Principles of Listening Church
Churches have a message that they feel obligated to proclaim, as well as ways of being that they feel obligated to continue. An additional reality needs to be taken into consideration: the questions that people themselves are asking.
If given an opportunity to raise their hands, as it were, church members tend to have questions that they would ask of God and about God. Sometimes those questions are quite different from the questions that the congregation is answering.
A healthy congregation wants to listen to those questions, as well as to questions coming into the faith community from the world outside.
In an extensive survey of churchgoers in many regions and denominations, we discovered that their questions tended to reflect yearning and curiosity, rather than anger or frustration.
Their content tended to be basic and rarely referenced standard church concerns -- or arguments -- like doctrine and cultural/political issues. Typical questions include:
- Who is God?
- Where does God live?
- What is God's purpose for my life?
- Why do people suffer, especially children?
- Will my life work out (get married, get a job, have good health)?
Rarely do questions deal with church controversies -- unless the person is steered that way by the church. On their own, people ask more basic questions of God.
Nor do questions deal with doctrine or institution.
A healthy church listens to the questions people are asking. Leaders don't force an agenda onto people. Leaders start by hearing where people's yearnings and curiosities lie.
An effective approach is simply to ask: "What one question would you ask of God?"
- Method 1: Pass out 3 x 5 card at Sunday worship and other gatherings. Don't explain up front, to avoid steering the questions.
- Method 2: If you have an e-mail newsletter, use it to ask the question, and provide a link so that people can send easily.
Questions are catalogued by content and feel, so that patterns can be discerned. For example:
Content:
- Purpose
- Faith
- Sexuality
- Peace
- Leadership
- Church
- Death
- Suffering
- Doctrine
Feel:
- Yearning
- Curiosity
- Anger
- Frustration
- Fear
A healthy church adapts itself to answering those questions. Doing so isn't the church's only agenda, but a promising starting point, especially in discerning direction for ministries and programs.
Clergy can preach to the questions, especially when they see patterns, such as numerous questions about war or children's suffering.
Educators can structure education offerings, both for children and for adults, around the questions.
If this is done transparently (people know questions and why they are being answered), people will form an impression of the congregation as a "listening church."
People will hear other people's questions and learn to respect diversity within the congregation.
Preaching and teaching will take on new urgency.
