Innovation In Ministry is Not Evil
COVID has forced innovation upon churches—even fundamental Baptist churches—and that is a good thing. There is no virtue in refusing to be innovative in carrying out the Great Commission.
Yesterday’s innovations have become today’s cherished traditions.
The fundamentalists of the mid-20th century were innovators. That generation of preachers that came back from World War II started bus ministries, planted churches, built mission boards, and so much more that were way beyond the status quo of the time. The danger for the following generations is to treat the innovations of previous generations as cherished traditional history. The world is changing around us and we have to alter strategies in order to reach it.
Evangelistic leaders throughout church history have been innovators. The Apostle Paul’s missionary work was a pioneering endeavor. William Carey renewed the idea of world-wide missions in a time when people considered it novel and unnecessary. The Wesley brothers used small group ministry long before the Church Growth movement did. The great Sunday School movement of the 19th and 20th centuries was a new methodology born out of a desire to reach children with the gospel. Even our Sunday Evening services were initially an innovative way to reach neighbors with the gospel through the draw of electrically lit church buildings.
One of my children asked me recently why we do Sunday Evening church at 6 pm. She is too young to remember when we ALL did it at 7 pm so the farmers could milk their cows before coming to church. When we finally realized that we had no farmers attending our urban and suburban congregations (this happened in the mid-1970s) there was a movement for churches to meet at 6 so families could get home earlier and put little ones to bed. Even little differences like changes in service times or orders can yield ministry results.
Innovation is essential.
If we are not seeking innovative ways to reach our ever-changing world, we are in danger of being disobedient to our calling. Such changes have to be tempered by our biblical values. We cannot use sinful or worldly means to accomplish the Great Commission, but we also must not build faulty or false theologies in order to stubbornly defend the status quo.
Innovation is a means to an end, not an end in itself.
This is not about just trying to do something new—like rearranging the living room furniture. There is a logical and biblical process for innovative ministry.
Frank Bumpus used to say that he fired himself and rehired himself every year. He tried to look at his church through brand new eyes every year. It forced core-value thinking. What is essential for a church to accomplish in order to be pleasing to God and are we doing it? If not, how can we? Change should occur in pursuit of that mission, not just in a quest to avoid boredom.
Innovation must be tempered by clearly defined biblical values.
We must never innovate ourselves out of biblical obedience. The New Testament Church must remain reverent, righteous, and holy. We must pray, preach, teach, sing, encourage, edify, and grow. We cannot approve immorality or any of the many things the New Testament clearly condemns as sin. The Holy Spirit must lead and empower what we do.
Innovation is not a cookie-cutter proposition.
What worked in Thessalonica and Berea fell flat in Athens. Innovation is tempered by geography, culture, current events, and more. The problems of the Jews in Jerusalem were different than the Romans in Philippi. Sometimes innovation means working around the hindrances to the gospel ministry in various cultures. Hudson Taylor found success in setting aside European clothing and dressing in the colloquial attire of the Chinese. We can be reverent, obedient, righteous, and holy without being anachronistic or provincial.
Innovation sometimes does not work.
Sometimes we try something new—for all the right reasons—in accordance with our values—and it falls flat. There is no shame in failure. There is shame in refusing to alter practices that are failing out personal stubbornness.
“What if it doesn’t work, pastor?”
I have heard these words many times over the years.
“If it doesn’t work, we will stop doing it and try something else.” Sometimes we are so afraid of failing that we over-plan and over-commit to a plan so much so that we never actually start doing something or become so committed to our over-planned endeavor that we are incapable of adjusting when it is required. There is a great danger in manufacturing a theology for a new practice that casts a critical eye on previous faithful generations and forces any future change to be viewed as failure and compromise. There are many ways to do ministry obediently.
COVID has forced us all to reconsider how we do ministry. Our temptation is to anxiously await the time when we can return to the status quo. Is that really what God wants? This is an opportunity to rethink how we do ministry and do it better. We owe it to our Lord and to succeeding generations to be good stewards of this moment.