Reggie McNeil's book "The Present Future"

As I read what Reggie McNeil wrote in his book The Present Future, about the new realities the church is facing I had to admit that I found what he wrote very true. Having served at Westover for five years and having served as a faculty trainer with Leadership Connection (Leadership Training Network) for the last seven years, I have witnessed these realities first hand. Reggie proposes six new realities facing the church:

Reality number one: The collapse of the church culture.
Reality number two: The shift from church growth to kingdom growth.
Reality number three: A new reformation: releasing God’s people.
Reality number four: The return to spiritual formation.
Reality number five: The shift from planning to preparation.
Reality number six: The rise of apostolic leadership.

I have discovered in my own research over the last seven years that the culture of the church is collapsing around her and this transition has pushed the church toward a post-Christian environment. This by necessity requires apostolic leadership to rise in the midst of this transition and assume the leadership position that stands waiting. I share this example because each of Reggie’s new realities are actually not new at all, rather they are simply a return to the values that supported the early church and the environment where the early church found themselves.

The early church found herself in a complete moral collapse of the culture where she existed. The early church was not focused on church growth for the sake of numeric expansion, but rather to expand the kingdom of God and fulfill the call of Jesus to go. The early church by design, clearly involved all God’s people, and these believers were scattered (Diaspora) throughout the Mediterranean world, released to be Christ to the world. They were attentive to their individual spiritual journey as they sought to live as Christ commanded and to know Him as much in His death and resurrection as in his walking around with them. The early church was definitely not focused on the strategic planning process involved in creating a 10 year, 100 year or 1000 year plan, but rather, on the prayer and preparation they felt was absolutely vital to bring about the Gospel message of Jesus Christ. Finally, as a result of the call of Christ upon His disciples, true apostolic leadership emerged, effectively propelling the church not only forward, but universally in every direction.

The book is not new, but rather ancient. It is ancient in its scope and it’s content. It’s ancient in the knowledge one reads there and the feeling that you have when you grasp what is really being said. It actually should have been titled The Ancient Present Future, for this would more clearly describe what one reads within its covers. I am consistently amazed that we, as leaders both in the church and the world, run to new books that are regularly published and exclaim that this is “the greatest book that I have ever read” or “you have to read this book, it has blown my mind.” When in all actuality, the contents of the book that we have just read are taken straight from a biblical perspective. This is the case with Reggie’s book.

Now understand that I am not advocating that we should not read contemporary books that take a look at the transitions that the church must take to continue to be effective, but completely opposite. I read these books regularly and have read practical truths that I have applied in my life and ministry within the church. Also know that it is not that I am not fond of this particular book or accusing Reggie of writing an already written book. This is not the case.

I am simply saying that as I read this book, my initial reaction was “this is not new at all, but rather ancient knowledge that was clearly demonstrated within the scriptures by the early church thousands of years ago.” Now having said this let me turn my attention to what I gained from this reminder that Reggie has provided us in a very clear, contemporary perspective.

Since coming to Westover Church some five years ago, I have consistently proclaimed that unless our church fluidly shift with the changing culture by proactively responding and changing the way that church is done, then we will lose our relevancy within our community and be overlooked by those seeking authenticity. In reality number one, Reggie describes this culture and the necessary transitions we must make, and basically says the same things. He lists three ways that the church denies the need for change:

1. Many churches withdraw from the community
2. Attempting to fix the church by flexing political or economic muscle
3. Many churches are obsessed with internal theological-methodological debates[1]

His description of this necessary change becomes more descriptive as he writes on the preceding page:

“The American culture no longer props up the church the way it did, no longer automatically accepts the church as a player at the table in public life, and can be downright hostile to the church’s presence. The collapse I am detailing also involves the realization that values of classic Christianity no longer dominate the way Americans believe or behave.”[2]

This collapse in the culture that the church finds herself immersed, requires a proactive response and necessitates the need for change and positive transitions. Unless churches make this determination to respond, they will experience a slow demise, as Reggie continues to write:

“A lot of religious clubs (currently called churches) will continue to operate just fine – for a while, maybe a long while, depending on how well they build and manage their endowment. It is quite possible that we will have a good number of churches being financed by dead people. As long as mission-less churches maintain financial support, they can remain in their denial and self-delusion that they are the Christian movement in North America.”[3]

I am thirty-seven years old, which places me on the edge between a modern mindset and that of a post modern perspective, so to read what Reggie writes about the need for a church for post modern people, thrills me. This is what I long for at Westover Church in Greensboro, North Carolina. As I have thought about this more intently over the last five years I have determined that when I read about churches focused on the post modern culture, I determine for me that this means…

· Relevancy in methodology and programming
· Authenticity in all things
· Relationally oriented
· Sacred and mysterious
· Holistic approach to discipleship and mission

As churches construct such an approach, they are effectively making the gospel accessible to those people, thirty years and below, who may never connect or engage with a traditionally modern church that is not capable or desirous of changing.

Greg Ogden, in his book The New Reformation describes what the First Reformation did in regards to the Word of God, the New or second reformation is now doing in regards to the Work of God. Reggie picks up on this theme when he basically writes that:

The First Reformation was about: The New Reformation is about:
Freeing the church Freeing God’s people
Decentralized the church Decentralized the ministry
Clergy rebelled against the Pope People rebelled against the clergy
Church closer to home Church closer to the world
Distinguished Christians Distinguishes followers of Jesus
About Church About Mission[4]

His premise, that the more relevant question we should be asking is how do we turn members into missionaries, rather than asking how do we turn members into ministers, I think is a case of semantics. If we take a look at what we mean by the term ministers, from a biblical framework, I think we would find that we mean the same thing with the substitution of the term missionaries. Others have attempted to do the same thing. Rick Warren in his book The Purpose Driven Life suggests that everyone should have a ministry within the church and a mission within the world. This is fine if you are trying to create a formula or check off your spiritual to do list with what you needed to do. However, I would suggest that when you take a holistic approach the term minister or missionary works for all of us. As a minister, I am responsible to live out my God-call and fulfill my priestly responsibilities wherever I am – in the church or the world. The same is true if I were called a missionary – I would still be responsible to live out my God-call wherever I am.

Since 1997 my ministry focus has been on helping the clergy to realize that our primary responsibility as leaders is to equip, release and empower God’s people to be the hands of Christ to the world. So when I read in this book that one of the key new realities is the release of God’s people, I want to cry out “its about time someone wrote about this vital transition that must occur within the church.” For too long clergy have avoided this topic because it would require more from us than from those that are ready to step into their God-called roles. It would require greater change on our part than on the part of the people we would be releasing. Therefore, we do not focus on doing this, but rather we avoid the discussion of this topic and steer beyond its application in our own lives.

Reggie is writing that unless churches release God’s people, then the culture in which we find ourselves will overlook us as irrelevant and people will respond negatively. If we just look culturally, a post-modern individual strongly desires to activate their faith by putting it into practice and living out their call. They do not want to just come and sit, soaking up what the speaker says but never doing anything about it. Rather, they want to practically live out what they learn on Sunday’s, serving beyond their comfort zone and living into their God-given gifts. If the church does not respond proactively to support this mindset, then we will lose an entire generation of people.

I also believe that the last twenty plus years has provided a solid foundation to allow clergy to release people into ministry and leadership within the church. In the eighties, I think we saw a focus on church growth and the questions that most churches were asking was how they might grow larger. As we moved into the nineties, the church transitioned away from growth to focus more clearly on health. The premise became if churches were healthy, then they would naturally grow because of this health. As we have moved into the new millennium, the focus is now on how churches can take their health and distribute it into the world, impacting their communities and changing the world around them. All this to say is that as churches release people, they are allowed to live into their call and change the world in which they live.

Reggie McNeal’s book The Present Future is an engaging book that looks at the necessary realities the church is facing now. The author does an effective job of debunking the realities which exists within the church and shares the new realities that the church must address if it plans to move positively move forward into a hopeful and world changing future.

[1] Page 2

[2] Page 3

[3] Ibid.

[4] Page 43.