"... change in your church is a natural by-product of your teaching and discipleship ministry. It should not be a product of the pastor’s power."

I found this to be a very helpful, challenging, and encouraging article. The temptations he mentions are all too real.

This is right on and what we’ve sort of naturally settled on over the years in our small rural church. Various folks have come in and tried to make big changes and it’s never worked out. We’ve discovered that just teaching and modeling has the result of the Lord transforming minds and hearts and then those transformed people change things subtly and for the better in the church.

We’re always disappointed as shepherds when we try to steer the ship too forcefully. Incidentally, we have mostly younger to middle aged and a few older, and they’ve always steered the church back to not just hymns, but hymns that reflect sound doctrine. We’ll do a few select praise songs, but they’re very keen on making sure the doctrine in them is healthy.