wfn.org | Change is positive re-direction, says Mead

[PCUSA NEWS <PCUSA.NEWS@ecunet.org>]

Note #6646 from PCUSA NEWS to PRESBYNEWS:

12-June-2001
GA01084

Change is positive re-direction, says Mead

by Midge Mack 

LOUISVILLE, June 12 - Jim Mead is a former Tacoma, Wa. pastor who, two years
ago, was vice moderator of the Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.).  Along with his
congregation, Mead has survived total, crucial, costly, and frightening
change in ministry in the past decade. He has taken his newly-learned skills
to the Presbytery of Pittsburgh and developed a network of people and
congregations working to "re-develop the kind of ministry Jesus might
mandate across His church."

Mead spoke Tuesday noon to some 150 persons, many of whom are part  of the
Churchwide Redevelopment Training network. The event, held at Galt House,
was a featured lunch hour program of the General Assembly of the
Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.).

The new "redevelopment movement" Mead describes as "getting back to basics"
and "one that doesn't break along theological lines." It scraps many church
traditions, revitalizes people and congregations, grows new members and
allows all involved to minister seriously to the needs of the adjacent
communities.

The situation redevelopment seeks to remedy is "church contentment," a state
Mead says is "a heart problem, the heart of the congregation and of its
members is turned inward on ourselves, our buildings, our programs, our size
and prestige, not outward into the community around the church building."

Story after story in Mead's repertoire exemplifies the symptoms of the
"contentment" malady. Many of them he tells on himself, how he learned along
with his own session and members how to do things differently, and how much
most of them, including himself, hated it. "I had to give up being a nice
guy," he says. "I had to learn to accept criticism as a positive. We have to
pay a high price to learn to be the church, because we have to change so
much, and in our culture we perceive any change as loss, when it really
should be seen as positive re-direction."

	Mead concluded with "the good news, God is in and with the congregations
experiencing such transformation."

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