Peter Drucker will be remembered forever as one of the most famous management experts in American history.  He once wrote that too often people focus on efficiency (doing things right) rather than on effectiveness (doing the right things).  Drucker went on to say, “There are few things less pleasing to the Lord and less productive than an engineering department that rapidly turns out beautiful blueprints for the wrong product.  Working on the right things is what makes work effective.”

The purpose driven concept helps church leaders ask themselves, “Are we working on the right things?  Are we working on the most important things?  Have we even identified the most important things?”

The above premise forms the basis for the purpose driven concept in Christianity as popularized by Rick Warren’s The Purpose Driven Church and The Purpose Driven Life.  In truth, Warren has simply borrowed the business concept that arose during the 1980’s to clarify the purpose of an organization through clearly defined mission/purpose statements...to then organize the business to accomplish that mission or purpose.

In brief, it asks, why do we exist and what are we trying to accomplish?  During the past two decades these questions have transitioned from the business community to the religious community.  These questions are not normally asked during good times (such as the boom years of the 1940’s – 1960’s), but the last two decades in Christianity have been known more for their staleness.  Surveys show the attendance in more than 80% of America’s churches is either plateaued or declining.  But yet America’s population continues to climb!

Rick Warren tapped into this problem in The Purpose Driven Church.  Warren explained that his church undertook a Biblical study to determine its Biblical purpose.  Through much study the church came to understand and accept that it had a five-fold purpose.  That purpose included worship, evangelism, ministry, fellowship, and discipleship.  The church then organized its staff, budget, training, and program around that five-fold purpose.  It also developed measurements to see how well it was achieving each process.

One of the outcomes was Warren’s highly popular Classes 101 - 401 to purposefully move people from the community into the crowd into the congregation into the committed into the core.  Of course, the trained core then brings people from the community into the crowd into...you get the picture!  This purposeful process has resulted in many changed lives for the glory of God!

It is my experience, along with the experience of others, that most churches are simply having church rather than accomplishing a specific purpose.  There is a lot of preaching...a lot of singing...but we are not producing strong Christians who can influence their community for Jesus Christ.

For example, a recent survey shows that only 17% of Southern Baptist churches provide training in that denomination’s basic beliefs.  In addition, half of all evangelical churches provide no training in personal evangelism.  (How then can they be classified as evangelical?)  One pastor recently lamented that his deacons (and deacon wives) combined went a total of sixty years without recruiting and adding one single adult new member to the church.  Naturally the church became stagnant and the attendance fell!  Such performance indicates there is a large performance gap between what we are actually accomplishing and what we should be accomplishing.

Rick Warren has demonstrated this performance gap can be closed by redefining our purpose and then executing that purpose.  After all, how can one go wrong by emphasizing worship, discipleship, ministry, evangelism, and fellowship?  Those five words contain the ingredients necessary to become “complete in Christ."  God wants us to be competent in all five of these areas.  For example,

“Our church’s purpose is to help every member become complete in Christ by emphasizing personal development in discipleship, evangelism, ministry, worship, and fellowship.”

That purpose statement lays the foundation for building the rest of the structure.  Notice it is specifically focused on developing the individual member.  We can now ask, “How do we build so-and-so in these five areas so he/she can change his/her own world for Jesus?”  From this point on we are intentionally or purposefully focusing our resources on God’s goal of helping every single member become complete in Christ.  We have demonstrated in our own ministry that a church of just 100 people can do this! (See Measure My Church's Effectiveness.)

That experience occurred more than ten years ago.  I can confidently say these ten-plus years have witnessed the greatest growth spurt in my ministry.  May that same experience be yours as you allow God to achieve His purpose in your life and His church!