In a recent blog, I commented on the diversity among the
speakers at the recent Willow Creek Association’s Global Leadership
Summit. Some might dismiss this
intentional effort to include women, blacks, Hispanics, and internationals as
affirmative action or “quota” programming.
I see this more as an attempt to address an oversight and move toward a
change is practice and attitude.
Bill Hybels, pastor of Willow Creek Community Church, has
explained that church leadership suddenly realized one day how homogenous they
were and how heterogeneous the Church was meant to be. They began to intentionally seek out
African-Americans and members of other races to become part of their lay
leadership, their worship teams, and their staff. They not only wanted to be more inconclusive
but they wanted to visibly communicate their desire to be more inclusive.
Here again, you might criticize this approach, but there
is a management axiom which applies here:
“What gets counted gets done.” If
you want to make a change, you have to keep track of your behavior. A person who is serious about an exercise
program keeps a record of walking, running, or other activity as a means not
only of documenting progress but to provide a level of accountability.
When people started seeing diversity in the life of
Willow Creek, they knew that their friends of other races or ethnicity were
welcome and started inviting them to attend services. Visitors of various races realized that this
was a place where they would be accepted.
By modeling a desired situation, the church grew in a new direction.
I think this is one of the values of the Martha Stearns
Marshall Month of Preaching that is promoted by Baptist Women in Ministry. Whether church members will admit it or not,
many are uncomfortable about women preachers because they have never heard a
woman preach! Many women in ministry
today testify to the first time they heard a woman in the pulpit and the
affirmation it provided to them to pursue God’s calling in their lives.
Some have suggested that one route to discipleship is
“behave until you believe.” In other
words, if you practice something long enough, the habit or practice will become
an important part of your life. Perhaps
if we practiced diversity and equality more, they would become part of our
churches’ lives.
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