Yorba Linda Vineyard

“TAKE THE BEST AND GO” Part 3

Building a Settlement While Retaining the Pioneer Spirit That Birthed It

By Tri Robinson

Those of us who have been called to lead in the midst of the church growth and church planting era are familiar with the allegorical concept which draws the parallel between a church movement with pioneers and settlers. John Wimber often used this analogy when communicating the subtle changes of our movement’s evolutionary development. For example, John once warned us saying, “Remember, church history reveals a cycle in which the homesteaders of one renewal movement persecute the pioneers of the most recent move.”[1]  At the time he said this we were in our pioneer phase of development being persecuted by another established ministry; yet I think he innately knew that over the course of time we too would become the established settlers.

Pioneers vs. Settlers

A move of God begins with the courageous, entrepreneurial efforts of a group of people who have gone out into the world believing God for the impossible. In this way they act like the early pioneers that once forged out a new life were there was nothing. They were driven by fresh vision, creativity, innovative ideas and the willingness to take major risks.  They were motivated by a compelling dream of what could be rather than being satisfied with the status quo of what was. Pioneers forge into unknown territories with a hope of a preferred future as their guide more than a well thought out organizational plan. Like the pilgrims who landed at Plymouth Rock with nothing but faith in God and a dream for a new beginning, pioneers resist the restraints of bureaucracy desiring the freedom to be lead by the Holy Spirit and simple Biblical values rather than top down, authoritative, centralized structures. Pioneers build pioneer towns, towns with minimal structure systems. They build only what is necessary to facilitate the immediate needs before them. Pioneers govern themselves, not so much because they are given titles and assigned positions of authority, but rather out of natural gifting and necessary functional roles. There is no mayor, no chief of police, no town council. There is no need; not at first anyway. 

As the settlement progresses new folks move in. These newcomers are different than the original pioneers; they come at first for the excitement of the pioneer life but desire more security and less risk. They perceive the free- flowing lifestyle of those that came before them as being disorganized and somewhat reckless. They value and strive for management and organization. They want schools for their children, law enforcement to maintain order, rules and regulations to define what’s acceptable and what’s not acceptable. Little by little the feeling of adventurous freedom and the creative entrepreneurial spirit that originally birthed the settlement dissipates under the restrains of increased polity. Pioneers solve problems as they arise, one at a time; settlers establish rules and write neighborhood covenants in hopes of avoiding conflict altogether. Polity subtly replaces vision as it is used to define the culturally current social direction. Ideology replaces missionality as ideas and thinking becomes a higher value than spontaneous action.

In reality this is an honest scenario for most growing human organizations. For true pioneers however, it is a sad reality that feels futile and hopelessly unavoidable. Or is it? Could there be a means of growing a viable organization without the encroachment and confinement of institutionalization? Could we build a lasting vibrant settlement, or in our case a church movement, that maintains the pioneer spirit? I think we can.

Becoming Settlers That Retain the Pioneer Spirit

Taking the best and going (see “Take the Best and Go” Part 1) doesn’t have to mean literally picking up and leaving everything that has been built for the sake of starting all over again. That will only produce a ghost town. Taking the best and going means evaluating what is the best and clinging to those things worth hanging on to. It may require a bit of deconstruction, but not total destruction. It demands confident leadership able to identify and admit problems and have a willingness to be radical enough to instigate what may require major structural reformation.

Every move of God begins with a visionary leader who has the courage and authority to point the way. When I was a kid I loved watching the television series, Wagon Train, which aired in the late 50s and early 60s. Seeing the wagonmaster, played by Ward Bond, stand up in his saddle and point his hand westward while shouting, “Wagons Ho!” and watching as a seemingly endless line of wagons starting to move at his command inspired me. He had the natural authority to point the way, and his people responded in unison. John Wimber had that spiritual authority, and like Ward Bond he originally pointed the way for us during our early pioneer days. Vision as we all know is a powerful thing when it’s God-inspired and humbly lead. Spirit-filled Christian people have an inner sense to discern whether or not vision is born of God or a result of ideological thinking. When we sense that it is God’s doing we are compelled to follow, believing that we will be led to a future of fruitfulness. When enough people decide to follow vision they begin forward movement. Little by little momentum builds and catalytic synergy engages individual gifting into a swirl of new life. Independence and codependence lose power as they are substituted for a thriving community committed to interdependent participants. Those who have experienced this pioneer stage of a church movement not only remember it well but crave to experience it once again. The momentum that builds is much like a great snowball rolling down a hillside picking up speed and size as it travels. It is a Spirit-inspired phenomenon that magnetically pulls others into its life. As it grows it builds momentum until it can’t help but become noticed, often being viewed as a threat to groups that are no longer experiencing it. I think that’s why John warned us about being persecuted by settlers. Ironically that warning is now a shoe on the other foot; we as settlers must not persecute new pioneers that are presently enjoying the exhilaration of the snowball phase. If we do, there will be little hope of starting our own snowball rolling once again.

When people have a sense of vision, purpose or mission a unique culture begins to emerge. Like vision, culture too generates an indefinable power. Every culture forms its own personality without being cognitively conscious of it. In the case of church, every fellowship’s culture takes on a life of itself. Church cultures are much like a human personality, some are charismatic and open to others while some are more self focused and closed. If people are experiencing great joy and fulfillment their culture will draw in outsiders simply because life always seems to beget new life. For this reason culture in itself is a powerful form of evangelism. People want to join in where there is clearly something meaningful going on and others are experiencing joy while on the journey. Many times they join a body of excited believers simply to be a part of something that has life – often without knowing where they’re going or why, but along the way they end up meeting Jesus, the head of that body.

 If the vision is clear and everyone understands it people can’t help but want to make it happen. They become motivated to participate and be used; but in order for them to succeed they need training, financial resources, facilities and mature oversight. They also need some structure – and here lies the caveat or danger. Too little of it and the culture becomes chaotic and frustrated; too much of it and the culture becomes routinized and institutionalized. The key to a healthy culture then lies in the balance of structure. This is the issue when it comes to building a settlement that purposefully chooses to maintain the excitement of pioneering. If pioneers feel that structure is robbing them of the freedom they once had they begin to lose interest and energy.  Many will leave altogether as so many of our original leaders have. This creates pain, frustration and conflict because the settlers who love structure simply can’t understand it. This begins to damage the culture and slow down the momentum that once powerfully aided in accomplishing the vision. Not only that, but too much structure eventually overrides vision causing it to become lost in the machinery. The telltale sign of this is evidenced when the next generation is unable to articulate what the original vision even was. In a Vineyard Reflections article John told us that one of the dangers with institutionalization is that “vision is often lost in the process of carrying it out.”[2]

In order to keep a movement alive it is essential to constantly revisit the vision and ask ourselves if it is clearly being communicated and understood. It must be remembered that the Vineyard movement was birthed as a result of John Wimber’s conviction to leave institutionalized ministry for the sake of leading in the freedom of the Spirit. (You can hear John’s own words on this in a clip from his testimony video, I’m a Fool for Christ, Whose Fool Are You?) Ruben – here is the spot for the video…

In a like manner the leadership must constantly inspire and energize the culture. It must continually take the culture’s temperature to make accurate assessments concerning its state of health. This allows the leadership to bring structure when needed to assure the culture is resourced and forward moving. Leaders of movements must be skilled at knowing the state of the culture so as not to over structure with unnecessary polity and boundaries, but to implement enough to empower and enable those who are doing the work of the ministry. I liken this to building a fire in the woods. When first creating a fire the woodsman must use fine tender that ignites easily. He must shield it from the wind and elements until it begins to generate its own heat. At that point he patiently adds small twigs, then larger sticks, always aware of exactly how much fuel is needed at the time. Eventually he adds bigger sticks, and then smaller logs knowing if he puts large logs on too soon it will snuff out the life that has been started. In the end a great bonfire is built that generates so much heat that even a rain storm will have a hard time extinguishing it. It is the same with structure – too much too soon will damage the life of the culture. In this way we will build something that is living and life giving; an organism rather than an organization if you will.  This principle is not only true for a church movement, but for the local church as well. 

I once taught a message based on Isaiah 61. I spoke about God’s heart for the poor and downtrodden. About a week later a man named Rocky approached me. He referred to my message that Sunday and said that after church he had taken his family to the park for a picnic. They were cooking hamburgers and realized they had brought way too much food. As they were about to pack up and leave he noticed two homeless men sitting on a bench nearby. Remembering the message that morning Rocky decided to offer them his leftover food. They gratefully accepted and while they ate Rocky’s family shared the Gospel with them leaving the park energized because of the experience. Rocky caught the vision to feed the poor and did something about it. He was so excited that he told a couple of his friends and they made the decision to join him the very next Sunday to do it again. The vision to care for the poor had been cast into the culture and a new ministry was birthed in a very organic natural way. This wasn’t structure (an organized benevolence program) driving the culture but rather a spontaneous response to vision.

As Rocky passionately recounted the experience with me he said he didn’t have resources to buy the hamburgers needed for that next afternoon. He wondered if the church could help him out. I asked how much he would need, and he told me twenty dollars. I reached in my pocket and gave him my last twenty dollar bill. That twenty dollar bill became this fledgling ministry’s first budget – the first form of structure. It was the first small twig on the campfire’s original fragile flame. This was a pioneer way of doing ministry. Rocky took my money and returned the next week with a story of victory. He had fed twenty new homeless people that afternoon. More people joined Rocky because the culture created was exciting and life-giving. Soon this little benevolence team needed a new BBQ because Rocky’s had fallen out of the back of his truck into traffic. Recognizing the opportunity to involve the church I took an offering, and because people were stirred by Rock’s heart, the new team was able to purchase three BBQs and a trailer to haul them in (more structure). People continued to be drawn to the team and the ministry grew until Rocky was feeding nearly two hundred homeless people every Sunday afternoon. More people required more organization and with the growth brought more hurdles to be overcome. Rocky’s entrepreneurial days had come to an end, and because he wasn’t a manager, so did his desire to be the head leader. He didn’t like delegation and felt the joy was lost in managing this now growing ministry. At that time another couple in the church, Tim and Tempe McFarlane, stepped in and organized regular functional teams and the ministry again took off like the second stage of a rocket. Tim was managerial and not only took good care of his workforce, but constantly gathered resources to keep what had become a dynamic ministry growing (larger sticks on the fire). In time we built a facility called the Barnabus Center that was completely dedicated to serving the poor. This required a major budget to pay the mortgage and eventually provide payroll for several full-time employees. This was a far cry from the twenty bucks I had given Rocky years before.

In telling this story of Rocky’s heart for the homeless, it brings us to the main point – structure never started this ministry. Vision created something in the culture that required minimal structure to keep it going. We never provided more structure than was needed knowing that it would damage what God was doing. Rocky was a courageous pioneer but he lost interest when the ministry outgrew him and demanded structure. However, Rocky’s legacy carried on with Tim and Tempe’s managerial gifting. That is how it works. The ministry now known as “Feeding God’s Children” has continued for nearly fifteen years to feed the homeless every Sunday afternoon, rain or shine. It has never lost its vigor, even as weekly team leaders and workers may come and go. In this way, the pioneers can keep inventing ministry while the settlers can keep them growing – there is room for both.

Good structure provides a place or an opportunity for everyone to play, and the training and resources for them to succeed. Good structure utilizes all of the diverse gifting of those who have chosen to belong, both pioneers and settlers. Good structure builds in ways of taking the culture’s temperature, actively listening in order to solve potential problems before they materialize. And finally, good structure handles problems one at a time, only as needed rather than setting unnecessary policy as a means of direction and control. If structure is balanced, the culture will remain vibrant and the vision will proceed and ultimately succeed. If a church movement is to keep moving it must take the best and go. It must evaluate and reevaluate the clarity of the vision, the health of the culture, and the need for structural revision.

[1] Reflections, October/November Issue, 1993, page 6 

[2] Reflections, October/November Issue, 1993, page 8

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