Kris Browning

“As North American culture glides toward secularism, significant numbers of church attendees view their church as a place where they gather in safety with others who hold similar beliefs and values. To them, the church is a home where they come each weekend to be healed, comforted, and encouraged before they venture back into an unfriendly world. Instead of being pioneers, venturing out to reach a lost world, numbers of churches have settled down to maintain the farm.”
― Gary L. McIntosh, The 10 Key Roles of a Pastor: Proven Practices for Balancing the Demands of Leading Your Church

“Alan noted that the Sunday service is the queen for the pastor, a powerful tool that we can become overly dependent on, which can, in turn, reduce our imaginations of what ministry and church can look like. With the arrival of the pandemic and the inability to meet in person came an opportunity. The queen was off the board. Some pastors fell into despair and frustration. Others held their breath until they could regather. Some imagined the moment as persecution and conspiracy. Alan, however, doesn’t think like a Taylorist and is deeply attuned to the dynamics of complex systems after years of studying networks. What Alan was doing for pastors was reframing the moment as an opportunity. A chance to let the pressure push us into adaptation, to seed creativity in a moment of challenge.”
― Mark Sayers, A Non-Anxious Presence: How a Changing and Complex World will Create a Remnant of Renewed Christian Leaders