Your Church’s BHAG
by Rev. Mark E. Tidsworth, Founder and Team Leader
When we first began visioning consulting with churches, we would almost immediately move to questions…mining for the vision of the leadership and congregation. Experience taught us this was a mistake. Without spiritual cultivation, when asked about their church’s future vision, disciples in churches tend to respond in one of three ways.
• Suggesting flat and uninspiring visions, since their spiritual imaginations are dormant
• Suggesting their personal preferences for what they like in church as the vision
• Suggesting what the church used to do when it was “successful” in their minds
This last suggestion is very common, built on the belief that culture is the same as back then, expecting the same response from culture as before.
These experiences made it clear that churches need raised awareness about the world around them, plus immersion on the story of God through scripture, plus encouragement to pray “not my will, but thine be done,” for visioning to actually be visioning. My small book Forty Days Of Prayer, Preparing Ourselves For God’s Calling published in 2012 became a part of our visioning processes, immediately strengthening visioning outcomes. By the way, thank you to those other church consulting organizations who have used this devotional prayer guide in their visioning work.
So, here’s where we are now… A couple weeks ago I introduced the Crossing Thresholds Visioning Process, with four churches currently using this approach to their visioning. Now we have created the Crossing Thresholds Prayer Guide, forty devotionals along with Prayer Prompts designed to prepare disciples in congregations for dreaming new dreams.
We continue to develop this process as we go, sharing it in its entirety with you in the near future. For today, you are invited to take in one of the devotionals in this prayer guide, found below. Feel free to use it with your leadership teams or however it may cultivate vision in your church.
Partnering with churches in their journeys, sorting through their experiences and making space for the Spirit…what an excellent and fulfilling calling this is. May the following devotional contribute to your and your church’s ongoing expression of this body of Christ.
Day 17 - Your Church’s BHAG
“Glory to God, who is able to do far beyond all that we could ask or imagine by God’s power at work within us; glory to God in the church and in Christ Jesus for all generations, forever and always. Amen.” —Ephesians 3:20-21 CEB
“….who is able to do far beyond all that we could ask or imagine”
Big Hairy Audacious Goal… Jim Collins popularized this expressive phrase in his book Beyond Entrepreneurship: BE 2.0, Turning Your Business Into An Enduring Great Company, first published in 2002 and then updated in 2020. BHAG, for short, requires little definition, given it’s descriptive and colorful language. We recognize BHAG is referring to an aspiration that’s nearly unreachable. Collins challenges companies to pursue their BHAG, knowing this will stretch them, while also moving them much farther ahead than small ordinary and uninspiring goals.
Then, there is scripture. Though I love Collins BHAG acronym, it pales in significance to this scripture from Ephesians, echoing many other Bible passages calling us into imaginative space. God is able to do far beyond what ask or imagine… far beyond. This looks like more than a BHAG, exceptionally more.
So, how about your church? Through our consulting and coaching work with churches and their leaders over time, we have come to recognize the following spiritual dynamic. There is a sweet spot for churches which I tend to call their “invigorating challenge.” This is a vision, ministry, program, or goal they are pursuing which is beyond their current ability to achieve, according to their self-perception as a church. This invigorating challenge is not so far beyond them that it becomes irrelevant, and therefore dismissed. At the same time, fitting invigorating challenges are far enough beyond the church’s capacity that they cannot achieve this without God’s help. In their own strength, it’s an impossible aspiration. Right and fitting invigorating challenges call churches into the gap between where they are and where they are called to go. Committing to this, churches must rely on Holy Spirit power in order to meet the challenge.
Knowing your church as you do, knowing its gifts and graces, its heartbeat and aspirations… what might your church be called toward doing? Sometimes one “signature ministry” rises up in a church, focusing may people and resources into this one endeavor. Other times, churches are moving out along multiple pathways simultaneously. Paying attention and listening for God’s guiding voice are necessary for discerning your church’s BHAG, your invigorating challenge.
Prayer Prompt – Please read today’s scripture again. We’ve been focusing on what God can do, yet there is more. God can do more than we can imagine... ”by God’s power at work within us.” Remember the devotional on constraining God through unbelief? Again, it appears that God is choosing to work through us as disciples and churches. So, how ready are we? How ready are we to go there with God? When God does more than we can ask or imagine, our lives will change. This is no small thing. Even more, God wants to do these things through God’s Church… in and through us. You are invited to respond to this invitation to participate in God’s amazing work through the prompts on the response page.