Church Consultant Tomorrow

We have something very interesting taking place tomorrow and the rest of this weekend at our church. We are having a church consultant come and analyze our church to help us be more effective in our big-picture ministry. We are having Gary McIntosh who founded the McIntosh Church Growth Network come with his team. He is also a professor at Biola and has written tons of books on Church Growth, Staffing Issues, Church Strategy, etc. They are going to interview one-on-one almost all (20) of the pastors and directors as well as 10 key administrative assistants. Then they are doing focus groups on Saturday with different segments of the church - lay leaders, regular attenders, people who have been at Calvary less than two years, elders, etc. Then on Sunday they come and observe the services and different ministries. Then they meet with elders and staff to give some preliminary thoughts on Sunday evening. After that, they do some demographic work of the surrounding community and do two different questionnaire surveys to a sample of the congregation - one is on worship services and the other is more general. Then in a few months they go over the complete findings and give us a big report.

It's kind of a weird deal. My appointment is at 11am tomorrow with Gary McIntosh and it should be interesting. I want to be honest. I want to be real. I want to be kind. I want to not be the complainer. I want to show the things I love and the things that are frustrating. So I will post more thoughts on this after the process.

Oh yeah, and by the way, we have this huge Student Conference at our church this weekend called Planet Wisdom. It's always a good thing, but a lot of work for us and kind of a pain in some ways. But I'm excited for the kids to grow from it. Mark Matlock, Sean McDowell, The Skit Guys, Addison Road, etc. Should be good. Should be tiring.

Oh yeah, and I preach on Sunday in Elevation with the consultant guy watching - eek!