The irony is that congregations that need people the most tend to repel those same people because their need is the thing they project to the world, and not their willingness to give themselves away. The thought life of a dying congregation is focused so much on itself that it can lose perspective on the ministry of selflessness it’s supposed to be committed to. It’s a near world class gymnastic contortion to go from “We have to do something or we’re going to die” to “For those who want to save their life will lose it, and those who lose their life for my sake, and for the sake of the gospel, will save it.”

Continue reading at Lee Harvey Oswald and the Neediness of Dying Congregations — [D]mergent.