The new synodical programs unroll and unravel, as leaders seek to keep people's attention on being busy rather than productive. If they believed in the efficacy of the Word, the programs would be laughed out of existence and never attempted again. But it is so much easier to tell the pastors they should be team players, for the pastors to endorse such hollow and patently false materials - wrapped in nice printing, colorful videos, and soporific audio.
The leaders have forgotten that extending the Left Foot of Fellowship leaves a mark - on them - that never vanishes. Recipients have friends, spouses, children, and access to social media. That explains - in part - why the Calvinist Church Growth sects have seen no increase, neither have they kept up with the population growth.
The synod presidents and Pope John the Malefactor should be paid based on their original salaries and benefits. For each year they have lost worship attendance, as measured by communion attendance, they should lose salary and benefits proportionately, the same decreases applied to all their staff. They should also be denied any kiss-up gifts from Thrivent or doctorates from their failing educational units (retroactive for Matt the Fatt).
Here is a simple to follow approach in the congregation, which makes more sense than trying to get a new, tired and bloated executive.
Means of Grace,
Efficacy of the Word
The congregation must revert to respectful, traditional,liturgical worship with real hymns, the Creeds, and actual sermons based on the text.
The pastor or staff will not cheat the members, their own spiritual growth, or visitors by using borrowed, canned, messages (I dare not call them sermons - most are Calvinist kaka.)
The sermonizer for the service will carefully study the text, use good materials, Greek and Hebrew, Lenski, and the Confessions, to proclaim the Gospel. The sermon will be written out in full and given either from memory or with the text resting there as a kind of comforter (but not for reading to people - deadly).
Holy Communion is offered regularly and all special services are offered (Ascension, Advent, Lent, etc).
Visiting will be the program of the congregation. For every question like this - what about a youth group?, the pastors or staff will say, "If you like that, organize and run it." Ha.
Visiting means taking the Gospel to members - shut-in, hospitalized, and the spiritually troubled or inert.
Educational
Instead of asking what is popular, teach what is necessary, not the pricey synodical stuff or (possibly) worse - the other stuff borrowed from Zwingli and his pals.Thanks to the non-profit Lutheran Librarian, there are many great classics that can be studied by the congregation. That is just one source. We are going to study Henry Eyster Jacobs' Summary of the Christian Faith and also Bunyan's Pilgrim's Progress.
Besides that, we teach New Testament Greek to members, pastors, and yes - children. We use Ustream for all worship and adult education.
Social media leverages what we do.
