Holy Spirit. Examples
of the Spirit shining in and working through the lives of people include charismata,
service,53
activities, utterances of wisdom and knowledge, faith, gifts of healing, working
of miracles, prophecy, discernment of spirits, various kinds of tongues, and
interpretations of tongues (1 Corinthians 12:4-10). In all of these activities shared among
the people of God, the Spirit activates and allots them as God chooses. Specifically, in
working through these various gifts, the one Holy Spirit unites the diverse group of
people as the one Body of Christ.
For just as the body is one and has many members, and all the members of the
body, though many, are one body, so it is with Christ. For in the one Spirit we
were all baptized into one body—Jews or Greeks, slaves or free—and we were all
53
diakoniw/n, or ―deacon‖ in English.
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made to drink of one Spirit. Indeed, the body does not consist of one member but
of many. (1 Corinthians 12:12-14)
The active, divine person of the Holy Spirit unifies the diverse people of God with
a variety of charismata into the one Body of Christ. According to Paul, God does not
necessarily unify the Body of Christ as a group with consensus of thinking and full
agreement. Instead, God the Holy Spirit works through the charismata of the people to
accomplish the missio Dei. The Holy Spirit unites the Body of Christ by virtue of the fact
that the Holy Spirit is working to accomplish the one missio Dei in and through the
charismata of the individual members of Christ‘s body.
In this, the Holy Spirit works in the people through the charismata in one shared
ministry of furthering the missio Dei. The Spirit works through the charismata of
individuals as they work in the world with shared vision. This work is missional only
because the Spirit gives the vision and the people work under the Spirit‘s leadership. It is
imperative that folks remember this caveat both during and after the vision cultivation
process. Vision will unite the people of God in one shared ministry only insofar as it
comes from and is the work of the Holy Spirit.54
This caveat is something that stands over against individuals who would seek to
manipulate the process or hijack aspects of the vision description to accomplish a
54
In practicing missional principles by seeking to deepen faith and connect with Christ, the
researcher walked a prayer labyrinth for the first time. During that time of prayer and discernment, God
revealed an understanding that there is a limit to what we can do to cultivate missional vision. There comes
a point when one just puts it out there in prayer, then lets go to release control and let God bring people into
God‘s caring, redeeming, and reconciling reign. At one point during the research, the congregation council
created a plan to invite congregants to go out into the neighborhoods nearby to knock on doors and visit
people. In preparing for worship that morning, the researcher in prayer used an image of this invitation
being a set of bones that council had set before the congregation in the hope that God and the congregants
would put flesh on the bones. That night, 28 people participated, by far exceeding everyone‘s expectations.
Recognizing the need and leaving room for the Spirit to work is essential in the ministry and work of the
missional church.
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personal project or desire, or to increase personal power. As previously discussed, the
Holy Spirit worked to cultivate missional vision wherein Gentiles would not have to
submit to circumcision as recorded in Acts 10-15. As Paul and Barnabas preached the
Gospel throughout lands that were predominantly Gentile, people advocating
circumcision tried to subvert the new missional vision that the Holy Spirit was bringing
into the wider Christian community. They did this by secretly circulating throughout the
crowds as they sought to increase support for circumcision. This was in direct opposition
to the preaching of Paul and Barnabas, and ultimately, it opposed the work of the Holy
Spirit. Because of this, the efforts of those supporting circumcision failed.
It was important, then, to strive to keep Scripture study and prayer as key aspects
of the vision cultivation process. It was also important to the process to include the widest
number of members of the Body of Christ as possible. Again, the hope was that
maximizing member participation brought the greatest number of charismata from the
broad and diverse Body into the cogenerative discernment process. This has the greatest
potential for the congregation to continue to hear the voice of the Holy Spirit, who
personally unites the Body and draws it into the work of mutually bearing burdens,
connecting with Christ, and sharing God‘s love.
As members of Christ‘s Body listen to the voice of the Holy Spirit and respond in
faith, the community can begin to experience a decrease in human control, and an
increase of God‘s reign breaking into the midst of the community and beyond. There are
times when individuals willingly leave comfort zones of personal control to experience
God‘s reign more fully. At other times, life‘s circumstances bring persons and
communities into the wilderness. Even though these wilderness times can be
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disconcerting and fearful, God nonetheless can use these experiences to connect people to
Christ and to one another. As persons and communities embrace and enter into these
wilderness experiences, they can bear one another‘s burdens mutually with God. In these
experiences, the community might experience God at work to bring them to a deeper and
even life-changing experience of community in what some refer to as liminality that
brings communitas.
Theology of Cultivating Missional Vision
Moving Beyond Community to Communitas
When Hurricane Katrina hit the Gulf Coast in 2005, it stripped away the veneer of
control that modern society imposes upon the environment.55
Without electricity, air
conditioners and refrigerators were inoperative. Due to hurricane damage, flooding, and
subsequent molding conditions, previously comfortable homes of various prices and ages
were either destroyed or uninhabitable. The hurricane not only took away almost all
human ability to control the environment and provide shelter, but it also stripped away
categories of race, socioeconomic status, level of education, etc. As one Biloxi inner-city
resident put it, ―We came here on different ships, but now we‘re all in the same boat.‖
In the response to Hurricane Katrina, local residents, nearby residents, and people
from far away worked together to restore order and bring healing to people harmed
emotionally and physically by the widespread destruction. Residents of the Gulf Coast
were jarred out of comfort zones and came together to regroup, recover, and rebuild.
People from across the country willingly left comfort zones to converge on the Gulf
55 The researcher went to the Gulf Coast six weeks after Katrina hit to assist in the recovery, and is
writing from personal experience.
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Coast to bear the burdens mutually of those whose lives the storm had so radically
altered. In the midst of social chaos, people discovered that God worked to comfort, heal,
provide, and bring restoration out of the midst of destruction in ways that were
inconceivable and even miraculous. In fact, people on the Gulf experienced these
miracles of God‘s reign breaking into their midst with such regularity that the miraculous
almost became mundane. The Holy Spirit bound workers from across the country, along
with local residents, together with a comradery of shared experience and work that many
found to be deeply moving and life changing.
In leaving the comfort zone of modern society, Gulf Coast residents and others
who came to help with the recovery entered into experiences of liminality. Based upon
the Latin word limen, or threshold, liminal experiences allow persons to step out of the
mundane, everyday experiences of life to enter a transitional or chaotic environment.
Over the years, researchers have found that when individuals enter a liminal experience,
they will often build connections and bonds in an effort to overcome adversity and
survive. This experience can create relationships of comradery with a depth that is
unlikely in casual or mundane encounters. This depth of relationality, reliance, and
mutuality among persons experiencing liminality is communitas. Clearly, Hurricane
Katrina was a liminal event that God used to form deep relationships in the midst of the
shared risk and trust. In this, God worked to create a deep, mutual, and perichoretic
communitas.56
56
Based upon reflection from reading Hirsch, The Forgotten Ways: Reactivating the Missional
Church, 220ff.
105
As members of a community move beyond safety, security, comfort, and
convenience, they can experience liminality that moves them beyond themselves and
controlled environments to experience God‘s provision in the wilderness through which
God can create communitas. Missional leaders work to inspire others to move beyond the
limits of comfort zones in order to engage in shared liminal experiences. In doing this,
the community trusts God to work, shape, and form deeper and stronger cogenerative
relationships of mutual burden bearing. Through shared liminal experiences, God can
work to shape life-changing relationships in communitas experiences.
Missional, Cogenerative Leadership
Missional leaders, then, work within community to discover opportunities for and
enter into shared liminal experiences. Patterned after the example of Jesus, who
kenotically emptied himself to join humanity and bring people into God‘s kingdom
perichoretically and mutually, missional leadership cogeneratively collaborates with
others to recognize and enter into God‘s caring, redeeming, and reconciling reign.
Missional leaders also identify and nurture spiritual growth in others, who work within
the community to encourage the further cultivation of missional vision.
This mutual and cogenerative aspect is a key component of missional leadership.
It is important to foster an understanding and a desire among congregants to leave control
and comfort zones to enter God‘s control zone willingly through liminal experiences that
move them beyond themselves. Again, the leader does this with the congregants,
nurturing ever more leaders, as God forms communitas, and as the community together
discusses and grows from these experiences.
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This happened with Jesus and his followers when he sent the seventy workers out
in pairs to the towns of Samaria in Luke 10. Jesus has just ―set his face to go to
Jerusalem‖ (Luke 9:51). He is purposefully and unswervingly now on a path to give
himself up to be crucified and to rise again from the dead. As he begins this journey,
Jesus ―appointed seventy others and sent them on ahead of him in pairs to every town and
place where he himself intended to go‖ (Luke 10:1). He gave them basic instructions,
telling them to focus on their purpose, to rely upon God‘s provision in and through the
mutual sharing of those whom they visit, and to be prepared for hard times. If those they
visit receive them, then they can enjoy the mutual hospitality and ―cure the sick who are
there‖ (Luke 10:9). If the people reject them, then they are to move on to somewhere
else. In all cases, however, they are to enter the town, proclaiming the same thing; ―The
kingdom of God has come near to you‖ (Luke 10:9, 11).
Put differently, Jesus trains the pairs of missional leaders and sends them out to
the places of liminality where he will be going to on his path to the Passion in Jerusalem.
These appointed missional leaders are in a mutual ministry—with one another and with
Jesus—of setting people free from sickness and unclean spirits, as they invite others to
recognize and experience God‘s caring, redeeming and reconciling reign. They are
accompanying Jesus in his ministry mutually on his path to Jerusalem.
This is borne out more fully as they return joyfully sharing the amazing things
they have seen and experienced, saying, ―Lord, in your name even the demons submit to
us!‖ (Luke 10:17). While cautioning them not to be exuberant about their power, but
instead to rejoice that their ―names are written in heaven‖ (Luke 10:20), Jesus
nonetheless shares their excitement. In an unparalleled expression of sharing this joy,
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Jesus, ―rejoiced in the Holy Spirit and said, ‗I thank you, Father, Lord of heaven and
earth‘‖ (Luke 10:21).57
In this extended conversation and prayer, Jesus rejoices with God
and the disciples in their shared ministry, apparently rejoicing at the fact that they have
experienced the wonder of life and communitas in God‘s caring, redeeming, and
reconciling reign.
As Jesus and the disciples, together, announce the coming of God‘s reign, they
mutually accompany one another in embodying and sharing that reign as they connect
with others to experience God‘s kingdom in their midst. As a practical consideration, any
process that cultivates missional vision must use a similar approach.
A Practical Vision Cultivation Process
In Living Lutheran, Renewing Your Congregation, along with his contribution to
The Missional Church & Leadership Formation, Dave Daubert articulates a process and
concept for cultivating missional vision in a congregation. This was the basic approach in
this research. The concern is that conventional wisdom and much of current practice
conceives of vision as something that is in the future. From this perspective, vision is
something that a gifted leader discerns, communicates to the followers, and motivates
them to attain. In cultivating vision, however, it is more helpful to understand vision as a
perspective or way of looking at current reality, that the community lives and works
together with, to enter into God‘s future.58
57
Emphasis added.
58 Daubert, Living Lutheran: Renewing Your Congregation. Also, Daubert, ―Vision Discerning vs.
Vision Casting: How Shared Vision Can Raise Up Communities of Leaders Rather Than Mere Leaders of
Communities.‖
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This is a change in understanding vision as a future reality—that may or may not
be attainable—to one that sees vision as guiding present vocations that we can begin
work to achieve today. The latter understanding is important to the concept of cultivating
missional vision.
Vision is something that we share together in making decisions today, as opposed
to being a picture of a future reality that we are trying to bring to fruition. This shift of
understanding can affect a congregation‘s actions in ministry profoundly and quickly. For
example, instead of articulating a future vision of eradicating hunger in ten years, one
could articulate a goal of working together to eradicate hunger today. In putting the goal
ten years into the future, one would be saying that it is acceptable for a group of people to
remain hungry for the intervening 9½ years. Instead, it is better to work on seeing God‘s
kingdom fully realized—in this case, by actively helping hungry people have food to
eat—immediately.59
To do the work of communally discerning and articulating a shared vision of
ministry, vision contains specific elements. Put differently,
Vision = God’s Purpose + Guiding Principles + Time60
In this process, the congregation prayerfully and communally, with conversation
and Scripture study, discerned and articulated God’s purpose for the congregation, both
within itself and in the wider community. This purpose is a portion of the missio Dei, and
is an articulation of God‘s call in communal and individual vocation. The guiding
principles then are the specific action phrases that describe the communal life together.
59 This example comes from Dave Daubert by means of the researcher‘s personal conversation
with him.
60 Daubert, Living Lutheran: Renewing Your Congregation, 46. Emphasis added.
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Examples of times might include ―Together we confess Jesus as Lord‖ and ―God
welcomes all in our midst.‖ As the community lives together and wrestles with questions
and ministry over time, God‘s vision grows and the future vision becomes clearer to the
individuals and the community as they collectively enter into it.61
Considerations for Christian Community in Cultivating Missional Vision
In order for the process of cultivating missional vision to have its full and desired
effect, the process itself must cultivate a missional community by design. A missional
community comes together in prayer, examining the world and community with the
discerned vision, to understand and embrace the aspect of the missio Dei that God is
specifically calling them to address. Then, the congregants support one another
perichoretically in living out God‘s call.
Jesus’ Participation in Small and Large Groups
In looking at Scripture, it seems that Jesus used a number of techniques to
embody and accomplish the missio Dei. He confronted the ruling authorities directly, he
suffered unjust punishment and death, and he gathered a small band of followers around
himself. This last item—working with small, defined groups—is most helpful in
developing structures for communally discerning God‘s call.
There were distinct differences in how Jesus interacted with larger groups and
with smaller groups. Jesus‘ interaction with larger groups tended to be either didactic or
confrontational. With smaller groups, Jesus tended to let his guard down a bit more, to be
more personal, and to reach out caringly.
61
Ibid., 46-47. Emphasis added.
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An example of Jesus working with a small group is in the number of people he
had close relationships with during the time of his ministry. Jesus called twelve people to
follow him as disciples and to prepare for sending as apostles. Jesus also travelled with a
larger number of disciples who followed him in his ministry. Together, Jesus developed
personal, longer-term relationships, to varying degrees, with the apostles and disciples.
Jesus had a tendency to speak to the large groups in parables that could be
difficult to understand, which he would later unpack and explain privately to the
disciples. For example, after speaking in parables to a ―very large crowd‖ (Mark 4:1),
Scripture reports,
When Jesus was alone, those who were around him along with the twelve asked
him about the parables. And he said to them, ―To you has been given the secret of
the kingdom of God, but for those outside, everything comes in parables; in order
that ‗they may indeed look, but not perceive, and may indeed listen, but not
understand; so that they may not turn again and be forgiven.‖ (Mark 4:10-12)
Again, as Jesus accompanied the disciples mutually in shared ministry, God‘s
purposes were clearer to them. Life in the small group gave the disciples a privileged
position to understand more clearly the teachings that Jesus gave to the larger group
without explanation.
At a pivotal moment, Jesus questioned the disciples and worked with them to
hone their understanding of God‘s vision. He did this in comparison to more public and
widely held beliefs. The small-group dynamic helped the disciples to recognize and
understand Jesus for who he is.
Now when Jesus came into the district of Caesarea Philippi, he asked his
disciples, ―Who do people say that the Son of Man is?‖ And they said, ―Some say
John the Baptist, but others Elijah, and still others Jeremiah or one of the
prophets.‖ He said to them, ―But who do you say that I am?‖ Simon Peter
answered, ―You are the Messiah, the Son of the living God.‖ (Matthew 16:13-16)
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Repeatedly, when Jesus wants to do momentous things, he chooses the small
group of the disciples, or even a subgroup thereof, to do his work. Jesus trains 70-72
disciples to travel to various villages to cast out unclean spirits, heal people, and to
proclaim the Good News that the Kingdom of God is near.62
Jesus reserves the Last
Supper and the ensuing conversation exclusively for the disciples.
Even more so, Jesus reserves the pinnacle moments for the very few people
closest to him. Repeatedly, Jesus singles out Peter, James, and John, a subgroup of the
apostles, to join him for significant events. Such events include the healing of Jairus‘
daughter,63
the Transfiguration,64
and Jesus‘ time of prayer in the Garden of Gethsemane
on the night of his betrayal (Mark 14:33).
There are still other examples. The sisters Mary and Martha also play significant
roles of a small sub-group with a personal relationship with Jesus in the Gospel of John.
When Jesus encounters Zacchaeus and his newfound faith, he calls him to come down
from his tree so Jesus can have dinner with Zacchaeus at his home for more personal,
intimate conversation. Finally, Mary Magdalene alone is the first person to see the risen
Jesus in John 20. Clearly, relationships with those closest to him are important to Jesus.
Through these relationships, both Jesus and others influence, and at times, even shape
one another, perichoretically.
The way that Jesus interacts with the smaller group is quite different from the way
Jesus interacts with larger groups. In all four Gospel accounts, Jesus provides food for
62
Cf. Luke 10, etc.
63 Cf. Mark 5 and parallels.
64 Cf. Mark 9:2ff. and parallels.
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5,000 people with five loaves of bread and two fish. In this, Jesus himself does not feed
the five thousand people. Instead, in an example of vocation lived in the priesthood of
believers, the disciples figure prominently in the feeding, as Jesus tells the disciples to
interact directly with the crowd. This happens, for example, when Jesus tells them, ―You
give them something to eat‖ (Mark 6:37). On the other hand, in the Sermon on the
Mount65
and the Sermon on the Plain,66
Jesus clearly interacts with a large group by
teaching the crowd, but not in relating to them dialogically on the personal level with
which he interacts with the disciples.
Relationship Building through Small Groups
With this in mind, it is clear that small group interaction was an important
component of cultivating missional vision at Living Water. It was an influential part of
discerning God‘s call. It was vitally important in creating and deepening relationships
with the goal of forming a stronger, more perichoretic community of faith.
The formation and nurturing of small groups, called Damascus Travelers, helped
cultivate a network that would continue in the tradition of the apostles and disciples. It
provided a place for God‘s Spirit to work in personal relationships and conversations to
tickle the missional imagination of the participants. The Damascus Travelers groups were
lay-led with an egalitarian and perichoretic design. The relationships that people formed
in the Damascus Travelers groups helped further the goal of grass-roots vision cultivation
by giving relational structures for conversation and discernment. They helped to build
65
Matthew 5ff.
66 Luke 6:17ff.
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and strengthen relationships among members, in the hope that members‘ relationships
with the wider congregation and community would be stronger as well.
Summary
It is important for leaders to work to cultivate missional vision in the
congregations they serve. This requires discipline for the leader to keep from trying to
shape and cast the vision for an ultimate or preferred destination. Instead, the leader tries
to help congregants discern God‘s vision for life. This inherently trusts that the Holy
Spirit works in the vocations and lives of members, through a vision for perceiving life
and making decisions, in furthering the caring, redeeming, and reconciling reign of God.
The PAR research methodology and intervention sought to accomplish this and reflect
upon its impact.
Huntley
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CHAPTER 4
RESEARCH METHODOLOGY AND DESIGN
The principle of emergence was developed to explain the ways organisms develop
and adapt in differing environments. Contrary to popular notions that they
develop through some top-down, predetermined, well-planned strategy,
emergence theory shows that complex systems develop from the bottom up.
Relatively simple clusters of cells, or groups of individuals, who individually
don’t know how to address a complex challenge, when they come together will
form, out of relatively simple interactions, an organizational culture of a higher
complexity that can address these challenges. In other words the answers to the
challenges faced by organisms and organizations in changing environments tend
to emerge from the bottom up rather than get planned before hand from the top
down. This is why we describe missional leadership as the cultivation of
environments within which the missional imagination of the people of God might
emerge.1
Recognizing the importance, then, of cogeneratively cultivating shared missional
vision as Jesus did with the disciples and as the Holy Spirit did in the midst of the early
Christian community, the researcher sought to cultivate shared missional vision in a
newly developed congregation. The method of Participatory Action Research (PAR)
seemed to be best suited for achieving this goal and for assessing the impact of doing so.
The purpose of the PAR at Living Water Lutheran Church was to unleash the
missional imagination of the congregants as they discerned, defined, and committed to
living in ways formed by the cultivated vision. This research was conducted in the hopes
that the ultimate result would include the people of Living Water reaching out to others in
the congregation and in the wider community to share the love of Christ and to
1 Hirsch, The Forgotten Ways: Reactivating the Missional Church, 263.
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participate in God‘s work to redeem and reconcile everyone to God and to one another.
This work was done with a PAR process and intervention that sought to cultivate
missional vision in the congregation of Living Water. The research utilized the following
methodology in seeking to accomplish this in the midst of the people of Living Water
Lutheran Church.
Overview of Research Methodology
The research for this thesis utilized Participatory Action Research2 in seeking to
answer the research question. The researcher is a part of Living Water Lutheran Church
as a called pastor. The research relied primarily upon concurrent (quantitative-qualitative)
research methods to gather data to analyze in answering the research question. The
researcher‘s perceptions, notes, insights, and experiences also served as an informal
qualitative source. The overall structure of the research was as follows:
1. Formulate research question and plan.
2. Gain approval to conduct research for thesis, perform and document background
information, then refine the research plan based upon feedback.
3. Obtain a baseline evaluation of the congregation‘s understanding of shared vision
utilizing a concurrent quantitative—qualitative method. The research design
utilized quantitative methods to yield general, broad information about missional
faith practices. This quantitative data also provided insights into congregational
perspectives that the researcher utilized in planning and implementing the
2 Cf. Greenwood and Levin, Introduction to Action Research: Social Research for Social Change.
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intervention. The researcher gathered data describing congregation practices and
perspectives using qualitative methods (yielding depth of information).
4. Implement the proposed PAR intervention by encouraging growth of relationships
by forming Damascus Travelers small groups and by working with the
congregation and congregational leaders to cultivate missional vision.
5. Obtain an endline evaluation of the impact of cultivating missional vision in the
lives of congregants and how they relate with the community after the
intervention. Concurrent quantitative and qualitative methods yielded data for
endline analysis.
6. Compare baseline and endline information and data to draw conclusions to
answer the research question.
7. Document research observations and conclusions. Submit final thesis for defense
and approval.
Specific Research Methodologies
Participatory Action Research
The primary research question for this thesis is, ―How does cultivating shared
missional vision in a newly developed congregation impact the lives of congregants and
how they relate to others in the community?‖ In answering the research question, a form
of PAR served as the primary research method.
In sociology, Action Research (AR) is a type of research that uses some kind of
iterative cycle that includes planning, action, and evaluation, then returns to planning, and
so forth, to learn how a group or organization reacts to various actions. Normally, there
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are several iterations of this process; however, due to time constraints, the research for
this thesis utilized one iteration of this process.
Participatory Action Research (PAR), utilizes this AR concept, except the
researcher conducts the research as a part of the organization. With PAR, the researcher
implements some kind of action in hopes that the action will bring a favorable change or
improvement to the organization.3 The learning comes as the researcher and the
participants in the organization reflect upon the effect of the intervention. PAR was the
best method for this research, because it fits with the desire to have a process that
cultivates missional vision in a bottom-up, egalitarian fashion with the people of Living
Water and the researcher. PAR works for this application, because:
Participatory action research is not just research … nor is it simply an exotic
variant of consultation. Instead, it aims to be active co-research, by and for those
to be helped. Nor can it be used by one group of people to get another group of
people to do what is thought best for them-whether that is to implement a central
policy or an organisational or service change. Instead it tries to be a genuinely
democratic or non-coercive process whereby those to be helped, determine the
purposes and outcomes of their own inquiry. 4
In conducting this PAR, then, the change resulting from the intervention was a
deeper understanding of missional faith practices that members of the congregation
understand and live in daily life. As people find transformation in their perspectives, the
intended result would be that they would live with a deeper understanding and personal
practice of faith in a number of areas. This would also result in a more missional
approach to vocation and praxis outside of the congregation, which would impact
3 Cf. Yoland Wadsworth, ―What is Participatory Action Research,‖ Action Research International,
November 1998, http://www.scu.edu.au/schools/gcm/ar/ari/p-ywadsworth98.html, (accessed March 4,
2010).
4 Ibid.
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members‘ relationships with persons in the community that congregants interact with on
a daily basis.
The intervention was the cultivation of missional vision for life, ministry, and
decision-making in the congregation. The response of the congregation and changes in
perspectives and practices due to the intervention in the congregation is the topic of this
research.
In conducting the research, the primary data-gathering technique was a concurrent
quantitative-qualitative method. A quantitative method provided data from a
comparatively broader sample that was used to gain perspectives regarding congregants‘
faith practices. Qualitative interview methods provided a deeper understanding of the
congregation‘s perception and embodiment of a missional vision. These methods, with
identical questionnaires and interview participants,5 yielded baseline and endline data.
The PAR method allowed for research based upon intervention with the
researcher as part of the system studied. The researcher analyzed the data using
quantitative and qualitative techniques, as appropriate, allowing for the determination of
the change that occurred in the congregation‘s perspectives and practices.
Other, unforeseen outside and inside influences can affect the outcome. These
outside influences included recent decisions by the Living Water‘s adjudicatory body, the
impact of the troubled economy, and the changes to the relationship between the
congregation and the mission developer.
5 The congregation council was interviewed in a group interview, and the two individuals were
chosen randomly according to age demographics from the congregation. The same two individuals were
interviewed for the baseline and endline data. The makeup of the council changed, over the year, however,
so although the same political entity was interviewed there were a few different people in the group at
baseline and endline interviews.
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The researcher reflected upon results in light of theoretical foundations, as well as
through biblical and theological reflection. Prayer for discernment and leading by the
Holy Spirit were an important part of the research and reflection. Conclusions drawn
provided insights into possibilities for further research. Even though the scope of this
thesis was to use one iteration of the PAR action-reflection model, the possibility for
future research and/or reflection in ministry was raised for others, for the researcher and
for the congregation.
Intervention
The intervention occurred through a number of inputs into the congregation.
These inputs included the following:
1. Working with the congregation council to help congregation lay leaders to
understand the vision cultivation process. They were important in fostering
healthy dialog, participation, and communication at congregational events, and in
distilling the data to create guiding principles and purpose statements.
2. Working with the congregation council to help them implement and embody the
cultivated vision in commission meetings and in daily interactions. This included
helping them to understand, live, and practice the congregation‘s vision in daily
life, that they might encourage and help others to do so as well.
3. Creating and fostering small groups, called Damascus Travelers. These groups
formed after the baseline and before the congregational retreat. Congregants were
invited to form small groups for the purpose of building relationships,
encouraging mutual prayer, mutual accountability, and Scripture study. They were
an attempt to decentralize leadership in the vision cultivation process and to
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encourage and provide a means for dialog in the vision cultivation process.
Participants in the Damascus Travelers were also encouraged to find and embrace
vocational ministry in praxis.
4. A congregational retreat followed by four weekly evening meetings. This is the
centerpiece of the vision cultivation process. The process relies heavily upon the
concepts contained in Dave Daubert‘s Living Lutheran book and the schedule was
similar to the ―Sample Event‖ in appendix F.6 The four weekly meetings
contained a similar agenda to the one for the congregational retreat. This effort
attempted to invite participation from congregants beyond those who participated
in the retreat. The congregational retreat agenda structure followed this outline:
a. The first session focused on discussion of missional church theology and
foundations with devotions.
b. The next session included study with individual groups studying and
discussing one each of Acts 2, 10 and 16. Participants then shared
perspectives with the larger group.
c. Later in the morning, individuals prayerfully described their understanding of
God‘s purpose for Living Water. Participants discussed these individual
responses in small groups, with specific descriptions of groups‘ understanding
of what a purpose statement should be for the congregation. Then, they shared
these perspectives with the larger group.
d. After lunch, groups reviewed the chapters of Acts they had studied earlier.
Then, individuals in small groups sorted through and described values and
6 Daubert, Living Lutheran: Renewing Your Congregation, 91-95.
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principles the persons in these passages used in making decisions. The groups
sorted through these principles to discuss the most important ones. Then, they
shared these perspectives with the larger group.
e. Later in the afternoon, small groups met to consider these principles and to
state what values should be the guiding principles for the congregation as a
whole. Then, they shared these perspectives with the larger group.
f. The retreat ended with Eucharist and prayers for safe travel for participants as
they returned home.
g. After the congregational retreat, several of the participants met at a local
establishment to reflect on the experience and process the discussion
informally. This after-event meeting was very instrumental in fostering
cogenerative cultivation of missional vision.
h. Results of the conversations were written on newsprint and hung in the
Narthex with space inviting congregants who did not attend the retreat to add
written comments in the vision cultivation process as well.
i. After the retreat, participants had an opportunity to speak during worship to
share observations and insights gained at the retreat. The intent of this was to
invite as many congregants as possible to participate in the vision cultivation
process.
5. Damascus Travelers met biweekly, studying suggested readings related to
missional church concepts. In addition, the groups were encouraged to read the
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lectionary readings from the Evangelical Lutheran Worship (ELW)7 hymnal daily.
Damascus Travelers were encouraged to converse and pray mutually for one
another both together and privately. The groups were also encouraged to grow
(and if clusters become large enough, to divide) through invitation and reaching
out to others. The groups were encouraged to reach out and minister together and
support one another‘s vocational ministry outside and inside of the congregation.
6. Midway through the intervention, at a council meeting, council members spent
extensive time during devotions to discuss the concepts of liminality and
communitas. The Holy Spirit provided a spark, and the council decided to move
the entire congregation into a liminal situation for the sake of being more
missional by shifting from two worship services at 8:15 and 10:45 a.m. to one
service at 9:30 a.m. They did this specifically to move the congregation out of
their comfort zone into liminality, while bringing everyone together to increase
interconnectedness. As the conversation continued, ideas for ways to be better
neighbors to those nearby came out of cogenerative, civil, and honest deliberation.
The council members specifically recognized these as ―baby steps‖ even as they
committed to helping the congregation stay out of their comfort zone to connect
with others and grow faith.
7. At the council meeting following the four meetings, congregation leaders sifted
through the information from the retreat and from subsequent congregational
7 Evangelical Lutheran Church in America, Evangelical Lutheran Worship, Pew ed. (Minneapolis:
Augsburg Fortress, 2006), 1147-48.
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feedback to form initial guiding principles and purpose statements. The council
communicated them to the congregation for discussion and review.
8. There was an open forum to encourage conversation for the congregation to
discuss the statements from council. Members were also encouraged to share
perspectives about the statements via email or written correspondence.
9. At the following meeting, the council revised the guiding principles and purpose
statements to incorporate the reflections from the congregation forum and
response.
10. A few weeks later, there was a congregational meeting to discuss and adopt the
guiding principles and purpose statement for the congregation.
11. Congregation council, commissions, and individual members were encouraged to
consider the guiding principles and purpose in making further plans and
decisions. Numerous congregants discussed the concept of Vision as something
that is lived into and of living with the guiding principles and purpose over time
in various forums throughout the process. They now seek to use the guiding
principles and purpose since their adoption. Congregants received instruction and
encouragement to live into the vision and to act and make decisions considering
the purpose statement and guiding principles.
12. Formal participation in Damascus Travelers concluded a few weeks prior to the
adoption of the guiding principles and purpose statement. The groups were
encouraged to continue to meet informally, but the formal program of the
Damascus Travelers ended. Depending upon the participation and enthusiasm
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level of the clusters, the Disciple Commission may continue to work with the
Damascus Travelers as a small-group ministry of the congregation.
After the completion of the vision cultivation process, the congregation had some
time to live with the guiding principles and purpose statement. During this time,
congregants had reminders of the new statements in various publications and forums.
Congregants had opportunities in informal groups and in Sunday School classes to
discuss the new vision. The statements were prominent in preaching during Sunday
worship. The time following the intervention gave congregants time to live with the
guiding principles and purpose statement in moving forward into God‘s vision for the
congregation‘s ministry. Members discussed ways to embody the purpose statement and
guiding principles and to move forward and continue to discern God‘s vision. This
provided opportunities for reflecting upon changes in personal perspectives and practice
as enunciated in the endline data collection.
Metrics for Observing Changes in Congregational Practices and Perspectives
Efforts in the PAR Intervention endeavored to shape a deeper understanding of
missional faith practices as members understand and embody them in daily life. As
people‘s perspectives experience transformation, the intended result was that they live
with a deeper understanding and personal practice of faith. The intent was that this would
also result in a more missional approach to vocation and praxis outside of the church,
which will impact relationships with persons that congregants interact with on a daily
basis.
The locus of activity for the PAR intervention was the cultivation and
understanding of missional vision for life and ministry in the lives of congregants. In
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analyzing the efficacy of the intervention in bringing about the desired change in
members‘ actions and perspectives, the researcher analyzed data in the following areas:
1. Personal faith practices and communal/vocational ministry. Data in this area
were gathered and assessed both in quantitative and in qualitative research data. A
quantitative questionnaire sought to gather data to compare congregants‘
perceptions of their practice in both personal practices and communal/vocational
ministry. This gave the researcher data about how much, in general, the activity of
congregants changed throughout the research. Qualitative questions also gathered
data that more specifically (and with greater depth) showed change in this aspect
of the members‘ actions and perspectives.
2. Understanding of the congregation’s shared vision. Through qualitative
questioning, data gathered and assessed helped to determine how well the vision
cultivation process led to an understanding of the congregation‘s shared vision for
decision-making and ministry activity.
3. Efficacy of how the congregation equips congregants for growth in personal faith
and communal/vocational ministry through the vision. Qualitative questions
examined how well the congregation puts the shared vision into action.
4. How congregation vision impacts personal/congregational faith practices.
Individuals answered questions about personal practices, while the congregation
council discussed questions about the congregational practices. The researcher
gathered further qualitative data to find specific ways that the cultivation and
determination of the congregation‘s shared vision impacted or influenced
congregants‘ personal faith practices.
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5. How congregation vision impacts communal/vocational ministry. Qualitative
inquiry sought to find specific ways that the cultivation of the congregation‘s
shared vision impacted or influenced how the congregants reached out to others in
answering God‘s call to mission, and how their relationships with others changed.
The first metric looks at a general concept of the individual‘s missional practices
both inside and outside of the congregation. The second and third metrics examine the
congregation‘s vision and how well congregants understand and embody the vision. The
last two metrics examine what difference the vision actually makes in the life of
congregants and their relationships with others in the wider community.
Quantitative Research Data Gathering
Faith Maturity Scale
The Faith Maturity Scale8 (FMS), administered via a Convenience Sample after
both Sunday worship services at the baseline and endline, gave a broad survey of
congregation attitudes and actions with respect to faith practices and missional activity.
The baseline sample also served to provide information for the researcher in designing
and implementing the PAR intervention. The researcher chose the FMS because of its
applicability to this research, and its broad multi-denominational support and use.
―Evidence supporting the validity of the FMS makes it quite suitable for research use.‖9
Thus, the FMS was not field tested due to its history of validity for research.
8 Peter L. Benson, Michael J. Donahue, and Joseph A. Erickson, ―The Faith Maturity Scale:
Conceptualization, Measurement, and Empirical Validation,‖ Research in the Social Scientific Study of
Religion 5 (1993): 171-174.
9 Ralph W. Hood and Peter C. Hill, Measures of Religiosity (Birmingham: Religious Education
Press, 1999), 172.
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The FMS questions focus on three important areas;10
views and faith practices
with respect to personal faith,11
views and faith practices with respect to the world,12
and
views and faith practices that integrate the two.13
With this in mind, congregants
completed a form of the actual FMS in its original and complete form, with the addition
of basic demographic questions (see appendix B). The researcher interpreted the results
as the authors of the study originally intended by means of an aggregate score. The
researcher also analyzed the results within clusters of (I)nward, (O)utward, and
(C)onnecting types of questions, and within various age groups. Baseline and endline
data comparisons used unpaired two-sample t-Test with unequal variances analysis to
determine what, if any, statistically significant change occurred. Participants had to sign
waivers in order to complete the FMS. They completed both the waivers and the surveys
via convenience samples on a Sunday after worship services at the beginning and end of
research.
Rationale for Breakdown of Survey Statements into Subgroups for Analysis
The FMS tool contains statements pertaining to various aspects of faith lived in
the lives of survey participants. While this can be helpful in determining faith maturity,
this research sought to identify changes in persons‘ faith specifically with respect to
personal beliefs and practices, and missional engagement in the world with others in daily
life. Although the FMS does not distinguish between personal or individual faith
10
See appendix B for a question by question breakdown of the three aspects that follow.
11 Inward-directed or personal faith views and practices.
12 Outward-directed, or faith views and practices that affect actions.
13 Connecting faith views and practices in the world; integrating faith and life.
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practices versus those that influence missional activity, it is the researcher‘s belief that
the survey results nonetheless yielded insights into personal beliefs and practices with
respect to public, vocational, and missional practices.
For the purpose of this particular analysis, the results of the FMS statements were
grouped into three categories. The intent of doing this was to allow for targeted analysis
of the responses with respect to categories of I, O, and C inner beliefs with outer
understandings. The questions, along with the designation of I, O, or C as assigned by the
researcher is located in appendix B. Criteria used to assign statements to the various
categories are as follows:
Inner (I) statements focus on personally held beliefs, private faith practices, or
issues related to stewardship of body, mind, or spirit. Respondents could hold these
personal beliefs or practice in such a way that they would not necessarily or specifically
affect the person‘s activity in the world. (Example: ―I know that Jesus Christ is the Son of
God who died on a cross and rose again‖). The thirteen statements on the FMS in this
category are 2, 7, 9, 10, 12, 15, 19, 20, 24, 26, 30, 32, and 34.
Outer (O) statements pertain specifically to the person‘s activity in the world, or
specifically focus on what one thinks are ideals for people to strive for in the world.
These are actions, as written, which do not specifically derive from beliefs. (Example: ―I
do things to help protect the environment‖). The ten statements on the FMS in this
category are 1, 4, 6, 8, 13, 16, 21, 22, 31, and 33.
Finally, Connecting faith and life in the world (C) statements describe action
based in personal beliefs. They may be actions that derive from beliefs, or they may be
beliefs that change due to action out in the world. To fit into this category, the statements
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must specifically assert that some belief directly impacts activity with others or in the
world. It may also describe how beliefs affect opinions about others or about God at work
in the world. (Example: ―My faith shapes how I think and act each and every day‖ On the
other hand, ―I speak out for equality for women and minorities‖ is an O because it does
not show how that action is based in or stems from a direct impact on personal beliefs.).
The fifteen statements on the FMS in this category are 3, 5, 11, 14, 17, 18, 23, 25, 27, 28,
29, 35, 36, 37, and 38.
Data Analysis
In all data analysis, the questions that were reverse scored (5, 10, 25, and 26) were
analyzed by reversing the numbers. Thus, for data analysis, responses coded as 1 were
analyzed as 7, responses coded 2 were analyzed as 6, etc. Reverse-scored results
described in this thesis are described in this fashion. To analyze the data, the researcher
created a database in Microsoft Access and entered the data in the database. The data
were then exported to Microsoft Excel, and the researcher wrote programs in Visual
Basic for Applications to format the data in Excel for analysis, to use the data analysis
tools in Excel, and to format the data for output and publication. The histograms came
from reports in Access. These graphs were exported from the Access reports and
formatted for publication.
Baseline and endline results from the FMS were analyzed using the unpaired
two-sample t-Test with unequal variances analysis technique (see appendix D). The first
table compares baseline and endline averages of responses to all 38 questions for all
respondents, for those aged 18-59, and for those aged 60+. The next three tables show the
results of analysis within the I, O and C categories for all ages, for 18-59, and for 60+.
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The last three t-Tests were performed to analyze data for each question with categories
for all ages, 18-59 and 60+. For all t-Test data, a P (T<=t) one-tail probability less than
.05 designates a statistically significant change from baseline to endline surveys. Results
in that column are highlighted to denote a value less than .05.
Data from the FMS were also analyzed, by individual question, to find the mean,
standard deviation, median, mode, kurtosis, and skew. These results were tabulated for
both baseline and endline responses for all ages, 18-59 and 60+. Finally, histograms
graphically showing the number of responses for each possible response (numbers 1-7
possible) for each question were generated. Three different sets of histograms show
baseline and endline data for all ages, 18-59 and 60+.
Qualitative Research Data Gathering
Qualitative Interviews
In using PAR to answer the research question, the researcher also analyzed
qualitative data derived from interviews. In gathering qualitative data, the researcher used
open-ended questions to gain depth of data about how peoples‘ perspectives changed in
response to the intervention. This tends to be somewhat more organic than the process of
gathering data through quantitative means such as the Faith Maturity Scale questionnaire.
This helped the research to yield additional, deeper insights into the effects of the
intervention at Living Water.
The researcher kept this desire to gain a depth of data in guiding conversation and
seeking data during the qualitative interviews. In the initial, baseline interviews,
questions sought information to describe participants‘ initial understandings, vision, and
practices of the missional perspectives at Living Water. Information from other sources
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also informed the researcher‘s interpretation of the data—results of the quantitative
surveys, personal diaries, newsletters, bulletins, etc. In comparing this with the endline
qualitative interview data, the researcher gained insight into changes the intervention
brought in answering the research question. From the qualitative interview data, then,
various categories and trends of change in the congregation‘s practices and perspectives
resulting from action with the intervention were available for analysis and consideration.
Qualitative data provided selective depth of information for consideration in the
conclusions.
The original plan was to select two participants randomly for the qualitative
interviews from the active membership of the congregation according to two general
categories; one person aged 20-39 and one person aged 40-59.14
The congregation
council was interviewed as a group for the third qualitative interview.15
While the congregation council did participate in baseline and endline interviews,
as the research progressed, it became apparent that the two general age categories were
not feasible for this study. In analyzing the demographic data for the persons participating
in the Damascus Travelers groups and the persons participating in the baseline FMS, the
researcher discovered that the majority of participants were in the 60+ group. This meant
that the bulk of the Damascus Travelers would be outside of the pool of potential
14
For purposes of this study, ―active member‖ is defined as someone who worships, on average
over the preceding year, at least once a month.
15 As stated previously, the council group interview was conducted regardless of which specific
persons were available for the interview. This was done in this manner because council elections, with
changes in specific office holders, occurred during the research timeframe. Council was selected as a group
to be interviewed not because of the specific persons who were on council, but because of the unique
position and responsibility council holds in congregational life. This responsibility and unique position
were consistent throughout the research regardless of who filled the specific positions on council.
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interviewees. This methodology would noticeably restrict the pool of participants and
thus the reliability of the data.
After conversation with an assigned research colleague and with these facts in
mind, the researcher alternatively decided to select one participant randomly from the
group of people who participated in the baseline FMS, and one participant who
participated in the Damascus Travelers groups. The researcher utilized a white-noise
based random number generator16
to select one person from the Quantitative Survey
participants‘ consent forms, and another person from the list of Damascus Travelers
participants.
Even though these two individuals were selected randomly, each person was
given an opportunity to either sign a research permission document or decline
participation in the qualitative data-gathering process. When a person agreed to
participate, they specifically agreed to participate in the interview at the beginning and
end of the study. In addition, the person selected from the Damascus Travelers group
agreed to participate in a Damascus Travelers group actively for the duration of the
program. One person selected from the FMS participants group was not an active
member, the second declined participation in the research, and a third person from that
category agreed to participate. This person did participate in the congregation retreat, the
Damascus Travelers, and one of the Wednesday night groups, although this was not
required. The first person selected from among the Damascus Travelers groups agreed to
these requirements.
16
The white-noise random number generator was used on the website http://www.random.org.
The website works by using ambient white noise signal levels (the best random source currently available)
to randomly select a number within a selected integer range.
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The researcher interviewed these two persons and the congregation council, with
qualitative data derived. A licensed court reporter17
transcribed the recordings of the
interviews for analysis. The recordings and transcriptions will be destroyed three years
after the thesis approval, and were treated with full confidentiality throughout the
process. Interviews at the beginning and end of research were conducted and compared to
one another to look for change in participants‘ understanding of and activity shaped by
missional vision.
Research Areas and Questions for Qualitative Interviews
The researcher structured qualitative interviews to seek data in evaluating the five
Metrics for Observing Changes in Congregational Practices and Perspectives described
earlier. Primary questions with potential follow-up questions are in appendix E. The
follow-up questions are available, but not required, for the interviewer to use to gather
data to answer the primary questions completely. These questions were field tested with
two persons who are not participating in the vision cultivation process at Living Water,
and one minor insight garnered from their feedback was utilized to improve the interview
schedule. The qualitative interview schedule questions addressed the following subject
areas.
Personal faith practices and communal/vocational ministry. The primary
interview question is, ―In what ways does your relationship with God make a difference
in your personal life and in your relationships with others?‖ This question seeks to
provide an introductory question to allow the interviewee opportunity to share personal
17
The researcher‘s sister is a licensed court reporter.
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experiences and to gain comfort with the interview process. It also serves to provide a
general understanding of the person‘s faith practices, both personal and
communal/vocational. The first follow up question is, ―What are some examples of times
when you have seen God at work?‖ This gives a framework to consider and remember
specific events that describe the person‘s faith. The second question seeks to focus more
on aspects of sharing one‘s faith with, ―When you talk about God with others, what do
you say?‖ The third question seeks a direct correlation between one‘s understanding of
God and their activities and personal faith with, ―How does God influence what you do
on a daily basis?‖ The fourth question again focuses on relationships with others, with the
question, ―How do you bring God into your day-to-day interactions with others?‖ The
final instruction focuses specifically on personal faith practices, ―Describe your
devotional life.‖ This item, with a specific focus on personal faith and practice, is last
because it is more personal and specific than the broader, more general questions above.
Understanding of the congregation’s shared vision. The primary interview
question is, ―What are some principles or concepts that people in the congregation hold in
common as they make decisions and work together in ministry?‖ This question goes
specifically to the information sought. The question looks to see if there is an
understanding of the congregation‘s shared vision for ministry. Other follow-up questions
that can provide ways of asking the respondent about the content of the shared vision
statements are available in case the respondent is unfamiliar with a shared vision in the
congregation. These include, ―How do you know this to be the case?‖ Also, ―Think of
some activities that the congregation does together. Based upon these communal
activities, what would you infer to be the congregation‘s vision for ministry?‖ Finally,
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―As a congregation member, how do you think a first-time Visitor would describe the
congregation‘s shared vision for ministry after worshipping here on a Sunday?‖
Efficacy of how the congregation equips congregants for growth in personal faith
and communal/vocational ministry through the vision. The primary interview question is,
―Consider this shared vision that you just described. What are some ways that this vision
helps you make decisions in your daily life?‖ This question seeks to determine how well
the participant feels that the congregation has helped her/him to put the shared vision into
practice. Delving deeper into what that process is, the first and second follow-up
questions ask, ―How do/would you apply it in making decisions on a day to day basis,‖
and, ―How does the shared vision impact decisions you make at home, at work, or
elsewhere?‖ The third follow-up question would only be necessary for a person who has
a clear understanding of the shared vision. This question looks for specific examples of
the congregation training for applying the shared vision with, ―When have you said,
‗Wow, this vision really is helpful in dealing with this situation in life,‘ here at this
congregation?‖ Finally, the last follow-up question seeks to find out what the
congregation has done specifically to help the respondent apply these with, ―How does
this congregation help you to experience a deeper personal faith life, or to feel
comfortable to talk about your faith in daily life?‖
How congregation vision impacts personal/congregational faith practices.
Questions involve individual aspects for individual interviews and congregational aspects
for the group interviews with council. The primary question is, ―Consider your
personal/the congregation‘s faith life for a moment. How has the congregation‘s shared
vision made a difference in your personal/the congregation‘s faith life?‖ The primary
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emphasis is specifically on the respondent‘s personal faith life to see how the shared
vision has impacted the personal faith life. This primary question with its follow-up
questions seeks to answer the portion of the research question dealing with the impact the
vision cultivation process has had on the personal faith life of the
congregant/congregation. The first follow-up question probes deeper for specific
examples of changed faith now because of congregational life; ―What is different in your
personal/the congregation‘s faith life now, compared to a year ago?‖ The second seeks to
find how God has spoken to the respondent/congregation, because of the shared vision
with, ―What were you doing privately/as a council when you felt God give you insight
through considering the shared vision?‖ A negative follow-up question seeks to find
negative impact due to the lack of vision with, ―When have you seen something happen
that went against the congregation‘s vision? What did you think or how did you feel
about that?‖ Finally, in the endline interview, a follow-up question of, ―How has the
vision cultivation process we have embraced as a congregation over the past few months
impacted the congregation‘s ministry?‖ is available.
How congregation vision impacts communal/vocational ministry. The primary
question is, ―How has the congregation‘s shared vision made a difference in how you
relate with others in the community?‖ Emphasis is first placed specifically upon the
respondent‘s missional life to see how the shared vision has impacted the respondent‘s
life in community and vocation. This primary question with its follow-up questions seeks
to answer the portion of the research question dealing with the impact the vision
cultivation process has had on the respondents‘ relationships with others in the wider
community. The first follow-up question looks for specific examples of missional life
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with, ―How has the congregation‘s shared vision impacted your relationships with people
outside of the congregation through your actions or verbal witness?‖ The second
follow-up question looks for understandings of relational aspects of the shared vision
with, ―How do your relationships with others compare to your understanding of the
congregation‘s shared vision?‖ The next follow-up question seeks specific examples of
changed behavior in the respondent and how others have been changed in the community
due to the vision cultivation process with, ―How have people in the community that you
know benefitted from the ministry of the congregation or its members?‖ Finally, the last
three follow-up questions are available for use in the endline interviews to probe specific
results brought about by the vision cultivation process. They are, ―What are you doing
differently in our community, whether intentionally or not, as a result of the
congregation‘s vision/vision cultivation process?‖ Secondly, ―How has the vision
cultivation process we have embraced as a congregation over the past few months
impacted your relationships with people in the community?‖ The final follow-up question
is, ―How has the vision cultivation process we have embraced as a congregation over the
past few months impacted how the congregation as a whole thinks about our
community?‖
Anything else? This closing question gives the respondent an open-ended
opportunity to share further information with, ―Is there anything else you would like to
say, or that you think I should consider?‖ The first follow-up question probes deeper into
the response with, ―Why is this important to you?‖ In the closing statement of the
interview, the interviewer expresses appreciation for the respondent‘s participation with,
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―Thank you for your time and effort in helping me understand more about your
understanding of this congregation‘s ministry.‖
Data Analysis
The interviews were analyzed using qualitative coding techniques. The researcher
initially coded respondents‘ answers. These codes were entered into a Microsoft Access
database, by question, and were printed out in two ways for further analysis.
The first method involved a longitudinal analysis, wherein codes and categories
were derived by comparing all three responses together, by question, for endline and
baseline interviews. For example, in longitudinal analysis, the initial codes from baseline
interviews for the two individual and the one group interview were coded distinctly and
together for each question. The researcher then compared these aggregate codes and
categories to similar longitudinal responses for the endline interviews by other
respondents in order to derive the results and conclusions.
The second method involved a latitudinal analysis, wherein baseline and endline
responses were coded by question for each interview. This means, for example, that one
individual‘s interview responses for each question were compared and coded with
baseline and endline together. This researcher also analyzed these findings to derive the
results and conclusions.
Summary
The research for this thesis utilized PAR in cultivating missional vision among the
people of Living Water Lutheran Church, a newly developed congregation. The
intervention of forming Damascus Travelers groups and cultivating missional vision did
139
have an impact on the congregants, and it had in impact on how they make decisions and
interact with others in their daily lives. The specific results will be described next.
Huntley
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CHAPTER 5
RESULTS OF STUDY AND INTERPRETATION
A life is not important except in the impact it has on other lives.
—Inscription on Jackie Robinson’s tombstone.1
Although this inscription on Jackie Robinson‘s tombstone may be worded a bit
strongly—we are created in the image of God, after all—it does highlight the important
role we play as we influence the lives of one another in God‘s caring, redeeming, and
reconciling reign. The inscription befits a man who broke segregation barriers and stood
as an advocate for social and civil rights causes. Robinson broke segregation barriers to
attend Officer Candidate School in the U.S. Army.2 As a second lieutenant in 1944,
Robinson endured the humiliation of a spurious court martial and subsequent acquittal for
refusing to move to the back of an unsegregated Army bus.3 In 1947, Robinson broke the
segregation barrier in baseball‘s major leagues by playing for the Brooklyn Dodgers.
Later in Robinson‘s life, his experience with his son‘s drug addiction motivated him to
become a staunch anti-drug advocate.4 Throughout his life, as Robinson stood for justice
and equality, he impacted society in ways that continue to benefit all of us today.
1 Italics and formatting are sic from the source: Steve Jacobson, Carrying Jackie’s Torch: The
Players Who Integrated Baseball--and America (Lawrence Hill Books, 2007), 239.
2 Arnold Rampersad, Jackie Robinson: A Biography, 1st ed. (New York: Knopf, 1997), 93.
3 Ibid., 102-109.
4 Ibid., 438-443.
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Although the scope of the Participatory Action Research (PAR) for this thesis was
significantly smaller than that of Jackie Robinson‘s entire life, it nonetheless sought to
similarly impact a congregation and inspire members to have a meaningful and missional
impact in the lives of one another and the community. The research question is, ―How
does cultivating shared missional vision in a newly developed congregation impact the
lives of congregants and how they relate to others in the community?‖ The PAR research
sought to have an impact on the lives of congregants, and by extension, on members‘
relationships with others.
In order to assess the impact of the PAR intervention it is important to analyze
data in order to assess the outcome of the mission cultivation process. The conclusions5
are based upon quantitative and qualitative data gathered during the research for this
thesis. The quantitative and qualitative data are now described to allow for assessment of
the PAR data in answering the research question.
Narrative of Intervention and Its Impact
The intervention phase6 of the PAR for this thesis began April 25, 2010,
7 with the
start of Sunday School discussions and the Damascus Travelers groups. The intervention
phase ended August 22 with the formal adoption of a purpose statement and guiding
principles discerned through the missional vision cultivation process. The researcher
5 Conclusions reached by analyzing the data garnered from the PAR will be described in chapter 6.
First, however, it is important to analyze the data in chapter 5 to provide material to consider and assess in
chapter 6.
6 See appendix A, ―PAR Intervention Timetable,‖ for a full description of the intervention
timeline.
7 The remainder of the months and dates refer to the year 2010 unless otherwise noted.
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worked before the intervention to prepare the congregation for the intervention and to
maximize its impact. There were also unanticipated results, including a
member-sponsored initiative to reach out and personally connect with residents in the
congregation‘s local neighborhood.
Pre-Intervention Preparations
In February, the researcher met with the congregation council at Living Water to
introduce the concept of cultivating missional vision. Dave Daubert‘s Living Lutheran8
served as a means of beginning the conversation. The council members purchased and
read the book. They held substantive and lengthy conversations about the material at
meetings in March and, to a lesser extent, in April. Because of this conversation,
congregational leaders embraced and endorsed the vision cultivation process and began
to have conversations with others in the congregation in the hopes of garnering
widespread acceptance and participation.
Additionally, in preparation for the beginning of the intervention, the researcher
included references to various elements of a missional church concept in sermons,
newsletter articles, and informal pastoral conversations. The intervention events, such as
Sunday School classes and the congregational retreat, were also publicized with an
attempt to maximize congregational participation.
Impacts of Intervention
The multi-faceted nature of the intervention brought a variety of results. Notable
results came in the areas of the Damascus Travelers groups, the congregation retreat, the
8 Daubert, Living Lutheran: Renewing Your Congregation.
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work of council on vision elements, the work in the congregation forum and meeting to
adopt a purpose statement and guiding principles, and through the act of quantitative and
qualitative data gathering.
Damascus Travelers
On March 16, a portion of the Discipleship Commission meeting dealt with
planning and launching the Damascus Travelers groups. The researcher shared the
concept, described fundamentals of the program, and encouraged cogenerative
conversation regarding program specifics. These details were about form and format,
program name, and means of garnering greatest congregational participation. One of the
best suggestions, for example, included having members of the commission call active
congregants to invite them personally to participate in the program.9
This approach of working with the Discipleship Commission was effective in
maximizing participation. Twenty-eight persons participated in seven groups; this
exceeded the commission‘s and the researcher‘s most optimistic expectations. In
conversation following the experience, participants showed appreciation for the
opportunity to get together. Most of the groups stated that they formed close personal
connections with the other group members, even with some occasional deep, and even
tearful, interactions. For example, one group comforted a member whose close family
member was diagnosed with cancer just hours before the scheduled meeting. Participants
also stated that they had a positive experience meeting in groups by deepening existing
relationships.
9 See appendix I
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An example of a problem due to a top-down vision-casting process rather than a
grass-roots style occurred in the use of a prayer labyrinth.10
The researcher advocated the
use of a prayer labyrinth, with little or no mutual conversation with participants. As a
result, only a couple of people utilized it. Overall, however, participants viewed the
opportunity to form and strengthen relationships with one another in the Damascus
Travelers groups positively.11
Congregation Retreat
The congregation retreat, on the other hand, had fewer participants than the
Damascus Travelers groups. Participation may have been low because, although the
council discussed the retreat, the researcher planned and promoted it almost exclusively
in a top-down style. Even so, after several collaborative conversations, the researcher
changed the format from an overnight to a one-day retreat when it became clear that
nobody would stay overnight. This flexibility in planning the retreat induced several
congregants to attend and participate.
The conversation at the retreat was lively and folks were engaged in the
conversation. After the retreat, most of the participants decided to gather for an
impromptu conversation and fellowship at a local restaurant. In this informal
conversation, it became clear that several of the participants were excited about the
missional concepts they had discussed previously. The cultivated vision was changing not
only their perceptions about Living Water, but also their understandings of what it meant
10
See appendix J.
11 The description of the Damascus Travelers experience is from the researcher‘s journal.
145
to be a congregation or a missional church.12
During this discussion, participants asked
the researcher to bring the retreat material back to the congregation and to host three or
four Wednesday evening forums with the same material. Several of the retreat
participants even participated in the conversations at the Wednesday evening meetings, in
an effort to expand the conversation to include the wider congregation. Apparently,
informal discussion following a liminal experience helped strengthen the impact of the
retreat and nurtured a communitas experience.13
Council Work on Vision Elements
On July 12, the council received the purpose and guiding principles statements
from the congregation retreat and the Wednesday night forums. After extensive
discussion, the council edited the fifth guiding principle14
and referred the proposed
statements to the congregation for consideration at the August 8 forum. The council also
discussed ways of encouraging greater participation from the congregation. The council
recommended the following purpose and guiding principles statements to the
congregation for consideration:
Purpose Statement: God‘s purpose for [Living Water] is to grow faith that
moves us beyond ourselves.
Guiding Principles:
1. Faithfully living with Christ at the center.
2. Prayerfully listening with open hearts and minds.
12 As one participant put it, ―You know at first, I thought that we needed to do a bunch of work to
reactivate a bunch of people who aren‘t coming any more. But now, as we talk about this and as I
understand this missional church, I can see that this isn‘t our focus. They can come or they can go, but we
need to be about doing this other stuff that is important. Working in our community, working on our faith
life.‖
13 See chapter 3, ―Moving Beyond Community to Communitas.‖
14 See appendix M.
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3. Selflessly welcoming all without preconceptions.
4. Courageously bearing our neighbor‘s burdens.
5. Relating to one another with respect and honesty.
6. Boldly sharing our blessings with others.
On August 9, the council met to review the inputs from the August 8 forum. After
reviewing the forum‘s conversation, they decided to present the purpose statement and
guiding principles for the congregational meeting without amendment.
Congregation Forums and Meeting
Qualitative analysis of the baseline and endline group interviews yielded a finding
that there were two perspectives, or visions for ministry, that congregants appeared to
hold in varying degrees. These mindsets are invitational and vocational visions for
ministry.15
These two perspectives seemed to shape much of the conversation at the
August 8 congregational forum.
As the meeting began, some members spoke about the need to invite persons in
the community to join the congregation as members. Some raised concerns about paying
the bills. Others spoke about the need to be more active in the wider community. A few
people spoke about the need to have a cohesive, shared vision to help congregants to
know what they are doing together in working with common purpose and vision.
This back and forth conversation continued for a while. Near the end of the
meeting, members affirmed the congregation‘s ministry and noted that the purpose
statement and guiding principles were helpful.
15
This will be discussed in greater depth in the ―Qualitative Interview Results‖ section.
147
At the congregational meeting on August 22, the congregation considered the
proposed purpose statement and guiding principles. There were no questions or
comments, and the congregation adopted the proposal unanimously without amendment.
The researcher observed that the persons who spoke from the invitational
perspective tended to be people who had not participated in the vision cultivation
meetings and process. Those that spoke from the vocational perspective, however, tended
to have been a part of the process and meetings in varying degrees. It seems that the
intervention helped participants to appropriate vocational perspectives and actions
proportional to the extent that they participated in the cultivation process.
Unforeseen Events and Results
At the June 14 council meeting, the researcher discussed the concepts of
liminality and communitas using the handout in appendix K. The discussion took the
form of a devotional based upon the concepts of liminality and communitas.16
The
conversation focused upon the benefits of risking a move beyond comfort and security to
step outside of the comfort zone17
and enter liminality in the hopes that the community
can grow relationally and experience communitas. As the conversation continued, various
council members shared memories of liminal experiences that had fostered communitas.
One person described a recent communitas experience of God‘s Spirit in relationships
16
The handout in appendix K is from Hirsch, The Forgotten Ways: Reactivating the Missional
Church, 219-221. Hirsch‘s works derives from the concepts of communitas and liminality described in
Victor Turner, The Ritual Process: Structure and Anti-Structure (Aldine Transaction, 1995).
17 Variations of the phrase ―stepping outside of the comfort zone‖ have become a part of the
congregation‘s lexicon as a result of the missional vision cultivation process.
148
formed by reaching out and connecting with a neighboring inner-city congregation.
Others shared similar experiences.
After much cogenerative discussion and discernment, the council decided to
invite their fellow congregants to step outside of their comfort zones intentionally and
experience liminality together. They also asked the researcher to share the liminality and
communitas material with the congregation in a sermon. Over the following month,
surprising numbers of congregational members responded to the invitation favorably, as
they reached out together to connect with and relate to residents in the local
neighborhood.
In reflecting upon these events, it would appear that this success emerged from
using familiar concepts to draw people into missional, shared experiences of liminality.
The conversations and sermons related to the missional vision cultivation process
seemingly influenced several people and their relationships with the community. Moved
by the conversations about missional vision, liminality, and communitas, the
congregation and its leaders shared liminal experiences that drew people together in
mission. As congregants joined in mutual conversation and fellowship after these
experiences, people seemed to experience communitas.
Quantitative Survey Results
In this research, the Faith Maturity Scale (FMS)18
served two purposes. First, it
provided baseline data that helped the researcher to shape the PAR intervention. Second,
it provided baseline and endline data for analysis to help determine the extent of the PAR
18
See appendix B.
149
intervention‘s impact on the congregation and relationships with others in the community
in answering the research question.
Participants completed the FMS as a baseline convenience sample on March 21
before the PAR intervention began. After the PAR intervention, worshippers completed
the FMS in an endline convenience sample on August 29. The convenience samples
consisted of people who agreed to remain after worship and complete the consent form
and the survey.
The developers of the FMS originally intended for it to be evaluated by averaging
the scores from the 38 questions to yield one aggregate number to represent the response.
Higher scores imply a more favorable result, presumably denoting participants holding a
stronger or greater maturity of faith. Five of the questions were reverse scored, and the
responses to these questions were reverse scored for analytical purposes (e.g. a ―1‖
survey response was recorded as a ―7‖ in the analysis for reverse-scored questions). The
baseline and endline scores were analyzed in this manner for all respondents, as well as
for the three age categories (all, 18-59, and 60+), with an unpaired one-tail t-Test. This
test is helpful in determining if there was any change of statistical significance from
baseline to endline due to the intervention (see appendix D). Finally, the questions were
separated into categories of (I)nward, (O)utward, and (C)onnecting faith orientations for
analysis with respect to the type of faith activity the question refers to.19
For data analysis, the questions were evaluated on a question-by-question basis to
look at the type of responses garnered. The same three age categories (all, 18-59, and
60+) were also analyzed. This analysis utilized histograms, along with kurtosis and skew
19
This was discussed in detail in chapter 4.
150
data, to examine the response for each question for purposes of crafting the PAR
intervention and for viewing overall perspectives in the congregation‘s faith. Finally, the
t-Test analysis was also performed for each question according to the three
aforementioned age categories to gain insights into changes in the congregation‘s faith
and practices because of the PAR intervention.
Analysis of Responses to Individual Questions
Techniques used for Quantitative Analysis
The histogram graphs report the number of responses for each possible selection
(number 1 through 7) by question. The data were analyzed to determine the mean ( ), the
standard deviation (s), the number of responses (N), the median, the mode, the kurtosis,
and the skew.
The mean is an average of all of the responses. It is helpful in determining the
midpoint value of the data; a higher value implies, for example, that the responses cluster
toward the higher end of the spectrum of possible answers (which are numbered
1 through 7).
The standard deviation describes the width of the data distribution from the mean
in a normal distribution20
sample. Higher standard deviations imply a wider data
distribution, while smaller standard deviations imply that the data tends to cluster tightly
around the mean. In a normal distribution, 66% of responses will fall within one standard
20
A normal (Gaussian) distribution is commonly referred to as a bell curve due to the bell-like
shape of the Cartesian plot of the normal distribution. It is used in probability and statistics for analysis
since probability data tends to be distributed along a normal distribution. Cf. ―Normal Distribution‖, n.d.,
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Normal_distribution, (accessed November 29, 2010).
151
deviation above and below the mean; 95% of responses will fall within two standard
deviations, and 99% will tend to fall within three standard deviations.
The median data point is the datum that falls in the middle of the data set. The
mode is the data value that occurs most often in the data set. By comparing the median
and the mode with the mean and with one another (and the standard deviation), one can
discern the shape of the data distribution. A set of data, for example, that has two modes
that are far from the mean of the data implies a bimodal system that is probably an
inverted form of a normal distribution. On the other hand, a set of data whose mean,
median, and mode are numerically close can imply a data set distributed more like a
normal distribution.
Kurtosis is a measure of how tightly the data clusters around a given response.
Kurtosis is a measure of how closely the data set matches a normal distribution. As the
data approaches one value, for example, the kurtosis will approach infinity. A histogram
with a bimodal response or inverted normal distribution with responses at both ends of
the spectrogram, on the other hand, will yield a negative kurtosis value. This is useful in
assessing the shape of the data distribution.21
In a standard distribution, the skew measures the extent to which the statistical
curve clusters to one side of the mean. A distribution where the mean, the median, and
the mode are equal will yield a skew value of zero. A positive skew, therefore, means that
the data clusters above the mean. Alternatively, a negative skew implies that the data
21
―Kurtosis‖, n.d., http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kurtosis, (accessed November 29, 2010).
152
clusters below the mean. Skew, therefore, is useful in determining if the main data cluster
is offset by a smaller cluster outside of the normal distribution.22
These statistical techniques were helpful in analyzing and interpreting the FMS
data. Perspectives gained through this analysis were helpful in highlighting areas to focus
on in the PAR intervention.
Intervention Perspectives from Baseline Quantitative Data
The FMS tool (see appendix B) provides a window into the faith and practice of
an individual or a group. Specifically, the FMS ―is designed to measure ‗the degree to
which a person embodies the priorities, commitments, and perspectives characteristic of
vibrant and life transforming faith, as these have been understood in ―mainline‖
Protestant traditions.‘‖23
The baseline FMS data revealed two major aspects of
congregants‘ faith and practice for the PAR intervention to address. These aspects are
personal faith, beliefs and practices, and perspectives in relating to others beyond the
congregation. Although responses to several questions gave insights into these areas, the
data from questions 2, 26, and 28 provide sufficient information to illustrate the
categories.
Personal Faith, Beliefs, and Practices
In the baseline FMS data, one person selected option six; everyone else selected
option seven, ―Always true,‖ for question 2, ―I know that Jesus Christ is the Son of God
who died on a cross and rose again‖ (see figure 5.1). This near-unanimous acclamation of
22
―Skew‖, n.d., http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Skew, (accessed November 29, 2010).
23 Benson, Donahue, and Erickson, ―The Faith Maturity Scale: Conceptualization, Measurement,
and Empirical Validation,‖ 171.
153
the crucifixion and resurrection of Jesus Christ served as a key starting point in
implementing the PAR intervention. It allowed the researcher to proceed from an
assumption that the congregation recognized the salvific actions of Jesus Christ. By
extension, it was also reasonable to assume that the congregation also recognized the
divinity of Christ. This finding allowed the understanding of the Lordship of the crucified
and risen Christ to be axiomatic in the intervention.
Figure 5.1. Histogram for Question 2, ―I know that Jesus Christ is the Son of God who
died on a cross and rose again.‖ = 6.98, s = .12, the kurtosis is 63, and the skew is -7.94
(baseline values).
Beyond the shared conviction of Christ‘s crucifixion and resurrection, however,
there was an acute difference of opinion about the implications of faith for praxis. In
answering the reverse-scored question 26, almost twice as many people chose ―Always
true‖ (1 for data analysis) as those who chose ―Never true‖ (7 for data analysis) in
answering the question, ―I believe that I must obey God‘s rules and commandments in
order to be saved‖ (see figure 5.2). The mean of 3.52 supports the finding that the
majority of respondents held that this statement is true to some degree. In addition, the
rather large standard deviation (2.34) implies a wide disparity of opinion on the topic.
The negative kurtosis value of -1.42 numerically supports the visual evidence that the
154
histogram delineates an inverted normal distribution. With the number of responses at the
two ends of the spectrum, it appears that the response to question 26 is bimodal, with the
primary mode being ―Always true‖ nearly by a factor of two to one.
Figure 5.2. Histogram for Question 26 (reverse scored)24
, ―I believe that I must obey
God‘s rules and commandments in order to be saved.‖ In the actual response, = 4.48
and the skew is .31; reverse scored for analytical purposes, = 3.52 and the skew is -.31.
In both cases, s = 2.34 and the kurtosis is -1.42, (baseline values).
The researcher was rather surprised to discover that a significant number of
respondents to the FMS with a Lutheran heritage of being saved by grace through faith
apart from works of Law would select ―Always true‖ in responding to the statement, ―I
believe that I must obey God‘s rules and commandments in order to be saved.‖ A
perception of works righteousness could lead congregants to look at impoverished
members in the community, for example, with an attitude that their actions had led them
to poverty, and that they simply needed to get a job in order to get out of poverty. At a
fellowship event, the researcher had a conversation with a congregant that followed this
line of reasoning. The insights gained from the response to question 26 prepared the
24
As a reminder, on histograms for reverse scored questions contain inverted numbers for the
purpose of data analysis. For example, a response of ―1‖ is recorded as ―7,‖ a ―2‖ is recorded as ―6,‖ etc.
155
researcher to be able to respond to this attitude with a call for understanding, compassion,
and action for those who may be struggling with addiction, difficult life circumstances,
health problems, etc. Conversations such as these, along with sermons, newsletter
articles, classes, and other appropriate forums, gave the researcher opportunities to focus
on God‘s prevenient and universal grace through the missio Dei in all of creation as a
source and foundation for missional activity and praxis.
Perspectives in Relating to Others beyond the Congregation
In answering the research question, ―How does cultivating shared missional
vision in a newly developed congregation impact the lives of congregants and how they
relate to others in the community?‖ it was important first to identify congregants‘
attitudes and perspectives about living missionally in the community. Responses to the
FMS questions showed that the congregants did not place as high of a priority or value on
engaging the community context as, for example, they held for personal faith
perspectives.25
One instance of this is evident in the responses to question 28 (see
figure 5.3), ―I care a great deal about reducing poverty in the United States and
throughout the world.‖ The mean of the responses to this question was near the middle of
the response spectrum, at 4.72. Also, the near-zero kurtosis of -.21 and of the skew (-.16)
imply that the response histogram data are distributed similarly to a normal distribution.
25
The prior discussion of the response to question 2 is an example of these strongly held faith
perspectives. More examples of these distinctions are contained in appendix D. Question7, ―My faith helps
me know right from wrong‖ shows a stronger, ―Always true‖ response than question 13, ―I am active in
efforts to promote social justice,‖ for example.
156
Figure 5.3. Histogram for Question 28, ―I care a great deal about reducing poverty in the
United States and throughout the world.‖ = 4.72, s = 1.31, the kurtosis is -.21, and the
skew is -.16 (baseline values).
This finding is also evident in FMS scores grouped in categories of (I)nward,
(O)utward, and (C)onnecting faith orientations. Respondents consistently selected
numbers for outer dimensions of faith that were 10 percent lower26
than those for inner or
combined dimensions of faith (see table 5.1). Because of this finding, the researcher
intentionally concentrated on encouraging congregants to focus more intently on moving
to ministry outside of personal comfort zones and relationships. This was a part of the
rationale for inviting congregants to engage in liminal experiences and to focus more on
ministry outside of the congregation and beyond their comfort zones. The impact of this
effort is also evident in the purpose statement that the congregation adopted, noting that
God‘s purpose for the congregation is to ―grow faith that moves us beyond ourselves.‖
26
The O mean value in table 5.1 of 4.46 is approximately .7 points, or 10%, lower than the
average I and C values.
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Table 5.1. Count, Mean, and Standard Deviation Data by IOC (All Ages)27
Category
(Nb)
(Ne) sb se
I 5.179
(63)
5.214
(43) 0.506 0.466
O 4.460
(63)
4.603
(43) 0.796 0.809
C 5.165
(63)
5.120
(43) 0.584 0.563
Other aspects of the impact of the PAR intervention are apparent in the
quantitative data. The t-Test is a tool for evaluating change between two sets of data. This
test revealed areas of change during the time of the PAR intervention.
t-Test Results
The unpaired one-tail t-Test analysis tool compares two data sets to determine if
there is a statistically significant difference between them. In this research, the t-Test
analysis showed the impact of the PAR intervention by comparing FMS baseline and
endline data. A probability (P) less than .05 in the t-Test result implies that the change in
the mean ( is statistically significant.
There were not any statistically significant changes between baseline and endline
data when averaging multiple questions‘ responses, whether analyzed by age category
and/or by I, O, and C categories. There is an increase in the FMS average for the Outward
category for ages 18-59 with P = .055, which is close to the .05 threshold but still outside
of required parameters (see table 5.2). In other words, there was a discernable increase of
27
Interpretive Key for Data Results:
N is the total number of responses.
is the mean.
s is the standard deviation.
b and e subscripts: baseline and endline data, respectively.
158
0.302 in the mean for the responses of persons aged 18-59 that is very close to being
statistically relevant.
Table 5.2. t-Test Results, by IOC Categories (Ages 18-59) 28
Category
(Nb)
(Ne) sb
2 se
2 df P
I 5.140
(28)
5.257
(23) 0.273 0.228 48 0.204
O 4.163
(28)
4.465
(23) 0.475 0.396 48 0.055
C 5.004
(28)
5.118
(23) 0.313 0.183 49 0.206
In the analysis of the responses to the individual questions, three questions had a
statistically significant change from baseline to endline. In the average of all ages, the
mean for Question 1 increased significantly from 4.344 to 4.857 (see table 5.3). Question
1 reads, ―I am concerned that our country is not doing enough to help the poor.‖29
Since
this was a component of several conversations during the PAR intervention, it is
reasonable to conclude that the intervention led to an increase in participants‘ concern for
the poor.
28
Interpretive Key for t-Test Results:
N is the total number of responses.
is the mean.
s and s2 are the standard deviation and variance, respectively.
df is the degrees of freedom value
b and e subscripts: baseline and endline data, respectively.
P is the probability (T ≤ t) one-tail. With bold font: statistically significant change (P < .05).
29 Benson, Donahue, and Erickson, ―The Faith Maturity Scale: Conceptualization, Measurement,
and Empirical Validation,‖ 173.
159
Table 5.3. t-Test Results, Question 1 (All Ages)
No.
(Nb)
(Ne) sb
2 se
2 df P
1 4.344
(61)
4.857
(42) 1.896 1.784 90 0.031
Two other questions (see table 5.4) showed a statistically significant change in the
means from baseline to endline when analyzed within the category of participants aged
18-59. Question 3, ―My faith shapes how I think and act every day,‖ increased from
5.714 to 6.087 and question 24, ―My life is filled with meaning and purpose,‖ increased
from 5.296 to 5.818. Again, these were both components of several conversations during
the intervention, so it is also reasonable to conclude that the intervention led to a positive
change in the areas of faith shaping action and experiencing a life filled with meaning
and purpose for respondents in the 18-59 age group.
Table 5.4. t-Test Results, Questions 3 and 24 (Ages 18-59)
No.
(Nb)
(Ne) sb
2 se
2 df P
3 5.714
(28)
6.087
(23) 0.804 0.447 49 0.048
24 5.296
(27)
5.818
(22) 1.217 0.823 47 0.038
Qualitative Interview Results
While the FMS was useful in garnering data from the breadth of the congregation,
it did not plumb the depths of congregants‘ faith and practices or identify specific actions
or examples. It was necessary, therefore, to dig deeper for data that would provide better
insights for understanding congregants‘ faith and practices. The qualitative interviews
160
yielded baseline information that also helped in shaping and implementing the PAR
intervention, albeit to a lesser extent than did the FMS quantitative data. Instead, the
baseline and endline qualitative interviews yielded significant specific data to assist in
evaluating the effects of the PAR intervention.
In seeking to answer the research question, the congregation council and two
randomly selected individuals participated in interviews at the beginning of the
intervention (baseline) and after the conclusion of the intervention (endline) in an effort
to gain information. The researcher examined interview transcripts using qualitative
evaluation techniques as described in chapter 4.
The qualitative analysis revealed information relating to four major categories.
These categories include:
1. Developing a Shared Vision. The data revealed a baseline understanding that there
was not a shared vision at the beginning of the intervention, although there had
been one prior to the construction of the congregation‘s building. Endline data
exhibited components of shared vision cultivated during the intervention.
2. Invitational and Vocational Perspectives. The qualitative analysis revealed a
disparity in vision between members focused largely on acquiring more
congregational members and those focused on embodying missional principles in
daily life.
3. Changes in Perspectives and Activity. The PAR intervention impacted, to varying
degrees, all of the interviewees‘ perspectives and vision for life and missional
activity.
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4. Impact of Missional Praxis on Beliefs and Perspectives. Data showed that some
of the respondents increased their missional activity during the intervention. One
individual who intentionally made significant behavioral changes in relationships
also experienced significant change in missional perspectives.
The qualitative analysis also revealed three minor categories relating to the
research question. These categories include Mission Developer Perspectives, Impact of
Denominational Decisions Regarding Gay Clergy, and Financial Concerns.30
Developing a Shared Vision
In seeking to answer the research question, questions in the qualitative interview
schedule focused on the interviewees‘ understanding of the congregation‘s shared vision
(see appendix E). In asking these questions in both the baseline and endline interviews, it
was possible to gain data about components of shared vision for ministry both before and
after the intervention. Data from the interviews show that there was little or no shared
vision for ministry prior to the intervention, apart from a general feeling of community
and shared experiences. In the endline interviews, however, there was a greater
understanding of a shared missional vision for ministry.
Analysis of the baseline group interviews and the two individual interviews
revealed data showing that there was not an understanding of a shared vision among the
respondents prior to the PAR intervention. Even so, there were common understandings
of what characterized ministry at Living Water Lutheran Church.
30
These categories will be described at length below in the ―Other Factors Influencing Research
and the Outcome‖ section.
162
Data Relating to Lack of Shared Vision Prior to Intervention
Over the course of the baseline group interview and discussion, participants grew
to understand that there was not a cohesive shared vision for ministry at that time. In
considering questions of what the shared vision was, participants identified elements of
unity such as worship practices, a unity of relationship in Christ, and a shared friendliness
within the congregation. As the baseline group interview continued and participants
described examples of how the shared vision inspired them in daily living or how the
congregation equipped members to live and make decisions informed by the shared
vision, people increasingly came to realize that there was not an existing shared vision for
ministry.
While this understanding was also present in the two individual baseline
interviews, it was strongest in the group baseline interview. In discussing and answering
the questions, the group seemed to realize with increasing agreement that there was not a
shared vision for ministry in the congregation. It reached a point where in response to the
beginning of question 5, ―How has the congregation‘s shared vision …‖ the group
literally interrupted the interviewer to state loudly, in unison, ―or lack thereof!‖ The
group realized that this was leading to a culture of grumbling and mutual attacks among
congregational members. As the conversation continued, participants discerned that this
was dangerous to the health of the congregation and could fracture the community if it
did not change. During the conversation, the group came to agree that there needed to be
a vision cultivation process and that there needed to be a shared vision for ministry.
The individual interviews revealed a weaker understanding of a lack of shared
vision for ministry in the congregation. In comparing the strength of the group‘s
163
understanding versus that of the two individuals‘ in the baseline interviews, it is difficult
to explain why there was such a conspicuous disparity. While this may be due to factors
such as the group dynamic of conversation and discernment, the increase in responsibility
of the group as congregational council members, or some other factor, it is difficult to
ascertain the true reason for the difference reliably without further research.
Data Relating to the Components of Shared Practices and Vision
Although there was a strongly shared understanding among the participants in the
baseline group interview that there was not a shared concept or perspective for making
decisions as a congregation, there were nonetheless aspects of experience with respect to
congregational life that participants identified as shared practices. While the baseline
perspective that there was no shared vision was evident within the group interview
responses, both group and individual interviewees shared components of these
understandings of congregational practices and perspectives.
In the baseline interviews, the group identified worship, a shared unity through a
relationship with Christ, a ―friendliness‖ that is evident in the congregation, and a shared
denominational perspective as elements of shared practices or perspectives. The
individuals identified a shared praxis of mutual care and concern (like the ―friendliness‖
concept from the group interview) similar to that of a family as an element of shared
congregational practice. One respondent described the congregation‘s mission as one of
caring for one another, with a movement to carry that practice out into the community. In
short, across all three interviews, there was clearly a shared perspective that the
congregation values relating to and caring for one another was an important aspect of
ministry and life together.
164
In the endline interviews, aspects of shared vision discussed in the baseline
interviews remained. One component that persisted from the baseline interview was the
perspective of mutual care and concern. The participants in the group interview noted that
the congregation members work together and care for one another in times of crisis.
On the other hand, there was evidence in the endline interviews of elements of the
congregation‘s newly-cultivated shared vision, as articulated in the purpose statement and
guiding principles. This vision to ―grow faith that moves us beyond ourselves‖ caused a
group interviewee to look out into the world more, and to have an increased awareness of
others. The vision was giving the person an increased awareness of spiritual and physical
suffering in the world. According to an individual interviewee, this newly cultivated
vision was affecting the congregation‘s quarterly participation in the program to house
homeless families at the church. This person also felt that the shared vision, as articulated
in the purpose statement and guiding principles, was motivating congregants toward
moving out to work in the community. The person noted that it helped inspire the
congregation to reach out and strengthen relationships with a nearby inner-city
congregation.
Two Perspectives: Invitational and Vocational31
The qualitative analysis of the group interview revealed data showing two shared
perspectives or visions for ministry among the members of the congregation. One vision
emphasizes an invitational role for the congregation, placing primary importance on
inviting others to come to the church for worship and spiritual nourishment. The second
31 While both perspectives might contain some elements of the other perspective, these monikers
seemed to describe the two perspectives in as non-pejorative a manner as possible. The researcher selected
these terms over others, such as traditional/contemporary, inward/outward, and church growth/missional.
165
vision emphasizes a vocational role for the congregation, placing primary importance on
encouraging and equipping congregants for ministry in vocation and daily living. The
researcher selected these terms as symbols to describe the two perspectives, with an effort
to communicate aspects of the perspectives without being pejorative.
Analysis of the group interview yielded this category as evidenced in the group
interview while participants interacted with one another in considering and discussing the
interview questions. Various participants seemed to address issues and share perspectives
from a particular mindset along this spectrum; in other words, no one person would be
completely invitational or vocational in his or her outlook. Rather, participants would
show a disposition or tendency to view questions and perceive reality from one of the two
perspectives. The group interviewees specifically described these perspectives; this
category was not evident in the individual interviews.
Invitational Perspective
Persons with a predominantly invitational perspective tended to focus on growing
the membership of the congregation. They saw outreach primarily as reaching out to the
community to invite persons to worship in the hopes that they might become members of
the congregation. This was the vision of the mission developer who is known for going
out into the community to knock on thousands of doors in neighborhoods and
subdivisions throughout the local and neighboring cities. This was done with a laudable
desire to grow the congregation to a size that could support the construction of a church
building and move forward there with the ministry of the congregation.
Thus, the persons with an invitational perspective in the group interview, for
example, specifically equated outreach with going into the community to knock on doors
166
and invite people to worship. During the intervention, the council even planned and led
an event that garnered strong participation by the congregation to go out into the nearby
neighborhoods to invite people to come to the church for an Independence Day event.
Invitational persons pointed out that in the past, conflict brought a call from
various folks with this perspective to return to the congregation‘s denominational roots
and traditional foundations. One person noted that folks in the congregation do not see
themselves as agents of God bearing Christ to the community or elsewhere in daily life.
Finally, one of the individual interviewees also noted a desire for visitors in worship to
identify themselves to the congregation prior to the start of worship.
Vocational Perspective
Persons with a predominantly vocational perspective, however, tended to focus on
embodying Christ in a sense of call to discuss and share faith with others. Persons with
this perspective would be more likely to seek to reach out and form mutual and
perichoretic relationships. This perspective also includes openness to newer,
non-traditional forms of worship and faith life that is lived and expressed personally.
In the baseline group interview, persons speaking from this perspective had a
focus on contemporary worship forms and songs. One person, for example, related a
story about a fellow member who threatened to cut his guitar strings with a pair of wire
cutters after he played his guitar during worship. One of the individual interviewees also
noted a desire to participate in the Damascus Travelers group and to read Centered Life32
32
Jack Fortin, The Centered Life: Awakened, Called, Set Free, Nurtured, 1st ed. (Minneapolis:
Augsburg Fortress, 2006).
167
in an effort to embrace and embody a vocational life lived from a relationship with Christ
at the center.
In the endline group interview, some with a vocational perspective advocated an
understanding that a new vision for ministry was emerging in the life of the congregation.
Participants noted that a new direction seemed to be emerging, that moved in the
direction of reaching out to the community with a desire for forming and shaping
relationships marked by mutuality and reciprocity. One person even recalled leaving a
personal comfort zone to include friends and their children in the congregation‘s
Vacation Bible School program. The person noted that this reaching out was something
that came as a direct result of the PAR intervention efforts.
Invitational/Vocational Interaction in the Group Interview
In the baseline group interview, persons engaging in dialog and answering the
interview questions noted the fact that there were two groups or concepts for
congregational identity and ministry within the membership. There had been verbal
clashes in congregational life between persons with the two perspectives. One such event
was the threat to damage the guitar described previously. Another person also noted that
during the recent call process there had been a push toward embodying a more traditional
denominational identity as opposed to the generic, non-denominational one of the
mission developer.
In the endline group interview, the distinctions between persons with invitational
and vocational perspectives were stronger. During the course of the interview, there was
a subtle back and forth between people advocating the two perspectives. During portions
of the interview, persons with the two perspectives posited and responded to one another
168
over the level of acceptance of the purpose and guiding principles statements. Those with
a predominantly vocational perspective perceived a widespread acceptance of a desire to
―grow faith that moves us beyond ourselves.‖ Others with a predominantly invitational
perspective felt that the vision was pushed from the top down rather than coming up from
the grass roots.
Nonetheless, even though there was this back and forth dialog between the
vocational and invitational folks, there was still a move from invitational to vocational in
persons with both perspectives. In the baseline group interview, one person with a
predominantly invitational perspective described a sense that the congregation needed to
move from an inward-direction of taking from the community to an outward-directed
giving stance. In the endline group interview, one person noted that there were numerous
personal changes to faith practices because of the vision cultivation process. In addition,
even though one invitational person noted that while individual members might not see
themselves as true agents of God, the person did think that people see the pastor, council
members, and ―certain people‖ as agents of God. This showed movement beyond the
pastor to include other laypersons as God‘s agents with a call33
to ministry. There was
shared thinking by persons with both perspectives that while it was not all encompassing,
there had nonetheless been ―baby steps‖ during the PAR intervention to move and change
perspectives toward a more missional and vocational perspective.
33
As was stated previously, vocatio, which is the root word of vocation, is Latin for ―call.‖
169
Changes in Perspectives and Vision for Life and Missional Activity
Qualitative analysis of the group interviews yielded data describing the extent of
shared vision, aspects of the shared vision, and the invitational/vocational perspectives of
the shared vision. While these aspects were evident in the two individual interviews, they
were primarily apparent in the group interviews.
In the individual interviews, however, qualitative analysis revealed a category
describing significant changes in perspectives and an increase in missional activity. Even
though the individual interviews revealed the greatest change from baseline to endline in
actual missional activity, there was also a discernable change from the PAR intervention
evident in the group interview.
Changes Evident in the Group Interview
Several of the persons who participated in the group interview indicated that there
were changes in perspectives and actions. One respondent noted in the endline interview
that the vision was causing the person to look into the world more, and that it was
increasing awareness of others. It was helping the person to see and to be more aware of
spiritual and physical suffering in the world.
Another respondent was specifically reaching out to others more in daily activities
and interactions. There was an understanding of the need for and a desire to embody
relationships intentionally characterized by mutuality and reciprocity in reaching out to
others.
Later in the interview, a respondent also pointed to a personal widening of
perspectives with respect to living with and in a missional faith. The person indicated that
this came in and because of the vision cultivation process.
170
Finally, a person in the group interview stated that there was more of an
intentional emphasis, both personally and in the congregation as a whole, to try to think
―outside of the box.‖ The person indicated that people talked more about new
possibilities for ministry due to the new paradigms that people discovered during the
vision cultivation process.
Changes Evident in the First Individual Interview
In the baseline interview, the first individual interviewee expressed a hope and a
desire to move to a prior bright spot in his34
journey and life of faith. In answering the
fourth question, ―Consider your personal faith life for a moment. How has the
congregation’s shared vision made a difference in your personal/the congregation’s faith
life?‖ he also mentioned that he did not see a strong connection between his
understanding of the congregational vision and his personal life.
In the endline interview, however, it became evident that there had been change in
perspectives and attitudes regarding personal and congregational ministry. The
interviewee was dreaming and brainstorming ideas for congregational ministry in the
community. He seemed to have a stronger missional imagination. For example, he was
trying to think of ways that the congregation‘s facilities could be used to serve the
community. He specifically had spoken with others about the feasibility of starting a
community garden for people in the surrounding area to share and use. He was also trying
to think of ways to let people know about the congregation and invite them to worship
and to be a part of the congregation. He recognized that he was intentionally trying to
34
This pronoun was selected randomly to allow for a better narrative flow and may or may not
match the gender of the first interviewee.
171
work ―outside of the comfort zone‖ and he realized that he was speaking from a new
perspective and way of viewing reality. He identified it as a way of viewing reality from
a missional perspective. Finally, he said that he felt that the vision articulated in the
cultivation process was a potential source for future congregational activity.
Changes Evident in the Second Individual Interview
The second interviewee showed the greatest impact or change because of the PAR
intervention. There had been conversations about the idea of the missional church prior to
the PAR intervention. In addition, her35
baseline interview occurred after the
congregation retreat. Thus, there are aspects of the baseline interview that were impacted
by the PAR intervention and preceding events. Even so, there still seems to be significant
and observable change from the baseline to the endline interviews.
In the baseline interview, the respondent indicated that her relationship with God
was beginning to affect relationships at her workplace in a factory. She was seeing God
as active in these relationships as she worked with subordinates to treat them with dignity
and in ways that were characterized more by mutual burden bearing than by top-down
direction and discipline. She was beginning to see long-term impact from these actions
and perspectives as she took personal interest in her coworkers‘ life struggles and
situations. Increasingly, she based her managerial style upon the emerging new vision, as
she acted out of a prayerful relationship with God.
Endline data indicate continued growth based upon the PAR intervention. While
she gained some of the perspectives through participation in the Damascus Travelers
35 This pronoun was selected because it is the opposite the previously selected pronoun for
inclusivity, for better narrative flow, and to distinguish the second interviewee from the first. It may or may
not match the gender of the second interviewee.
172
groups, most of the perspectives came through the conversations and meetings during the
vision cultivation process itself.
Her vision for ministry had been based on an understanding of the congregation
as a family who cares for one another. After the PAR intervention, her vision was
primarily one of reaching out to invite people from society‘s fringes that congregation
members might not normally invite. She described perspectives that she gained by being
open to change and experimentation, using open-minded processes of discernment. She
eschewed a consumer church mentality. She stated that in the practice of her faith, she
was moving beyond previous experiences of worship and church life as a rote liturgical
enactment that does not fully engage the heart and mind. Instead, she was actively living
her faith and worshipping more holistically. She found that she was having more
conversations about faith with others rather than keeping it ―bottled up‖ as she grew
spiritually with the process. She was also seeing others grow mutually in faith as she
related to them through this experience.
Specifically, her newfound missional perspectives and relationality directly
influenced her work relationships and environment. As she reached out to relate with
others, specifically those on the ―fringes,‖ she found that people would respond with trust
and would talk with her more openly about their personal problems and difficulties. As
she intentionally took time to relate with her coworkers, to care about them, and to bear
burdens mutually with them, they would also take a cue from her by reaching out to one
another to relate in the same way. This complemented a similar initiative to create a more
caring work environment from her company‘s new owners. She felt that the vision
cultivation process gave her the insights to do this in her work.
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Previously, workers perceived supervisors as a threat. Supervisors would watch
workers closely and discipline them harshly. Since the PAR intervention, workers were
beginning to see one another and supervisors increasingly as working together as a team
and relating to one another in relationships of mutual caring. Problems became
opportunities for learning. When coworkers were having personal problems, people
would respond with mutual care and support. Supervisors were even giving workers more
flexibility to adjust work hours to handle personal problems.
These changes occurred during the PAR intervention. Certainly, this experience
would not be automatically reproducible in every context. Even so, the interviewee
clearly described these changes and attributed these new perspectives to her actions as
stemming from the vision cultivation process.
Missional Praxis Bringing New Vision and Understanding
Qualitative analysis of the interview data yielded an unexpected finding that
missional praxis yielded a deeper faith and understanding of missional vision. The first
individual interviewee, for example, described a greater understanding of the cultivated
vision as articulated ―on paper.‖ He expressed a desire to move from discerning identity
to living it. He could see potential in the newly cultivated vision, anticipated an increase
in missional activity in the congregation, and could see future benefits coming from the
articulated vision. However, he did not describe any personal experiences of living with
the vision and its effects. He had some ideas for moving forward with missional vision
(such as starting a community garden) but there was no experience or concrete planning
to do so. Thus, changed thinking did not bring a noticeable change in activity.
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Participants in the group interview also mentioned specific missional actions that
brought a deeper understanding of missional concepts and an increased desire to act
based upon the newly cultivated vision. One respondent, for example, described an
experience of leaving the comfort zone to share faith with other friends.
The second interviewee described another example of missional praxis nurturing
new perspectives. This person clearly described a deeper appreciation and appropriation
of the cultivated missional vision by practicing missional living. Through the
congregation‘s quarterly ministry of housing the homeless for a week, she reached
outside of her comfort zone to get to know the members of the homeless families that the
congregation housed. In this experience, she learned new ways of seeing and perceiving
others. This, coupled with her perception and observation of her spouse‘s interactions
with Family Promise guests, contributed to increased awareness of persons ―on the
fringes.‖ This paved the way for relating with others at work based upon missional vision
as described previously. It would seem that as the person continued to behave missionally
and then reflected upon the activity, new understandings brought even newer and deeper
understandings and appreciations of missional vision that could lead to further changes in
practice. Apparently, this continuing loop of praxis–reflection–change may continue to
lead her to further growth and action with missional vision.
Other Factors Influencing Research and the Outcome
Qualitative analysis yielded insights into three outside factors that influenced the
outcome of the PAR intervention and research. These factors include the relationship and
legacy of the mission developer and interim pastor, the impact of a recent denominational
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decision to ordain partnered gay clergy, and concerns regarding a lack of financial
resources.
Mission Developer Perspectives
In the baseline group interview, as described previously, there were references to
a preexisting shared vision of inviting new members and constructing a building.36
These
references pointed to the ministry of the mission developer and his relationship to the
congregation. There were also issues related to his departure and the ministry of the
subsequent interim pastor.
During the course of the baseline group interview, respondents discussed the work
of the mission developer. Early in the congregation‘s history, the mission developer cast
the vision and members embraced it in a top-down manner. This limited members‘
activity, even as it yielded positive results of congregational growth. This had the effect
of limiting controversy and conflict. When the mission developer left, however, there was
a sense of widespread disunity as the unifying power left and various disparate visions for
ministry held by the members came forth. Several members viewed the interim pastor
who followed the mission developer unfavorably. As a result, the congregation
transferred the expectations for leadership onto the president. The person who served as
president at that time stated that it took approximately 35-40 hours a week (aside from
the person‘s regular occupation) to meet the congregation‘s demands for leadership.
36
The author views these observations neither negatively nor positively. It is standard practice, in
planting a congregation, to focus on growth in numbers and to construct facilities for the congregation to
utilize. In fact, the mission developer possesses an impressive ability to knock on doors and invite
community residents to worship. This discussion simply attempts to show data gathered during the
interviews as a matter of factual representation of outside influences and their impact on answering the
research question.
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Impact of Denominational Decisions Regarding Gay Clergy
All interviewees noted the fact that the denominational decision to allow
partnered gay clergy caused several members of the congregation to leave. This trend
continued through the time of the PAR intervention and research, such that
approximately one third of the congregation‘s membership had departed the congregation
by the end of the research.
In the baseline group interview, for example, interviewees noted that this issue
had divided a unified congregation. They lamented the decision and noted that they were
feeling its effects. The individual interviewees also noted in the baseline interviews that it
was difficult to understand why so many people had left the congregation. Even so, one
individual who did not agree with the decision also did not want to exclude gays from the
congregation‘s ministry. The divisiveness of the issue also bothered respondents in all
three interviews because of the loss of members.
In the endline interviews, respondents noted that the congregation membership
continued to dwindle because of this decision and other unspecified ―nasty blows.‖ There
was a perception that people in the congregation were still ―reeling‖ because of the
decision. One person noted that people who were leaving the congregation over this
decision might be doing so because they were failing to see themselves as Christ‘s agents
in the world. Finally, an individual interviewee noted that while the decision was
divisive, it had the benefit of being an opportunity to welcome a broader range of people
into the congregation‘s fellowship, with potential for positive repercussions.
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Financial Concerns
In the baseline group interview, the group also mentioned financial concerns as a
major issue in the life of the congregation. They noted that the building and the
congregation‘s finances were a major focus.
In the endline interview, they pointed out that they were seeing many members
who were wrestling with pragmatic fiduciary responsibilities that might have been
reducing their willingness to risk faith to step forward into ―the unknown.‖ They also
noted that they saw people as seeking to find a balance between fiduciary responsibilities
and faith.
Conclusion
In looking at the events that transpired during the PAR intervention, the results of
the FMS and quantitative analysis, and the results of the interviews and qualitative
analysis, it is clear that the PAR intervention had a significant impact on the congregation
and its relationships with the community. The quantitative data from the FMS produced
broad data from the congregation. This data yielded insights that the researcher used in
planning and implementing specific elements and emphases of the intervention. The FMS
data analysis showed that the congregation was more attentive to community needs.
The qualitative data also provided deeper insights through conversation with a
group and two individuals into specific ways the individuals‘ and congregation‘s vision
for ministry had changed through the time of the intervention. The qualitative data
showed that in the lives of some of the interviewees, there had been significant change in
behavior and perspectives. The ramifications of these impacts will now be considered.
Huntley
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CHAPTER 6
CONCLUSIONS WITH THEOLOGICAL AND THEORETICAL REFLECTION
The Spirit is not in the possession of the church but is Lord over the church,
guiding the church from its limited, partial, and distorted understanding and
embodiment of the truth into the fullness of the truth in Jesus, who is the one in
whom all things consist (Col. 1:17). Not every spirit is the Holy Spirit. Not every
form of vitality is his work. There is need for the gift of discernment. …
There is no substitute for the gift of discernment, no set of rules or institutional
provisions by which we can be relieved of the responsibility for discernment.
Dialogue cannot be ―made safe for all possible risks.‖ The Christian who enters
into dialogue with people of other faiths and ideologies is accepting the risk. But
to put my Christianity at risk is precisely the way by which I can confess Jesus
Christ as Lord—Lord over all worlds and Lord over my faith. It is only as the
church accepts the risk that the promise is fulfilled that the Holy Spirit will take
all the treasures of Christ, scattered by the Father’s bounty over all the people
and cultures of mankind, and declare them to the church as the possession of
Jesus.1
In Open Secret, Lesslie Newbigin describes the Christendom Church as having a
top-down mindset with respect to missional activity. He does not describe it in those
terms, but the sentiment is present. In this top-down mindset, expert Christendom
missionaries enter other places, faiths, and cultures in an attempt to proclaim the Gospel
and Christianize the local inhabitants. The missionaries, who unquestioningly bring the
truth of the Gospel, share the Christian message and expect others to reject preexisting
beliefs and accept it.
1 Lesslie Newbigin, The Open Secret: An Introduction to the Theology of Mission, Revised. (Wm.
B. Eerdmans Publishing Company, 1995), 187-188.
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With more of a bottom-up mindset and grass-roots focus, Newbigin calls for
Christians to approach other cultures and faiths from a mentality founded in one of
mutual respect rather than from one that views others as objects to be evangelized.
Missionaries enter a culture joining God who is already at work in the missio Dei.
Through dialog and mutual discernment, both parties risk pre-existing beliefs in sharing
their faith with one another.
In order for people to engage one another in this type of mutual and egalitarian
relationship, both parties must be open and vulnerable in order to embrace each other
fully. This openness means that both parties respect and listen to one another, change in
some way through the encounter, and accept the risk attendant with true openness.
Through this type of conversation, two parties can engage in cogenerative dialog that
seeks to discern an unexpected outcome. This outcome will probably challenge the two
parties to question their preconceived notions and to embrace the aspects of the resultant
dialog upon which they both agree.
This open vulnerability to engage one another in cogenerative discernment is a
key aspect of the grass-roots missional vision cultivation process in the PAR intervention.
This research shows that utilizing a cogenerative vision cultivation process infused with
mutuality and conversation is effective in bringing the researchers and participants
together in a way that encourages people to shape and embrace the process and the result.
It also showed that, at times, activity founded in a heavy-handed top-down mindset
between the researcher and the participants resulted in a response of resistance or
rejection. The vision cultivation process impacted both the researcher and the
participants, changing them through shared activity and dialog.
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The theoretical and theological concepts described in chapters 2 and 3 were
helpful in planning, influencing, and implementing the PAR intervention. In addition,
considering the research findings from theoretical and theological perspectives provided
insights into answering the research question, ―How can cultivating missional vision in a
newly-developed congregation impact the lives of congregants and the community?‖
These insights inspired questions that may be helpful for future research and ministry.
Finally, the data analysis and interpretation yielded unexpected new insights for
missional leaders to consider.
Impact of Theoretical and Theological Foundations
The theoretical and theological foundations for considering the research question
were discussed in chapters two and three. These foundations directly impacted the
planning and implementation of the PAR intervention. They include the need to foster a
grass-roots cogenerative process, the intent to cultivate missional vision patterned after
the social and perichoretic aspects of the Trinity, and the invisible influence, similar to
that of an electromagnetic field, that vision has on persons united as an organization.
A Grass-Roots Process that Invites Participation in Cultivating Shared Vision
Grass Roots Rather Than Top-Down Vision Cultivation
The process an organization uses in working together to cultivate shared vision
has a direct impact on the result of the process. A faulty process often yields an
undesirable result, while a healthy process has the best chances for yielding a beneficial
outcome. This means that an organization that seeks to live together with shared vision
needs to discern and define that vision in a manner that cogeneratively cultivates shared
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vision. In order for an organization to maximize the likelihood that members will
embrace and share the vision, it should encompass four main components. It should seek
to deliberate and to act in ways that are egalitarian, increases interconnectedness,
cogeneratively cultivates shared vision, and provides multiple entry points. In attending
to these components, a process of cogeneratively cultivating shared vision inherently
builds organizational habits of working together with shared vision.
In order for the missional vision cultivation process to yield a vision that the
congregation would embrace widely, it was essential that the process itself would
embody these characteristics. By inviting congregants at Living Water to cogeneratively
discern and describe a shared vision for ministry, the process inherently nurtured an
environment of mutual discernment that moved the congregation to embody a shared
vision of mutual ministry.
One example of this occurred in the Damascus Travelers planning process within
the Discipleship Commission. Rather than bringing the concept of the Damascus
Travellers to the commission with a list of tasks that the commission needed to
accomplish in order to implement the small group ministry, the researcher brought the
idea to the commission and fostered conversation about the program‘s goals and
objectives. During the course of the conversation, the commission shaped the program
mutually. In the conversation, they decided to invite every member of the congregation
personally to participate. The commission members took ownership of the program and
enthusiastically agreed to do the phone work. They even named the program Damascus
Travelers and the name helped shape their shared vision for the project and its
implementation.
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A failure by means of top-down vision casting occurred when the researcher
unilaterally decided to provide a prayer labyrinth for the Damascus Travelers to utilize.
There was little conversation about the helpfulness of using a prayer labyrinth, little
training for the participants in how to use it, and no cogenerative conversation about it.
Thus, even though the researcher spent several hours creating the prayer labyrinth, the
Damascus Travelers only used it sparingly. This highlights the need for grass roots,
cogenerative vision cultivation.
It is also important to note that persons not elected or appointed to official
leadership positions can nonetheless serve as leaders in a grass-roots cultivation process.
During the informal conversation after the congregational retreat, participants
cogeneratively discerned a need to hold subsequent Wednesday night meetings and invite
the wider congregation to join the process. The participants in this conversation included
the researcher, elected lay leaders, and other members of the congregation. These persons
took on an important, albeit unofficial, leadership role in expanding the process to
include more people in the congregation.
An example of an entry point into egalitarian vision cultivation occurred when the
congregation responded with vigorous participation in reaching out to the community
after the June 14 council meeting. After discussing the concepts of liminality and
communitas, the council planned events for the congregation to connect with the
community in July. Again, the group made these plans cogeneratively with teachings and
insights from the researcher, and together they embraced the ideas with the congregation.
The planning and implementation of the event increased interconnectedness for those
who participated. With this bottom-up discernment and action, the researcher, the
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council, and the congregation worked together to enter liminality and experience
communitas through missional action. In fact, by including all four components of
grass-roots vision cultivation, the events seemed to encourage a fuller shared experience
and a better result.
Finally, respondents to the group interview highlighted an example of the risks of
top-down vision casting in their description of the congregation‘s past vision to construct
the church building. The mission developer did an excellent job of inviting and drawing
people from the community to participate in the congregation‘s ministry. The mission
developer‘s vision was powerful and helpful in forming the congregation and in
constructing the building. When the mission developer left, however, the congregation
seemingly did not have ownership of the vision or possess the skills to continue with
cogenerative vision discernment. This contributed to difficulties when the mission
developer departed, and the group clearly described a lack of shared vision for ministry in
the congregation. Again, a process and tendency for grass-roots vision discernment,
founded in love, may have been more beneficial to unite and motivate the congregation in
the long term.
The Ability of Vision, Lovingly Shared, to Unite and Motivate
Shared vision is a key factor in uniting a group together as an organization. In a
congregation who voluntarily unites in mission, it is essential for the vision to not only
connect the members, but also for it to inspire and motivate them to work together with
shared purpose. This common interest must be stronger than personal concerns in order
for the individuals to decide to sacrifice personal desires in furthering the purposes of the
larger organization. Therefore, a love that inspires members to sacrifice in embodying the
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shared vision is an essential aspect of a shared vision cultivation process in a
congregation.
The two individual respondents in the qualitative interviews indicated that the
tendency for the congregation to love and care for one another mutually was an important
aspect of the shared vision for ministry. Both interviewees described instances where
love motivated them and others in the congregation to sacrifice personal concerns and
unite in shared ministry.
Respondents in the group interview also noted a new dimension of the
congregation‘s ministry emerging through the PAR intervention. They indicated that the
congregation was moving in a direction of reaching out to the community to form and
shape relationships marked by mutuality and reciprocity. In this case, the
newly-discerned shared vision inspired congregants to move beyond themselves
sacrificially to others outside of the congregation.
One of the individual qualitative interviewees described a strong connection
between his understanding of the congregation‘s vision and his changed activity in
praxis. He was brainstorming ways to connect with the community with a new missional
imagination that conversations during the PAR intervention sparked. He was even acting
upon these new ideas to create fresh ways for the congregation to connect together with
the community. He did this, for example, by working to start a new community garden on
the congregation‘s property.
Finally, the second interviewee noted a dramatic increase in missional activity in
the workplace due to new perspectives she gained through the vision cultivation process.
She described the fact that she was intentionally reaching out to coworkers on the fringe
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of her work community to build connections based upon her new understandings of
missional living. She based this intentional relationality on a new understanding of
trinitarian perichoretic and mutual relationality that brought dramatic changes in her
workplace environment. Along with other influences from management at her workplace,
her intentional relationality even impacted relationships her coworkers had with one
another. This was helping to change her agonistic work environment to one where
coworkers were increasingly acting with mutual care, compassion, and teamwork.
Social Trinitarian and Perichoretic Foundations of Vision Cultivation
An essential theological component in missional vision and a foundation of the
cultivation process is the concept of the social Trinity. According to the social model of
the triune God, the three persons of God exist in a perfect, mutual, loving, and
interdwelling union. God‘s unity of three persons comes largely from the perfect and
loving union wherein God is one God, existing as three persons acting in concert with
one another in one divine will. The three persons of the Trinity perichoretically relate to
one another, embrace creation (including humanity), and act with one will. As God
graciously invites humanity to join the same perichoretic fellowship, God restores
relationships of mutual accompaniment.
While it is important for the result of a missional vision cultivation process to
contain perichoretic aspects, it is also important for the process itself to be mutual and
perichoretic. The Damascus Travelers groups were an opportunity for this type of
fellowship patterned after the relational social Trinity. Several groups formed close
personal relationships to such a depth that there were several deep, even tearful,
interactions. These intimate and perichoretic social ties seemed to form part of the
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foundation for the purpose statement, ―to grow faith that moves us beyond ourselves,‖
along with the guiding principles, ―courageously bearing our neighbor's burdens,‖ and
―relating to one another with respect and honesty.‖
According to the individual interviewees, the Damascus Travelers experience also
helped to foster an environment of trust that impacted perceptions about the mutual care
of congregants for one another. This experience, along with others gained through other
aspects of the vision cultivation process, made a significant impact in the missional
vision, worldview, and activity of the two interviewees. This mutual conversation was a
natural, perichoretic experience of the social Trinity enfleshed in the community.
A final example of Trinitarian relationality occurred spontaneously, in the form of
a self-forming, bottom-up community2 after the congregation retreat. After a day of deep
and thoughtful discussion about the missional church, God‘s purpose, and shared guiding
principles for Living Water, several participants decided to stop at a local restaurant for
continued fellowship. During the course of the informal conversation, participants
continued the retreat‘s discussion. During this spontaneous and informal conversation, it
was clear that the social Trinity was active in the perichoretic dialog to unleash new
perspectives that participants embraced and appropriated. Because of the conversation,
the participants with the shared vision served as a catalyst to continue and extend the
conversation at Living Water during the Wednesday night conversations that they
advocated. This shared vision served to unite them, like the field effect, with a desire to
continue the conversation and vision cultivation in these Wednesday night meetings.
2 See chapter 2 for a discussion regarding self-forming, bottom-up communities.
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Vision and the Field Effect
The concept of vision acting upon an organization to unite people invisibly in
shared purpose and action was also present in the vision cultivation process. According to
electromagnetic theory, a changing magnetic field along a wire will induce a
corresponding current in the wire. Conversely, a changing electric current in a wire
creates an invisible corresponding magnetic field.
The field effect that invisibly unites electric currents and magnetic fields is
analogous to the effect that a shared vision and purpose has in uniting a group to form an
organization. As the vision permeates the organization, the unseen force of vision has the
effect of bringing various, seemingly disconnected actions into concert as the people
accomplish the shared purpose and vocation of the organization.3
One of the individual qualitative interviewees identified the field effect nature of
shared vision as an impact in changing his perspectives and actions in personal and
congregational ministry. The interviewee seemed to have a stronger missional
imagination because of the vision cultivation process and the shared vision that emerged
from the conversation. For example, the person was thinking of ways to use the
congregation‘s facilities for ministry in the community, notably by establishing a
community garden. The person stated that he actively ―stepped outside of the comfort
zone‖ using a phrase that was part of the cultivation conversations. He had even
discussed the idea with others and was actively working to enact his new ideas. This was
one unexpected way that the field effect of the vision, along with the cultivation process
3 Wheatley, Leadership and the New Science, 55-56.
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itself, shaped congregants‘ perspectives and activity. It is clear that the vision cultivation
process had an impact on this interviewee‘s missional vision and activity.
Impact of the Cultivation Process
Theoretical and theological aspects discussed in chapters 2 and 3 give particularly
strong insights into the PAR intervention and the impact it had on the lives of
congregants and how they relate to the community. One of these aspects is the concept of
promise, tools, and bargain that the researcher utilized to invite participation and shape
imagination for how the intervention might benefit the individual participants and the
congregation as a whole. Another illuminating aspect is the concept of liminality and
communitas. Finally, the focus on missional vocation, the Holy Spirit, the missio Dei, and
the reconciliation in God‘s reign are evident in the process and resulting cultivated
missional vision.
Promise, Tools, and Bargain
In order for an effort to organize people to be effective, it must capture the interest
of the people in the group, it must have structures that facilitate the health and growth of
the organization, and it must inspire the group‘s members to participate energetically. In
seeking to organize a group, leaders can hold out promise to the members that will
encourage them to participate in the organization. Leaders also provide tools that
effectively facilitate participation and interaction as the members engage the organization
and receive the promised benefits. Finally, leaders inspire members to give of themselves
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through a bargain that defines what they bring to the group and give to others in sharing
the promised benefits.4
The elements of promise, tool, and bargain proved to be very helpful as a way to
invite participation in the vision cultivation process in various areas of the congregation‘s
organizational structure. In the top-down method of vision casting, the leader casts the
vision and tries to convince and motivate followers to accept and embrace it. The
top-down method places the leader in a position of superiority over the followers as the
expert who has better insights into God‘s will for the congregation.
Instead, based upon the positive response of congregants in the research, it would
appear that the elements of promise, tool, and bargain were a better fit for the grass-roots
vision cultivation process. With these elements, the leader shares the promise, designs the
tools, and invites the congregation to accept the bargain. This inherently respects the
personhood of the congregant to decide to accept the bargain, participate in the process,
and embrace the cultivated vision. It is more egalitarian, because it respects people and
invites insights and participation from the wider congregation. It differentiates the roles
of leader and congregation in mutual and cogenerative ministry without setting up a
hierarchical structure of expert and amateur. The concept of cultivating missional vision
using promise, tool, and bargain seemed to invite and encourage cogenerative
participation rather than demand and force acceptance by power and manipulation.
These elements of inviting and encouraging participation in the process were
present in various degrees as the researcher dealt with the council and the Discipleship
Commission. They were also present as the researcher and the council mutually expanded
4 Shirky, Here Comes Everybody, 260ff.
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the process to include the wider congregation. The basic itinerary for introducing these
concepts was:
1. Introduce and explain the tool. Starting with an explanation of the framework and
timeline for the process seemed to help alleviate anxiety and provide a foundation
for further discussion about the shape and parameters of the vision cultivation
process.
2. Highlight the need for a vision cultivation process. Cogenerative discussion
inviting participants to discuss the need for the process helped foster lively
participation.
3. Discuss the promise. Having described the tool and highlighted the need, further
discussion encouraged brainstorming possibilities and creating hope for the
benefits the process offered.
4. Encourage investment in the bargain. The final aspect included an invitation for
participants to invest the time and energy to participate in the process and help
discern and describe the congregation‘s shared missional vision in moving
forward together.
Again, it was important to encourage and invite participation in the vision
cultivation process carefully without doing so in a manipulative or coercive manner.
Rather, by cogeneratively discussing the promise, tools, and bargain in various forums,
participants helped shape even the process itself in a cogenerative manner.
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Inviting the Council into the Vision Cultivation Process
Prior to the beginning of the PAR intervention, the researcher shared the basic
tools of the process with the council as they read and studied Daubert‘s Living Lutheran5
book together. As they discussed this material, the researcher also shared the overall
research timeline, and the council formally agreed to participate in the process. This
allowed the council to understand the overall process fully and to accept the bargain with
a clear understanding of their role in the protocol.
Preparing for the PAR intervention by involving the council beforehand in this
way helped strengthen the impact of the process on both the council and the
congregation. The council embraced the promise enthusiastically and participated deeply
in all aspects of the cultivation process. Their conversation during the group qualitative
interviews also provided the researcher and the council with further understanding of the
need for and benefits of the vision cultivation process.
Working with the Discipleship Commission and Damascus Travelers
The researcher discussed the concept of the Damascus Travelers with the
Discipleship Commission immediately prior to the start of the PAR intervention. The
group discussed various aspects of the objectives of the small group program, along with
the program‘s role within the larger vision cultivation process. As the group discussed
and honed the tools and promise of the program, their overall enthusiasm and investment
in the program grew. The enthusiasm grew to the point where the group members devised
the extent of the bargain and the method for inviting the congregation to participate in the
5 Daubert, Living Lutheran: Renewing Your Congregation.
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program. Because of this cogenerative discussion, the entire Discipleship Commission
committed not only to participate in the program, but also to call every active member of
the congregation personally and to invite them to participate in it as well. In this way,
cogenerative egalitarian participation increased the Discipleship Commission‘s
investment in the bargain of the intervention.
The Damascus Travelers program was a key element of the PAR intervention. It
fostered growth as disciples of Christ, it helped to develop and deepen perichoretic
relationships of mutual burden bearing, and it encouraged missional imagination and
synergism of the participants in the vision cultivation process. Quantitative endline data
from the group and the two individual interviews, along with an informal evaluative
conversation with several Damascus Travelers participants after the program‘s
completion, substantiated the finding that the Damascus Travelers played a key
component in drawing the wider congregation into accepting the bargain to participate in
the vision cultivation process.
Inviting the Congregation into the Vision Cultivation Process
In addition to the role that the Discipleship Commission and the Damascus
Travelers program played in drawing the congregation into the conversation, the council
also created and shaped unexpected elements of the process. At the June 14 council
meeting, the researcher discussed the concepts of liminality and communitas. The council
enthusiastically embraced the ideas and encouraged the researcher and one another to
share personal experiences and perspectives as they discussed the concept of ―moving
beyond the comfort zone‖ with the wider congregation. During the conversation, the
council cogeneratively fashioned its own intervention in the congregation in the form of
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opportunities to connect with the wider community during the month of July. Together
with the researcher, the council articulated the promise of reaching beyond the
congregation‘s comfort zone with these tools, and invited the congregation to participate
in these opportunities.
The congregation responded energetically to the council‘s invitation. Members
who had previously shown an aversion to such activity participated wholeheartedly. The
quantity and strength of the congregation‘s response was surprising to the researcher and
to several members of the congregation and council. By entering a liminal experience as
they stepped together outside of their collective comfort zone, the participants shared an
inspiring and intense experience of comradery and communitas.
Liminality and Communitas
As members of a community move beyond safety, security, comfort, and
convenience, they can experience liminality that moves them beyond themselves and
controlled environments to experience God‘s provision in the wilderness through which
God can create communitas. Missional leaders often work to inspire others to move
beyond the limits of comfort zones in order to engage in shared liminal experiences. The
community also trusts God to work, shape, and form deeper and stronger cogenerative
relationships of mutual burden bearing.
In the congregational retreat, the participants seemed to experience liminality as
they left the comfort and familiarity of their hometowns to journey for a daylong retreat
at a retreat facility. During the conversation in the morning sessions, participants formed
bonds in which they shared increasingly personal perspectives, concerns, and hopes. For
lunch, the facility staff inadvertently served the participants‘ food to another group. This
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unexpected problem served to heighten the sense of liminality, and as participants waited
in the steamy July heat for the kitchen staff to prepare a second meal, communitas began
to form as the participants joked with one another and expanded upon previous
discussions.
This comradery continued as the participants, in an example of grass roots,
self-forming community, gathered for refreshments after the retreat in an impromptu
gathering at a nearby eating establishment. The shared liminal experience of leaving
familiar environs to overcome adversity and discuss the congregation‘s vision for
ministry seemed to unite them in bonds of fellowship and a form of communitas.
The shared bonds of communitas nurtured during the congregational retreat
impacted the overall congregational vision cultivation process. First, the idea for the
Wednesday night components of the cultivation process came directly from the
impromptu meeting of participants following the retreat. This was not in the original
plan, and the researcher embraced the idea and worked with the council to implement it.
Second, even though the retreat participants experienced the cultivation process at the
retreat, they nonetheless were passionately involved in the repeat cultivation process on
the Wednesday nights. Finally, since they contemplated and discussed several of the
process discussion topics at the retreat, they tended to help focus the conversations at the
Wednesday night meetings in ways that furthered the goals of the missional vision
cultivation process. In this way, the communitas experience of the congregation retreat
gained through the liminality of stepping outside of comfort zones to experience shared
cogenerative discernment had a strong impact on the cultivation process for the
congregation as a whole.
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Missional Vocation, the Holy Spirit, the Missio Dei, and God‘s Reign
Through the daily vocation and faithful activity of God‘s people, the Holy Spirit
does the loving work of Christ to redeem and reconcile the world to God. The Spirit gifts
and works in the world through God‘s people to do this. As the people of God use their
gifts and talents in ways shaped by God‘s vision for life, God works in the world. The
Spirit works in and through various people to accomplish the universal missio Dei, even
if individuals do not recognize the unifying and unified work of the Spirit in their
individual gifts and vocations. In this, the Spirit frees people from the dark powers of sin
and unites them to God and one another perichoretically as they embody the kenotic,
self-giving God who lifts a fallen humanity. Through their callings and vocations, God
works in the world, invites others to enter God‘s kingdom, and redeems people from a
world ruled by power and darkness. Efforts through these aspects of the PAR intervention
impacted the congregation‘s vision-discernment and decision-making process. The
quantitative and qualitative data also reveal impacts that the PAR intervention had on
respondents.
In reviewing the baseline quantitative Faith Maturity Survey (FMS) data, the
researcher concluded that the data showed strong internal faith aspects, such as
understanding and acceptance of creedal statements like, ―Jesus is the Son of God who
died on a cross and rose again.‖6 Even so, the average response to (O)utward faith aspects
was 10 percent lower than the average for (I)nward or (C)onnecting aspects of faith.7
This finding caused the researcher to focus extensively on encouraging congregants to
6 Question 2 from the FMS: Benson, Donahue, and Erickson, ―The Faith Maturity Scale:
Conceptualization, Measurement, and Empirical Validation,‖ 173.
7 See chapter 5, ―Perspectives in Relating to Others beyond the Congregation.‖
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look outside of the congregation and to work as participants in the missio Dei to embody
the work of the Holy Spirit through vocations in the caring, redeeming, and reconciling
reign of God. This seemed to have a statistically significant impact in the group aged
18-59, as they showed increases in scores to outward-oriented questions, and a near
statistically significant increase in the overall O category score. This effort clearly
impacted the vision cultivation process, as the community intentionally decided to step
outside of their comfort zones and as they ultimately agreed that God‘s purpose for the
congregation was to ―grow faith that moves us beyond ourselves.‖8
Several participants in the qualitative group interview, along with both individual
interviewees, pointed to the impact of the PAR intervention in shaping perspectives and
in encouraging a stronger focus and ministry outside of the congregation. Both group and
individual interviewees stated that they were looking into the world more and that they
had an increased awareness of others because of the process. The congregation reached
out to deepen relationships with a nearby inner-city congregation. Finally, an individual
interviewee gave a detailed description of the impact that the PAR intervention had on
her perspectives and activities in her workplace. She began to see her work as a
vocation—a vocatio or calling—to live the missio Dei. Previously, she indicated that she
did not notice people on the ―fringes.‖ Because of her new perspectives, she was
specifically connecting and relating with these fringe persons. This, along with other
influences at her workplace, contributed to an experience of God‘s redeeming,
reconciling, and gracious reign confronting the workplace powers of division and
agonistic tendencies that she had experienced previously.
8 Emphasis added.
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Finally, there was evidence, both in the group qualitative interview and in the
researcher‘s notes relating to the congregation forum, that the PAR intervention fostered
a new vision for ministry among various congregants. The researcher discovered these
perspectives, labeling them as vocational and invitational, near the end of the PAR
intervention. These perspectives were evident in the group qualitative interviews. They
were also evident in congregational dialog during the congregation forum and special
meeting near the end of the cultivation process as congregants discussed and adopted the
proposed guiding principles and purpose statement.
It is reasonable to expect that any intervention to a system will engender a
corrective or counteractive response. In this case, the corrective response took the form of
an impetus to retreat from an outward-directed vocational vision to an inward-directed
invitational vision. The researcher found that persons who advocated enthusiastically for
an invitational vision were also persons who had minimal to no participation in the vision
cultivation process. The opposite was also true. This also supports a finding that the
vision cultivation process impacted the lives of congregants and how they relate to the
community. In this case, to the extent that congregants participated in the process, they
also grasped and accepted the cultivated shared vision as their own.
Possibilities for Further Research
Although the PAR intervention in this research had an impact to varying degrees
on the lives of congregants and how they relate to the community, the limited scope of
the intervention and its enactment revealed questions for further research and inquiry.
These opportunities include the following questions:
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What role do core faith values play in perspectives and openness to cultivating
missional vision? One finding, for example, is that almost twice as many
respondents answered always true as those who answered never true in rating the
quantitative FMS statement, ―I believe that I must obey God‘s rules and
commandments in order to be saved.‖9 This statement would seem to be in
conflict with the concept of being justified by grace through faith apart from
works of law. Considering the fact that so many congregants hold this and other
points of view, how do these perspectives shape discernment and appropriation of
missional vision? How do other social and theological perspectives influence the
vision and the cultivation process, for good or for ill? How can congregants
discern their charismata and work to free others from the dark powers of sin,
bondage, and oppression that prevent them from being reconciled to God and
experiencing God‘s reconciling reign?
How do congregational or community perspectives and traditions influence a
vision cultivation process? For example, what affect would a larger or stronger
tradition in an established congregation have on the impact of a missional vision
cultivation process? How would one cultivate missional vision in a congregation
with a deep-seated agonistic culture? How would one cultivate deeper missional
vision in a healthy congregation that is already actively engaged in missional
activity in the community and beyond?
9 Benson, Donahue, and Erickson, ―The Faith Maturity Scale: Conceptualization, Measurement,
and Empirical Validation,‖ 174.
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How applicable would this be in larger congregations or adjudicatories? This
vision cultivation process occurred in a newly developed congregation; are there
some lessons learned that could apply to a larger congregation? How would a
leader conduct a cogenerative vision discernment process at the adjucatory level?
Considering the fact that the researcher and pastor of the congregation had been
present for thirteen months at the beginning of the research, what impact would a
longer history of prior ministry have on the vision cultivation process? When a
pastor begins ministry, both the pastor and the congregation change as the
community and leader adapt to the new situation. Both parties are more open to
change at the beginning of a pastoral relationship than they are after a history of
ministry together. How would the dynamic of a longer shared history impact a
vision cultivation process?
What are the long-term impacts of a cogenerative vision cultivation process?
What influences congregants to return to behaviors and perspectives that the
congregation had prior to the cultivation process? What helps the congregation to
embody the cultivated vision in the long term? What changes to ecclesial
structures can a congregation make to encourage the action-reflection cycle of
discovering God‘s missional vision and nurture discipleship practices for faithful
living? How can a congregation continue to seek and enter liminal experiences
together over the long term?
This research was confined to one newly-developed congregation, with the results
and findings applicable to the particular congregation with its particular heritage and the
culture of its context and place in history. Even so, the research yielded unexpected
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findings that may also be useful in applying and testing the results and conclusions in
other contexts.
Unexpected Research Findings
In planning and implementing the vision cultivation process, with the hopes that it
would have the maximum beneficial impact on participants, the researcher made three
unexpected discoveries. These findings include a need to include participants
cogeneratively in the planning and implementation of the intervention, the fact that new
praxis can yield new missional perspectives, and the discovery of the helpfulness of the
action-reflection model for gaining new perspectives from communal reflection upon
shared missional experiences.
Cultivating Vision for the Process and the Role of the Holy Spirit Throughout
In planning the PAR intervention and wrestling with which methods to select in
conducting it, the researcher realized that introducing an inflexible and preplanned
process in accomplishing the intervention in a top-down manner would be undesirable.
Since the process sought to cultivate missional vision in a grass-roots manner, the
researcher decided to design and implement it in a grass roots and cogenerative fashion as
well. The researcher did this prayerfully, seeking assistance from the Holy Spirit.
The researcher cultivated vision for the process in various ways, including the
cogenerative planning and implementation of the Damascus Travelers portion of the
intervention with the Discipleship Commission. The researcher also cultivated vision for
the overall intervention itself with the congregation council. As previously described, this
engendered broader participation and support for inviting and including a larger portion
of the congregation in the process. It also drew more people with richer perspectives in
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planning the intervention. The researcher attempted to do all of this cogeneratively,
prayerfully listening and trusting the Holy Spirit to speak and work among the various
participants. Finally, as the researcher exclusively planned and implemented some
elements of the process—the failed attempt to garner participation from the Damascus
Travelers participants in the prayer labyrinth, for example—it became clear that
prayerfully including more people in not only the implementation but also in the planning
of the intervention was beneficial and probably even indispensable. The intervention
seemed to have a greater impact due to the researcher‘s openness to changing
preconceived notions and plans based upon conversation with the participants.
New Praxis Yielding New Perspectives
The impact of praxis in creating new missional perspectives was an unexpected
finding. Several participants in the vision cultivation process decided to step outside of
their comfort zones to connect with others in unfamiliar ways. As they did so, they had
experiences that shaped new missional vision and impacted perspectives for further
missional activity. This was evident in responses from participants in both individual
interviews and in the group interview.
For example, one group respondent spoke with friends in the community about
her faith and invited them to participate in the summer vacation Bible school she
supervised. An individual participant decided to create some new congregational
initiatives in sharing faith due to the conversations she participated in during the vision
cultivation process. Finally, the second individual interviewee intentionally reached out
to form new relationships with persons ―on the fringes‖ as a result of new experiences
she gleaned in the congregation‘s homeless housing ministry and as a result of the
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conversations she had during the cultivation process. She engaged participants in the
homeless ministry in relationships in ways that she otherwise would not have attempted.
Again, these experiences led her to engage others at work relationally in ways she
normally would not have done.
Often times, congregational leaders seek to change behavior by teaching and
describing concepts for ministry in the hopes that congregants will learn new perspectives
and incorporate them into daily living. Contrary to this standard practice, this unexpected
finding highlighted a praxis-reflection-change process for changing perspectives and for
increasing missional activity. This finding suggests that missional leaders would do well
to pair teaching and fostering missional perspectives with creating opportunities for
congregants to step outside of comfort zones to engage personally in missional
experiences.
Benefits of Planning, Acting, and Reflecting
Finally, in conducting Participatory Action Research, the benefit of the
action-reflection model was evident. This is not a new idea. In Scripture, Jesus publicly
drew the disciples into new experiences of ministry and into conversations with a variety
of people. Afterward, Jesus would privately engage the disciples in faith conversations
and ask reflective questions. One notable example is when Jesus asked the disciples,
―Who do people say that the Son of Man is … but who do you say that I am?‖ (Matthew
16:13, 15). After reflecting upon this question with their shared experiences in mind,
Simon declared with what may have been a new insight, ―You are the Messiah, the Son
of the living God‖ (Matthew 16:16). In light of Simon‘s cogeneratively inspired insight,
Jesus decided to change his name from Simon to Rock, or Peter. Jesus then took the next
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step of promising Peter that, ―on this rock I will build my church, and the gates of Hades
will not prevail against it‖ (Matthew 16:18).
There were examples of this iterative process of plan-act-reflect at work. In the
impromptu gathering at a restaurant following the congregational retreat, those gathered
reflected upon the activity at the retreat and realized that the congregation would benefit
from a similar experience spread across four Wednesday night gatherings at church. The
researcher, in conversation with the council, even changed the PAR intervention plan
based upon these insights. The Damascus Travelers groups used a similar
action-reflection process as participants read various missional materials then gathered to
discuss them. Finally, as the group interview participants considered research questions
and discussed them, new perspectives for missional ministry arose through reflecting on
previous activity in ministry during the PAR intervention. These new perspectives,
gained through reflection on previous shared experiences, yielded further possibilities for
shared ministry and communal discernment. This strengthened the impact of the vision
cultivation process on congregants and how they relate to others.
Personal Reflections on this Research and Missional Leadership
As researcher, I found that the grass-roots process of cultivating missional vision
in this context of a newly developed congregation was extremely helpful. It encouraged
the people of Living Water to move beyond the post-construction feeling of
accomplishment and complacency to begin to contemplate how we can move beyond our
comfort zones to engage our local community and join in the missio Dei. In addition, in
this cogenerative journey of discovery and discernment, I wrestled with questions about
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how to lead missionally from within the congregation from a grass-roots cultivation
mindset rather than from the familiar top-down vision casting mindset.
In other words, this PAR research had an impact both on the congregation and on
me. All of us have changed, to varying degrees, through embarking together on this
journey of cultivating missional vision. Consider, again, the insights from Lesslie
Newbigin at the beginning of this chapter. As a leader, it is tempting to try to stay in
control in an effort to ensure a desired outcome in ministry. Clinging to control, however,
can inhibit the work of God‘s Spirit to call and enliven us as disciples in daily vocations.
Trusting others and nurturing deeper relationships that allow love to flourish is inherently
risky. Furthermore, engaging a cogenerative and mutual process of discernment requires
openness to change with a grasp on previously held opinions that is gentle, yet firm.
This is a difficult and important thing for missional leaders and congregations to
remember in life and ministry. The days when the pastor could go to a congregation to
direct and control the congregation‘s activities are long gone. On the other hand, simply
standing back and allowing a congregation to wander about aimlessly in the hopes that it
will independently discover God‘s call to ministry and mission is unlikely to yield a
vibrant and thriving ministry. In fact, it is an abdication of leadership. Instead, the model
of missional leadership that nurtures missional capacity and imagination in a
cogenerative manner and that fosters and motivates a mindset of grass-roots vision
discernment seems to be more beneficial. At least, this cogenerative model has immense
potential and likelihood for nurturing ministry that people embrace with shared vision as
they live and reach out to others vocationally as the priesthood of believers.
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In fact, it seems that a missional leader must wrestle continually with the question
of how much pressure one needs to apply in cultivating missional vision. Rather than
seeing the pastor as a religious expert or congregational therapist, a missional leader
would do well to view the role of leadership as one of nurturing respectful and loving
relationships that encourage constructive dialogue, safe space,10
missional imagination,
and cogenerative discernment in a congregation.
This concept of cogenerative discernment includes the aspect of listening together
to one another and to God for leadership, purpose, and direction. Discernment can even
have an aspect of action and reflection. This is akin to Luther‘s ―sin boldly‖ concept of
confidently and faithfully acting with God‘s incomplete revelation while trusting God to
act graciously in spite of our shortcomings and incomplete understanding of God‘s will.
As leader and community do this, while listening to God and to one another, God speaks
to them. God changes them. This is important to remember in discerning and discovering
God‘s purpose and vision for shared ministry.
This is how Jesus seemed to interact with the disciples. For missional leaders, the
cogenerative discernment model of planning, acting, and reflecting is a key component of
leadership. This model works well as the leader encourages congregants to seek out and
enter into shared liminal experiences prayerfully in the hopes that God will draw them
together in mutual communitas experiences. It was our experience that, as we left our
comfort zones and entered liminal moments together, the Holy Spirit did indeed work to
open new possibilities and perspectives for cogenerative discernment and perichoretic
10 The phrase ―safe space‖ also includes the aspect of openness to experimentation and even
failure. It is necessary for a missional community to understand that only God is perfect, and to allow
imperfect congregants to try various missional endeavors even if they do not produce the intended results.
In fact, we learn a great deal from our failures through God‘s grace and forbearance.
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communitas. As we reflected together upon these experiences, we recognized the voice of
God speaking to us together as a community. It is reasonable to expect that approaching
ministry with this mindset of liminal and cogenerative discernment would yield similar
benefits in various contexts and specific areas of ministry beyond discerning general
vision in a newly developed congregation.
In Scripture, Jesus repeatedly entered liminality to share kairotic11
moments with
the disciples. In the reflective discussion that followed these experiences, the Holy Spirit
seemed to work among them to strengthen bonds of comradery and inspire new and
shared vision for life and ministry. Following the ascension of Christ, the Holy Spirit
entered the disciples and drove them out into the world to join in the missio Dei as they
traveled to the ends of the earth as ambassadors of God‘s freeing and reconciling reign.
As missional leaders, this is our heritage, our motivation, and our call in life and
ministry. We are Jesus‘ contemporary disciples, called to grow personally and
communally in faith as we are reconciled to God in Christ through the Holy Spirit. We
are Jesus‘ contemporary friends,12
united in loving fellowship and increasingly drawn
together with shared vision and purpose. We are Jesus‘ contemporary apostles, sent
beyond ourselves as Christ‘s Body to places of power and influence, to the fringes of
society, and to the ends of the earth to form relationships for the Holy Spirit to inhabit.
God of the universe, you lovingly created us in your image for communion with
you and one another. In our brokenness, we depart from you and embark upon
paths that lead to brokenness and darkness. As you send your Son with the Holy
Spirit to restore your righteous reign and heal our relationships, heal our
11
Καιρός, or kairos, is the Greek word for ―opportune time.‖ Being different from the ordinary
chronological time of daily life, kairos refers to a moment in time that is particularly poignant or filled with
extraordinary possibilities.
12 Cf. John 15:12-17.
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brokenness and the divisions that we cause. Restore us to your fellowship.
Cultivate your vision for life in us. Send us forth burning with zeal and joy for
your redemptive reign. Work in us, through us, and in all of creation, that you
might restore your loving reign and fellowship with all, through Jesus Christ,
your Son, our Lord, who lives and reigns with you and the Holy Spirit, one God,
now and forever.
Huntley
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EPILOGUE
NEW BEGINNINGS, REALIZING DREAMS
In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was
God. He was in the beginning with God. All things came into being through him,
and without him not one thing came into being. What has come into being in him
was life, and the life was the light of all people. … And the Word became flesh
and lived among us, and we have seen his glory, the glory as of a father’s only
son, full of grace and truth. (John 1:1-4, 14)
New Beginnings
Epiphany is a day for recognizing and affirming the gift and call of Christ who
gives his life for the salvation of the world. On Epiphany, we celebrate the appearance
and manifestation of God in Christ as ―the true light, which enlightens everyone, [which]
was coming into the world‖ (John 1:9). As I write this, it is Epiphany—January 6, 2011.
Today we celebrate the missio Dei, concretely manifest in Jesus Christ, who walked
among us bringing God‘s reign to invite and embrace everyone.
It has been five months since Living Water Lutheran Church adopted the purpose
statement and guiding principles at their July 25 congregational meeting. The purpose
statement, ―God‘s purpose for [Living Water] is to grow faith that moves us beyond
ourselves,‖1 continues to make an impact on the ministry of the congregation‘s members
as Living Water turns a page in ministry and reaches out to deepen relationships with a
local congregation and the greater community.
1 Living Water‘s purpose statement (the pseudonym replaces the congregation‘s name).
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This coming Sunday, the people of Living Water will not gather for worship as
they normally do at their church building. Instead, they will gather to worship God with a
nearby inner-city congregation at their house of worship. This newly developed
congregation, the youngest in their conference, will gather and celebrate the beginning of
a 6-9 month discernment period for a new partnership of shared ministry with the oldest
congregation in their conference. The discernment period will culminate with an
interview and qualitative analysis to reflect upon the time of shared ministry. The hope is
that this discernment period of ministry action and reflection will lay foundations for a
long-term shared-parish ministry.
As the people of Living Water discussed this new opportunity for partnership in
ministry over the past four months, they did so with a stated and shared purpose of
moving beyond themselves. They will now share pastoral ministry on a half-time basis.
More importantly, as they connect with this nearby congregation, Living Water will
further the intentional effort to cultivate shared missional vision for ministry together.
Only now, it will be an effort that includes their brothers and sisters in Christ in the
neighboring congregation and community.
In this shared endeavor, the two congregation councils are intentionally
continuing the action-reflection process Living Water experienced in the vision
cultivation process. They will meet bimonthly and in a summer retreat to foster a
collaborative effort as mutual companions in ministry as they perichoretically dream,
plan, and share in the missio Dei. Living Water is intentionally reaching out to invite and
engage the nearby congregation with an invitation to enter a shared liminal experience
together. The hope seems to be that God will cogeneratively nurture relationships of
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shared ministry and communitas. The common hope is that in doing this, God will bridge
racial and cultural boundaries by forming new bonds of comradery and mutuality.
The expansion of this existing relationship is an expression of the shared vision
for ministry that Living Water cultivated in this participatory action research (PAR). As
researcher and now pastor of these two congregations, I celebrate this opportunity to
continue fulfilling a personal desire and dream that I have had for a long time.
Realizing Dreams
I remember a momentous day about ten years ago, as a first-call pastor in a rural
congregation, when I was sitting in the mid-summer late-afternoon heat of my basement
office. It had been a long and hot day of, among other things, dealing with
inconsequential squabbles among congregation members. As I sat in my chair taking a
much-needed rest from the day‘s work, I leaned back and laced my fingers together
behind my head. I wondered, ―Is this what ministry is supposed to be?‖ It was frustrating
and troubling for me to realize that I had given up a promising career as an Air Force
electrical and flight test engineer to deal with the picayune issues I was facing. I had
entered full-time pastoral ministry hoping to expand upon the fulfilling experiences of
seeing God at work in peoples‘ lives that I had known as a lay youth leader. The reality
of ordained ministry was not meeting my expectations.
As I considered this, I thought, ―Surely this can‘t be what ministry is about! What
am I supposed to be doing? What is a pastor in ministry supposed to do?‖ This was the
beginning of a new dream for pastoral ministry. I hoped for a day when ministry would
be about experiencing Christ‘s activity in our lives to deepen our relationships with God
and with one another. I began to watch for an opportunity to answer these questions and
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find ways to nurture this kind of ministry. This became a deep and personal hope, prayer
and dream for my life in pastoral ministry.
On another day in February, five years ago, I was again doing mundane office
work. As I read the mail, I came across a pamphlet promoting the Congregational
Mission and Leadership (CML) D.Min. program at Luther Seminary. After an hour of
prayerful research on the Internet, I realized that this program was an opportunity for me
to begin to answer my earlier questions and to realize my dream to shape perspectives in
a meaningful and missional pastoral ministry. I entered into the program a month and a
half later.
Through this D.Min.-CML program and thesis research, I have been able to
wrestle with the questions about vision for pastoral ministry that I raised on that summer
afternoon in my first call. This theologically informed PAR has been an excellent
opportunity to consider, apply, and reflect upon my earlier learning in the CML program.
Thanks to the experience of sociological research I gained through this endeavor, I now
have perspectives and tools for ministry that I will carry with me for the rest of my life.
Although I doubt that I will ever fully answer the questions I raised early in my ministry,
these important insights are giving me new vision for future ministry. I hope that this
continuing vision cultivation process will also have a long-term impact on both
congregations in their lives of personal, congregational, and shared ministry in the days
and years to come.
Moving into the Future
So now, we cross the threshold of entering into new ministry endeavors as we join
in further cultivating shared vision for mutual ministry in the days ahead. As we move
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into the future, we will experience joys and sorrows together. We will experience success
and disappointment. We will experience light and darkness. Even so, as we enter the
future on common paths of mutual ministry, we will continue in the ongoing process of
cogeneratively dreaming, planning, acting, and reflecting, both theologically and
theoretically, on our shared experiences. We will do this in the presence of a gracious
God who continues to unite us as we move beyond ourselves to engage one another and
the world in the missio Dei. We will accompany one another as we mutually and
perichoretically bear one another‘s burdens in life.
In this, I am convinced that we will see the light of Christ breaking onto our midst
to graciously dispel the darkness of our world. This coming Sunday, we will take the next
step in a process of discerning God‘s vision for us together on a new, unfamiliar path of
shared ministry. We will experience God‘s reconciling reign breaking into our midst to
dispel the darkness. We will perichoretically bear one another‘s burdens. God will send
us forth with shared vision for ministry as we joyfully enter liminal experiences in God‘s
loving grace. May God‘s kingdom come … may God‘s will be done.
Epiphany of Our Lord, 2011
Huntley
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APPENDIX A
PAR INTERVENTION TIMETABLE
Figure A.1. PAR Intervention Timeline, February 14-August 29, 2010.
February 14, 2010 - April 19, 2010—Congregation council reads and discusses Living
Lutheran by Dave Daubert in preparation for beginning the vision cultivation
process in April.
March 21, 2010—Obtain baseline quantitative assessment.
April 8, 2010—Field test qualitative interview questions.
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April 28, May 24 and 26, 2010—Obtain baseline qualitative assessment.
April 25, May 2 & 9, 2010—Sunday School classes discuss missional church concepts
(see appendix F) and process for vision cultivation based upon material from
Living Lutheran.
April 25, 2010—Damascus Travelers kick-off event.
May 10, 2010—Disciple Clusters begin to meet biweekly. Missional Church concepts
and theology are discussed in various settings.
May 22, 2010—Congregational Retreat, utilizing modified retreat schedule from
appendix B of Living Lutheran. See appendix G for retreat session plan.
June 9, 16, 23 and 30, 2010—Wednesday night cultivating missional vision forums are
held at Living Water.
July 12, 2010—Congregation council reviews information from retreat and refines
purpose and time statements for congregational review.
August 8, 2010—Open forum held for congregation to reflect and respond to results of
council work.
August 9, 2010—Council reflects upon input from congregation and makes revisions as
necessary, producing Draft 2.
August 15, 2010—Meet with Damascus Travelers participants to share experiences and
evaluate the program. Damascus Travelers program formally ends, but groups are
encouraged to continue to meet.
August 22, 2010—Congregational meeting held to adopt purpose and time statements.
Congregation members and commissions (committees) are encouraged to utilize
purpose and time statements in planning and making decisions. Congregants will
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receive instruction and encouragement to live into the vision and to act and make
decisions considering the purpose and times.
August 22-28, 2010—Second and final qualitative endline assessment.
August 29, 2010— Second and final quantitative endline assessment to evaluate the
congregation‘s understanding and effort toward achieving a missional vision after
the intervention.
Huntley
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APPENDIX B
QUANTITATIVE INSTRUMENT; FAITH MATURITY SCALE1
Instructions: Please answer the following demographic information. The information will only be used to
evaluate the validity of the responses demographically with respect to the congregation as a whole.
This information will not be used to attempt to identify you as the respondent, and it is completely
optional.
Gender: Male
Female
Age Range: 18-29
30-44
45-59
60-74
75+
On average, how often do you attend or participate in worship in this congregation?
Less than once per month
Once per month
Twice per month
Usually every week.
Describe your relationship to this congregation:
Voting member
Inactive member
Associate member (e.g., a winter visitor who is a member of another congregation)
Non-member affiliated with congregation for longer than six months
Non-member affiliated with congregation for less than six months
Thank you for your time and attention in completing this survey! Please turn to the next page for the
survey questions.
1 The Faith Maturity Scale, without the demographic questions, is from Benson, Donahue, and
Erickson, ―The Faith Maturity Scale: Conceptualization, Measurement, and Empirical Validation.‖
217
Instructions: Mark one answer by circling only one number for each statement. Be as honest as possible,
describing how true it really is and not how true you would like it to be.
Choose from these responses:
1 = never true 5 = often true
2 = rarely true 6 = almost always true
3 = true once in a while 7 = always true
4 = sometimes true
Never Always
True True
O 1. I am concerned that our country is not doing enough to help
the poor. 1 2 3 4 5 6 7
I 2. I know that Jesus Christ is the Son of God who died on a cross
and rose again. 1 2 3 4 5 6 7
C 3. My faith shapes how I think and act each and every day. 1 2 3 4 5 6 7
O 4. I help others with their religious questions and struggles. 1 2 3 4 5 6 7
C 5. I tend to be critical of other people (R). 1 2 3 4 5 6 7
O 6. In my free time, I help people who have problems or needs. 1 2 3 4 5 6 7
I 7. My faith helps me know right from wrong. 1 2 3 4 5 6 7
O 8. I do things to help protect the environment. 1 2 3 4 5 6 7
I 9. I devote time to reading and studying the Bible. 1 2 3 4 5 6 7
I 10. I have a hard time accepting myself (R). 1 2 3 4 5 6 7
C 11. Every day I see evidence that God is active in the world. 1 2 3 4 5 6 7
I 12. I take excellent care of my physical health. 1 2 3 4 5 6 7
O 13. I am active in efforts to promote social justice. 1 2 3 4 5 6 7
C 14. I seek out opportunities to help me grow spiritually. 1 2 3 4 5 6 7
I 15. I take time for periods of prayer or meditation. 1 2 3 4 5 6 7
O 16. I am active in efforts to promote world peace. 1 2 3 4 5 6 7
C 17. I accept people whose religious beliefs are different from mine. 1 2 3 4 5 6 7
C 18. I feel a deep sense of responsibility for reducing pain and
suffering in the world. 1 2 3 4 5 6 7
I 19. As I grow older, my understanding of God changes. 1 2 3 4 5 6 7
I 20. I feel overwhelmed by all the responsibilities and obligations I
have. 1 2 3 4 5 6 7
O 21. I give significant portions of my time and money to help other
people. 1 2 3 4 5 6 7
O 22. I speak out for equality for women and minorities. 1 2 3 4 5 6 7
218
Never Always
True True
C 23. I feel God‘s presence in my relationships with other people. 1 2 3 4 5 6 7
I 24. My life is filled with meaning and purpose. 1 2 3 4 5 6 7
C 25. I do not understand how a loving God can allow so much pain
and suffering in the world (R). 1 2 3 4 5 6 7
I 26. I believe that I must obey God‘s rules and commandments in
order to be saved (R). 1 2 3 4 5 6 7
C 27. I am confident that I can overcome any problem or crisis no
matter how serious. 1 2 3 4 5 6 7
C 28. I care a great deal about reducing poverty in the United States
and throughout the world. 1 2 3 4 5 6 7
C 29. I try to apply my faith to political and social issues. 1 2 3 4 5 6 7
I 30. My life is committed to Jesus Christ. 1 2 3 4 5 6 7
O 31. I talk with other people about my faith. 1 2 3 4 5 6 7
I 32. My life is filled with stress and anxiety. 1 2 3 4 5 6 7
O 33. I go out of my way to show love to people I meet. 1 2 3 4 5 6 7
I 34. I have a real sense that God is guiding me. 1 2 3 4 5 6 7
C 35. I do not want the churches of this nation getting involved in
political issues (R). 1 2 3 4 5 6 7
C 36. I like to worship and pray with others. 1 2 3 4 5 6 7
C 37. I think Christians must be about the business of creating
international understanding and harmony. 1 2 3 4 5 6 7
C 38. I am spiritually moved by the beauty of God‘s creation enough
to help the poor. 1 2 3 4 5 6 7
(R) = reversed scored.2
Key to leftmost column:3
I = Inward orientation (13 questions)
O = Outward orientation (10 questions)
C = Connecting faith and world (15 questions)
2 The reverse scoring notations were not in the version distributed to the congregation.
3 This column was not in the version distributed to the congregation.
Huntley
219
APPENDIX C
FAITH MATURITY SCALE PARTICIPATION THANK YOU LETTER
March 30, 2010
Greetings in the name of our Lord Jesus Christ!
Thank you for participating in the Faith Maturity Scale (FMS) survey after worship on
March 21. The information that you provided will be extremely helpful for us as we enter
into a period of cultivating missional vision as a congregation. I look forward to working
with you and the people of [Living Water] as we listen to God‘s call to ministry for us as
a congregation.
I also would like to thank you for signing the Informed Consent Form before completing
the survey. As promised, I am returning a copy of that form to you for your records. As
part of this visioning process, we will take the FMS after worship late in July. If you are
present that day and if you agree to take the survey again, then this consent form will
apply to that survey as well. In other words, if you take the survey a second time in July,
then you won‘t need to complete another copy of the consent form.
Again, thank you for your help and contribution to the visioning process. May God bless
you and the congregation of [Living Water] as we move forward together in ministry [in
our area]!
In Christ,
[Signed]
Enclosure (1)
Huntley
220
APPENDIX D
QUANTITATIVE SURVEY RESULTS
t-Test Results
Interpretive Key
N is the total number of responses
is the mean
s and s2 are the standard deviation and variance, respectively.
b and e subscripts: baseline and endline data, respectively.
P(T ≤ t) one-tail with bold font: Statistically significant change (P < .05)
I: Inward-directed questions
O: Outward-directed questions
C: Combined (both inward-directed and outward-directed questions)
Table E.1. t-Test Results, Responses Averaged by Participant
No. Nb Ne sb2 se
2 df tStat
P(T ≤ t)
one-tail
t Critical
one-tail
P(T ≤ t)
two-tail
t Critical
two-tail
All 63 43 4.98612 5.01818 0.265408 0.228524 95 -0.328458 0.3716441 1.661052 0.743288 1.985251
18-59 28 23 4.831859 4.992455 0.225398 0.144596 49 -1.341252 0.0930113 1.676551 0.186023 2.009575
60+ 35 19 5.109528 5.039197 0.269712 0.353128 33 0.433749 0.3336465 1.69236 0.667293 2.034515
Table E.2. t-Test Results, by IOC Categories (All ages)
No. Nb Ne sb2 se
2 df tStat
P(T ≤ t)
one-tail
t Critical
one-tail
P(T ≤ t)
two-tail
t Critical
two-tail
I 63 43 5.179149 5.213506 0.255798 0.216791 95 -0.360125 0.3597766 1.661052 0.719553 1.985251
O 63 43 4.460128 4.602824 0.633374 0.654186 89 -0.897701 0.1858836 1.662155 0.371767 1.986979
C 63 43 5.165306 5.120377 0.340736 0.317332 92 0.397306 0.3460309 1.661585 0.692062 1.986086
Table E.3. t-Test Results, by IOC Categories (Ages 18-59)
No. Nb Ne sb2 se
2 df tStat
P(T ≤ t)
one-tail
t Critical
one-tail
P(T ≤ t)
two-tail
t Critical
two-tail
I 28 23 5.139881 5.256689 0.272847 0.227857 48 -0.833252 0.204415 1.677224 0.40883 2.010635
O 28 23 4.163492 4.465217 0.474658 0.396008 48 -1.632264 0.054584 1.677224 0.109168 2.010635
C 28 23 5.003571 5.117805 0.312785 0.183064 49 -0.825915 0.2064277 1.676551 0.412855 2.009575
221
Table E.4. t-Test Results, by IOC Categories (Ages 60+)
Cat. Nb Ne sb2 se
2 df tStat
P(T ≤ t)
one-tail
t Critical
one-tail
P(T ≤ t)
two-tail
t Critical
two-tail
I 35 19 5.210563 5.152227 0.247497 0.219379 39 0.427542 0.3356682 1.684875 0.671336 2.022691
O 35 19 4.697438 4.727444 0.647605 0.966532 31 -0.113923 0.4550167 1.695519 0.910033 2.039513
C 35 19 5.294694 5.133333 0.334179 0.514568 31 0.843094 0.2028171 1.695519 0.405634 2.039513
Table E.5. t-Test Results, by Question (All Ages)
No. Nb Ne sb2 se
2 df tStat
P(T ≤ t)
one-tail
t Critical
one-tail
P(T ≤ t)
two-tail
t Critical
two-tail
1 61 42 4.344262 4.857143 1.896175 1.783972 90 -1.891012 0.0309198 1.661961 0.06184 1.986675
2 63 42 6.984127 7 0.015873 0 62 -1 0.1605987 1.669804 0.321197 1.998972
3 62 42 5.935484 5.97619 0.782655 0.755517 89 -0.232659 0.4082803 1.662155 0.816561 1.986979
4 60 42 4.433333 4.595238 1.639548 2.051684 82 -0.586614 0.2795373 1.663649 0.559075 1.989319
5 61 41 4.47541 4.243902 1.553552 1.689024 83 0.896644 0.1862512 1.66342 0.372502 1.98896
6 63 42 4.52381 4.285714 2.092166 2.062718 88 0.82984 0.2044373 1.662354 0.408875 1.98729
7 62 42 6.419355 6.52381 0.575357 0.450639 95 -0.738432 0.2310362 1.661052 0.462072 1.985251
8 62 42 5.080645 5.119048 1.878636 1.717189 91 -0.143933 0.4429357 1.661771 0.885871 1.986377
9 62 42 4.145161 3.928571 2.978583 2.702091 91 0.646099 0.2599206 1.661771 0.519841 1.986377
10 62 42 4.596774 4.785714 2.801957 2.75784 89 -0.567473 0.2859108 1.662155 0.571822 1.986979
11 63 42 6.285714 6.380952 1.175115 0.631823 102 -0.518825 0.3025031 1.65993 0.605006 1.983495
12 63 42 5.15873 5.357143 1.555044 1.405923 91 -0.822747 0.2064014 1.661771 0.412803 1.986377
13 60 41 3.683333 4.04878 1.779379 2.147561 81 -1.275918 0.1028156 1.663884 0.205631 1.989686
14 63 42 4.84127 4.738095 1.393753 1.319977 90 0.44585 0.3283882 1.661961 0.656776 1.986675
15 62 42 5.225806 5.404762 1.915389 1.61266 93 -0.679844 0.2491459 1.661404 0.498292 1.985802
16 62 40 3.145161 3.225 2.158911 2.230128 82 -0.265284 0.3957283 1.663649 0.791457 1.989319
17 63 42 5.904762 5.642857 1.410138 1.942509 78 0.999714 0.1602701 1.664625 0.32054 1.990847
18 63 42 4.666667 4.52381 1.580645 1.914053 82 0.537413 0.2962189 1.663649 0.592438 1.989319
19 63 41 5.761905 5.853659 1.829493 2.078049 82 -0.32496 0.3730194 1.663649 0.746039 1.989319
20 62 43 4.016129 3.813953 2.475145 3.297896 82 0.592036 0.2777278 1.663649 0.555456 1.989319
21 62 43 4.741935 4.55814 1.407721 2.300111 76 0.665839 0.2537649 1.665151 0.50753 1.991673
22 61 41 4.344262 4.487805 2.596175 2.656098 85 -0.438121 0.3312051 1.662978 0.66241 1.988268
23 62 43 5.66129 5.72093 1.014543 1.72979 75 -0.250705 0.401364 1.665425 0.802728 1.992102
24 61 41 5.52459 5.731707 1.186885 1.15122 87 -0.949962 0.1723815 1.662557 0.344763 1.987608
25 62 43 4.483871 4.44186 2.778424 3.014396 88 0.123928 0.4508276 1.662354 0.901655 1.98729
26 60 43 3.516667 3.488372 5.474294 5.684385 90 0.059859 0.4762003 1.661961 0.952401 1.986675
27 60 43 4.983333 5.255814 2.016667 1.909192 92 -0.975569 0.1659182 1.661585 0.331836 1.986086
28 60 43 4.716667 4.55814 1.698023 2.300111 82 0.554307 0.2904389 1.663649 0.580878 1.989319
29 62 43 5.145161 5.186047 1.273665 2.202658 74 -0.152617 0.4395579 1.665707 0.879116 1.992543
30 62 43 6.064516 6.162791 1.14331 1.139535 91 -0.463573 0.3220302 1.661771 0.64406 1.986377
31 61 42 5.098361 5.119048 1.990164 2.448897 82 -0.068602 0.4727367 1.663649 0.945473 1.989319
32 61 43 3.95082 3.767442 2.847541 3.277962 86 0.523056 0.3011401 1.662765 0.60228 1.987934
33 62 42 5.096774 5.404762 1.826547 1.124855 100 -1.298675 0.0985212 1.660234 0.197042 1.983972
34 62 43 5.83871 6.046512 1.1211 0.75969 100 -1.099043 0.1371941 1.660234 0.274388 1.983972
35 61 43 3.721311 3.581395 3.837705 3.963455 90 0.355288 0.3616025 1.661961 0.723205 1.986675
36 62 43 6 5.744186 1.47541 2.337763 77 0.915002 0.1815235 1.664885 0.363047 1.991254
37 61 43 5.360656 5.534884 2.034426 1.778516 94 -0.637415 0.262702 1.661226 0.525404 1.985523
38 61 43 5.131148 5.139535 1.782514 2.170543 85 -0.02971 0.4881841 1.662978 0.976368 1.988268
222
Table E.6. t-Test Results, by Question (Ages 18-59)
No. Nb Ne sb2 se
2 df tStat
P(T ≤ t)
one-tail
t Critical
one-tail
P(T ≤ t)
two-tail
t Critical
two-tail
1 28 23 4.25 4.869565 2.490741 1.664032 49 -1.542638 0.0646763 1.676551 0.129353 2.009575
2 28 23 6.964286 7 0.035714 0 27 -1 0.1630945 1.703288 0.326189 2.051831
3 28 23 5.714286 6.086957 0.804233 0.44664 49 -1.698496 0.047878 1.676551 0.095756 2.009575
4 26 23 4.269231 4.608696 0.924615 2.158103 37 -0.943713 0.1757191 1.687094 0.351438 2.026192
5 27 22 4.296296 4 1.37037 1.619048 43 0.840248 0.2027086 1.681071 0.405417 2.016692
6 28 23 4.392857 4.304348 2.099206 1.675889 49 0.230196 0.4094488 1.676551 0.818898 2.009575
7 27 23 6.481481 6.434783 0.566952 0.529644 47 0.222562 0.4124205 1.677927 0.824841 2.011741
8 28 23 4.607143 4.913043 1.506614 1.355731 48 -0.910998 0.1834245 1.677224 0.366849 2.010635
9 28 23 3.785714 3.782609 2.619048 2.450593 48 0.006943 0.4972446 1.677224 0.994489 2.010635
10 28 23 4.5 4.869565 2.407407 2.573123 46 -0.830843 0.2051771 1.67866 0.410354 2.012896
11 28 23 6.285714 6.26087 0.804233 0.656126 49 0.103836 0.4588618 1.676551 0.917724 2.009575
12 28 23 4.571429 4.956522 1.439153 1.316206 48 -1.168427 0.1242026 1.677224 0.248405 2.010635
13 28 23 3.321429 3.956522 1.411376 2.134387 42 -1.678252 0.0503624 1.681952 0.100725 2.018082
14 28 23 4.5 4.826087 1.518519 1.059289 49 -1.029692 0.1541054 1.676551 0.308211 2.009575
15 28 23 4.964286 5.304348 2.332011 1.675889 49 -0.86057 0.1968332 1.676551 0.393666 2.009575
16 28 23 2.857143 2.826087 2.275132 1.968379 48 0.076032 0.4698547 1.677224 0.939709 2.010635
17 28 23 5.607143 5.478261 1.728836 2.26087 44 0.322162 0.3744279 1.68023 0.748856 2.015368
18 28 23 4.571429 4.347826 1.513228 1.873518 45 0.607442 0.2733053 1.679427 0.546611 2.014103
19 28 22 5.928571 6.090909 1.846561 1.324675 48 -0.457042 0.3248512 1.677224 0.649702 2.010635
20 28 23 4.464286 4 1.813492 2.454545 44 1.121166 0.1341496 1.68023 0.268299 2.015368
21 28 23 4.357143 4.391304 1.349206 1.794466 44 -0.09616 0.4619149 1.68023 0.92383 2.015368
22 28 23 3.642857 4.304348 2.312169 2.312253 47 -1.54585 0.0644241 1.677927 0.128848 2.011741
23 28 23 5.571429 5.956522 0.994709 0.86166 48 -1.425403 0.0802557 1.677224 0.160511 2.010635
24 27 22 5.296296 5.818182 1.216524 0.822511 47 -1.817597 0.037752 1.677927 0.075503 2.011741
25 28 23 4.428571 4.478261 2.253968 2.806324 45 -0.110417 0.4562847 1.679427 0.912569 2.014103
26 28 23 3.535714 3.826087 4.924603 5.513834 46 -0.450415 0.3272637 1.67866 0.654527 2.012896
27 28 23 4.892857 5.478261 2.099206 1.26087 49 -1.624918 0.055298 1.676551 0.110596 2.009575
28 28 23 4.464286 4.434783 1.665344 1.802372 46 0.079466 0.4685035 1.67866 0.937007 2.012896
29 28 23 5.178571 5.173913 1.041005 2.150198 38 0.012887 0.4948927 1.685954 0.989785 2.024394
30 28 23 6.107143 6.347826 1.210317 0.600791 48 -0.91397 0.1826504 1.677224 0.365301 2.010635
31 27 23 5.037037 5.217391 1.806268 1.814229 47 -0.472367 0.3194253 1.677927 0.638851 2.011741
32 28 23 4.607143 4.086957 2.321429 3.083004 44 1.116805 0.1350697 1.68023 0.270139 2.015368
33 28 23 4.964286 5.26087 1.813492 0.837945 47 -0.932304 0.1779722 1.677927 0.355944 2.011741
34 28 23 5.678571 5.869565 1.48545 0.754941 48 -0.651756 0.2588336 1.677224 0.517667 2.010635
35 27 23 3.851852 4.217391 3.054131 3.450593 46 -0.712589 0.2398495 1.67866 0.479699 2.012896
36 28 23 5.857143 5.782609 1.830688 1.268775 49 0.214674 0.4154562 1.676551 0.830912 2.009575
37 28 23 4.785714 5 2.174603 1.636364 49 -0.55549 0.2905435 1.676551 0.581087 2.009575
38 28 2 4.928571 20 1.253968 648 1 -0.837244 0.2781248 6.313752 0.55625 12.7062
223
Table E.7. t-Test Results, by Question (Ages 60+)
No. Nb Ne sb2 se
2 df tStat
P(T ≤ t)
one-tail
t Critical
one-tail
P(T ≤ t)
two-tail
t Critical
two-tail
1 33 18 4.424242 4.833333 1.439394 2.147059 30 -1.013586 0.1594429 1.697261 0.318886 2.042272
2 35 18 7 7 0 0 In. 65535 Indeterm Indeterm Indeterm Indeterm
3 34 18 6.117647 5.833333 0.713012 1.205882 28 0.958615 0.1729788 1.701131 0.345958 2.048407
4 34 18 4.558824 4.5 2.193405 2.029412 36 0.139717 0.4448312 1.688298 0.889662 2.028094
5 34 18 4.617647 4.611111 1.697861 1.663399 35 0.017323 0.4931385 1.689572 0.986277 2.030108
6 35 18 4.628571 4.222222 2.122689 2.771242 31 0.877159 0.1935738 1.695519 0.387148 2.039513
7 35 18 6.371429 6.611111 0.593277 0.369281 42 -1.23827 0.1112464 1.681952 0.222493 2.018082
8 34 18 5.470588 5.333333 1.893048 2.235294 32 0.323638 0.3741589 1.693889 0.748318 2.036933
9 34 18 4.441176 4 3.163102 3.058824 35 0.860323 0.197733 1.689572 0.395466 2.030108
10 34 18 4.676471 4.722222 3.195187 3.271242 34 -0.087132 0.4655388 1.690924 0.931078 2.032245
11 35 18 6.285714 6.555556 1.504202 0.614379 48 -0.971751 0.1680231 1.677224 0.336046 2.010635
12 35 18 5.628571 5.777778 1.181513 1.124183 35 -0.48103 0.3167443 1.689572 0.633489 2.030108
13 32 17 4 4.117647 1.935484 2.360294 30 -0.263512 0.3969788 1.697261 0.793958 2.042272
14 35 18 5.114286 4.611111 1.163025 1.781046 29 1.384019 0.0884563 1.699127 0.176913 2.04523
15 34 18 5.441176 5.611111 1.526738 1.545752 35 -0.469908 0.3206678 1.689572 0.641336 2.030108
16 34 16 3.382353 3.75 2.000891 2.333333 28 -0.812625 0.2116445 1.701131 0.423289 2.048407
17 35 18 6.142857 5.833333 1.067227 1.676471 28 0.880305 0.1930939 1.701131 0.386188 2.048407
18 35 18 4.742857 4.777778 1.667227 2.065359 31 -0.08666 0.4657495 1.695519 0.931499 2.039513
19 35 18 5.628571 5.777778 1.828571 2.300654 31 -0.351625 0.3637492 1.695519 0.727498 2.039513
20 34 19 3.647059 3.473684 2.780749 4.263158 31 0.313335 0.3780624 1.695519 0.756125 2.039513
21 34 19 5.058824 4.684211 1.269162 3.005848 27 0.847179 0.2021712 1.703288 0.404342 2.051831
22 33 17 4.939394 4.705882 2.121212 3.345588 27 0.457007 0.3256609 1.703288 0.651322 2.051831
23 34 19 5.735294 5.473684 1.04902 2.818713 26 0.617983 0.270981 1.705618 0.541962 2.055529
24 34 18 5.705882 5.611111 1.122995 1.663399 29 0.267583 0.3954572 1.699127 0.790914 2.04523
25 34 19 4.529412 4.315789 3.286988 3.450292 37 0.404961 0.3439191 1.687094 0.687838 2.026192
26 32 19 3.5 2.894737 6.129032 5.321637 40 0.881351 0.1916967 1.683851 0.383393 2.021075
27 32 19 5.0625 5.157895 1.995968 2.251462 36 -0.224305 0.4118941 1.688298 0.823788 2.028094
28 32 19 4.9375 4.789474 1.673387 2.953216 30 0.324783 0.3737996 1.697261 0.747599 2.042272
29 34 19 5.117647 5.157895 1.500891 2.473684 30 -0.096393 0.4619248 1.697261 0.92385 2.042272
30 34 19 6.029412 5.947368 1.120321 1.830409 30 0.228173 0.4105299 1.697261 0.82106 2.042272
31 34 18 5.147059 4.944444 2.18984 3.46732 29 0.399644 0.3461735 1.699127 0.692347 2.04523
32 33 19 3.393939 3.473684 2.683712 3.48538 34 -0.154979 0.4388773 1.690924 0.877755 2.032245
33 34 18 5.205882 5.555556 1.865419 1.555556 38 -0.930281 0.179049 1.685954 0.358098 2.024394
34 34 19 5.970588 6.263158 0.817291 0.760234 39 -1.156029 0.1273511 1.684875 0.254702 2.022691
35 34 19 3.617647 2.736842 4.546346 3.649123 41 1.543195 0.0652338 1.682878 0.130468 2.019541
36 34 19 6.117647 5.631579 1.197861 3.80117 24 1.002058 0.1631562 1.710882 0.326312 2.063899
37 33 19 5.848485 6.157895 1.445076 1.362573 39 -0.910405 0.1841008 1.684875 0.368202 2.022691
38 33 19 5.30303 5.157895 2.217803 3.140351 33 0.301005 0.3826495 1.69236 0.765299 2.034515
224
Overall Response Analysis
Interpretive Key
N is the total number of responses
is the mean.
s is the standard deviation.
b and e subscripts: baseline and endline data, respectively.
I: Inward-directed questions
O: Outward-directed questions
C: Combined (both inward-directed and outward-directed questions)
Table E.8. Count, Mean, and Standard Deviation Data by Age
Age Nb Ne1 sb se
All 63 43 4.98612 5.01818 0.515177 0.478042
18-59 28 23 4.831859 4.992455 0.47476 0.380258
60+ 35 19 5.109528 5.039197 0.519338 0.594246
Table E.9. Count, Mean, and Standard Deviation Data by IOC (All Ages)
Nb = 63
Ne = 43
Cat. sb se
I 5.179149 5.213506 0.505765 0.465608
O 4.460128 4.602824 0.795848 0.808818
C 5.165306 5.120377 0.583726 0.563322
1 One respondent to the endline FMS survey did not answer the age question; thus, the sum of the
counts for the 18-59 and the 60+ age ranges is one less than the count for all respondents.
225
Table E.10. Count, Mean, and Standard Deviation Data by IOC (18-59)
Nb = 28
Ne = 23
Cat. sb se
I 5.139881 5.256689 0.522348 0.477344
O 4.163492 4.465217 0.688954 0.629292
C 5.003571 5.117805 0.559272 0.427859
Table E.11. Count, Mean, and Standard Deviation Data by IOC (60+)
Nb = 35
Ne = 19
Cat. sb se
I 5.210563 5.152227 0.497491 0.468379
O 4.697438 4.727444 0.804739 0.983124
C 5.294694 5.133333 0.584462 0.717334
226
Individual Response Analysis
Table E.12. Interpretive Key
Cell Attribute Kurtosis Range Skew Range
Black with White Text 3 ≤ {Value} -2 ≥ {Value}
Gray with Black Text 1 ≤ {Value} < 3 -1.5 ≥ {Value} > -2
Hash with Bold Text {Value} ≤ -1
Table E.13. Baseline Data (All Ages)
No. s N Median Mode Kurtosis Skew
1 4.344262295 1.377016653 61 4 5 -0.485916727 -0.296906937
2 6.984126984 0.125988158 63 7 7 63 -7.937253933
3 5.935483871 0.884677727 62 6 6 0.829365428 -0.752144408
4 4.433333333 1.280448368 60 4 4 -0.205645277 0.028099487
5 4.475409836 1.246415626 61 4 4 -0.713813821 0.137953784
6 4.523809524 1.446432127 63 5 4 -0.495198152 -0.329676162
7 6.419354839 0.758522876 62 7 7 0.520516524 -1.115025117
8 5.080645161 1.3706333 62 5 5 -0.450261836 -0.426027014
9 4.14516129 1.725857109 62 4 5 -0.961871959 -0.152619768
10 4.596774194 1.673904608 62 5 3 -1.33857992 0.042698406
11 6.285714286 1.084027309 63 7 7 8.033812922 -2.326586157
12 5.158730159 1.247013842 63 5 6 -0.493942195 -0.516812446
13 3.683333333 1.333933481 60 4 4 0.031417751 0.344526073
14 4.841269841 1.180573251 63 5 4 -0.291958958 -0.228787444
15 5.225806452 1.38397568 62 5 5 0.049019492 -0.689280967
16 3.14516129 1.469323187 62 3 2 -0.408268929 0.413652592
17 5.904761905 1.187492421 63 6 6 1.630263126 -1.362508485
18 4.666666667 1.257237114 63 5 5 -0.216020647 -0.290589241
19 5.761904762 1.352587553 63 6 6 3.642252663 -1.771299484
20 4.016129032 1.573259491 62 4 4 -0.576639114 -0.131836953
21 4.741935484 1.186474097 62 5 4 -0.642577916 0.035967646
22 4.344262295 1.611264989 61 4 3 -1.084756514 -0.067419152
23 5.661290323 1.00724504 62 6 6 0.078708545 -0.558735365
24 5.524590164 1.089442631 61 6 6 0.052073403 -0.784650691
25 4.483870968 1.666860556 62 4 3 -0.951361069 -0.047729506
26 3.516666667 2.339720878 60 3 1 -1.421975883 0.314989996
27 4.983333333 1.420093894 60 5 5 0.240324216 -0.557445823
28 4.716666667 1.303081962 60 5 5 -0.209768947 -0.162283445
29 5.14516129 1.128567556 62 5 6 -0.347071192 -0.294905924
30 6.064516129 1.069256947 62 6 7 0.032051917 -0.963259814
31 5.098360656 1.410731702 61 5 5 -0.546516989 -0.437567122
32 3.950819672 1.687465847 61 4 4 -0.805911631 0.03663193
33 5.096774194 1.351497984 62 5 6 1.0851038 -0.922307565
34 5.838709677 1.058820073 62 6 6 -0.334109261 -0.694258031
35 3.721311475 1.959006105 61 4 2 -1.189897577 0.157770851
36 6 1.214664495 62 6 7 1.782440678 -1.474572706
37 5.360655738 1.426333141 61 5 7 -0.696323516 -0.45685013
38 5.131147541 1.335108108 61 5 4 -0.981158624 -0.030530966
227
Table E.14. Baseline Data (Ages 18-59)
No. s N Median Mode Kurtosis Skew
1 4.25 1.578208079 28 4 6 -0.921773714 -0.201667201
2 6.964285714 0.188982237 28 7 7 28 -5.291502622
3 5.714285714 0.896790279 28 6 6 2.055319625 -1.036083708
4 4.269230769 0.96156923 26 4 4 0.352008029 -0.008651969
5 4.296296296 1.170628195 27 4 4 -0.514967691 0.611786594
6 4.392857143 1.448863813 28 4 4 -0.101663577 -0.124550419
7 6.481481481 0.752961863 27 7 7 -0.241084821 -1.100111107
8 4.607142857 1.227441957 28 4.5 4 -0.645798923 -0.072463238
9 3.785714286 1.618347187 28 4 4 -1.046576987 -0.360089965
10 4.5 1.551582227 28 4.5 5 -0.851887483 0.096103464
11 6.285714286 0.896790279 28 7 7 -0.152029619 -0.954822241
12 4.571428571 1.199647214 28 5 6 -0.940535334 -0.319664113
13 3.321428571 1.188013325 28 3 3 2.328111226 0.887860892
14 4.5 1.232281834 28 4.5 4 -0.179299867 -0.191837404
15 4.964285714 1.527092198 28 5 5 -0.339025973 -0.540437433
16 2.857142857 1.508354161 28 2.5 2 0.48520248 0.818340334
17 5.607142857 1.314852075 28 6 6 1.25414115 -1.303498238
18 4.571428571 1.230133128 28 5 5 -0.636808646 -0.112820547
19 5.928571429 1.358882205 28 6 6 6.026570149 -2.24613815
20 4.464285714 1.346659595 28 4.5 4 -0.54966252 -0.261358513
21 4.357142857 1.161553421 28 4 4 -0.137691137 0.297619852
22 3.642857143 1.520581899 28 3 3 -0.71140094 0.387570616
23 5.571428571 0.997350989 28 6 5 0.289584567 -0.45291828
24 5.296296296 1.102961566 27 6 6 0.026412255 -1.015957487
25 4.428571429 1.501322169 28 4.5 4 -0.237856652 -0.31175121
26 3.535714286 2.219144694 28 3 1 -1.359467237 0.222644543
27 4.892857143 1.448863813 28 5 5 -0.380650309 -0.272083952
28 4.464285714 1.290482048 28 5 5 -0.579981045 -0.193595858
29 5.178571429 1.020296668 28 5.5 6 -1.021038856 -0.383670111
30 6.107142857 1.100144291 28 6.5 7 0.767749546 -1.124465592
31 5.037037037 1.34397463 27 5 5 -0.32155818 -0.38019908
32 4.607142857 1.523623501 28 4.5 4 -0.670839953 -0.219121918
33 4.964285714 1.346659595 28 5 5 1.41590698 -1.008561379
34 5.678571429 1.218790275 28 6 7 -0.853474644 -0.515423961
35 3.851851852 1.747607237 27 4 5 -0.788557585 -0.035955345
36 5.857142857 1.353029132 28 6 6 1.945770683 -1.557692536
37 4.785714286 1.474653578 28 5 4 -0.789348066 -0.12412626
38 4.928571429 1.11980724 28 5 4 -0.837194237 0.490416857
228
Table E.15. Baseline Data (Ages 60+)
No. s N Median Mode Kurtosis Skew
1 4.424242424 1.199747448 33 5 5 0.086529533 -0.33021947
2 7 0 35 7 7 Indeterminate Indeterminate
3 6.117647059 0.844400662 34 6 6 -0.510809728 -0.554017211
4 4.558823529 1.481014731 34 5 5 -0.607153409 -0.121715257
5 4.617647059 1.303019939 34 5 5 -0.525396251 -0.186725528
6 4.628571429 1.456945118 35 5 5 -0.564817113 -0.512268494
7 6.371428571 0.770244968 35 7 7 1.232042009 -1.178924648
8 5.470588235 1.375880855 34 6 5 0.681887865 -0.936226119
9 4.441176471 1.778511064 34 5 5 -1.134131619 -0.137774691
10 4.676470588 1.787508648 34 5 3 -1.620317255 -0.019779288
11 6.285714286 1.226459001 35 7 7 9.501234214 -2.716471096
12 5.628571429 1.086974059 35 6 6 0.307771887 -0.78804884
13 4 1.391216687 32 4 4 -0.303586207 -0.076671497
14 5.114285714 1.078436465 35 5 6 -0.727356591 -0.089778872
15 5.441176471 1.235612386 34 6 6 0.450364297 -0.727108135
16 3.382352941 1.414528637 34 3 4 -0.642764429 0.15197835
17 6.142857143 1.033066741 35 6 7 1.497904678 -1.319988641
18 4.742857143 1.291211404 35 5 5 0.261133815 -0.444509146
19 5.628571429 1.352246808 35 6 6 3.031253917 -1.538215346
20 3.647058824 1.667557694 34 4 4 -0.491264286 0.143432934
21 5.058823529 1.126570997 34 5 6 -0.7115995 -0.121553105
22 4.939393939 1.456438163 33 5 6 -0.811514319 -0.405418235
23 5.735294118 1.024216582 34 6 6 0.210003358 -0.685605972
24 5.705882353 1.05971442 34 6 6 -0.071812596 -0.661117019
25 4.529411765 1.813005108 34 4 3 -1.319908151 0.046886477
26 3.5 2.475688239 32 3 1 -1.511629764 0.387770958
27 5.0625 1.412787225 32 5 5 1.226380587 -0.849384804
28 4.9375 1.293594642 32 5 5 0.212878222 -0.163176571
29 5.117647059 1.225108675 34 5 5 -0.126454121 -0.237023909
30 6.029411765 1.058452104 34 6 7 -0.379608154 -0.876003396
31 5.147058824 1.479810654 34 5 6 -0.582558635 -0.506615321
32 3.393939394 1.638203932 33 3 3 -0.437727783 0.35933161
33 5.205882353 1.365803388 34 5.5 6 1.215995352 -0.926537625
34 5.970588235 0.904041234 34 6 6 0.021165906 -0.724210846
35 3.617647059 2.132216174 34 3 1 -1.367936209 0.295581695
36 6.117647059 1.094468347 34 6 7 0.992823166 -1.277222378
37 5.848484848 1.202113039 33 6 7 -0.752156715 -0.610229179
38 5.303030303 1.489229005 33 5 7 -0.942417637 -0.377059021
229
Table E.16. Endline Data (All Ages)
No. s N Median Mode Kurtosis Skew
1 4.857142857 1.335654194 42 5 5 -0.366881972 -0.113181897
2 7 0 42 7 7 Indeterminate Indeterminate
3 5.976190476 0.869204717 42 6 6 -0.002660812 -0.654648803
4 4.595238095 1.432370095 42 4 4 -0.182668699 -0.174901469
5 4.243902439 1.299624711 41 4 4 -0.414462067 -0.191925185
6 4.285714286 1.436216477 42 4 4 -0.195292175 0.246636199
7 6.523809524 0.671296352 42 7 7 3.494026791 -1.614432856
8 5.119047619 1.310415703 42 5 6 -0.055706311 -0.639784379
9 3.928571429 1.643803696 42 4 4 -0.80470241 0.085074186
10 4.785714286 1.660674478 42 5 4 -0.782984918 -0.312570409
11 6.380952381 0.794873236 42 7 7 0.584881502 -1.118149064
12 5.357142857 1.185716385 42 6 6 0.126675121 -0.655572808
13 4.048780488 1.465455893 41 4 4 -0.34705995 0.41274349
14 4.738095238 1.14890242 42 5 5 -0.384140151 0.342414451
15 5.404761905 1.269905389 42 6 6 -0.122885067 -0.676189299
16 3.225 1.493361378 40 3 2 -0.07244605 0.565975919
17 5.642857143 1.393739111 42 6 7 1.408995055 -1.132804603
18 4.523809524 1.383493197 42 4 4 0.125564906 0.064254476
19 5.853658537 1.441543888 41 6 7 3.751871964 -1.889639196
20 3.813953488 1.816010986 43 4 5 -0.742427802 0.115017586
21 4.558139535 1.516611599 43 5 5 -0.010159772 -0.610127315
22 4.487804878 1.629753834 41 5 5 -0.182583661 -0.523590389
23 5.720930233 1.315214656 43 6 6 2.921068612 -1.495387983
24 5.731707317 1.072948979 41 6 6 0.541002588 -0.960566506
25 4.441860465 1.736201733 43 5 4 -0.870228809 -0.298368756
26 3.488372093 2.384194913 43 3 1 -1.321663582 0.501537613
27 5.255813953 1.38173499 43 6 6 -0.270240754 -0.712383059
28 4.558139535 1.516611599 43 5 5 -0.588277367 -0.137677019
29 5.186046512 1.484135374 43 6 6 1.233245736 -1.160392329
30 6.162790698 1.067489992 43 7 7 0.739182135 -1.202096033
31 5.119047619 1.564895087 42 6 6 1.393779209 -1.209092806
32 3.76744186 1.810514388 43 4 2 -0.875626872 0.364343406
33 5.404761905 1.060591731 42 5 5 -0.68436438 0.00457562
34 6.046511628 0.871601929 43 6 6 -0.453258877 -0.545183631
35 3.581395349 1.990842824 43 3 1 -1.093503039 0.291790469
36 5.744186047 1.528974497 43 6 7 2.603450262 -1.599313597
37 5.534883721 1.33361016 43 6 7 -0.285472828 -0.646886773
38 5.139534884 1.473276157 43 5 5 0.653718943 -0.954841115
230
Table E.17. Endline Data (Ages 18-59)
No. s N Median Mode Kurtosis Skew
1 4.869565217 1.289973496 23 5 6 -0.292787303 -0.29277517
2 7 0 23 7 7 Indeterminate Indeterminate
3 6.086956522 0.668311541 23 6 6 -0.536099706 -0.096474988
4 4.608695652 1.469048252 23 4 4 -0.38902709 0.284431815
5 4 1.272418021 22 4 4 0.243616828 -0.305116155
6 4.304347826 1.294561442 23 4 4 0.069963256 0.612400255
7 6.434782609 0.727766631 23 7 7 4.363873596 -1.690483094
8 4.913043478 1.164358718 23 5 5 0.846238508 -0.384887061
9 3.782608696 1.565436963 23 4 4 0.101621228 0.628054496
10 4.869565217 1.604095549 23 5 6 0.084685636 -0.709178777
11 6.260869565 0.810016347 23 6 7 -1.243410821 -0.534401998
12 4.956521739 1.147260011 23 5 6 0.264986995 -0.897443491
13 3.956521739 1.460954261 23 4 4 -0.092513815 0.560806174
14 4.826086957 1.029217439 23 5 5 0.456515928 0.378079291
15 5.304347826 1.294561442 23 6 6 0.502770432 -0.902073644
16 2.826086957 1.402989468 23 2 2 0.397681604 0.878175617
17 5.47826087 1.503618823 23 6 7 1.96886575 -1.184455132
18 4.347826087 1.368765059 23 4 4 0.860957875 0.000440377
19 6.090909091 1.150945405 22 6 7 7.014745341 -2.253901563
20 4 1.566698904 23 4 5 0.053027631 -0.077674862
21 4.391304348 1.339576949 23 5 5 -0.243248323 -0.304896988
22 4.304347826 1.520609406 23 5 5 -0.387361448 -0.397790519
23 5.956521739 0.928256473 23 6 6 -0.161838229 -0.655126936
24 5.818181818 0.906923824 22 6 6 0.407912524 -0.87397812
25 4.47826087 1.675208677 23 5 5 -0.594116587 -0.466982874
26 3.826086957 2.348155445 23 3 7 -1.447920718 0.389930318
27 5.47826087 1.122884484 23 6 6 0.381669935 -0.890164737
28 4.434782609 1.342524317 23 4 4 -0.483489975 0.337196302
29 5.173913043 1.466355219 23 6 6 1.6006932 -1.181078247
30 6.347826087 0.775106776 23 7 7 -0.896062525 -0.722675112
31 5.217391304 1.346933276 23 5 6 3.088665938 -1.288907356
32 4.086956522 1.755848499 23 4 4 -0.8307867 0.186608171
33 5.260869565 0.915393175 23 5 5 -0.155688349 0.594798398
34 5.869565217 0.868873242 23 6 6 -0.729772445 -0.185937043
35 4.217391304 1.857577155 23 4 4 -1.078098365 0.118484936
36 5.782608696 1.126398998 23 6 6 0.409760054 -0.994856399
37 5 1.279204298 23 5 6 0.023280423 -0.570791336
38 5.173913043 1.230379613 23 5 5 1.079242089 -1.00222887
231
Table E.18. Endline Data (Ages 60+)
No. s N Median Mode Kurtosis Skew
1 4.833333333 1.465284554 18 5 5 -0.391743291 0.070115887
2 7 0 18 7 7 Indeterminate Indeterminate
3 5.833333333 1.098126747 18 6 7 -0.934443783 -0.533058552
4 4.5 1.42457424 18 4.5 6 0.379206049 -0.755374432
5 4.611111111 1.289728147 18 4 6 -0.976649774 -0.276097233
6 4.222222222 1.664704728 18 4 4 -0.441359247 0.120424779
7 6.611111111 0.607684989 18 7 7 1.12632156 -1.36161604
8 5.333333333 1.495090003 18 6 6 -0.022368421 -1.003284081
9 4 1.748949264 18 4 6 -1.103994083 -0.371101938
10 4.722222222 1.808657466 18 5 7 -1.396909983 -0.003037892
11 6.555555556 0.783823376 18 7 7 6.069092349 -2.266576628
12 5.777777778 1.060274967 18 6 6 -0.810924824 -0.503105561
13 4.117647059 1.536324874 17 4 5 -0.288144941 0.3641818
14 4.611111111 1.334558261 18 4 4 -0.86023062 0.483959059
15 5.611111111 1.243282604 18 6 6 -0.600431772 -0.595164538
16 3.75 1.527525232 16 4 4 0.304642296 0.352711365
17 5.833333333 1.294785924 18 6 7 -0.278362573 -0.934923908
18 4.777777778 1.437135859 18 5 4 -0.488467393 0.035782317
19 5.777777778 1.516790557 18 6 7 5.068594234 -1.967090814
20 3.473684211 2.064741605 19 3 3 -0.821441913 0.50741856
21 4.684210526 1.733738144 19 5 6 0.358955428 -0.883401095
22 4.705882353 1.829094922 17 5 4 0.233921783 -0.756273874
23 5.473684211 1.678902454 19 6 7 1.441103424 -1.326749817
24 5.611111111 1.289728147 18 6 6 -0.007204697 -0.831338291
25 4.315789474 1.857496271 19 4 4 -1.007905098 -0.052655061
26 2.894736842 2.306867449 19 2 1 -0.655596973 0.901666829
27 5.157894737 1.50048725 19 6 4 -0.802296786 -0.409339913
28 4.789473684 1.718492471 19 5 5 -0.208355006 -0.66371781
29 5.157894737 1.572795031 19 6 6 1.295910668 -1.151727288
30 5.947368421 1.35292622 19 7 7 -0.504178393 -0.947642091
31 4.944444444 1.862074183 18 6 6 0.318987564 -1.016495389
32 3.473684211 1.866917276 19 3 2 -0.606192388 0.589989033
33 5.555555556 1.247219129 18 6 7 -0.752521008 -0.448897821
34 6.263157895 0.87191394 19 6 7 0.99397842 -1.138079858
35 2.736842105 1.910267732 19 2 1 -0.273689713 0.901445506
36 5.631578947 1.94965884 19 7 7 1.637445527 -1.528426123
37 6.157894737 1.167293065 19 7 7 -0.472564044 -1.04203438
38 5.157894737 1.772103518 19 5 5 0.371647907 -1.002501431
232
Response Count Histograms
All Ages
Figure E.1. Response Count Histograms, Questions 1-6 (all ages), the x-axis denotes the
response to the question and the y-axis denotes the number of responses to the question.
233
Figure E.2. Response Count Histograms, Questions 7-12 (all ages), the x-axis denotes the
response to the question and the y-axis denotes the number of responses to the question.
234
Figure E.3. Response Count Histograms, Questions 13-18 (all ages), the x-axis denotes
the response to the question and the y-axis denotes the number of responses to the
question.
235
Figure E.4. Response Count Histograms, Questions 19-24 (all ages), the x-axis denotes
the response to the question and the y-axis denotes the number of responses to the
question.
236
Figure E.5. Response Count Histograms, Questions 25-30 (all ages), the x-axis denotes
the response to the question and the y-axis denotes the number of responses to the
question.
237
Figure E.6. Response Count Histograms, Questions 31-36 (all ages), the x-axis denotes
the response to the question and the y-axis denotes the number of responses to the
question.
238
Figure E.7. Response Count Histograms, Questions 37-38 (all ages), the x-axis denotes
the response to the question and the y-axis denotes the number of responses to the
question.
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Ages 18-59
Figure E.8. Response Count Histograms, Questions 1-6 (18-59), the x-axis denotes the
response to the question and the y-axis denotes the number of responses to the question.
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Figure E.9. Response Count Histograms, Questions 7-12 (18-59), the x-axis denotes the
response to the question and the y-axis denotes the number of responses to the question.
241
Figure E.10. Response Count Histograms, Questions 13-18 (18-59), the x-axis denotes
the response to the question and the y-axis denotes the number of responses to the
question.
242
Figure E.11. Response Count Histograms, Questions 19-24 (18-59), the x-axis denotes
the response to the question and the y-axis denotes the number of responses to the
question.
243
Figure E.12. Response Count Histograms, Questions 25-30 (18-59), the x-axis denotes
the response to the question and the y-axis denotes the number of responses to the
question.
244
Figure E.13. Response Count Histograms, Questions 31-36 (18-59), the x-axis denotes
the response to the question and the y-axis denotes the number of responses to the
question.
245
Figure E.14. Response Count Histograms, Questions 37-38 (18-59), the x-axis denotes
the response to the question and the y-axis denotes the number of responses to the
question.
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Age 60+
Figure E.15. Response Count Histograms, Questions 1-6 (60+), the x-axis denotes the
response to the question and the y-axis denotes the number of responses to the question.
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Figure E.16. Response Count Histograms, Questions 7-12 (60+), the x-axis denotes the
response to the question and the y-axis denotes the number of responses to the question.
248
Figure E.17. Response Count Histograms, Questions 13-18 (60+), the x-axis denotes the
response to the question and the y-axis denotes the number of responses to the question.
249
Figure E.18. Response Count Histograms, Questions 19-24 (60+), the x-axis denotes the
response to the question and the y-axis denotes the number of responses to the question.
250
Figure E.19. Response Count Histograms, Questions 25-30 (60+), the x-axis denotes the
response to the question and the y-axis denotes the number of responses to the question.
251
Figure E.20. Response Count Histograms, Questions 31-36 (60+), the x-axis denotes the
response to the question and the y-axis denotes the number of responses to the question.
252
Figure E.21. Response Count Histograms, Questions 37-38 (60+), the x-axis denotes the
response to the question and the y-axis denotes the number of responses to the question.
Huntley
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APPENDIX E
QUALITATIVE INTERVIEW RESEARCH TOPICS AND QUESTIONS
1. Personal faith practices and communal/vocational ministry
In what ways does your relationship with God make a difference in your life and
in your relationships with others?
o What are some examples of times when you have seen God at work?
o When you talk about God with others, what do you say?
o How does God influence what you do on a daily basis?
o How do you bring God into your day-to-day interactions with others?
o Describe your devotional life.
2. Understanding of the congregation’s shared vision
What are some principles or concepts that people in the congregation hold in
common as they make decisions and work together in ministry?
o How do you know this to be the case?
o Think of some activities that the congregation does together. Based upon
these communal activities, what would you infer to be the congregation‘s
vision for ministry?
o As a congregation member, how do you think a first-time Visitor would
describe the congregation‘s shared vision for ministry after worshipping
here on a Sunday?
3. Efficacy of how the congregation equips congregants for growth in personal
faith and communal/vocational ministry through the vision
Consider this shared vision that you just described. What are some ways that this
vision helps you make decisions in your daily life?
o How do/would you apply it in making decisions on a day to day basis?
o How does the shared vision impact decisions you make at home, at work,
or elsewhere?
o When have you said, ―Wow, this vision is really helpful in dealing with
this situation in life?‖ here at this congregation?
o How does this congregation help you to experience a deeper personal faith
life, or to feel comfortable to talk about your faith in daily life?
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4. How congregation vision impacts personal/congregational faith practices
Personal applied to individuals, congregational applied to the council interviews.
Consider your personal/the congregation‘s faith life for a moment. How has the
congregation‘s shared vision made a difference in your personal/the
congregation‘s faith life?
o What is different in your personal/the congregation‘s faith life now,
compared to a year ago?
o What were you doing privately/as a council when you felt God give you
insight through considering the shared vision?‖
o When have you seen something happen that went against the
congregation‘s vision? What did you think or how did you feel about that?
o (For endline interviews). How has the vision cultivation process we have
embraced as a congregation over the past few months impacted the
congregation‘s ministry?
5. How congregation vision impacts communal/vocational ministry
How has the congregation‘s shared vision made a difference in how you relate
with others in the community?
o How has the congregation‘s shared vision impacted your relationships
with people outside of the congregation through your actions or verbal
witness?
o How do your relationships with others compare to your understanding of
the congregation‘s shared vision?
o How have people in the community that you know benefitted from the
ministry of the congregation or its members?
o (For endline interviews). What are you doing differently in our
community, whether intentionally or not, as a result of the congregation‘s
vision/vision cultivation process?
o (For endline interviews). How has the vision cultivation process we have
embraced as a congregation over the past few months impacted your
relationships with people in the community?
o (For endline interviews). How has the vision cultivation process we have
embraced as a congregation over the past few months impacted how the
congregation as a whole thinks about our community?
6. Anything else?
Is there anything else you would like to say, or that you think I should consider?
o Why is this important to you?
o Thank you for your time and effort in helping me understand more about
your understanding of this congregation‘s ministry.
Huntley
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APPENDIX F
SUNDAY SCHOOL MISSIONAL CHURCH LESSON PLAN
Note: This was covered over a three-week time span. There was not a specific plan for
which portions were covered on a given day; each session covered as much material as
appropriate. All of this material was covered over the three weeks.
1. God’s work in the world
a. Genesis 2 and 3; God in fellowship with humans, left searching for us.
―Where are you?‖
b. God‘s reign is now incomplete. We listen to other voices besides God for
our marching orders.
c. Love and choice. We choose others over God.
d. Even the Exodus and the 10 commandments. Israel is God‘s kingdom for
reaching out to the world.
i. Enslaved after trusting Pharaoh to provide instead of God. Other
gods always do this!
ii. God frees the Hebrew people
iii. Priesthood of Believers did not begin with 1 Peter or Luther.
―Exodus 19:5-6. Now therefore, if you obey my voice and keep
my covenant, you shall be my treasured possession out of all the
peoples. Indeed, the whole earth is mine, 6but you shall be for me a
priestly kingdom and a holy nation. These are the words that you
shall speak to the Israelites.‖
iv. ―I am the Lord who freed you … have no other before me‖
(Exodus 20).
v. Jealous God
e. We want a human king. (1 Samuel 8) —rejecting God as king
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f. This continued, back and forth. The prophets constantly called the nation
of Israel back to God.
g. Two things: Focused on God in the temple, out worshipping other Gods.
What happened to the nation of priests (with the Levites priesting the
priests)?
h. Babylon
i. People kicked out of the temple, SENT out there to the nations.
ii. Carry the message of God‘s kingdom to Ninevah.
iii. God … was there already.
iv. God‘s anointed one, or messiah could be … Cyrus? Isaiah 45.
i. Finally, in Jesus, the sent one … God leaves it all behind (Philippians 2) to
empty himself and become us.
2. Trinity
a. The perichoretic nature of God
b. Is poured out for us drawing us into that perichoretic relationship
i. The spirit brooding over the waters of chaos, the word sent out to
bring order out of chaos in creation (cf. Gen 1 and John 1)
ii. Missio Dei–sending of God in mission at work in the world to
come and heal the division
iii. Missio is all over John! Cf. John 17:1-8, 15-23. Then, John
20:21-23.
iv. Holy Spirit: sent John 14:25-27
v. Now, we: sent John 20:21:23
c. The sending is a reaching out of the perichoretic God to bring us back to
fellowship with God. To restore creation to what it was before we broke
relationship with God and forsook God‘s kingdom for our own.
3. Christendom
a. Early church structure; a movement of people being led, formed and
shaped by the Spirit
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i. Founded in the commandments to love God and one another.
ii. On the fringe (how can you preach Christ crucified from a position
of power?)
iii. A movement and a network
iv. Inherently relational and personal
b. Constantine: Christianity is the official religion (325)
i. Church buildings for each parish
ii. Baptism and membership automatic
iii. Maintenance and in the center of society
iv. Sometimes coopted by the king or wrongly using power from king
(crusades, missionaries in imperial age, etc.)
c. But now … something new and old is happening
i. Luther started it in the west, the separation of Church and state
(leave Roman church)
ii. US as new country without king and with religious freedom
iii. Postmodern democratizing of universal and instant
communication. What now?
iv. Where is perichoresis in this?
4. missio Dei—The “Mission of God” or “Sending of God.”
a. Righteousness of God and right relationships 2 Corinthians 5:17-21
b. Church in the world is the very presence of God (through the Holy Spirit)
to reconcile humanity with God
5. Kingdom of God
a. Redemptive reign of God
b. An assault on the dark powers of this world that keep people in ―control‖
and away from true peace
c. Characteristics
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i. It is Good News
ii. It is already breaking into history, yet its fulfillment is
eschatological and universal.
iii. God‘s reign, as described in the Sermon on the Mount, changes
everything.
iv. The kingdom is centered in Christ, who is king of all.
v. God‘s reign is being actualized in and through the Spirit’s work in
the Church, of which Christ is King and head.
6. Role of the Holy Spirit
a. Charismata and the Holy Spirit in the body of Christ, 1 Corinthians 12
b. Priesthood of believers
c. Vocatio (calling) cf. Luke 5 and the calling of Peter
d. the church is called to represent God‘s kingdom as servants;
Huntley
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APPENDIX G
RETREAT/WEDNESDAY NIGHT AGENDA AND SESSION PLANS
Retreat Schedule (Saturday, May 22, 2010)
8:30 a.m. Devotions (Who is my neighbor?)
8:45 a.m. Session 1–Missional church overview
10:15 a.m. Break
10:30 a.m. Session 2–God‘s purpose in the Book of Acts
12:00 p.m. Lunch
1:00 p.m. Session 3–God‘s purpose for Living Water
2:30 p.m. Break
2:45 p.m. Session 4–Biblical/Guiding principles for Living Water
4:00 p.m. Closing Eucharist
4:30 p.m. Depart Beckwith
Wednesday Night Meetings Agenda
June 9, 2010 Session 1–Who is my neighbor?/Missional church overview
June 16, 2010 Session 2–God‘s purpose in the Book of Acts
June 23, 2010 Session 3–God‘s purpose for Living Water
June 30, 2010 Session 4–Biblical/Guiding principles for Living Water
Devotions (Who is my neighbor?) Session Plan
1. Luke 10:25-28
1.1. What does this mean?
1.2. One person tell a 90 second story of loving your neighbor as yourself. How did
you feel?
2. Luke 10:29
2.1. What does this mean?
2.2. One other person tell a story about when someone was a neighbor to you.
2.3. Write ―And who is my neighbor?‖ on the board.
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3. Luke 10:30-37
3.1. What‘s a priest? Today? Pretend you‘re the priest (reread the story)
3.2. What‘s a Levite? Today? Pretend you‘re the Levite (reread the story)
3.3. What‘s a Samaritan? Today? Pretend you‘re the Samaritan (what do you look
like, pastor on Harley, reread the story)
3.4. What‘s a guy beaten up by robbers? Today? Pretend you‘re the guy. Reread the
story.
4. Some thoughts
4.1. What if it was our goal to intentionally be Samaritans?
4.2. Who would we hang around with?
4.3. Ministry, missionary work is done on the fringe. What would it look like for us to
hang out on the fringe?
5. Read 10:25-29 and contemplate quietly.
6. Sing Amazing Grace, verse 1.
Missional Church Overview Session Plan
1. Some initial conversation
1.1. How do we currently talk about church?
1.2. What is our vision (define it) of ministry and congregational life? What does it
look like?
1.3. How do we define success
2. Organizational Theory
2.1. The church is, does what it is, organizes what it does
2.2. Currently, we organize, we do that, and that makes us what we are; franchise
ELCA congregation.
3. meChurch video (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cGEmlPjgjVI)
3.1. Describe these people
3.2. Read, ―Then Jesus told his disciples, ‗If any want to become my followers, let
them deny themselves and take up their cross and follow me.‘‖ (And a version of
this is in all three synoptics).
3.3. What kind of disciple does a meChurch shape? (Society is shaping us to be
selfish).
4. Lonely People video (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Py_3IsEmyCU)
4.1. Describe these people
4.2. What would ministry with these people look like?
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4.3. Instead of effectiveness, what if we shot for faithfulness. How would we measure
our level of faithfulness?
5. Brisco‘s Transitioning From Traditional to Missional (see appendix H)
5.1. Item 1: Perichoresis and missio Dei. Bulletins are ―visitor friendly.‖ What if,
instead, the custom and culture was that everybody brought Bibles to church and
we all read from our Bibles?
5.2. Item 2: Apostleship
5.3. Item 3: Priesthood of Believers/Spirit working in believers‘ vocations
5.4. Item 4: Sending of 72 to free people so that they may love God.
5.5. Item 5: Perichoresis
5.6. Item 6: Faithfulness, Kingdom of God
5.7. Item 7: Woman at the well
5.8. Item 8: Parables
5.9. Item 9: Paul, ―To those outside the law I became as one outside the law (though I
am not free from God‘s law but am under Christ‘s law) so that I might win those
outside the law. To the weak I became weak, so that I might win the weak. I have
become all things to all people, that I might by all means save some. I do it all for
the sake of the gospel, so that I may share in its blessings.‖ 1 Corinthians
9:21-23.
God’s Purpose in the Book of Acts Session Plan1
Vision = God‘s Purpose + Guiding Principles + Time
A. Form small groups. Keep groups smaller than eight per group. Count off by the
number of groups needed, depending on how many are present. Do not let people
self-group. There should be a multiple of three groups (3, 6, 9, etc.--usually six
groups is enough) so that an equal number of groups study each chapter. These will
be the work groups for the day.
B. Give each group one chapter to study. If more than three groups are formed, give
more than one group the same chapter to study. Do not give more than one chapter
to any group! 1. Acts 2
2. Acts 10
3. Acts 16
C. Have each group discuss the text. Each group will need to have a scribe to record
answers to the following questions. Each group should list at least five or six
answers for each question. Have them read the text and then spend about 10-12
1 From Daubert, Living Lutheran: Renewing Your Congregation, 91-92.
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minutes on each question. The facilitator should help them keep on track with the
task and the time available.
1. What did God do in the chapter you studied?
2. What did people of faith do in the chapter you studied? (For example: prayer,
public preaching, etc.)
3. What key lessons would you say any church should learn/remember from this
chapter?
D. Report back to large group. (group scribe serves as primary reporter) 1. Record all answers on newsprint, using large print and markers.
2. Process each question for each group one at a time. (For example, have the
group working on Acts 2 list all the things they found God doing in their text,
then have the group working on Acts 10 do the same, then the group working
on Acts 16 do the same. Then move on to question 2 and repeat the cycle.)
3. Post the newsprint sheets on the walls around the room for everyone to see.
E. Close session with prayer.
God’s Purpose for Living Water Session Plan2
A. Return to the same small groups.
B. Sticky Note Exercise--This is done in silence. Do not allow any conversations until
step 6! 1. Give everyone a self-stick note.
2. Have 10 minutes of silent prayer and reflection on morning
lessons--encourage people to wander around the room in silence and reflect
and pray as they read the newsprint notes from the earlier session. Maintain
silence for the entire time as participants work and pray and think! No one
should write until they have walked around the room and read what is posted
and spent time praying.
3. Instruct each person to create a purpose statement by completing this
sentence, adding no more than twelve additional words: ―God‘s purpose for
our church is …‖ Have them write their statement on their sticky notes.
Remind participants to remain silent as they complete this task.
4. Have participants post their sticky notes on the wall in silence. The purpose
notes from each group go in a cluster on one wall.
5. Let participants read the notes in silence until everyone has read what
everyone wrote.
6. After each person has written a purpose statement for the congregation,
reassemble the small groups again. Instruct each group to discuss the
statements and from them produce one purpose statement to share with the
large group.
2 Ibid., 92-93.
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7. Come together as a large group and have small groups share their draft
purpose statements.
8. Save written copies of each group‘s statements for the leadership team to use
after the retreat.
Biblical Guiding Principles Session Plan3
(Return to the same small groups from the morning session)
A. Review the chapter (Acts 2, 10, or 16) that you studied earlier. Look at major
events and the decisions/choices that people of faith made in them. What values or
principles were they using to make those decisions? Each small group should make
a list of all the key principles they see in action. Do not try to determine the most
important ones; just list as many as you can in 30-40 minutes.
B. Sort through the guiding principles you have found and discuss which ones
seem to be most important. Compile a list of the five most important.
C. Bring the small groups back to a large group and have each group share the
top five guiding principles that they see in action in the Bible text. Have
someone from each small group read the principles that they have discerned. (A
possible idea is to have five different people from the group each read one principle.
This involves more people in the reporting.)
Guiding Principles for Living Water Session Plan4
A. Return to the same small groups. Have everyone wander and read what has been
posted through the day. Then have each group draft five guiding principles for the
congregation. What should be the most important as you follow God‘s purpose for
your congregation?
B. Have each group share with the larger group the five principles they drafted.
Explain what will happen with the work of the group after the event (see below). Thank
participants and send them home with a prayer and a blessing.
3 Ibid., 93-94.
4 Ibid., 94.
Huntley
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APPENDIX H
TRANSITIONING FROM TRADITIONAL TO MISSIONAL HANDOUT1
Over the past few months I have had an increasing number of conversations with pastors
and church leaders about moving existing churches in a missional direction. I have been
asked what key issues or topics need to be considered when attempting to transition a
traditional church. The following list is certainly not conclusive or comprehensive, but
here are nine elements that I believe need to be considered when making a missional
shift:
1. Start with Spiritual Formation
God calls the church to be a sent community of people who no longer live for themselves
but instead live to participate with Him in His redemptive purposes. However, people
will have neither the passion nor the strength to live as a counter-cultural society for the
sake of others if they are not transformed by the way of Jesus. If the church is to ―go and
be,‖ rather than ―come and see,‖ then we must make certain that we are a Spirit-formed
community that has the spiritual capacity to impact the lives of others.
This means the church must take seriously its responsibility to cultivate spiritual
transformation that does not allow believers to remain as adolescents in their spiritual
maturity. Such spiritual formation will involve much greater relational underpinnings and
considerable engagement with a multitude of spiritual disciplines.
One such discipline should involve dwelling in the word, whereby the church learns to
regard Scripture not as a tool, but as the living voice of God that exists to guide people
into His mission. If we believe the mission is truly God‘s mission, then we must learn to
discern where He is working; and further discern, in light of our gifts and resources, how
He desires a church to participate in what He is doing in a local context.
2. Cultivate a Missional Leadership Approach
The second most important transition in fostering a missional posture in a local
congregation is rethinking church leadership models that have been accepted as the status
quo. This will require the development of a missional leadership approach that has a
1 Brad Brisco, ―Transitioning from Traditional to Missional‖, May 20, 2010,
http://missionalchurchnetwork.com/transitioning-from-traditional-to-missional/, (accessed May 21, 2010).
(Included here sic).
265
special emphasis on the apostolic function of church leadership, which was marginalized
during the time of Christendom in favor of the pastor/teacher function.
This missional leadership approach will involve creating an apostolic environment
throughout the life of the church. The leader must encourage pioneering activity that
pushes the church into new territory. However, because not all in the church will embrace
such risk, the best approach will involve creating a sort of ―R&D‖ or ―skunk works‖
department in the church for those who are innovators and early adopters.
A culture of experimentation must be cultivated where attempting new initiatives is
expected, even if they don‘t all succeed. As pioneering activities bear fruit, and the
stories of life change begin to bubble up within the church, an increasing number of
people will begin to take notice and get involved.
3. Emphasize the Priesthood of All Believers
Martin Luther‘s idea of the priesthood of all believers was that all Christians were called
to carry out their vocational ministries in every area of life. Every believer must fully
understand how their vocation plays a central part in God‘s redemptive Kingdom.
I think it was Rick Warren who made popular the phase ―every member is a minister.‖
While this phrase is a helpful slogan to move people to understand their responsibility in
the life of the church, God‘s purpose for His church would be better served if we
encouraged people to recognize that ―every member is a missionary.‖ This missionary
activity will include not just being sent to faraway places, but to local work places,
schools, and neighborhoods.
4. Focus Attention on the Local Community
As individual members begin to see themselves as missionaries sent into their local
context the congregation will begin to shift from a community-for-me mentality, to a
me-for-the-community mentality. The church must begin to develop a theology of the
city that sees the church as an agent of transformation for the good of the city (Jeremiah
29:7). This will involve exegeting each segment of the city to understand the local needs,
identify with people, and discover unique opportunities for the church to share the good
news of Jesus.
5. Don’t Do It Alone
Missional activity that leads to significant community transformation takes a lot of work
and no church can afford to work alone. Missional churches must learn to create
partnerships with other churches as well as already existing ministries that care about the
community.
6. Create New Means of Measuring Success
The church must move beyond measuring success by the traditional indicators of
attendance, buildings and cash. Instead we must create new scorecards to measure
ministry effectiveness. These new scorecards will include measurements that point to the
church‘s impact on community transformation rather than measuring what is happening
266
among church members inside the church walls. For the missional church it is no longer
about the number of people active in the church but instead the number of people
active in the community. It is no longer about the amount of money received but it is
about the amount of money given away.
A missional church may ask how many hours has the church spent praying for
community issues? How many hours have church members spent with unbelievers? How
many of those unbelievers are making significant movement towards Jesus? How many
community groups use the facilities of the church? How many people are healthier
because of the clinic the church operates? How many people are in new jobs because of
free job training offered by the church? What is the number of school children who are
getting better grades because of after-school tutoring the church provides. Or how many
times do community leaders call the church asking for advice?
Until the church reconsiders the definition of ministry success and creates new scorecards
to appropriately measure that success, it will continue to allocate vital resources in
misguided directions.
7. Search for Third Places
In a post-Christendom culture where more and more people are less and less interested in
activities of the church, it is increasingly important to connect with people in places of
neutrality, or common ―hang outs.‖ In the book ―The Great Good Place‖ author Ray
Oldenburg identifies these places of common ground as ―third places.‖
According to Oldenburg, third places are those environments in which people meet to
interact with others and develop friendships. In Oldenburg‘s thinking our first place is the
home and the people with whom we live. The second place is where we work and the
place we spend the majority of our waking hours. But the third place is an informal
setting where people relax and have the opportunity to know and be known by others.
Third places might include the local coffee shop, hair salon, restaurant, mall, or fitness
center. These places of common ground must take a position of greater importance in the
overall ministry of the church as individuals begin to recognize themselves as
missionaries sent into the local context to serve and share.
In addition to connecting with people in the third places present in our local communities,
we need to rediscover the topic of hospitality whereby our own homes become a place of
common ground. Biblical hospitality is much more than entertaining others in our homes.
Genuine hospitality involves inviting people into our lives, learning to listen, and
cultivating an environment of mercy and justice, whether our interactions occur in third
places or within our own homes. Regardless of our setting, we must learn to welcome the
stranger.
8. Tap into the Power of Stories
Instead of trying to define what it means to be missional, it is helpful to describe
missional living through stories and images. Stories create new possibilities and energize
people to do things they had not previously imagined. We can capture the ―missional
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imagination‖ by sharing what other faith communities are doing and illustrate what it
looks like to connect with people in third places, cultivate rapport with local schools, and
build life transforming relationships with neighbors.
Moreover, we can reflect deeply on biblical images of mission, service and hospitality by
spending time on passages such as Genesis 12:2, Isaiah 61:1-3, Matthew 5:43; 10:40;
22:39; 25:35; and Luke 10:25-37.
9. Promote Patience
The greatest challenge facing the church in the West is the ―re-conversion‖ of its own
members. We need to be converted away from an internally-focused, Constantinian mode
of church, and converted towards an externally-focused, missional-incarnational
movement that is a true reflection of the missionary God we follow.
However, this conversion will not be easy. The gravitational pull to focus all of our
resources on ourselves is very strong. Because Christendom still maintains a stranglehold
on the church in North America—even though the culture is fully aware of the death of
Christendom—the transition towards a missional posture will take great patience; both
with those inside and outside the church. Many inside the church will need considerable
time to learn how to reconstruct church life for the sake of others. At the same time, the
church will need to patiently love on people, and whole communities, that have
increasingly become skeptical of the church.
Huntley
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APPENDIX I
DAMASCUS TRAVELERS INFORMATION
Phone Call Talking Points
The following talking points were utilized by the Discipleship Commission members
who called and personally invited active congregants to participate in the Damascus
Travelers groups:
Small groups of about 5 people
Men are with men, women are with women
Groups meet biweekly.
Groups are asked to read various book(s) and Scripture passages and to discuss
the readings and their perspectives about them.
The first book is The Centered Life, which talks about the difference God makes
in our life when Christ is at the center of what we do and say.
The hope is that we will deepen our faith as we listen and share our faith with one
another.
Groups begin to meet in May and the program formally ends in July.
We also hope that everyone will participate in the May 21-22 congregational
retreat, and that the Damascus Travelers groups will be part of the retreat
experience. This is not required, just desired.
We really believe that this is an opportunity to form new relationships and deepen
existing ones. Our hope is that we will grow in faith as we participate in these
conversations with one another.
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Initial Group Instructions, Sent via Email on May 13, 2010
Basic Info
1. I have included a list of the Damascus Traveler groups that are assigned, as of
May 13. Groups can grow and even split if they reach a size of six or seven people.
In fact, you are encouraged to invite others to participate!
2. For each group, I am asking a person (designated with an asterisk * in the list of
groups) to take the bull by the horns and contact folks to schedule a first meeting.
Please try to meet by May 23.
3. For each meeting, I recommend choosing a facilitator. It would be a good idea to
take turns facilitating at each meeting to prevent one person from seeming as
though they are ―in charge.‖ The facilitator‘s job is to make sure there is equal time
for everyone to speak and to share perspectives. Encourage quiet people to
participate, and try to keep talkative people from dominating. The facilitator should
also participate in an appropriate amount.
4. Remember to respect confidentiality. Do not share anything from the groups with
spouses, friends or anyone else. It is important that we can trust and respect one
another as we share intimate perspectives.
5. Please let me know when you plan to meet, just so that I know. Also, after you
meet, it might be helpful/inspiring to have a person in your group share some
insights or ―aha‖ moments with everyone else. To do so, just send an email to
[email protected]. Remember to respect confidentiality and
only share appropriate info that the source specifically allows you to share with the
rest of us.
6. Remember, there is not really a ―right‖ way to meet as a group. This is not a
program; it is an opportunity for you to grow in your faith. This is for you; make it
fit you. Use it as a chance for you to connect with others, to grow as Christians, and
to nurture one another‘s faith. Talk about things that are important. Bring issues that
impact your faith to the group so you can gather insights. Bear one another‘s
burdens. Pray for one another. Love one another. Have fun. Be a blessing and be
blessed!
7. On a personal note, I must admit that this is something that is totally new and
unfamiliar for me. We are learning and growing together. There are certainly ways
that we can do this better, and there are ways that we will do this well. That‘s OK,
because we are doing this together and with God. I am absolutely convinced that
God wants to be closer to us, and it excites me that we have this opportunity to
grow together in our relationship with God. Doing things the ―right way,‖ or
270
figuring out what is ―right,‖ is less important than being faithful and growing in our
relationship with God. I am confident that God will bless us with his presence in
this journey with one another. That is why I think it is important to learn together
(myself included). Any and all constructive conversation in this regard is highly
encouraged! And I praise God that we have this opportunity to grow together.
8. It might be helpful for you to keep a journal. Write down things that occur to you
either in your devotions or in your group. What is God saying to you? What is God
saying to others? What are you wrestling with? What occupies your prayer? What
do you hear in the daily Scripture readings? How is God challenging you to grow as
a Christian? What makes you happy, afraid, concerned, peaceful, in love, sad, or
any other emotion? Why do you feel that way?
9. Remember to keep up with the daily devotions and the other readings we have. It is
a discipline. I truly believe that God will be present in unanticipated ways as we
feast on God‘s word together daily and consider our faith from these other
perspectives.
General Group Meeting Structure
As a reminder, each meeting is flexible, subject to the consensus of the group. This is a
general outline, an idea, for how you can structure your conversation as a group. Feel
free to modify it as appropriate as you journey together on the road to Damascus!
10-15 minutes: Checking in, highs, lows and updates for prayer concerns since last
meeting.
25-30 minutes: Discuss the readings for the two-week period.
10-15 minutes: Sharing, discernment, mutual conversation, prayer concerns. (Is there
anything you are wrestling with in your life? Do you have any concerns
or items for prayer? Is there anything the group can do to help bear a
burden in your life or shed additional insight or wisdom?)
10-15 minutes: Prayer
Partial Reading Schedule
May 10-23: Centered Life, chapter 1 (This is a change, I had originally asked for the
first two chapters)
May 24-June 6: Centered Life, chapters 2 and 3.
June 7-June 20: Centered Life, chapters 4 and 5.
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Also, please immerse yourself in the Scriptures appointed for the Daily Lectionary in the
ELW (the cranberry hymnal). A copy of the Daily Lectionary is attached to this email for
your convenience.
The overall structure for our planned time together is (and it is subject to change):
May: Centered in Christ. Group discussion will focus on insights gleaned from The
Centered Life.
June: Faith practices. Specifically, this will include dwelling in the word, prayer, and
other spiritual practices. Folks will be encouraged to individually participate in a
faith experience, such as a prayer labyrinth. We will also finish The Centered Life.
July: Relating to others, sharing faith and ourselves with others. We will likely look at
excerpts from Unchristian and from Free of Charge, Giving and Forgiving in a
Culture Stripped of Grace.
Final Full Schedule, Sent via Email June 23, 2010
Greetings!
I finished discerning the reading schedule, and I also wrote/found/edited discussion
questions for the remainder of the readings. The schedule is below, as well as attached to
this email as a .pdf file. The readings are also attached as .pdf files.
Earlier, I mentioned that each group could continue at their own pace. That is still the
case. After putting together the remainder of the reading schedule, however, I am torn
between my enthusiasm for these readings (they are quite good, actually) and a desire to
fulfill the promise to complete our time together by the end of July.
With that in mind, I would like to ask that you prayerfully consider either 1. Stepping up
your reading schedule to more closely reflect the original plan, or 2. Possibly meet once
or twice in August to complete the reading schedule and conversations. I really think that
you will appreciate the readings and conversation.
Also, please remember that this week and next week is the time for participating in prayer
with the Prayer Labyrinth. Again, it will be available for use in the Narthex this week and
next week. There are also labyrinths available in Robertsdale and Mobile.
Let me know if you need anything or if there is anything you would like to discuss.
Peace,
Pastor Mike <><
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Full Reading Schedule
May 10-23: Centered Life1, chapter 1
May 24-June 6: Centered Life, chapters 2 and 3.
June 7-June 20: Centered Life, chapters 4 and 5.
June 21-July 4: Celebration of Discipline2, chapters 1 and 3
July 5-July 18: unChristian3, chapters 1 and 2
July 19-Aug 1: unChristian, chapter 9
August 8: Meet Sunday after worship to discuss our experiences together as a large
group.
Also, please immerse yourself in the Scriptures appointed for the Daily Lectionary in the
ELW (the cranberry hymnal). A copy of the Daily Lectionary was distributed previously.
The overall structure for our planned time together is:
May: Centered in Christ. Group discussion will focus on insights gleaned from The
Centered Life.
June: Faith practices. Specifically, this will include dwelling in the word, prayer, and
other spiritual practices, with excerpts from Celebration of Discipline. Folks will
be encouraged to individually participate in a faith experience via a prayer
labyrinth. We will also finish The Centered Life.
July: Relating to others, sharing faith and ourselves with others. We will look at
excerpts from Unchristian.
1 Fortin, The Centered Life.
2 Richard J Foster, Celebration of Discipline: The Path to Spiritual Growth, 20th anniversary ed.,
3rd ed., rev. ed ed. (San Francisco: Harper Collins, 1998).
3 David Kinnaman and Gabe Lyons, unChristian: What a New Generation Really Thinks about
Christianity... and Why It Matters (Baker Books, 2007).
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Discussion Questions
June 21-July 4
Celebration of Discipline, Chapter 1
1. In the first paragraph, Foster talks about the need for deep people. Share an
experience in your life when you had a deep, spiritual experience. What has
happening when you had the experience? What impact did the experience
have on you and your relationships with those around you?
2. What are some ways that you experience a deep relationship with God? What
prevents you from going deeper?
3. What ―ingrained habits of sin‖ (p. 4) bind you and keep you from deepening
your faith? Talk about your struggle to move beyond ―will worship‖ (p. 5) to
enter the door of inner transformation (p. 6ff.).
4. In the section, The Way of Death: Turning the Disciplines into Laws, Foster
discusses the dangers of practicing the Spiritual Disciplines externally but not
internally. Is this a potential danger for you? Why or why not?
Celebration of Discipline, Chapter 3
1. What is prayer for you? Describe your prayer life. When you pray, what is it
like?
2. After reading chapter 3, in what ways do you hear the Holy Spirit speaking,
calling you to grow and deepen your prayer life?
3. In this chapter, what spoke to you the strongest, and why?
4. Foster writes, ―Our prayer is to be like a reflex action to God‘s prior initiative
upon the heart‖ (p. 42). Talk about this. What are some ―prior initiatives‖ God
is placing on your heart?
5. In the section, The Foothills of Prayer, Foster shares several possible means
and topics for prayer. Which ones of these foothills resonated with you? What
foothills would you add to the list?
274
July 5-18
unChristian, Chapter 14
1. Do you know any ―outsiders?‖ Would you consider them to be friends? What
do you think their perceptions are of Christians or Christianity?
2. The author contends that young people do not like to join things that seem
easy, mainstream, or normal. What does that mean for Christianity today?
How can we help people grasp that Christianity was never meant to be safe?
3. When a young Christian interacts with the world, they are much more likely to
live within a truly pluralistic generation … that is, many of his or her friends
are not likely to be Christian. What should change, if anything, in the way we
prepare to live in a pluralistic, diverse world?
4. How does the Bible teach Christians to behave toward outsiders? If the Bible
describes your life as an ―open letter‖ (2 Corinthians 3:2), what does it say
about the God you serve?
unChristian, Chapter 25
1. One outsider in the research made the following comment (p. 26): ―Christian
means conservative, entrenched in their thinking, anti-gay, anti-choice, angry,
violent, illogical, empire builders; they want to convert everyone, and they
generally cannot live peacefully with anyone who does not believe what they
believe.‖ What is your reaction to this comment? Why do people come to
these conclusions?
2. When Christians talk about being persecuted by today‘s American culture, do
you think they are accurate or not? How does Jesus teaching about being
persecuted line up with what people experience today? What is the biblical
response to being ―hated‖ by the world? What does this mean for the way you
live the Christian life?
4 Adapted from ―unChristian Discussion Guide‖, 2007, 1,
http://www.unchristian.com/downloads/uc_discussion_questions.pdf, (accessed June 22, 2010).
5 Adapted from Ibid.
275
3. What are some examples of ways Christians have become known for what
they oppose? What is your church known for? Why does it have that
reputation?
4. Do outsiders‘ views matter to you? From the Perceptions of Christianity chart
on page 28, discuss the unfavorable and favorable perceptions of Christianity
and how they compare with your experiences engaging outsiders.
5. The book describes a movement of young Christians who are reluctant to
admit they are Christians. They are not simply trying to be cool or popular,
but they are concerned that the current way Christianity is expressed toward
outsiders actually makes it more difficult to express what Jesus was about.
Are you encouraged or troubled by this trend? In what situations are you more
or less likely to say you are a Christian?
6. In what ways can your life help to redeem the term Christian? How can you
be a Christian, rather than simply telling people you are one? What does a
Christian who represents both truth and grace look and act like?
July 19-August 1
unChristian, Chapter 96
1. Reflect on how you can engage criticism with the right perspective. Do you
respond with anger and resentment? Or do you respond with understanding
and compassion?
2. Cultivating deep relationships with fellow Christians and outsiders is a key
element to turning the tide of negative perceptions. How much emphasis did
Christ put on relationships in his own life? Discuss steps that will afford you
opportunities to connect with outsiders.
3. Do you use clichés to express your faith? What clichés need to be shelved and
what new phrases or statements can the Holy Spirit create in you?
4. How can your group or church begin to creatively express your faith in new
and fresh ways?
6 Adapted from Ibid., 5.
276
5. Christ was an example of a true servant. How are you serving your fellow
Christians and outsiders in your community?
6. Have someone in your group read aloud the Isaiah 58 passage. Discuss what it
means to ―spend yourself on behalf of the poor.‖
Huntley
277
APPENDIX J
PRAYER LABYRINTH HANDOUT
The Prayer Labyrinth The labyrinth is an ancient symbol for the spiritual journey and is
found in many cultures around the world. Utilized as a spiritual tool
in the Christian faith since the fourth century, it has played a
prominent role in the design of numerous cathedrals since the 12th
century. Today, the labyrinth has been discovered by a whole new
generation of Christ-followers who hunger after God and seek to
deepen their spiritual life as they walk its winding paths.
What is the Labyrinth?
It is a single meandering path which ends in an inner circle. The same path must be followed to
leave the labyrinth. Thus, it is not a maze with blind alleys, dead ends, and puzzles.
For what is the Labyrinth used?
The Labyrinth is designed for prayer and meditation. As a metaphor for the spiritual journey, the
labyrinth suggests insights and analogies for each person’s place on the spiritual path. The
labyrinth is an effective tool for “centering prayer”- prayer which is essentially focused on
listening to God. It can touch our sorrows and release our joys.
How does the labyrinth work?
Walking a labyrinth is a way to pray and meditate just as kneeling, folding one’s hands, or
bowing one’s head are ways to pray. The labyrinth helps us center on God through the physical
act of walking a set path that requires our attention. In the walking, distractions fall away and
the mind is put at rest so that the spirit (rather than the mind) is able to lead the prayer for the
labyrinth-walker.
What are some of the benefits of walking the labyrinth?
Mental and physical benefits can include relaxing and healing, as well as relief from stress and
anxiety. Spiritual benefits can include deepening our relationship with God, gaining greater
self-knowledge, and transforming our souls through communion with God.
278
How do I use the Labyrinth?
Pause at the entrance and ask God to direct your prayer. Take a moment to reflect on
where you are in your life.
Bring a question or a problem which you would like to discuss with God, meditate on a
Scripture, or simply be silent in your mind and let your senses become aware of the
garden around you.
Let the labyrinth set the pace of your walk. Let the labyrinth slow and calm you.
If you meet someone else on the path, simply step to the side and allow them to pass.
If you get confused about where you are, just keep going, and you will wind up at either
the center of the labyrinth or its entrance.
Pause as you exit and offer thanks to God for His presence with you in the labyrinth.
Take some time to reflect on your labyrinth experience. You might wish to record your
thoughts and experiences in a spiritual journal From http://www.stlukesmethodist.org/labyrinth
If you haven't experienced a labyrinth before:
1. Take advantage of this opportunity to pray with your whole body. Give yourself permission
to follow the intuitions and desires that come. Be open to your body expressing itself
through gestures, movements, or the flow of tears. Don’t be trapped by the thought, “I can’t
do that, other people are watching!” Other people are busy with their own labyrinth
experiences.
2. You can’t get lost on a labyrinth, but you can get turned around. If you move off the path
and forget which way you were heading when you step back on, you will either end up at
the threshold or the center. From there you can decide to continue or end your experience.
3. You may choose to walk the path from the threshold to the center and from the center back
out, or to explore the labyrinth pattern in another way. For instance, you may wish to walk
around the labyrinth, experience it by witnessing others as they move on it, sit beside it—
the possibilities are limitless! If an idea comes, try it! For some ideas see Living the
Labyrinth.
4. Many have experienced the labyrinth as a mirror where it is possible to view one’s life
internally and externally at the same time. Open your heart; open your mind to what you
may notice. Be compassionate with yourself; judging yourself isn’t helpful!
5. Labyrinth experiences are seldom “done” when one leaves the pattern. You may wish to
journal, walk around the labyrinth, use art supplies to explore the meanings of your time on
the labyrinth, or sit quietly to let what has begun continue to grow. You may not become
aware of all the meanings of your labyrinth encounter for hours, days or even months!
6. Witnessing others as they move in prayer can be a very meaningful way of readying yourself
for your prayer on a labyrinth. One of the many gifts the labyrinth offers us is a place to
practice watching others with eyes of prayer rather than eyes of judgment.
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7. Before you enter, let go of any expectations about what may happen during your labyrinth
experience. Pay attention whatever develops as you move in prayer. Try to let go of
thoughts that distract you from being present to the experience.
8. It is often helpful to respond to your labyrinth experience by writing, drawing, or using some
other creative process.
Some prayerful ways of approaching your labyrinth experience:
Caring “God, [person’s name] is in need…”
Centering As you feel God's presence, move into it more deeply.
Focusing A favorite name for God, i.e. “Jesus, Jesus, Jesus...”
A spiritual word that has significance for you, “Love, love, love...”
A short prayer, “Please help!” “Thy will be done” “I'm available.”
Moving Embody your sacred communication. No words are necessary.
Opening “I'm here. Help me to stay open to all You wish to communicate.”
Praising “Speak God's name or attributes with love and appreciation.”
Questioning “What is the next step?” “What do I need?” “What is changing?”
Reflecting Read or recall a biblical story. Ponder its meanings as you move. Take your scriptures with you. Stop anywhere to read and respond.
Releasing “Help me let go of...” “I forgive...”
Searching “God, I want to understand...”
Seeking “Holy One, reveal Yourself to me.”
Singing Choose a favorite spiritual song. Sing it silently or out loud.
Transitioning “Ever since Sarah died...” “Thank You, God, for the new opportunity...”
Excerpted from http://www.jillgeoffrion.com ©Jill K H Geoffrion Used with permission.
Huntley
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APPENDIX K
JUNE 14, 2010 COUNCIL MEETING LIMINALITY/COMMUNITAS HANDOUT
From The Forgotten Ways by Alan Hirsch, pp. 219-221.1
1 Hirsch, The Forgotten Ways: Reactivating the Missional Church, 219-221.
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APPENDIX L
HANDOUT DISTRIBUTED AT AUGUST 8, 2010 CONGREGATIONAL FORUM
Missional Vision Forum
What we are doing What is our vision for ministry? What vision of ministry do we hold in common? What is
God‘s purpose for us as a congregation? What Biblical principles do we agree upon, to
use as a foundation for shared decision-making in light of God‘s purpose for us?
Today we gather to discuss these questions, and others, as we discern and define a shared
understanding of who we are as a congregation. This will then become a basis for
deciding what we will do, and how we will organize what we do together in ministry. The
Council will meet Monday (August 9) to reflect upon our conversations today to update
the purpose statement and guiding principles. We then ask everyone to return on Sunday,
August 22 for a special congregational wherein we will officially adopt these statements
as our purpose and guiding principles.
These statements come from months of conversation among [Living Water] members at a
congregational retreat, at special Wednesday night forums through the month of June,
and from several council meetings. They serve as a basis for our conversation today.
Suggested Purpose Statement God‘s purpose for [Living Water] is to grow faith that moves us beyond ourselves.
Suggested Guiding Principles 1. Faithfully living with Christ at the center.
2. Prayerfully listening with open hearts and minds.
3. Selflessly welcoming all without preconceptions.
4. Courageously bearing our neighbor‘s burdens.
5. Relating to one another with respect and honesty.
6. Boldly sharing our blessings with others.
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APPENDIX M
PURPOSE STATEMENT AND GUIDING PRINCIPLES
From Congregation Retreat
Purpose Statement
God‘s purpose for our church is:
Share the Good News.
Show everyone the love of God.
Guiding Principles
1. We are unconditionally loving.
2. We listen with an open mind.
3. We are faithfully trusting.
4. God is changing us.
5. Believing Jesus is our Lord.
6. Scripture is our rule of faith.
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From Wednesday Evening Forums
Purpose Statement
God‘s purpose for [Living Water] is to grow faith that moves us beyond ourselves.
Guiding Principles
1. Faithfully living with Christ at the center.
2. Prayerfully listening with open hearts and minds.
3. Selflessly welcoming all without preconceptions.
4. Courageously bearing our neighbor‘s burdens.
5. Respectfully seeking and speaking the truth.
6. Boldly sharing our blessings with others.
From July Council Meeting (Adopted by the Congregation August 22, 2010)
Purpose Statement
God‘s purpose for [Living Water] is to grow faith that moves us beyond ourselves.
Guiding Principles
1. Faithfully living with Christ at the center.
2. Prayerfully listening with open hearts and minds.
3. Selflessly welcoming all without preconceptions.
4. Courageously bearing our neighbor‘s burdens.
5. Relating to one another with respect and honesty.
6. Boldly sharing our blessings with others.
Huntley
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