29 March, 2024

My Journey to Journey

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by | 13 November, 2010 | 2 comments

By Darin Brown

I can still remember taking notes from a breakout session at the Eastern Christian Convention more than 10 years ago. Gene Appel was describing the transformation that had occurred at the church he was leading in Las Vegas and was presenting a simple yet profound formula for change. I wrote down “Dissatisfaction + Vision + Next Steps = Change.”

As I listened to Appel explain these concepts, I had no idea my life and ministry would be heading down the same path.

It should not have happened so quickly. I was the senior minister of a new church plant in suburban Washington, D.C., that broke the proverbial 200 barrier on its opening weekend. Everything I had learned about church planting suggested we were poised for growth. We had several staff members, technological toys, a cool meeting venue, awesome worship services, and people coming to Christ.

Dissatisfaction

Four years later I had “grown the church down” from 200 to about 90. I was the only remaining staff member. Sunday mornings often felt thrown together. I had that sinking feeling if I were new to the community and visited our church, I probably wouldn”t come back.

By the summer of 2001, I was doing everything I could just to keep the church alive, preaching to 30 adults seated in metal chairs at a middle school cafeteria. I had U-Haul on my speed dial and knew I was only a few months away from rolling back to the Midwest with my tail between my legs, another victim of the beast called “the East.”

I cried out to God: “I know I”m yours. And I know I”m in the right place. I”ve done some good things here. But if you don”t change something quickly I don”t see how I”m going to make it here.”

Vision

My vision for church planting dates back to my days as a student at Ozark Christian College. I had always dreamed of going into some community that needed Christ and starting something from nothing . . . and doing it with cool and creative people. That vision had now come to a screeching halt, or so I thought.

Five hours north of where I was living in Maryland, God had called Mark Wilkinson to leave the church he was serving in Albany, New York, to plant a new church. Mark had seen the same demographics that had drawn me to suburban Washington, D.C., and he was now sniffing out possible locations for a new church plant in my own backyard!

In the summer of 2001, after a two-hour meeting at Panera Bread with Mark and his friend Dave Bucci, God gave me my vision back. It became crystal clear God was going to involve me in something big and dynamic that would change thousands of lives for Christ, and the only thing I needed to do was the very thing most ministers would find the most difficult. I had to step down as senior minister. I had to fit into a different role and let someone else lead.

Next Steps

I don”t buy the phrase “seamless transition.” Every change I”ve ever experienced has had challenges, and stepping down as senior minister presented me with some uncomfortable moments. When I tried to explain the changes to my wife, who hadn”t attended more than six Sunday morning services in three years because of nursery duty, she thought I had given away the church and my position. Initially she was upset with me. Who could blame her?

When the new church planting team, of which I was now a bit player, went through a 48-hour assessment exercise, I experienced role confusion to the extent that on the final night I lamented to my wife, “Wow, this is a really strong team. I don”t think they even need us.” I even worried, for a couple of days, about assigning the term “lead pastor” to Mark for fear of what my existing group would think and how they might respond to it. But as God helped us work through those issues, he also guided us to some extremely helpful next steps.

We mutually decided the best way to position ourselves to have an immediate impact as a new church was to shut down the old one. With the new team”s blessing, I spoke privately to the core families from my existing church. I went to their homes and with great passion recast the vision for the new church and my role in it. I assured the families I was not going anywhere, nor was I being phased out. I told them I would still be a visible leader and I would be preaching frequently. I assured them that as I moved into some areas that emphasized my strengths, the new church would be poised to attain heights we could never reach without the change.

I kept repeating to them that the direction the new church plant team was headed was what I had always hoped our church would become and that their commitment to it was essential to its success. One by one each family committed to the direction God was leading us. This served as a huge confirmation from God concerning my decision.

My second action was to celebrate and properly bury the old ministry. It would have been a huge mistake to pretend that God had done nothing in the previous years of my ministry, or to hurry on to the next thing without regard for the feelings of those who had worked so hard for the former. Because we were small, we were able to take an entire Sunday to review and remember and celebrate all that God had done. We celebrated the people who had come to Christ, the relationships that had been built, and the fun we had shared serving together as a church.

Next we entered a phase called discontinuity. I will admit that this phase caused me some anxiety. Practically speaking, it meant we needed a lapse between the ending of the old ministry and the beginning of the new one. To this day, I still wonder what that time frame should have been, but because I was nervous about keeping the old group engaged and about receiving a paycheck, a shorter period made sense to everyone. Within a couple of weeks, the old group and the new group were meeting in a park to unveil the name of the new church. Relationships were forming like wildfires, not the least of which was the friendship between my family and Mark”s family, which exists even today.

But perhaps the biggest event to occur during this time of discontinuity was the tragedy of September 11, 2001. Our original start-up date (spring 2002) got bumped up to October 2001, when Journey”s Crossing conducted its first service. Looking back, it”s easy to see how God was working in our lives and preparing a group of people to meet real needs at a crucial time for our community.

One of the final steps I took on this amazing journey was to humble myself and try to plug the many holes that always surface in new church work. I moved back into youth ministry. My wife and I served together in the nursery, and I found myself leading the backbreaking work of setup and teardown in a porta-church meeting in a movie theater.

Along the way something amazing and God-sized happened: I found my sweet spot in ministry. I have always loved evangelism, outreach projects, mission work, and preaching. Now I was doing all these things, and God was overwhelming me with more blessings and opportunities than I could keep up with. The winds of change were blowing, and my life was at full sail.

Looking back, I can”t help but wonder what would have happened had I stubbornly refused to step down and make changes. Looking forward, I can”t help but wonder how God might unleash growth and change in countless other local churches if other ministers would be willing to do the same.

Darin Brown is pastor of outreach at Journey”s Crossing””A Christian Church in Gaithersburg, Maryland. He is a graduate of Ozark Christian College and lives with his wife and two daughters in suburban Washington, D.C.

2 Comments

  1. David Miller

    Darin’s experience is a great example of how God can utilize all of us when we step outside of our comfort zone and follow his leading. Few “lead” ministers ever visualize a move to an associate position as a positive. However the opportunity to serve God with a larger and talented team again answers the question: “Who is better than all of us?” Thanks Darin for such a positive lesson.

  2. Judy & Frank Malinoski

    Awesome story! Just the word “˜change”™ conjures up visions of dealing with scary new people, the unknown, and being way outside your comfort zone.
    But when we remember God is right next to us magic happens. We find that comfortable and best place that feels like home. And then we hit ourselves on the head and say, “Of course! Everything is possible through Jesus Christ.”

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