Managing Change

Do you like change?  I have to confess to being a bit of a change junkie, I love trying new stuff even knowing that a significant chunk of it won't work.  I love the fact that I am saved by Jesus Christ not by whether what I try or do succeeds of fails.  But as we think about change what are some of the things which ought to temper our thinking (notice that it tempers our thinking it doesn't paralyse us into not changing!!!)

The People we have
As churches and as leaders people need to drive what we do.  Every change we make will in some way affect people and loving my neighbour will mean that I do not want change to harm others.  Take for example the hypothetical of a church changing the venue in which it meets.  It is right and good to be thinking carefully about pastorally caring for people in change - who will this affect the most, who may be genuinely in difficult if we do this, or move here?  For whom does this make it very difficult to attend church?  And how can we counter that?  What do we need to do to ensure transition is good and we take people with us?

The People we don't have
The danger is that in thinking about the people we have we don't think about the people we don't have yet.  Again take the hypothetical of a church moving meeting venue.  Maybe there is an area they could move to which has no gospel presence in which case the great commission and Paul's approach to planting churches would seem to suggest such a need should make us pray about it and seriously consider it?  Perhaps the area they are meeting in is already reached by another church or has a church or churches close to it.  Then there is a both a drive out and a pull in to another area.

There are lots of other factors we may want to take into account, but I think people need to be our primary factors as we think about change.  What difference would it make to our programmes if we thought about people first and foremost and built everything around them?  What risks would it lead us to take?  What changes would love compel us to make?