McAlpine, Bill, Joel Tiessen, Keith Walker, Arch Chee Keen Wong. Signs of Life – Catholic, Mainline, and Conservative Protestant Congregations in Canada. Tyndale Academic Press / Canadian Bible Society. 2021.
I’ve often read books starting in the last chapters and then reading from the front. Although any good fiction writer decries my desecration of the sacred reading protocol, I find this approach works well.
With Signs of Life, the last two chapters will give you a fantastic summary of the book – with a forecast into a post pandemic world. You can go back to the first chapters and find a shorter repetition of the same information. This book is descriptive of our Canadian scene – and any prescriptions for flourishing are evidence based with seasoned observation attached.
But where you want to go is into the eleven sections that outline the basics of a flourishing congregation. While the authours chose these sections based on their research and experience, the data they have gathered further confirms their ideals.
Here is my paraphrase of the eleven sections – see where you would end up
1. Organizational ethos – what makes things run with longevity and purpose.
- Self identity – get this right and you are on your way
- Leadership – you won’t run if the path isn’t pointed out
- Innovation – long time runners need to retool, new runners need the newest tools
- Structure and Process – wear the right equipment and miss the injuries along the way
2. Internal – Working with people on the inside
- Discipleship – Where one goes, so go the others
- Engaged Laity – One is not enough, you need others
- Hospitable Community – Others want to be with others, make it easy
- Diversity – No one is the same, work with it
3. Outward – Reaching out to people beyond our parameters
- Neighbourhood involvement – Where you live is where you live
- Partnerships – You don’t have to like someone to work with them
- Evangelism – Things die when new life is missing
My own reading of the book gleaned these seven thoughts about what this book is for:
1. For Resources – you will find reference to online sources, books, bibliographies. Spend enough time reaching out to these resources and a flourishing congregation will become obvious to you.
2. For Questions – We all need to be people of the examen. Examine our lives, our congregations, our purpose. There are more than enough questions in this book to help you on your path to discovery.
3. For Canadian research – This is what Canadians say. Qualitative research quantified.
4. For Interpretation – We hear all sorts of things. Listen to those who are soaked in those “all sorts of things” give you their interpretations.
5. For opinions – While we can interpret, extrapolate and forecast – sometimes an opinion formed over years of observation leads the way.
6. For Parsing a congregation – The pie chart of a flourishing church is worth the price of the book. Consider this your grammar on flourishing congregations
7. For COVID – The guesses contained in this book are well worth considering.
And finally, a little thought on the format of the book. The content is amazing! Sometimes extended paragraphs will test attention spans. I would love to see a sequel to this book called “The Questions!”. There are worthwhile questions sprinkled throughout the book. Put them together by themselves and you will have dialogue time with your congregation for the next decade or two!
For a further review on this book – along with a local application of the principles of the book, check out Dr. Kevin Driver’s review at the Flourishing Congregations website – HERE
To buy the book – go HERE (Amazon) or HERE (Canadian Bible Society).
Ron Baker, Director, Small Church Ministry Centre