If you look at your church and have a deep sense that something fresh and new needs to happen, you are not alone, according to Kevin Harney and Bob Bouwer in their book The U-Turn Church: New Direction for Health and Growth. The book aims to give hope to church leaders as they enter a Spirit-directed U-Turn journey that will lead to a season of health, faithfulness, growth and new vision, a journey which the authors have themselves experienced.
So, what does it take for a church to make this sort of U-turn? The authors describe how a U-Turn begins, not with the heart of a church leader or the desperation of a church board, but with a holy zeal from the loving heart of God. Other elements needed in the beginning of the process are urgency, a crystal-clear vision, and the power of prayer. The book then goes on the describe the factors required in the middle of the U-Turn, and how the U-Turn journey never finishes.
Two of the things which I found most helpful about the book are the concepts of “holy zeal” and “the wow factor”. It seems to me that holy zeal is a distinguishing aspect of any lively biblical church, the hunger for the glory of God to pour into the church and overflow into the community, and that the “wow factor” is what communicates to people that something extraordinary is happening in the church, because churches filled with holy zeal will do things which outsiders regard as remarkable.
I suspect that many of those most in need of the authors’ advice will never even consider reading this book, which is a pity because the book is reasonably short, easy to read, and full of information which will be very useful to anyone on the leadership team of a church which needs a U-turn.