Our staff recently finished reading a book about Christian leadership in uncharted territory. It is called Canoeing the Mountains by Tod Bolsinger. If you are like me, that title is definitely a bit confusing…how does one canoe the mountains?
That question is exactly the point of the book. As Bolsinger writes, “How do you canoe over mountains? You don’t. If you want to continue forward, you change.”
In this book, Bolsinger, a Vice President at Fuller Theological Seminary, gleans principles for church leaders from the journey of Lewis and Clark. After fifteen months of following the Missouri river, the Discovery Corps reached the spring that was the source of this river. The explorers expected to crest a mountain and find a river that would lead them easily to the Pacific Ocean. Instead, what they found, after already so much travel, were the Rocky Mountains!
There was no way that they could canoe over those mountains. The Discovery Corps had to change their plans. Everyone, up to that point, had believed that the topography of the West would match that of the Eastern USA. Unfortunately, that wasn’t the case. Lewis and Clark had a choice: they could either adapt to the environment, or just give up.
In the same way, Bolsinger argues, the American church is now in uncharted waters. What worked before is no longer tenable in a post-Christian culture. In order to still be effective and complete the mission that God has given us, the American church must adapt. The methods that worked so well in the previous century aren’t effective now that the age of Christendom is over.
That might sound a little scary, but there is definitely some truth to it. We all know that Wednesday nights and Sunday mornings are no longer sacred. My seven-year-old has had to miss baseball games because they are scheduled on Sunday mornings. It seems that athletics and entertainment have surpassed the church in the eyes of most Americans.
However, our mission hasn’t changed. We are still called to be Christ’s hands and feet. To be His ambassadors. His witnesses. The point that Bolsinger makes is not for us to lament how things are and long for how things used to be. That would not be helpful. Instead, he argues that we need to take on an adaptive, adventurous mindset, just like Lewis and Clark.
Bolsinger writes, “We are canoers who have run out of water. There is no route in front of us, no map, no quick fix or easy answer. But…this is good news. This is a divine moment. This is an opportunity to express even more clearly what it means to follow and serve the God who is King of the entire world. The church at its best has always been a Corps of Discovery. It has always been a small band of people willingly heading into uncharted territory with a mission worthy of our utmost dedication.”
Our methods may change to better reach our culture, but our message will always stay the same. For God so loved the world that he sent his only Son. Let’s do our best to continue to get that message out to a world that desperately needs to hear it!
In Him,
Pastor Zach