Review: Peter Steinke’s A Door Set Open and New Visions Training Program

This is a new Blog devoted to Church Consultation.
I recently attended an Interim Ministry Conference in Nashville. We spoke about mediation, consultation and how to change the mindset of many congregations today. Below is my review of a post conference seminar program.

Review: Peter Steinke’s A Door Set Open and New Visions Training Program
Peter Steinke has been a guru of understanding emotional systems in churches for over thirty years. A Student of Edwin Friedman and Murray Bowen, his books seek to explain why church members act as they do and what pastors can do about it. His latest book: A Door Set Open: Grounding Change in Mission and Hope and its accompanying New Visions study materials give a good background into how the American church got where it is, (once the dominant culture in America but no longer) to where it is now (on the edge of society looking in), struggling with secularization and the concept of too much information and change to process it all properly.

As in his other books, Steinke spends some time explaining family systems theory for novices. He throws in his favorite concept, “reptilian brain thinking,” the idea that change throws most church members into “fight or flight” syndrome and his favorite word in conjunction with anxious church members, “amygdala,” an emotional center of the brain. Beyond the usual, however, the book also states a clear premise: churches resist change least when it involves mission and when that mission is grounded in hope. The purpose of Steinke’s book is to get churches out of survival and social club mode and return to the original mission of the Christian church, doing good for others. For Steinke, hope is the key. He states correctly that the temptations of denial, despair and the desire for “quick fix” magical outcomes are common in today’s churches and must be resisted.

The process of change is deep and a struggle, says Steinke[1] His “eight steps to significant change” (establish urgency, form a congregational coalition, visioning, communicating the vision, empowering action, consolidation of vision, incorporation into the system and identifying leaders to continue the vision) should be essential reading in any seminary.

Steinke seeks to move congregations one small group at a time from “mission drift” into “mission culture.” This paradigm shift is touted not for church survival or growth in numbers or finance but for spiritual growth in members and mission beyond the congregation. If properly developed this program could also result in numbers and financial growth. His book is accompanied by excellent workbook materials chapter by chapter, as well as Steinke himself in a couple of videos telling stories of his experiences in churches. These additional materials, though pricey ($40/group member but reusable, with optional videos extra) can be very helpful in leading change over several months.

If Steinke’s gambit succeeds, it will transform church culture as we know it into a dynamo of social improvement and will succeed in adapting it to the rapidly changing environment we live in today and to become the yeast in the dough of society. One can hope this endeavor succeeds. Steinke himself would be the first to admit that, American churches being the resistant emotional systems that they are, only a percentage will themselves to be transformed in this way. I agree; many churches as we know them are doomed to extinction but those that do persevere and succeed in adopting Steinke’s “mission culture” will become the foundation of the future church.

I am available to teach this series to any congregation or judicatory that would desire it. I can arrange to teach this via the internet to avoid travel expenses

[1]Peter SteinkeA Door Set Open: Grounding Change in Mission and Hope. (Alban Institute, Herdon, Virginia, 2010), 49 ff.

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