As water is to fish, culture is to any organization--including the church. We are immersed in culture with all of its artifacts, values, and assumptions. Unless something happens to challenge those givens, we rarely think about the culture we find ourselves in.
For the most part, a church creates culture without thought or intention. Stephen Blandino writes,
Every organization has a unique culture, but not every organization created their culture on purpose. Most drifted into their culture. Unfortunately, the same is true for churches. Cultures are simply by-products of the way we do things. When you don’t think strategically about what you do, the by-product is usually mediocre--or even toxic--culture.
Have a clearly articulated purpose gives a standard by which to measure our culture. Whatever we undertake, does it fit into what we say is important to us? Although we may see our church’s purpose as aspirational, what steps are we taking to help it become a reality?
If we say that we believe that women have equal opportunities to serve in leadership roles in our church, do we see that expressed in the clergy roles, lay leadership, and ministry activities?
If we say that people are our primary concern, how is this reflected in the allocation of our resources? How are we investing in people development activities?
If we say that we embrace ministry outside the church, how do we affirm that? If we are more concerned about staffing and programming that serves those inside the congregation, are we really oriented toward community engagement?
It is easy to fall back into the default position of “We have always done it that way.” Purpose challenges us to take a fresh look at who we are and who we want to be.
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