Monday, February 25, 2008

Stale Revolution


Raul Castro aged 76 is elected Cuba's new president, not very surprising but probably more troubling is the election of 78 year old Machado Ventura as vice president, I don't know the man or have any judgement to make just that it seems to me that there is fear to hand over to a younger generation.

When I was younger this was a worry that I expressed often, that churches in general need younger leaders. Now a days I wonder who on earth as a younger leader would want to take on a church? leadership is something that is good to aspire to but somehow I think church leadership in the hereditary sense is not the most popular option.

Young leaders don't want to inherit they want to build something new. Now i am not saying we shouldn't preserve our heritage and maybe some will be called to maintain the churches established by our fore fathers.

The worrying trend would be that men and women who broke away from traditional church structures in the 1960's can no longer see the wood for the trees. What they created worked for the 70's and 80's but but may not work for 2008 and beyond. I believe they will almost be like the Brethren and Baptist circles they left and try to hold back the younger guys who want to establish something new. Maybe I am being to negative?

What works?

What needs to change?

For me the pioneers of the new church movement where young guys who just went for it, they had well thought through theology (most of the time), they had to have thick skins, and they had to be willing to be misunderstood and mistrusted. They were accused of being divisive, arrogant and cultish! They couldn't work within the established framework so they got out and created a new one. They made mistakes and offended people, they took good people out of the established church with them.
Why would they be resistant to young guys doing the same thing now? Surely they should be happy that they have created and sown a DNA into people that stops them from settling?

Have the revolutionaries become old men trying to bolster up the past and lost some of their wild fighting spirit?

Is what is happening in Cuba and analogy of what is happening in church?

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