Culture Creation: A Leader’s Most Critical Task

I got an e-mail not long after starting Gateway Church in Austin:

I feel so much guilt and always feel like I just don't belong in church. So it was a very big step to walk into your church this past Sunday. I have to say I was very welcomed by everyone, and I loved the service and teaching. I just wanted to thank you and the staff for creating such a warm and loving environment for people to open up to even hear the message, knowing that whatever level they're coming in at is okay - they'll be loved for who they are! I know with any organization that attitude comes from the top and is duplicated by the whole organization, which can be good or bad, but yours is great!

- Gabrielle

It struck me that this was Gabrielle's first time at Gateway. While I was thankful it had been a good experience, it opened my eyes to the impact of culture, the intended or unintended messages and vibe your whole group emits.

Since the day Gabrielle walked through our doors, thousands of young, skeptical or hesitant spiritual explorers have started following Christ at Gateway out of our post-Christian, postmodern generation. I now believe paying attention to culture is the most critical task of leadership and the most difficult.

Paul reminds church leaders in his letter to the Corinthians: "I planted the seed, Apollos watered it, but God has been making it grow. So neither the one who plants nor the one who waters is anything, but only God, who makes things grow - for we are God's co-workers ?" (1 Corinthians 3:6-9 TNIV)

As leaders in a post-Christian society, our job is not making people grow or change. God is responsible for the growth, for changed hearts, but the soil is the responsibility of the leaders. Our task is creating the right soil, a rich healthy environment, in which messy people can come as they are and God can cause the growth over time. But have we considered the cultural soil needed for a healthy Christian community in a hard-packed, post-Christian society?

Defining Culture
First, what exactly is culture? Culture could be defined as the glue that holds any social unit or organization together. All life requires the right environment for healthy growth. Clearly this is true of plant life. Research confirms the family culture most influences a child's healthy growth toward maturity.

In Christian community, culture encompasses the normal practices and behaviors of people as they determine what, why, or how they act or interact. Culture creation forms the texture of relational life in a local church. James Alexander notes how "the culture becomes highly ingrained to the point of becoming invisible to the members of the organization. That is why it is so difficult for group members to talk about their culture, because it operates at a level below our normal consciousness."Because culture is largely unseen, we are mostly unaware of the cultural soil we have created. Yet culture affects lobby conversations, attitudes of the "in group" toward newcomers, how patient believers will be with messy unchurched visitors, how people live and do life together. Culture answers the questions our generation first asks: "Do I want to be like these Christians?" "Do I fit here?" So what can leaders do to shape the culture?

Leadership Mindset
Creating culture begins with the mindset of the leadership of a church. Often what leaders need is not a new strategy or methodology to implement, but a mindset shift. As the leaders interact with others, they model the culture much as parents model the creation of a family's culture. What do you and the other leaders in your church currently model culturally?

Does your leadership think with the mind of Christ? The religious establishment hammered Jesus for letting people "come as they are." Jesus said "Go and learn what this means: 'I desire mercy, not sacrifice.' For I have not come to call the righteous, but sinners." (Matthew 9:13 NIV) Are you friends with any of the messy, unchurched people you are trying to serve? If not, what does this say about the mindset of leadership? What do you consider as most important to the effectiveness of your community? How do you model this for those you lead? As your views and attitudes shift, the culture will morph.

Public Vibe
The "vibe" of the public service or group meeting also serves to create culture. The look and feel, the quality factor, the style of music, the way people speak and dress and interact publicly are very important. These elements signal to others what you are like, what to expect, and how to act. This public aspect of culture must be contextualized more than any other aspect to the tastes and language of the unchurched around you if you want to reach them.

Nola came to Gateway exploring faith and emailed, "I have been to your church three times now. I have tried to describe the experience as 'alive' and 'authentic' but even these words do not quite define it." She's picking up messages of what Christ-followers are like from the vibe.

What messages do people pick up from the public vibe in your community? How well are you communicating the timeless truths of scripture in the language and style and musical preferences of the surrounding culture? If your unchurched neighbor said he wanted to check out your church, would you feel embarrassed or nervous or excited? Your answers signal to you as a leader something about the culture you've created.

Vision Casting
One of the most overlooked aspects of culture is how the average person, seeker or believer, captures a vision of how to live and function as Christ's community. In our highly mobile society, the committed Christ-follower attends two or three services a month.  As a leader, this means you will not be able to give people the full counsel of God through your public service alone. So think about what's central. What message did Jesus emphasize? What needs communicating over and over and over again? What stories get told? What real-life spiritual journeys are highlighted to reinforce what the church is about? What does the average person think about when they think about your church, what it stands for, and their role in it? We found "sticky statements" that communicate grace ("come as you are"), growth ("but don't stay that way"), and authenticity ("no perfect people allowed"). These vision statements traveled as we reiterated them.

Trey had just finished a horrible two-day binge of alcohol and cocaine when he called Gary for help. Gary had just come to faith at Gateway, but he quickly caught the vision of our culture. Trey recalls, "Gary told me that he had been going to this church that had really helped him connect with God for the first time in a practical way. Craig told me that Gateway's policies were ?Come as you are' and ?No perfect people allowed.' That immediately put me at ease, because I definitely qualified: I had lost my car to a drug dealer, I had lost my fiance, and I had just about lost hope that I wanted to live. Fast forward to today. Five years later, I have been sober since the first weekend I walked into Gateway. I realized that drugs and alcohol were just symptoms of my real dilemma - separation from God. And I have realized that I can enjoy this life rather than simply endure it. I thought that I needed to get well and then come to church. I had it backwards. I needed to come to church to get well." People will begin to act and live out the culture they hear envisioned over and over.

Organization
And culture creation cannot be divorced from organization. If the church is an organism, the Body of Christ, it must function in a coordinated way. How do we organize in a way that enhances and supports culture much like a skeleton supports a body?  Organization that is too rigid does not allow the flexibility and agility the Body needs to fully express itself. On the other hand, no organizational backbone hinders the Body from forming and expressing itself in a growing diversity of unified parts.

In emerging church conversations, I sometimes hear expressed the sentiment that organizational leadership is passé - we don't need leaders to structure or organize. This idea is naive at best and downright harmful to the Body at worst. I found out if you say you value community, yet new people don't feel included or can't get connected due to ineffective organization, you hurt people. Every time your church or organization grows by about thirty percent, there will be processes or systems once effective that no longer work. Pay attention to how your organization reinforces or undermines culture values.

Are you planting and watering, tilling and fertilizing the culture of your church, small group, or ministry? Creating the cultural soil where God can cause the growth is the essential task of leadership.