Changing your church culture

If you’re going to change the culture of your church, that change has to come first through the teaching given. As a result I have taught a great deal about being a missionary church. Dave Devenish was very helpful to me and to the church on this. When looking at being a missionary church rather than just a pastoral church, he argued that good pastoral care is actually there to care for people who are getting saved and to equip them to reach the next group of people, so you need to teach it that way. For example, a great way to begin to change the culture of your church would be to equip people to witness. I’m talking about a huge cultural shift here.

It’s foundational that you begin to look at everything in church life through a different filter - and you also have to model it yourself as a leader. This is personally demanding; one year I invited 18 people to our Christmas Carol Service. I invited 18. I think in the end 10 of them came and one went on the Alpha course.

And we have set ‘smart’ goals for our growth. When I first started at King’s I made yearly goals because what was needed was to gain trust from a church that had struggled. I set such goals so that we could have measurable amounts of progress that everyone could see and recognise. Initially I set goals at such an attainable level that we had almost achieved them by the time the ink dried on the paper - even though I was giving us a year to reach them!