Spirit of Organization

Another organizational theory that might help the church break out of these routines is what has been called the "learning organization." According to Watkins and Marsick (1993), the learning organization is one that "learns continuously and transforms itself" (p. 8). Garvin (1993) describes it as.

"an organization skilled at creating, acquiring, and transforming knowledge, and at modifying its behavior to reflect new knowledge and insights" (p. 80).

In a learning church, not only does the individual learn, but the church itself learns. The knowledge that individuals and groups acquire is transferred to the church as a body, in all its dimensions: in its processes, in its structures, in its strategy, in its leadership, and in its interactions with people.

It also means that the classroom is not the only (nor the best) way to learn. We learn by analyzing everything we do and asking ourselves the question: "How can we improve?"

This kind of self-analysis for the purpose of improvement requires the union of thought and action. According to the mechanistic organizational design, thinking comes before action in a direct linear process. The thinkers are usually the top governing body. They cloister behind the closed doors of a conference room where they think about strategy and develop a strategic plan. Once the plan has been completed, they pass it down the pyramid to the "workers" to be carried out.

In a learning church, the formation of strategy is shared and is mixed with action. A learning church does not separate action from learning, but instead sees action as the mechanism of learning. This approach also seems to be consistent with biblical teaching. The writer of Hebrews complains about lack of maturity on the part of the Hebrew Christians and then he pinpoints the reason why this is so.

Though by this time you ought to be teachers, you have need again for someone to teach you the elementary principles of the oracles of God, and you have come to need milk and not solid food. For everyone who partakes only of milk is not accustomed to the word of righteousness, for he is an infant. But solid food is for the mature, who BECAUSE OF PRACTICE have their senses trained to discern good and evil (Hebrews 5:12-14).

In the sixth chapter of the New Testament book of Acts, we find a situation that could have destroyed the church. The Greek Christians were complaining that their widows were not being attended as well as the Hebrew widows. To resolve this problem, the church had to LEARN. This learning was not just cerebral, but very practical. They named seven Greek men to serve the tables of the Greek widows. Some New Testament scholars believe this is the first mention of the office of Deacon in the church.

The church of the New Testament was organized around spiritual gifts, not by seniority or political power. Paul wrote:

One and the same Spirit works all these things, distributing to each one individually JUST AS HE WILLS" (I Corinthians 12:11) [and] "God has placed the members, each one of them, in the body, JUST AS HE DESIRED" (12:18).

Is the church equipped to plant churches in today's rainforest? Sometimes I have my doubts, not doubts about God's ability to accomplish this, but doubts about whether we are capable of breaking our old mechanistic structures and adopting more flexible structures. Will the church be able to trust the Holy Spirit to equip the body of Christ?

The truth is that the mechanistic church--tied to its means and structures of the past--is dying. Such churches are becoming irrelevant in a world that they don't even realize exists. The mechanistic structures do not fit the rainforest. They become artifacts of the past instead of promoters of healthy spiritual transformation.

If you are a leader in the Church of Christ, I encourage you to liberate yourself from mechanistic structures and embrace organic structures for the church. The time has come for Christian leaders to decide: "Will we be true leaders or will we remain simply managers?" A true leader always helps the church to traverse the rainforest of change. As managers fight the rainforest, leaders say: "How can we take advantage of the opportunities that the rainforest presents, while at the same time, avoid its dangers?"

When the church finally learns and incorporates these organic principles, we will see revival, because Christ will be able to function as the true head of His body, placing the members as He sees fit and helping the church to extend deep roots into the soil of a living, breathing, dangerous, and beautiful world.

Sources Cited

Watkins, K. E., & Marsick, V. J. (1993). Sculpting the learning organization: Lessons in the art & science of systematic change. San Francisco, CA: Jossey-Bass.

Garvin, D. A. (1993). Building a learning organization. Harvard Business Review, 71(4), 78-91.

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