The 'inside' and the 'outside' of church
... and how one can save the other
I’m starting my 10th year as a Free Range Priest!
Way back in 2016, I left my job as a Canon in the Episcopal Church - I was kind of an ‘in house’ consultant to clergy and (mostly small) churches in the Diocese of North Carolina.
When I started, I was driven by one thought (I still am!) : there’s got to be a better way!
It seemed to me that pretty much every congregation I knew and worked with (and there were a lot of them) was struggling with the same thing:
it’s harder and harder to do and be church like we’ve always done it. Clergy, too, were (and are) feeling that stress. Many are leaving their vocations because so many parts of it are overwhelming.
So for the last nine years, I’ve been pushing myself to find answers - what isn’t working anymore, and why? What parts can we change? How do we see God leading us to a new place as the church?
I’ve written about this a lot. It’s been a continuing journey of discovery for me, and I’ve had lots of great companions along the way.
A lot of churches want to grow and change, but they don’t know how.
And - they don’t want lose who they are and how they feel about their community.
There’s a place where I just feel it in my bones that we can - and should - reimagine church. In ways that hold on to what is dear to us - what brings us closer to God and our neighbor - and helps us to expand and grow in how we engage with the Christian faith, and how we share it with others.
I’ve felt all this bubbling up - and I’ve consistently had trouble articulating it in a way others can understand!
This morning, on my run (it’s a beautiful day in North Carolina today!), this image came to me that was simple and (hopefully) clear:
We keep the ‘outside’ of church
We rebuild the ‘inside’ of church
What does that mean?
Well, when most of us think of church, we think of this:
Yes - we know - the church is the people.
It’s the body of Christ. Yet most of us who love church love a particular place. A particular sanctuary that has its own smell and the beautiful way the light angles in through the windows. A place you can feel the presence of those who’ve gone before us, you can hear the prayers that have been said there for decades (or centuries).
And not just a building. It is also the people - those who have been there with us through life’s ups and downs, who have prayed and sang and come to the altar with us. It’s the worship and fellowship, it’s the suppers and bag lunches we give out to others. This particular community.
This is the ‘outside’ of church.
It’s the particulars that make up the people, the worship, the property, the programs of this holy place.
So what is the ‘inside’ of church?
To me, it’s the foundation of the faith. It’s the formation of each one of us for our calling and ministry. It is instruction and guidance and nurturing of souls. It’s immersion in Scripture, in tradition, in discipleship.
It seems to me that over the past few decades, the ‘inside’ of church has not caught up with the ‘outside’ of church, at least in the mainline denominations (I think our evangelical brothers and sisters have the opposite struggle - their ‘outsides’ don’t always keep up with their ‘insides’, but that’s another blog for another day…).
In the churches I’m familiar with, the ‘inside’ is either somewhat assumed, or associated with seminary or other kinds of formal education.
It’s not black and white - we certainly do have Bible studies and adult formation and newcomers programs. Though I do wonder how systematically we attend to the spiritual life and growth of those who’ve been faithful members for years and years. Where are they with their walk with God? How do we know?
3 things have stymied the growth of the ‘inside’ of church:
Congregations struggle to find clergy to serve with them
Most congregations cannot afford fully time clergy salaries - lots can’t afford part-time. Clergy people are typically who have supported the ‘inside’ of church for their community, but the resources they have tend to be spent supporting the ‘outside’ of church (incidentally, I think this adds to a great deal of clergy burnout - we tend to be called to the ‘inside’ parts, but most of our attention and time are put first to the ‘outside’).Congregations are lacking the resources - spiritual and financial - to sustain the ‘inside’ of church
Clergy and congregations are caught in a spiral - we want to preserve the ‘outside’ of church - understandably! - so we put most of our limited resources there. Yet as the ‘inside’ languishes, members don’t feel as connected to God, they’re not growing in and sharing the faith. This leads to fewer members, which leads to fewer resources, which leads to more resources going to the ‘outside’. And so on…
Congregations are reluctant to embrace 21st century technology
This is also understandable. First, because church members tend to be older, and older people tend to be less interested in and more suspicious of technology (not all of them! for sure. but enough that it can keep a community from being more tech-savvy together).
And second, because we often focus on the ‘outside’ of church with our technological innovations!
We love the ‘outside’ of church, and we don’t want it to change.
So streaming services (except for those who can’t make it to church), using screens in worship in buildings/traditions not originally set up for this, and setting up video meetings are all things that congregations tend to resist because it is messing with the ‘outside’ that they love so much.
All this makes me realize that this is what I’m trying to do with my own ministry:
How do we re-imagine the ‘inside’ of church?
How do we create ways to support members - and new Christians - in their discipleship? With growing in faith? How do we help people learn more about the Bible, about the sacraments, about the Christian tradition? How do we help people understand how much God loves them, how Jesus saves them, and why this is all so much Good News? And how do we support them growing in their own calling and ministry, and sharing more Good News with others?
AND - how do we do this in such a way that congregations can strengthen the ‘inside’ of church, which then in turn supports the ‘outside’?
AND AND - how do we do this in such a way that people who don’t feel compelled by the ‘outside’ of church can engage with the ‘inside’ online?
AND AND AND - how do we use today’s technology to build the ‘inside’ of church in ways we can easily share it - with individuals and with congregations?
I’ve started to see that it’s not that hard to find answers to these questions, once they’re framed this way. Once we can articulate that the ‘outside’ of church is to be deeply valued and preserved, and the ‘inside’ of church nurtured and supported in new ways.
I have to say I’m excited about the ‘inside’ and the ‘outside’ of church right now!
As I’ve moved into my tenth year of being a Free Range Priest, I’m also moving into an experiment: can I create (with lots of help!) an ‘inside’ that helps the ‘outside’?
This week, I’m starting to find out…
I especially resonate with the inside and outside. A lot of my Community as church, church book held this out as a way forward. With all due respect, I mean that I don't accept that we scrap everything as Anglican and other evangelicals do, empty the church of cross, candles, altar, vestments, the liturgy of the Book of Common Prayer, in favor of lite,
entertaining" worship that already is time locked and obsolete. There is something to a shape of worship that's been around for well over 1500 years. There is a centrality of the Eucharist. There is a worth to the scriptures and preaching on them as opposed to "messages." Don't misunderstand. This is not a retrogressive yearning for the past, down to the cut of chasubles, the maniple, biretta and number of candles on the altar and whether you face east or the people. I think the liturgy we and many other churches have come to over the last 30 years or so, the result of years of study and writing about sources is solid, with a foot here and the other in the kingdom, a real incarnational encounter. And I absolutely agree it's the "inside" where some serious transformation is needed by laity and clergy alike.
This stays on my mind and I don’t know what to do with it. Many of the ideas for personal growth, faith development, and the inner life you describe seem so dependent on leadership. As you rightly observe, the pastor provided this when such a person could be hired. But now, in the arena of “shared ministry” it sure seems that no one is at the helm. I’m on the Ministry Development Team, which is what the Covenant Group becomes after the potty break halfway through the evening. I’ve been at our church for just over two years, but it seems I’m not yet a member of “the club.” Let’s hear from other small churches about how they make shared ministry work!