The Welfare of the City
How One Church of Christ is Finding Renewal
A neighbor texted me recently and asked, “Can we have a kids' movie night in your church parking lot?” A few years ago, our church leaders would not have jumped on this opportunity so enthusiastically, but everything’s different now. "That’s a great idea!" I exclaimed to our neighbor, Gunnar, knowing I’d have the full support of our leadership. Our church has a different relationship with our neighbors now. We see God moving among them. As a result, we’re more alive than we’ve been in a long time.
Similar to our human bodies, churches also have a life expectancy. According to researchers, the average lifespan of a church in the U.S. is about 75 years. Our church reached 75 years old a few years ago. Due to declining membership, some could see that very soon we would be in hospice care. We had a choice to make. Fortunately, unlike the human body, churches can experience new life through renewal.
We asked our elders if we could bring in church consultants to help us figure out what to do. So, in September 2018, we gathered a diverse leadership group of about 20 individuals (different races, genders, and ages) and had a weekend assessment workshop with Stan and Gena Granberg.
SEE YOURSELF AS YOU ARE
The Granbergs helped us realize that we were in the “life support” stage of church growth (the last stage before death) and that we would need to do some serious redevelopment if we wanted to survive and grow. We were challenged to reevaluate everything our church had been doing and be open to new ways of reaching out. This involved letting go of sacred cows, attuning our ears and eyes to what God was doing in our community, embracing personal transformation, and becoming open to ministering in new ways.
This team of people (dubbed our Redevelopment Team) began meeting regularly, praying together, reading through the book Canoeing the Mountains by Tod Bolsinger, and sharing where we saw God moving. Presently this team has morphed into what we now call our “Renewal Team,” because we’re in a different stage now.
NEW FUTURE
In his book Think Again Adam Grant challenges his readers to take a second look at what they believe, and how they see things, and be open to change. Our world is changing at break-neck speed and one of the most valuable skills to have as an individual and an organization is the ability to pivot.
In some ways, we felt like exiles in a foreign land as we went through this redevelopment process. I like the words that God gives a group of exiles in Babylon in the book of Jeremiah: “Also seek the peace and prosperity of the city to which I have carried you into exile. Pray to the Lord for it, because if it prospers, you too will prosper” (Jer 29:7, NIV). So, the people of God found themselves in a foreign land, and they were told to “plant vineyards, tend gardens, build your houses, have children.” God told them to pursue what’s best for their city (their neighborhood). Pray for Babylon. But don’t just pray, work actively on their behalf. This is not totally altruistic - it’s also self-promoting. Our welfare is connected to their welfare.
We believe we have Biblical support for ministering to our community in ways that target their areas of greatest felt need.
Phil 2:4: “Look not only to your own interests, but also to the interests of others.”
I Cor. 9:22: “I have become all things to all men so that by all possible means I might save some.”
When we got our Redevelopment Team up and running, we didn’t have to start totally from scratch. We were already connecting with our neighbors in a few ways such as “Trunk or Treat,” “National Night Out” and Christmas caroling to the houses on our block. Then the pandemic hit! We adjusted our antenna and scanned for opportunities. We advertised a drive-through giveaway of Easter baskets on Nextdoor.com and got a good response and lots of appreciation from neighbors.
Our antennas were still in search mode when our nation was shaken by the killing of George Floyd. We organized a demonstration on the street outside our church building which is a major thoroughfare in San Leandro. 150 people came out to line the street with signs to protest racism and police brutality. Cars passing by honked in support. Several families with children came up to us and thanked us for hosting this event. They said that they had really wanted to show solidarity with the movement but were hesitant to join other protests because they sometimes got unruly or ended up involving destructive elements. They said that when they heard that a church was organizing a demonstration, they knew they could trust it to be a safe place to demonstrate with their kids.
“We don’t claim to have all the answers. But we do believe that by opening ourselves up to rethinking and listening to God in different ways, we have discovered renewal and a greater sense of purpose.”
Soon afterward our church hosted two “Listening Summits for Racial Justice.” We wanted to provide a safe place for people to talk, share, and process together. We heard from different races as well as speakers from law enforcement, education, and local government. (Watch the second listening summit on our church website if you’re interested in seeing what it was like. Go to www.slcofc.org and click on the Listening Summit tab.)
At the end of 2020, the city of San Leandro sent emails to churches and non-profits asking if anyone was interested in learning about becoming a resilience hub. My wife and I had always wanted to investigate the possibility of our church being an evacuation center for the community in times of disaster. We felt this was an opportunity to be investigated, so we jumped in and signed up for the series of Zoom workshops. As they say, the rest is history.
One of the reasons the city of San Leandro reached out to us to become a resilience hub was because they recognized that community-based organizations such as churches, non-profits, and schools are trusted entities within local communities, so residents will be more likely to seek resources or help from them in a disaster. Rather than recreating the wheel, the city's role is to provide guidance and resources to these organizations so they can better serve the community during disruptive events as well as build neighborhood cohesion during normal times.
We began our Resilience Hub journey by surveying the residents in our neighborhood and discovered that their top three priorities for us serving them as a resilience hub were: More block parties, Emergency Preparedness, and Community Garden/Climate Change/Energy Efficiency.
We secured a grant and purchased a generator so we can host our neighborhood during a power outage. (This will enable us to provide a gathering place in our Fellowship Hall for people to power up computers and cell phones, and store medicines in the church fridge.) We’ve had Block parties (with a live band), movie nights, and snow cone trucks over the past few years. We are working now on traffic calming efforts because this is a priority for our neighbors. In the meantime, we’ve become a polling center as well as a place for the Red Cross to have blood drives.
One of our neighbors is a landscaper and organized the construction of a community garden next to our church playground. We have a stand at the end of our parking lot where we share the garden’s produce with neighbors and neighbors share their produce. We recently purchased solar panels for the church and have installed a solar backup battery system so we can be self-sustaining when power is down.
We don’t claim to have all the answers. But we do believe that by opening ourselves up to rethinking and listening to God in different ways, we have discovered renewal and a greater sense of purpose. Just today a neighbor texted me requesting that a couple of us from the church help solve a conflict between a few of the neighbors. Opportunities like this come our way now because by connecting with our neighbors regularly, we’ve communicated that we care. I’ve heard a number of our neighbors in casual conversation say, “Our church is doing this or that” (even though they do not attend our worship services.) Our neighbors have claimed us! We look forward to seeing what God is going to do with these deepening relationships with our community as we respond to the opportunities He puts before us.
Woody Square has been an associate minister for the San Leandro Church of Christ for the past 32 years which followed 6 years of mission work in the country of Papua New Guinea. He enjoys all the different aspects of ministry: weekly small group time with the young adults, regular kids' events with the children, occasional preaching and counseling, helping with all church events, and ministering to the neighborhood.
Excellent!