This comes from Honda’s global website:

Honda engineers are committed to the development of advanced technology, but recognize that the purpose of technology is to serve the needs of people. At Honda, this philosophy has long been expressed as “man maximum, machine minimum.” In short, Honda’s goal with each product is to minimize the space required for machinery, while focusing on the comfort and functionality of the product for the people who will use it.

The “man-max, machine-min” philosophy has been guiding Honda for decades. It can be seen in their cars and even in their new corporate jets which have odd looking engines mounted above the wing rather than below or on the tail like most small jets thus allowing greater interior space. This ad from 1978 captures the spirit of man-max, as does Honda’s tag line “We make it simple.”

What if we approached the church’s mission with a similar philosophy: “man-max, machine-min”? Let me explain. I believe the contemporary church suffers from two confusions.

CONFUSION ONE: CHURCH & MISSION

Alan Hirsch likes to say that when we look theologically at the mission of God, the missio Dei, we discover that it is incorrect to say, “the church has a mission.” The more theologically accurate statement is, “the mission of God has a church.” We often get this backwards. We believe that mission is an instrument of the church-a means by which the church grows or increases its reach. So, missions/outreach/evangelism becomes a committee or subgroup within the institution of the church.

Missional theology is helping to correct this confusion. It is reminding us that the church is actually the instrument of God’s mission. The church is the means by which his purpose/mission is being accomplished in the world. Therefore, whenever the church is distracted from his mission it is actually failing to fulfill the purpose for which it was created.

CONFUSION TWO: CHURCH & INSTITUTION

We’ve all heard the old adage, “the church isn’t a building, it’s the people.” We’ve come to recognize that the brick and mortar structure isn’t the church, but somehow we haven’t had the same epiphany about the intangible structures of the institution. In many peoples’ imaginations “the church” is a bundle of programs, committees, policies, teams, ministries, initiatives, budgets, and events. Most people speak of “the church” the same way they refer to “the government”-it’s a hierarchy of leaders managing an organization that they engage but remain apart from.

We should all be regularly reciting a new phrase until it becomes a cliché: “the church isn’t a 501c3 tax-exempt institution, it’s the people.” I see this error most clearly when it comes to volunteer service. As church leaders we often feel compelled to draw more people into the institution’s programs to serve. I have, like many of you, scanned the membership roster and marked possible recruits who are not presently “serving the church.” Those focused on the financial end of things keep track of who is “giving to the church.” Even the use of words like “churched” and “unchurched” testifies to the centrality of the institution in our imagination and mission.

The prevalence of Confusion One and Two above has resulted in an epidemic of bloated, missionally inefficient, and inwardly focused churches. Here’s what I mean. When attendance at a church program is large we say, “the church is growing,” and “the mission is advancing.” And when attendance is poor we say, “the church is shrinking” or “the mission is failing.” But is that really accurate? Is the church growing, or merely the institution? Can we even tell the difference anymore? Sometimes I wonder if we have so confused these two entities-the church and the institution-that our mission becomes the growth and advancement of the later rather than the former.

Let’ return to Honda. The automaker understands that ultimately the machines it builds must serve people. Therefore, Honda seeks to keep maximum focus on humans by allowing minimal room for mechanics. Translated to the church this philosophy has huge implications. I am convinced that human beings are the vessels of God’s Spirit, not organizations or structures. (You can read more about this idea in chapter 5 of my book, The Divine Commodity.)

If this is the case, the church should be putting maximum emphasis on empowering and releasing people to advance God’s mission rather than keeping them confined within institutional programs. I am not anti-institution; I believe structure is necessary. Structure is good and even God-ordained. We see organization and structure from the very foundation of the church in Acts. But these structures always existed to serve God’s people in the fulfillment of their mission. Today, it seems like God’s people exist to serve the institution in the fulfillment of its mission (which is usually to become a bigger institution).

Most of the curricula available to pastors on spiritual gifts and service focus on getting people to serve within their institution. Rarely does a church recruit, equip, and release saints to serve the mission outside its own immediate structure. (Imago Dei Community in Portland, Oregon, led by Rick McKinley is a refreshing exception to this rule.)

I know some of you will dismiss me as a cynic that’s spent too many evenings away from his young family trapped in church business meetings. Touché. But the ranks of those who love the church (the community of God’s people) but not the institution is growing. Willow Creek’s REVEAL study, which has been the focus of relentless conversation on blogs, testifies to the dissatisfaction more mature believers feel toward the institution. I don’t believe they’re rejecting the church. The study shows these believers continue to grow spiritually by serving others and through meaningful relationships with other believers. In other words, they are growing by engaging the church. What they’ve realized they can do without is the institution. George Barna’s 2005 book, Revolution, documents a similar trend.

This is not an anti-institutional philosophy of ministry any more than Honda is an anti-mechanical car manufacturer. It simply recognizes that people are both the instruments and objects of God’s mission in the world. But this approach would result in asking radically different questions when the church (the community of believers) seeks to advance the missio Dei:

Not: How do we grow the institution?
But: How do we grow people?

Not: How do we motivate people to serve in the church/institution?
But: How do we equip people and release them to serve outside the church/institution?

Not: How do we convince more people to come?
But: How do we inspire more people to go?

Not: How many programs can the church start?
But: How many programs have other churches/organizations started that we can help support?

Not: How many people have a committed relationship with our institution?
But: How many people have a committed relationship with another brother or sister in Christ?

Not: How do we make people dependent on the institution for their growth?
But: How do we equip people to grow independent of the institution?

Not: How much revenue can the institution generate?
But: How much revenue can the institution give away?

Not: How many buildings, pastors, and programs are necessary for the institution to have maximum exposure in the community?
But: How few buildings, pastors, and programs are necessary for God’s people to have time and energy to engage the community?

Not: How is God blessing our church?
But: How are we extending God’s blessing to our world?

How these questions are answered will vary from place to place and church to church. How the Spirit of God leads one community of believer to engage the mission will look different than another. I’m not attempting to prescribe a single institutional model as normative for all. What I’m trying to do is challenge the assumptions behind the pervasive confusion that sees institutions rather than people as the vessels and instruments of God’s power in the world, and the equally dangerous confusion that believes the church has a mission rather than the fact that God’s mission has a church. Learning to think “man-maximum, institution-minimum” may be the first step toward becoming a truly missional, rather than institutional, community.

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