Has the Crimson Tide under performed?

This coming Wednesday is national signing day for high school football players to sign letters of intent for college scholarship.  There is an entire industry that has grown up around which student will go to which school.  There are entire publications and writers that have made a full time job charting, predicting and guessing where a high school senior will go to college to play ball.

Watching parties are built around national signing day, such as the one at the College Football Hall of Fame in Atlanta.  It is estimated that around 300 high school athletes will descend on this venue as the place where they will make public their choice in a college team.  Many high schools will hold special assembly meetings, covered by local news and, in some cases the national media, for local football heroes to declare where they will be attending university.  It has become, especially in the Southeast, a sort of national championship in and of itself.

For some players there have been dozens of scholarship offers.  In the moment of the declaration the football player is alone in the spotlight.  Often there is great artistry in maximizing the drama of the moment.  The young man offers thanks to everyone from his parents to his coach to the volunteer that managed the local pee- wee football program.  He thanks all the schools that have made him an offer and talks about what a tough decision it was and finally the choice is revealed. The crowd, on queue, cheers wildly for the next super star of college athletics.  Some will go on to be great college football players while a very select few will advance to play on Sunday in the NFL.  Most will find that being a big shot playing with high school boys is a lot different from playing with college men and will spend most of the time at college football games on the bench.

When it comes to recruiting the best team in the nation, for the last several years it has been the University of Alabama Crimson Tide. “Experts” rate each recruiting class to determine which team signed the most talented group of incoming players.  From 2008 till 2016, Alabama has had the top-rated, recruiting class every year with only two exceptions.  In the recruiting game there are very few teams that operated in the rarified air of a top twenty recruiting class.  Since 2005, only 41 teams have made an appearance in the top twenty recruiting list.  During that time only 5 teams have been a part of that elite list every year; Alabama is one of those teams.  Since Nick Saban arrived, Alabama has been the best recruiting team in college football.  To go along with that, over the last 8 years Alabama has won 4 national championships and has come close on a couple of other occasions.  I think we can say that based on its excellent resources, in terms of talent, Alabama has performed as expected. 

What about the church in America?  When it comes to the resources that are available to the church how is the church doing?

Churches often act as if there is a chronic short fall in terms of financial resources.  But the reality is that most churches do, in fact, receive generous offerings from their members.  If giving is down, is it matter of motivation?

Churches always seem to be short of volunteers for our programs.  But are we having a hard time recruiting help because we are offering programs rather than life-changing ministry?

Church attendance, membership, and conversions are in decline.  But is that because we have lowered the meaning of belonging to the point that being a part of the community of faith is not terribly important?

As the church of the risen Savior we have:

_§    The Greatest Message of all times.

_§    The Word of God to teach and guide us.

_§    The Father whose love is the motivation for the grand venture.

_§    The Son who will plead with God to move Heaven and Earth at our request.

_§    The Holy Spirit to empower, convict and lead us to the great work of the Gospel.

I could go on, but you get the idea.  In football, Alabama, when compared with the other teams, is better than anyone else at amassing talent and tends to produce winners.  We as the church have resources that are beyond compare.  But in the American church we are dramatically under performing. 

I do not have the answers!  I cannot write an article or a blog or a book and outline the steps needed to make the change.  But I can say as a churchman, church consultant, minister and Christian, American Christianity isn’t working.  Maybe it is time to challenge all of our assumptions about how to do and be the church.  Maybe it is time to say, let’s start over and return to faith and the practice of the church as she was in those first dynamic years.