CHANGE???

I don't believe we can transform our churches simply by teaching church leaders new information and giving them new ways of doing ministry.  It does little good to train a person and send him or her back into a system that isn't willing to change.  It is also true that it usually isn't helpful for a church to be ready to be transformed if the pastor is stuck in the same old ways of thinking about ministry.  Both the pastor and the congregation needs to be on the same page if we want to see real change occur in our churches.  Otherwise, we will continue to see pastors become frustrated with ministry to the point of abandoning it completely, and we will continue to see churches stuck in decline because their pastors are unwilling to try new ways of doing ministry.