“Too many people and opportunities were slipping through the cracks. We weren’t making the kind of impact on the region around us we knew God had called us to make.”
When Pastor Dan and the team at Christ Church in Oak Brook, IL reached out to The Unstuck Group, it wasn’t because their attendance was dropping. In fact, they still had thousands of people coming to their ministries. But they knew that simply getting people to attend their church wasn’t enough.
“We lacked a unifying vision for how to move more people from being dabblers to disciples or consumers to stakeholders. We were still effectively attractional but knew we must become much more missional.”
The Christ Church board and staff leadership team began exploring their options for an outside perspective, interviewed three organizations, and ultimately landed on The Unstuck Group. Pastor Dan said that the “unique blend of competencies” brought by Tony and the team included:- Extensive experience and understanding of best practice ministries across America,
- A thoughtful framework for assessing ministry health,
- A proven record of helping churches develop initiatives that move them toward greater vitality,
- An appreciation for the way staffing and structure must be aligned to ministry aims, and
- An understanding of the multisite church context.
Despite their thorough research, the process didn’t go quite as they expected due to the COVID-19 crisis. The Christ Church team wondered, “How effective would the planning process be if we couldn’t meet in-person with the Unstuck staff? How could we plan for a future whose character seemed so uncertain? Would we have much of a congregation left with which to apply our plans?”
“Despite our anxieties, however, God surprised us with his grace,” Pastor Dan recalled, “Our planning team formed a strong bond with Tony and Amy, even through Zoom. They helped us discern practical ways of moving forward that will make our church more resilient and able to minister effectively even if another pandemic overruns us. God has not only preserved the core of our congregation, he has lifted that core to a higher level of commitment than before.”
The Unstuck Process prioritizes clear assessment, actionable initiatives, and accountability on follow-through. We caught up with the Christ Church team one year after completing the Unstuck Process, and this is what they had to say:
“The Unstuck process gave our leadership a common picture of current reality and of the concrete measures we need to move toward our preferred future.
The process yielded a fresh vision for impact on the world and well-defined initiatives in the areas of digital outreach, our discipleship pathway, missional group life, and leadership development. It yielded a new ministry structure and staffing model better-aligned with where God is leading us. And the process gave us clarity about the key metrics we needed to be tracking to know we were making progress on the plan.
One year after starting our process with the Unstuck Group, our staff morale is stronger, giving is up, action plans are being implemented, and we are steadily building the relationships and processes that we believe will help us emerge out of COVID ready for deeper influence.”
Ready to clarify your vision and start executing your unique strategic plan? Learn more about how The Unstuck Process can help your church start achieving wins in the first 90 days.
