Originally posted on March 27, 2015
Years ago a therapist colleague said to me, “All relationships end.” She was reflecting on the human experience of birth, growth, maturity, decline, and death. Her clients sometimes need to hear this: that it’s normal for any relationship to go through this cycle. It can sometimes be a kind of relief to accept this universal truth.
Larger human organizations are no different. They have a birth experience: ground is broken, letters of incorporation are drawn up, a business license is issued. They go through a time of vigorous and exciting formation, and enjoy a ‘cruising altitude’ of stable functioning. Then things may get a little stale, there might be conflict and discomfort, and if the organization doesn’t work on its issues, decline and even disintegration could follow. People start saying that they wish they could go back to “the way things used to be.” Sometimes the organization closes up shop. After all, we know that like all individuals, and like all relationships, all organizations end.
In our work with congregations, we help leaders look at their organization through this lens. We call it the Life Cycle Model. It’s just one of many models—or lenses—that help leaders assess how things are going, consider ways to revitalize or redevelop the congregation, and plan their first steps on the road back to formation and health. Lay and clergy leaders learn this model and then teach it to their congregation, inviting discussion on various levels, whether it’s an intimate gathering of a planning team, a vestry/bishop’s-committee retreat, or a congregation-wide town meeting. Sometimes everyone comes up to the model and makes a mark where they think the congregation might be, and the group looks at the results and discusses what this data might mean.
Where might your congregation find itself on the Life Cycle Model? If you have a sense of where that might be, what could be some of the needs and tasks that you’re facing? This lens can shed some light on both the gifts and challenges you’re facing at this point in the life cycle, and suggest a few ways forward.
One last note: “death” can be a frightening word, and we instinctively resist the idea that our organization (or even a committee or team within the organization) is dying, or dead. But we are a Resurrection people. We know that at every point in the life cycle, God is calling us to new birth.
—Stephen Crippen