An Interview with Bill Hybels

J.D. Greear reports on a recent interview that he had with Bill Hybels. I found it to be very interesting in light of how Bill has changed some of this views over the past 20 years. When I was younger I was a huge follower of Willow Creek church, but in probably the last 7-8 years I have chosen to prefer a different style of ministry.

This interview is worth the read. The whole thing is found below:

Got to meet and have breakfast with Bill Hybels yesterday. An incredible learning experience. Sure, there are things we do differently. But the man is a leader, and is leaving the world a legacy of doing whatever it takes to get the Gospel to people. I'll rise to applaud that any day.

He talked about second conversions...certain things that he has been "reborn" to in recent years of his ministry. Here is a handful of them (in my paraphrase):

• "A church is to be missional, not just attractional." Jesus did not die to attract a crowd on Sundays, but to train believers to work righteousness in the streets and bring the Kingdom of God to the world.
• "A church ought to be diverse IN EVERY WAY that its community is diverse if it is to properly be called an Acts 2 church." That means age diversity, ethnic diversity, socioeconomic diversity, and religious tradition diversity. Many of us have figured out we can grow a church more quickly by doing our music and programming to attract only one kind of person. But how does getting a group of people who all resemble each other and like to hang out with each other anyway demonstrate the awesome mystery of the body of Christ? Wouldn't a group of young people who got along with old people and black people with hispanic people and rich people with poor people be a mystery the world would have to notice?

I asked Pastor Hybels point-blank... "If programming for diversity meant that you could only grow half as large as a church, would you still do it?" Without batting an eye, he said "Absolutely... The larger witness of the church is more permanent than a temporary number surge. Plus, it's biblical. The Bible is the manual for the church and it tells us that in the same Christ-community ought to be people of all flavors. The church is to be a house of prayer for all nations. It angered Him when the Jews turned it into something different. I imagine it angers Him still today when we do it." (My paraphrase)

He continued, "The New Testament strategy for church growth is not to find a niche of people to reach, but to strive to make the footprint of your church resemble the footprint of your community."

• "Numerical growth is not the best, and certainly not the only, indicator of the health of the church." This has been a lesson that I will probably forever be relearning. We do care about numbers because we want to reach as many people as possible as fast as possible. But I have to remind myself that God evaluates disciples, not numbers. And I have to remind myself that I should never sacrifice what the Bible says a church should be for what works in bringing in a big crowd or lots of money (not that those two are always opposed). I have to remind myself that God's evaluation has much more to do with how faithful I am to Christ than how large my church is.
• "It is the church's responsibility to speak out against injustice and care for the poor in their community and around the world."
• "White churches are often oblivious to the racial dimensions of the society around them." For example, predominately white churches often don't see why they should acknowledge Martin Luther King, Jr. Day, since they don't acknowledge Lincoln or Washington Day either. But black Christians can't fathom why they don't, and feel it disrespectful and denigrating not to do so. White Christians think that because they have black friends they have fulfilled their role in racial reconciation. But the issue is more complex than that.

One other thing that stood out to me was his humility... It always amazes me how some great men and women never lose the learning edge. And not fake, smarmy humility either. Bill was honestly trying to learn something me (and the other pastors I was with), who collectively have not done 1/10 of what he has done.

OK, those were just a few teasers... it was awesome and inspiring. And please don't write me and tell me that you have concerns with Bill Hybels. That's not my point here. From the conversations I often have at pastor's conferences, you'd think that his middle name is "now, we don't really support everything he says."

I do not deny do we need to be discerning, but I do maintain that we can always learn from spiritual giants.