Culture Change in the Church
Walt Bennett
July, 2019
I recently had the opportunity to teach the entire book of Luke to the staff of our church—in 25 minutes! Distilling a lesson on this Gospel down to this limited time frame (one that any pastor I know could easily fill up with a study of just one verse) was a challenge that paralleled my earlier efforts to write my conversion testimony in just 100 words (try it sometime!).
As I read and reread this Gospel, looking and praying for some new and inspired 100,000-foot level overview, I was struck by the character of the author himself. Luke was a man who embodied humble following to the extreme. He was the only Gentile to pen a single word of the New Testament—and between his Gospel and the book of Acts, he wrote more than even Paul himself. He was a Greek physician who abandoned his practice—not just for a time, but for the rest of his life—to walk with Paul and spread the Gospel. He alone stayed with Paul to the very end of Paul’s life. He never mentions his own name or points to himself or the sacrifices he has made to follow the Lord’s leading. We actually learn more about who he was from Paul’s writings than we do from his own.
As I reflect on the life of this humble servant, I see clearly the challenge we have in many of our churches today. So many Christians have their lives and their priorities completely reversed. They are in a cycle of living in service of the weekly life that they live in this world, making a brief visit on Sunday to their Christianity—an adjunct to the rest of who they are. Sunday services are a brief side trip (when they don’t interfere with school activities, sports, department store sales, and community events/festivals/etc…). When this is the formulary of your rhythm of life, the lens through which you look at everything you do and every decision you make serves this life. The purpose behind everything you do is to enhance and perpetuate everything that comes between Sundays and the Lord’s work is on the agenda where it can fit in.
"...but the lens through which he looked to inform every decision he would make and every action he would take would be dominated by his desire to be in God’s will and to grow the Kingdom."
In contrast, I believe that if Luke were part of a church today, his rhythm of life would be something else entirely. He would look at Sunday services as the opportunity to return to his touchstone to be in community with other believers, share stories of the week and recharge his tanks. This would all be toward the goal of preparing to enter into the world for another week of spreading God’s Word through relationship building and showing the character of God to everyone he encounters. He would still get his daily work done—and do it with integrity—but the lens through which he looked to inform every decision he would make and every action he would take would be dominated by his desire to be in God’s will and to grow the Kingdom. Luke’s entire life would be dominated by his number one priority—not in abandonment of everything else, but in concert with everything else.
It should be the goal of every church leader to move the culture of their church toward one that emulates Luke’s model of humble service and laser-clear priorities. This needs to be a culture in which the church is not just an adjunct to the weekly cycle of life, but where the weekly cycle of life is in service to the Kingdom that revolves around and is energized and inspired by, the community experienced in and around church services.
Walt Bennett is the Executive Director for Organic Outreach International. Walt shares teaching and coaching responsibilities with Kevin and Sherry as well as overseeing all of our day-to-day operations including content and systems development, and church and international partnerships. Walt is located in the Houston, Texas area and leads that hub of our operations in addition to his overall organizational responsibilities.
