Bill Wilson
“What is your primary reason for being?” This is the first question my friend Bill
Wilson, Executive Director of the Center for Healthy Churches, asks when assessing
the health of a congregation. Bill, who is in fifth decade of church ministry and
leadership, contends that “All organizations, including churches, have a reason for
being. Only a few actually know that reason and articulate it and live into it.”
He wrote a blog in March titled The 8 Deadly Sins of the Church. In it,
he names eight common congregational mindsets in declining and dying churches
across the country:
- Building-centric
- Denomination-centric
- Doctrine-centric
- Laity-centric
- Money-centric
- Pastor-centric
- Program-centric
- Staff-centric
At the end of the article Bill offers a healthy alternative to the eight scenarios above,
which he calls mission-centric: seeking to align congregational life with the mission
of God as articulated by Jesus: To love God, to love our neighbor, and to make
disciples.
Do we know why we exist at First Baptist Church? What’s your “elevator speech”
about our identity and purpose as a congregation? What would a newcomer assume
is our main reason for being, if she or he were simply to observe us as a community?
Let’s keep talking about this together.
Peace and grace,
