McNeal, The Present Future

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Reggie McNeal, The Present Future: Six Tough Questions for the Church. Jossey-Bass/Leadership Network Series, 2009.

Sequels:

Referenced in: Missional Philosophy

LifeandLeadership.com Summary

This is a very accessible and candid call to a missional engagement with culture. Written on a popular level, it is not of the same academic weight as Darrell Guder’s Missional Church and Hunsberger-Van Gelder’s The Church Between Gospel and Culture. But for the average reader, it is my first recommendation on the missional movement. It was highly acclaimed and widely used in its original 2003 hardback edition, and now exists in several formats including DVD, audio, and the new paperback. It is a brief, well-written, provocative polemic against the present churched-culture slumber, and an impassioned plea to refocus on the mission of God. It is full of carefully crafted gems that hit dead center on the current ineffectiveness of the church, and how to move forward in “reshaping the Christian movement in North America.” (xix) On the other hand, it may need to be toned down if presented to a group of lay leaders who are fondly attached to the churched-culture perspective.

McNeal couches his messages into six new realities that are expressed as “tough questions” for the church. Below is a summary of the six questions:

New Reality Number One: The Collapse of the Church Culture – McNeal says, “The current church culture in North America is on life support. It is living off the work, money, and energy of previous generations from a previous world order.” (1) In the style typical of each chapter, he contrasts the wrong question with the right questions for the new era. In this case, the wrong question is “How do we do church better?” and the right question is “How do we deconvert from Churchianity to Christianity?” This will come about as we recapture the mission of the church, and engage the current world, which is similar to the world of Jesus’ advent. This world experienced a widespread sentiment of disillusionment with religion but hunger for God, and were attracted to the life-changing experience that Jesus offered.

New Reality Number Two: The Shift from Church Growth to Kingdom Growth – Instead of asking “How do we grow this church?” (the church growth movement) we ask, “How do we transform our community? (How do we hit the streets with the gospel?)”. This suggests a truly incarnational style of ministry. A special concern is a kingdom approach of extending grace and love to those who are searching for God rather than pharisaical thinking.

New Reality Number Three: A New Reformation: Releasing God’s People – This contrasts the old approach of turning members into ministers and the newer approach of turning members into missionaries. He asks for a renewed emphasis on missiology, both as a theological pursuit and an operational paradigm. He says current missiology should focus on the transition from modernity to postmodernity. The chapter ends with nine concrete suggestions on how to create an informed missiological culture.

New Reality Number Four: The Return to Spiritual Formation – Addresses the shift from the question of “How do we develop church members?” to “How do we develop followers of Jesus?” This involves reorienting our curricula for spiritual formation from text to life experience, from classroom to home, from didactic to experiential, from privatized learning to team learning environments, and from scripted to shaped.

New Reality Number Five: The Shift from Planning to Preparation – Contrasts the approach of predicting and planning the future (e.g. strategic planning) to praying and preparing for God’s intervention and our partnership with him in it. He offers a redefinition of vision, values, results, strengths, and learnings as seen in this new framework.

New Reality Number Six: The Rise of Apostolic Leadership – Surveys the history of church leadership roles from priest to pedagogue to the current situation of professional (counselor, manager, and/or technician). Suggests a more apostolic role of equipping people to be sent into their communities as an expression of the reign of God.

McNeal also brings a voice of reason to these pleas in a chapter entitlted, “Things I Didn’t Say.” He prefaces this with, “Here is what you may have thought you heard me say, or wondered whether I said, but did not hear me say.”

It’s over for the church
We need a postmodern church
Christianity and spirituality are the same
There are ways to God besides Jesus
All churches should be contemporary
Bible study is not important
I am against planning
These shifts will be easy
The situation is hopeless

From the Publisher

In this provocative book, author, consultant, and church leadership developer Reggie McNeal debunks these and other old assumptions and provides an overall strategy to help church leaders move forward in an entirely different and much more effective way. In The Present Future, McNeal identifies the six most important realities that church leaders must address including: recapturing the spirit of Christianity and replacing “church growth” with a wider vision of kingdom growth; developing disciples instead of church members; fostering the rise of a new apostolic leadership; focusing on spiritual formation rather than church programs; and shifting from prediction and planning to preparation for the challenges of an uncertain world. McNeal contends that by changing the questions church leaders ask themselves about their congregations and their plans, they can frame the core issues and approach the future with new eyes, new purpose, and new ideas.

About the Author

Reggie McNeal is the director of leadership development for South Carolina Baptist Convention. Drawing on twenty years of leadership roles in local congregations, and his work over the last decade with thousands of church leaders, McNeal counsels local churches, denominational groups, seminaries and colleges, and parachurch organizations in their leadership-development needs. He lives in Columbia, South Carolina, with his wife and two daughters.

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