The Church the Elders Built

This weekend we took the eldership and ministry team away for a retreat together. It took awhile to find a weekend that suited everyone - but we finally got there. The first task of the weekend that I gave to the elders to do was to build a new church from the ground up. I gave them a pile of materials and explained this was their opportunity to work together to create something brand new. The catch was they were not allowed to talk or to write notes. They could use hand signals and mime, but no other forms of communication were permitted.

On Friday night one of the elders was yet to arrive, so I gave them a extra resource person to assist with the project - that was Yvonne, our worship and creative arts pastor.

Well after some slight hesitation the work soon got underway. The place became a hive of activity.
It was a fascinating experience to watch and observe the process. Some became very animated communicating vision. Some gravitated to positions of strong practical leadership and others were content to sit back and see what others were doing and then help out as they could. There were differences of opinion that had to be resolved. Different values also soon emerged in the design of the building.


After some 30 minutes the project was finished. It was a grand structure that included three different features. There was a worship centre, a large youth hall with a glass atrium design and a very modern office block included.

The amazing thing with this design was that you could lift the roof and take a look inside at what was happening!

After the project was finished there was a lively discussion about the various roles people took and the frustrations they experienced in the process. Poorly understood communication was explained and different values were discussed. They complained because they thought there was a lack of resources to do the job properly! (Any of this sounding familiar?)

At the end of the project there was also a lament. They said, "We had the opportunity to something totally new and different, and yet without thinking about it we built a very conservative structure that is really very much about more of the same." Interesting observation eh!



Well we didn't make them work all the time. Saturday morning we enjoyed a walk along the beach. We were staying at a shack at Primrose Sands and the beach was magnificent.

After our morning walk we settled down to reflect on the leadership principles in the call of Joshua, we prayed together and shared our dreams and ideas of where we need to focus and what we need to do to be able to move forward as a church.