I don't want to always be too serious here, but I have a question rattling around in my head that I would love to hear from some folks on. For those of you who know me, you know two things...first, I don't like to be serious too much of the time, and second, when a question gets in my head it doesn't take long to get it out in the open.
So here's the question...How much time do we as pastors, or Christians in general, spend in building the church for the next generation? How many of us have a vision of the church for our grandchildren and the grandchildren of our friends and fellow parishioners and work steadily toward that vision?
Several years ago I pastored a church that had a large segment of senior citizens. They were a great group, but some of them really wanted to hang on to "their" church rather than "give in" to this generation. Looking back on it, I worked hard to build the church for THIS generation with little or no consideration for the next couple of generations. No setting up standards for making certain that the ministry of the Gospel continued to penetrate the culture whatever might come. No willingness to embrace new paradigms to prepare for the future. No asking of the simple question, "Will our children even want to go to church here?" I know that we educate our children and teach them Scripture, etc. But do we build the church for them and their descendants by any means other than giving them the chance to build a church for their generation when they get to our place?
Am I the only guy out there thinking about this? I doubt it, because I just am not that smart. Let me know what you think or what experiences you have had with churches who have set this task before themselves in commendable ways.
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