Last month we excerpted parts of Thom and Joani’s book, detailing several problems that plague many of our churches. We saw that people frequently aren’t learning what we’re trying to teach, usually because over time churches lose sight of the true goal of education. If you missed that article, take a moment to read it from our archives and then come back here for the conclusion.

“If you know where you want to go, you have a much better chance of getting there.” —Anonymous

The battle is on for attention in the church. What will be our real focus? Without a clearly defined goal, we’ll waffle and never “win the prize.” But if our educational goal is a good one that’s apparent to everyone, we’ll change lives with the power of the Lord.

We’ve settled on “to know, love, and follow Jesus” as our own goal for learning in the church. It covers the cognitive, the affective, and the behavioral. It’s results-oriented, harvest-oriented. It reminds us that Christianity is a lifestyle. And, as educators, we’re successful only when our students’ learning results in real-life action and changed lives.

So where do you begin in crafting your goal for your church?

• Gather together people who care about education. Select a cross-section of key people—the obvious and not-so obvious. Work through proper church channels; get the leadership on board. There’s nothing more frustrating than getting revved up about change and then being stonewalled because you didn’t connect with the people “in charge.”
• Meet together to raise concerns and do goal-setting . Here’s where the fun begins! After welcoming people, pray for guidance and wisdom. Explain why you’re interested in digging into your church’s education efforts. Have people tell about a significant memory they have from church or Sunday school. Have two volunteers play the part of Thom and Katrina from the dialogue in last month’s article, and break the meeting into groups of two or three to discuss how they felt about the dialogue. See the book for more examples of creative activities to stimulate thought in this meeting. With new perspective, have people list as many purposes of Christian education as they can think of. Prioritize these, and then pull them together toward consensus on a succinct, one-sentence goal statement that captures your top priorities. Again, ours was a simple: “to know, love, and follow Jesus.” Notice that it’s not written as what we do, it’s written as what we want to see happen in our students’ lives.
• Follow up with what you decided to do. After all the effort in your goal-setting meeting, don’t let your accomplishments die on the vine. This is just the start of something big. You can change why nobody learns much of anything at church.

Remember: Focus on learning rather than teaching!

Adapted from Why Nobody Learns Much of Anything at Church: And How to Fix It (Group Publishing, 2004.) Thom and Joani Schultz are pioneers in rethinking church ministries. Thom is president of Group Publishing, and Joani is Group’s chief creative officer.

Copyright © 2004, Group Publishing, Inc. All Rights Reserved.