“Imagine your customers as employees,” Kevin Kelly, kk.org.
In this post, Kevin Kelly explores what it means in a connected world to imagine your customers as an extension of your company. “Customers at least want to be involved at some level in the creation of what they use.”
The “final destiny for the future of the company … the company that is only staffed by customers. No firm will ever reach that extreme, but the trajectory that leads in that direction is the right one, and any step taken to shift the balance toward relying on the relationships with customers will prove to be an advantage.”
Now, cross-relate this with Rodney Stark’s discussion of the process of conversion, given in “The Rise of Christianity” and excellently recapped here. The point that Stark makes is that people do not convert to doctrine first, and then to the church and the community. They come into the community first because they like the people (and at some basic level they connect to the foundational idea), and eventually come to confess their faith in the doctrine. (Well, most people actually grow up in the church—and 1/3rd as many convert).
(Note that on jollyblogger’s article linked above, I disagree with his point 5—the disciples’ confession of faith came long after they decided to “follow” Jesus. Community played a significant role early on.)
What’s great about the church planting movement principles is this: you begin with a “person of peace” and simply treat that person as if they already were a believer. In other words, you begin by discipling them into faith. That’s probably not the best explanation, and may even be not 100% accurate, but it is the right trajectory.
So, some food for thought:
(1) don’t have a point where people become a “member” of the church. Or, at least, have it very well hidden. Just assume that people who walk through the door more than once or twice are “members” and begin incorporating them into the church. Ask them to do something. “Here, can you set up the churches? Can you make some coffee?”
(2) do require a profession of faith before allowing sacraments (e.g. communion).
(3) don’t require a profession of faith before encouraging people to take on a service role in the church.
(4) do enable a kind of low-grade discipling, where people who are still non-believers are encouraged to “disciple” other non-believers. Is that possible? Can you, by discipling someone else, actually disciple yourself into the Kingdom? Could you encourage a non-believer to host a small group that discusses a book (like, say, Mere Christianity for example), fill that small group with a mix of believers and non-believers, and have a lively discussion—and end up seeing people “disciple each other” into the Kingdom? (Granted, you’d want a believer background-discipling the non-believer host).
Obviously there are some roles in the church that should be limited to believers. But if the church keeps itself to a fairly simple structure (perhaps house churches?) those roles are far less than what we might think they would be.
What do you think?
If you’re interested in MUP’s training in facilitating church planting movements, email me to find out how you can attend one of our training events.
