These three have served as the metrics for how the church is progressing. I’m not against those. I just don’t think they are enough. They don’t go far enough and don’t always capture the truth of the situation. Willow Creek was successful based on those standards, but an assessment showed they had missed the mark on discipleship.
Part of creating an assessment culture is being concerned about the right things. Builders don’t measure the nails to see if the lumber will fit them. They measure the lumber. No one measures a light switch and plans the construction around it. You have to measure the right things. In the church, when we spend our time only measuring the outlying issues, we will miss the core mission of God.
I believe that measurements matter for the church. I don’t think we should eliminate them, but I do think we need a new scorecard. We need to key on factors that facilitate more people becoming Christ followers, more believers growing in their faith and more churches making an impact on their communities. Our scorecards must include an emphasis on things like accountability, discipleship and spiritual maturity.
That’s what Thom Rainer and I outlined in Transformational Church and what is at the center of the Transformational Church Assessment Tool. We need to find the right scorecard and begin evaluating and valuing the right things. Bodies and budgets may (and even should) be included, but they cannot be the only factors discussed. Find a tool, whether it is ours or not, that is valuing the right things and begin to implement a culture of assessment in your church.
In the final post of this series, I want to highlight two of the central issues that should be considered when a church sets about creating an assessment culture.