The following is an adaptation of the writing I did for the pastor search team at Vineyard Church. It is a discussion of five key trends as we navigate the next for churches.

• COVID-19
  COVID-19 Hit and large, in-person gatherings will be slow to be a thing again, if ever. 
  We will always need to be building a flexible, adaptive, distributed, agile, and newer version of church in order to reach.  We will need to have leaders that understand that wherever the people are, that is our congregation.  An organization needs to develop such agility combined with mission, that situations like COVID will never again cripple churches like it has the past ten months.  25% of churches in America may not survive this next year as the shakeout from COVID subsides.  But God is still on the throne, and His Kingdom will go forward.

• GENERATIONAL LEGACIES
  The Church at large and our local churches in particular are increasingly older-generation and must turn our focus on the next generations.  In order to supply the resources (think Money, Wisdom, Time, and Skills) that are needed for this younger generation reach, we have to have leadership that can continue to connect with the 40-70+ year-olds and give them vision for resourcing the outreach to the next.  Someone who is mature, that understands the need to change what we were doing and begin to intentionally pass on and train up younger leaders is required. The Church needs to focus on intentionally giving room to new leaders to grow into their next.  But the delicate balance is keeping the connection to the older generations and allowing the blessing of their resources be poured into reaching the younger ones. No one should have an agenda of being the superstar.  Instead, we all should be willing to release and support others in their growing into leadership.

• CULTURAL INTERFACING AND APPROPRIATION
  The Church at large and our church as well is no longer going to be able to adopt culture in order to reach culture. We have experienced such fracturing of cultural fronts that we need to build and disciple ambassadors to the multiple, distinct sub-cultures.  We need to understand how to move from a single, attractional model to a diverse, reaching and transforming model.  This will require unique leadership that has a strong commitment to central truth, while understanding how to reach those who are not yet in the truth. The Church must have a way to stay connected to foundational, Biblical truth, while reaching out to and bringing into understanding those who are in sub-cultures. The Church must reach my kids’ generation and the next ones beyond that.  We must be a church that makes Jesus and His Lordship central to everything we do, and allow the power of the Holy Spirit to work and move freely, while taking transformed hearts and discipling them to go back into their cultures and reach.  If a church is becoming healthy, God will literally hand us families and individuals on a weekly basis that He has drawn.  He is building the church, but we must understand how to make disciples that reach their previous broken cultures and bring about the transformation of the culture that God calls the Church to.

• INFLUENCING THE CHURCH
  The future of the Church and its influence in this world is in our hands.  We have a responsibility to become the unique expression of the church that can help THE CHURCH learn how to adapt, reach, and transform.  The uniqueness of what has happened at Vineyard Church the past two years has been recognized by dozens of National and International leaders who have commented that the model we have been working toward is powerful and transformative.  They believe that we could end up bringing renewal to the Church at large, as we demonstrate the values that have begun to be embraced.  It is our calling as an organization to not only successfully reach the hundreds of thousands that God has given us, but to influence the Church at large to embrace values that will bring transformation to the entire Church.  I believe that what God has birthed here, with a mixture of our thirty-year history along with the lessons He has taught us over the past twenty-five months, is actually bigger than simply Vineyard Church Kansas City.  We have an opportunity to influence the Vineyard Movement, and an opportunity to bless the Church in Kansas City as well as the World.

• EVERYONE GETS TO PLAY – MOVING FROM “I” TO “WE”
  Seeing every person as a minister of the grace and gospel of Christ is essential. Moving from I to We is the only way to engage, build, and impact this city and the world.  People who merely attend, and consume content at a church rarely impact their worlds.  The now growing old model of attractional gatherings, that inspire and inform must be built upon and extended to now call people into impact and transformation.  We must see each person as a unique gift from God, and develop them in their following of Christ to such an extent that THEY become the powerful force for the mission of a church. Moving from I to We also means moving from the Pastor-centric model to the empowered-member model.  Pastors will instead be called to be catalytic equippers of the people, rather than simply gatherers to events and recruiters of supporters for those events.  Positions in the church should reflect giftedness and not be a catch-all place for a person to get paid to serve. If a person is a Pastor, they should be a Shepherd. If they are Apostolic, they should be a submitted, visionary risk taker. If a person is an Evangelist, or Prophetic, then we can let them function within the body, as one alongside, growing and building up in love, the entire body. Teachers should teach, but no one gift is above or more elevated than another.