Evaluating evaluations

Before I went into the ministry, I was a business manager. Scuttling papers back and forth on my desk, I dreamed of seminary. A headache grew between my eyes every single day. As I downed the aspirin, I couldn’t wait to train for my “real job.” I had no idea that being a business manager was preparing me for my calling. I didn’t realize that one of the biggest complaints pastors would make was that they didn’t get instruction in running a business. Reading budgets, making investments, structuring debt, motivating employees, negotiating salaries, making sales—this was the very experience that I was receiving and it would help me more than I could imagine.

Now I do a lot of consulting with the Center for Progressive Renewal, so I keep up with the news in the business world. Unlike some church consultants, I don’t think that churches are businesses. We have different cultures, goals and missions. Businesses are vehicles for making money. Churches are gatherings that encourage us to love God and love each other. While business models tell us to put energy into our greatest strengths, church reminds us of “the least of these.” While business models rally us to win and succeed, church whispers, the last shall be first and the first shall be last.

Plus, the average life span for a publicly traded company is only 15 years. We have churches that have been in existences for hundreds of years. For church to long to be like business is akin to a tortoise longing to be like a gnat.