 
 Mike sits down with Dr. Ted Wymyslo to discuss health care issues | The health care debate (or, you might say “divide”) has consumed the nation’s attention for most of 2009. I recently had the opportunity to sit down with Dr. Ted Wymyslo, a 20-year member of Ginghamsburg Church and a Dayton-area physician, to find out how he, as both a Christian and medical doctor, views key health care issues--including the current proposals under consideration in Congress, socialized medicine and other hot button topics. Ted has combined his profession and his faith for many years to provide managed healthcare for the poor and has been nationally recognized for his work by the American Medical Association. Listen to Part 1 of my interview with Ted. Part 2 will be posted next week.
God bless…
I have comprehensive medical coverage. Head to toe minus deductibles. My question is this; when I have my teeth cleaned, why is insurance involved? When I had a flat tire last week, I didn’t call Allstate. Why do we need these “Cadillac” plans for every potential medical issue? Let’s get back to basics and drive the inefficiencies out of medical care.
The medical combine is a product of legal concerns and forces doctors to over test. It’s amazing to learn how this adds to the cost structure. I enjoyed the conversation and thought the doctor’s perspective added tremendous value to this debate. Why wouldn’t we want to form professional relationships with those who keep us alive?
Posted By: Rich B on Oct 22, 2009 09:12PM
Very informative! Thank you Dr Wymslo and Pastor Mike. This interview explained things so well.
Posted By: Amy Kasprzak on Oct 22, 2009 11:15PM
 Artist’s rendition of Ginghamsburg’s planned worship center. It has never been built as we resolved to minimize brick and maximize mission. Ironically, the design was based on a tent metaphor. |
Growing churches inevitably face space constraints. With growth comes the dilemma to build or not to build, where to build, and what to build? This is when we must honestly wrestle with the issue of theology of space. Buildings define our ministry and values. They also create a certain permanence that tends to become restrictive with demographic and culture shifts. Much of The United Methodist Church’s ministry has been limited by the fact that more than 70 percent of our church facilities are located in small towns and rural areas where only 16 percent of the U.S. population lives. The permanence of our nineteenth- and twentieth-century capital assets has us out of position for twenty-first-century mission. Our brittle wineskins cannot hold new wine! Why are we reluctant to commit to new wineskins? We have assigned sacred value to our physical facilities, and we can’t let go. Buildings are not sacred--people are sacred! We need to let go of buildings and invest in the world that God loves and for whom Jesus died.
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How many massive cathedrals have been built that consumed centuries of mission resources that stand today only as museums memorializing the relics of the past? The Cologne (Köln) Cathedral is one of the world’s largest churches. The cathedral is one of the best-known architectural monuments in Germany and has been described as an exceptional work of human genius. Construction of this Gothic church began in 1248 and took until 1880 to complete. The project lasted more than six hundred years, yet when I visited the church on an August Sunday morning, fewer than fifty people were in attendance. How many declining churches are using the vast majority of their shrinking resources to maintain a building that represents the ambitious building initiative of another era? That was why God preferred the mobility of the tent of meeting to the immobility of the temple of Solomon. God imagined and designed the tent, and then King David turned it into a temple. David’s ambitious project mirrored the materialistic values of the surrounding pagan cultures. David said, “My son Solomon is young and inexperienced, and the house that is to be built for the Lord must be exceedingly magnificent, famous and glorified throughout all lands; I will therefore make preparation for it.” So David “provided materials in great quantity before his death” (1 Chr 22:5). Can we speculate that ego might become a factor in many building projects? God gave Moses detailed instructions for the design and setup of the tabernacle, but David developed on his own the temple architectural design that he gave to his son Solomon. God came up with the tent, and David, the temple! During the pilgrimage from Egypt to the land of promise, God gave Moses very specific instructions for a tabernacle-tent that would be representative of God’s presence with the people in their wilderness journey. The journey metaphor is prevalent throughout both Testaments. Jesus’ call to “follow me” is an invitation to journey. He calls us to “go into all the world and make disciples.” The church of Jesus mobilizes to the places of need. The tabernacle is a metaphor/model for the church that is mobile, going where Jesus is going, being who Jesus is being, and doing what Jesus is doing in the world. The cloud that covered the tabernacle signified the presence of God’s spirit for the purpose of directing the community’s progress. The mobility and flexibility of the tabernacle-tent of meeting are God’s strategic metaphor for the church. Inflexible capital assets create systems and structures that necessitate strategies for “bringing the world to the church” rather than the “church going to the world.” You may be feeling frustrated that you have had to postpone building or other personal projects due to current economic realities. Have you considered that this might be a yield sign from the Holy Spirit? Did I mention the importance of prayer and fasting in the continual process of checking your strategic priorities against God’s? Get ready to move, Church! Get ready to trade your master plan for the Master’s. We are a pilgrim people who are called to go where Jesus is going, be who Jesus is being, and to do what Jesus is doing in the world! For practical strategies and theology on minimizing brick and maximizing mission, read Change the World: Recovering the Message and Mission of Jesus (Abingdon, February 2010). God bless…
It's not only brick and morter that keep our mission dollars tied to home but the "business" of church. Salary's for large church staff's also are a big part of the maintenance problem. Recently I found out, that at the International House of Prayer, where my internship is, that with over I believe it's about 2400 staff members, they are considered missionaries, (even the leaders and pastors) and for the most part,solicit support, as any foreign missionary does, to do their jobs. There are work scholarships for some positions, that supplement that support, which is usually about $500 a month if I heard correctly, which actually comes from the church. As a result, not only do they have people who really want to be there....it's a call from the Lord, but they also free up the church's money for mission. I dont' think there is anything wrong with paying salary's, but I thought that was an interesting, and wise response to growing need in the world. Well, what about the needs of those employee's? As I listen to the testimonies, they have learned well the truth of living simply so that others might live, and most live in humble homes, second hand cars, etc. There is a family with 18 adopted children from human trafficking and other situations, who are able to care for them all on mission support. If we really want to take God at His word, and believe, living in faith, I think we would find our faith rewarded. We just need to trade the American dream for God's dream.
Posted By: Lisa Sowry on Oct 17, 2009 10:18AM
Hi Lisa. When staff solicit money from outside the church budget it still comes out of the same pockets of believers in the church. My son raised his support this way when he was on the staff of a christian organization. He would leave the mission field for at least two months each year just to raise money. It seems to be more efficient we we agree to do this corporately. Ginghamsburg supports a large number of field staff through the types of ministries that you are referring to. Our missionaries in the Czech Republic have seen their largest support coming from our weekly church budget at GUM. The church there is growing and vibrant. Church staffs that are winning and growing disciples are well worth the investment-as the Bible says the "laborer is worth their wages." Just think about the children and student ministry staff that have helped disciple our own children. I always appreciate you thoughtful participation in the blog.
Posted By: Mike on Oct 19, 2009 08:43AM
Hi Mike, I guess one of the differences about IHOP is most people are from outside the Kansas City area, coming in from a lot of different places. So they are soliciting from their home church friends and family. I see your point about soliciting at home.
Posted By: Lisa Sowry on Oct 19, 2009 09:51AM
If my understanding is correct, the focus since many people have local jobs & they're not necessarily mobile that in those cases, brick & mortar although necessary is minimal, efficient & focused on missions. Whether those missions are within a persons neighborhood or national or international, etc., depends on where those people are in their lives, their walk & their call.
Posted By: michaiah combs on Oct 19, 2009 07:04PM
My best friend, his church is builing a new church at a new location. Their pastor preaches twice on sunday and once on Sunday night. He is afraid that the church will over extend themselves financially. I told him that you Mike preach at least five times on the weekend and Gum has move people to other churches and homes. I realize it is hard work for you to preach that many times on the weekend, but you are doing God's work and not spending all of the churches finances on brick and mortor. I thank you for your hard work. Oh yes your sermon on living simpley enough has been working for me. God has blessed me this past week. I have told my friends about what happened and it was truly a GOD THING. GOD IS GOOD, Period.
Posted By: Craig on Oct 21, 2009 02:42PM
 Worshippers enjoy the music at our Fort McKinley Campus. Fort McKinley United Methodist, a small dying urban church in Dayton, merged with Ginghamsburg in July 2008. Now 300+ people worship there each Sunday and are on mission within the economically disadvantaged Fort McKinley neighborhood. | I traveled to Moscow with a group of international church leaders in April 1992 to celebrate Russia’s first free Easter after the fall of the Iron Curtain. A large banner proclaiming, “Christ has risen,” loomed over Red Square. I couldn’t help but notice that less than twenty-five yards away stood the mausoleum tomb of Vladimir Lenin, the father of the Soviet Revolution. It struck me as ironic that “Christ has risen” overshadowed the tomb of the Communist leader who had proclaimed the death of God during his lifetime. Christ’s tomb was empty, yet Vladimir lay entombed in a granite and marble mausoleum, his body sealed in a glass sarcophagus, cooled to sixty-one degrees and humidity between 80 and 90 percent. A fifteen-member team goes to extreme measures to make sure that his body is preserved in this state, where it has laid since his death on January 24, 1924. Why try to preserve what has already died?
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Many of our mainline churches continue to dump vital resources into the corpses of institutional churches that died decades ago. If you are not reaching the lost and freeing the least, you are dead! People age, and so do churches. The megachurches that thrived with the boomers have tended to age with their leaders. These same churches have also shown decline in recent years. I notice far more gray heads in our congregation as I approach sixty than I did when I was in my midthirties. This is only natural, but if we are not giving birth to new churches, we will become irrelevant to next generations. The church growth movement that spawned the megachurches tended to focus on expansion growth, breaking through the barriers of 200, 400, 800, and beyond. But, the model of the New Testament church, on the other hand, was a church-multiplying ministry. The rapid spread of this early movement grew through the multiplication of relatively small congregations. The evangelist Luke gave an insightful account of Jesus’ call to his first disciples (5:1-11), which also demonstrates a key component of this ministry multiplication principle. Jesus was teaching the crowds on the bank of the Sea of Galilee. Two boats were sitting on the water’s edge while the owners were cleaning their nets after a long, tiresome night of fruitless labor. Jesus enlisted the fishermen’s assistance and used Peter’s boat for a better vantage point in addressing the amassing crowds. And “when he had finished speaking, he said to Simon, ‘Put out into deep water, and let down the nets for a catch.’” In other words, do something that you haven’t yet tried. Take new risks. Act out of the box of your traditional experience. Go to new places. Try new things. I am encouraged by The United Methodist Church’s commitment to equip 1,000 clergy and laity to plant 650 new congregations by the end of 2012. The goal of creating “new places for new people” is honorable, but our ingrained institutional pattern is to continue to fish in the same old places using the same methodologies as bait. We continue to try to resuscitate small town and rural churches when, according to 2007 statistics, 84 percent of the U.S. population lives in metropolitan areas and 16 percent lives in nonmetropolitan areas. We send our high-potential young leaders to backwater rural places to function as funeral directors while they “pay their dues.” If we are going to strategically create new churches to reach new people, we have to take radical actions related to the reallocation of resources. We can’t keep putting our resources in underperforming entities. Our best resources need to go to the most competent, courageous, contagious leaders. We need to focus our best strategies on new church places where the majority of people live and work. Consider the result when Peter was willing to cast out into new places: “When they had done so, they caught such a large number of fish that their nets began to break. So they signaled their partners in the other boat to come and help them, and they came and filled both boats so full that they began to sink” (vv. 6-7). Those of us in churches that are healthy also need to multiply our missional DNA by fishing in new places, multiplying mission and ministry to church the area—not to become the biggest church in the area. In the book Change the World: Recovering the Message and Mission of Jesus (Abingdon, February 2010) read how Ginghamsburg is multiplying the mission by recycling dying churches and their facilities so that they in turn will go out and transform their local communities. God bless…
Mike, I loved your picture and caption about the Fort McKinney campus, and am happy to hear about your success in Dayton proper. Back when the UMC was in its missional years before the turn of the twentieth century, the church was not about large churches, but moving to where the population had shifted (west)and beginning new congregations. Today, the poplulaton is shifting back from rural into metropolitan areas, yet instead of moving with the population, we have stayed put, and we have many, many churches in places where the communities have moved away long ago. Today, where we have limited resources and we have limited amount of younger clergy, we have to become good stewards and begin to put our resources in places where we will see results. Furthermore, we need for more of our larger churches to accept the misson of multiplacation through starting new congregations, and not settling for just adding a few members each year. The challenge is going to be in crossing cultural, racial and economic lines to meet the new population centers where they are at. We not only need young clergy, but young diverse clergy for this new challenge that lies ahead. Would love to hear suggestions on how to adress this.
Posted By: Nathan Hodge on Oct 08, 2009 09:24PM
Hi Nathan. We are doing a pre-conference at our Fort McKinley campus on Oct 21 to address these issues. I would love to see you there!
Posted By: Mike on Oct 10, 2009 08:44AM
I am so looking forward to that book, Mike! Thanks!
Posted By: Thomas Risager on Oct 12, 2009 01:41PM
Who would be the best person at Ginghamsburg to talk with about the model for merger that you came up with? Who initiated the process?
Posted By: Jamie Westlake on Oct 14, 2009 11:46AM
Hi Jamie. Dave Hood is our campus pastor at the Fort. You can email Dave (dhood@ginghamsburg.org).
Posted By: Mike on Oct 17, 2009 08:50AM
I attend a circles class at the fort and we have been going there for about 17 weeks now . i love the surroundings and everyone their . we attend church at the main churh with barb and tom staley and we feel that we are at home thank you so much for being you.
Posted By: deanna coder on Oct 19, 2009 10:42AM
 Ginghamsburg house churches provide the biblical model of the church to those seeking more intimate community and to those who might find a traditional church structure uncomfortable or threatening. |
In the 1990s, many of us were talking about the 24/7 church— the church that ran a complex array of programming seven days a week, twenty-four hours a day. The missional church that is engaging its community and world in the places of real need today will not waste time and resources fueling complex organizational structures and programs. Less is more! The focus will be given to the fundamentals of community, discipleship, and mission.
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The growing, boomer generation churches of the 1980s and 1990s emphasized programs of excellence for every age group. We developed the contemporary worship movement that integrated media, music, and drama framed in elaborate artistic, media-driven staging. Some of our growing physical plants rivaled small college campuses and our parking lots, shopping malls. With growth came the necessity of leadership and management styles the caliber of those at small to midsize corporations. The complexity of staffing, financing, and programming developed over the preceding twenty years left church leaders ill prepared for the economic tsunami. This complex model of the last decades is not mobile or highly reproducible for the vast majority of churches in the post-Christian socioeconomic culture of the twenty-first century. While some megachurches do continue to thrive, some of the most future-oriented developments in the church are on a much smaller level. Many churches are moving away from the mall-sized facilities that attract masses of people to highly engineered and resourced programs of excellence (a macromodel) and toward relational communities meeting in multiple locations with a focus on growing by doing (a micromodel). Although it is easy to get lost in a crowd, transformation happens in communities of accountability and encouragement. Large churches can ensure this with a strong connection between celebration (worship) and cell (small groups), but it requires exponential increase in organizational activity and resources in gatherings of thousands. The eighteen- to thirty-five -year-old generation in particular is seeking more intimate, relational places for connection that also allow for local, environmental, and global contributions of significance, especially as they relate to social justice, poverty, and making a real difference in their local community and world. At Ginghamsburg, cell groups and house churches allow for faith communities to develop on a smaller scale. Our cell groups emphasize discussion based around the weekly sermon. This allows for deeper exploration and growth through group participation that gets beyond lecture presentation. The format also gives structure that keeps the group from the distractions that come from extraneous conversations. Ginghamsburg house churches (different from cell groups, which are integrated into our “big church” model) meet together at various times on different days of the week. They linger over a meal together, share a worship liturgy with communion, and watch the weekly message given in “big church” on DVD. They then take time to discuss the message together. This returning to basics—aiming for micro, rather than macro— means reallocating resources so that life transformation and mission are prioritized over expensive and exhausting programming and expansive building projects. We have to ask hard questions about the resources poured into facilities that are used a few hours each week. Our questions must be relentless concerning the programs and meetings that consume thousands of hours of staff and servant time but fail in producing measurable results in discipleship and mission. After all, missional movements aren’t mandated from the top down but grow from the bottom up. They begin as the grassroots efforts of ordinary people who commit to changing the world together. For more info about macro vs. micro movements, you will want to read Change the World: Recovering the Mission and Message of Jesus (Abingdon), to be released February 2010. God bless…
Mike, appreciate the post. Would you consider answering the following 2 questions:
1. How does Ginghamsburg define a local church?
2. What is/are the difference/s between your cell groups and house churches?
Jason Wing
jason.wing@apexcommunity.org
Posted By: Jason Wing on Oct 02, 2009 02:54PM
Thanks for the question, Jason. A local church is a community of faith that both worships together and serves together in Christ’s mission. Our house churches are this type of community and focus on both worship and service. Cell groups focus on discipleship (going deeper) and mission but connect into “big church,” our larger community of faith, for the purposes of worship. In other words, if you are in a house church, you would seldom come to our Main Campus or Fort McKinley Campus to attend a worship celebration because you worship within your weekly house church gathering. If you are in a cell group, you would drive to one of those campuses to be part of a weekly worship celebration.
Posted By: Mike Slaughter on Oct 02, 2009 04:02PM
For as many years as I can remember as an active Christ Follower, I was aware of the unseen reality of the unity of the Spirit reflected primarily in the oneness of mind & spirit of God's people.
Even without meetings, it seems that when it comes to spiritual things there's a harmony and agreement and a peace in the inspiration we receive from Christ.
I still remember thinking or talking about something on the way to church & when we got there, it was talked about in the service. It was kind of interesting & always faith-filling.
Posted By: Michaiah Combs on Oct 02, 2009 09:25PM
So if part of worship is in praising and singing, why isn't more congregational singing done versus solos being done. Isn't this one way that ALL of the congregation can join in praise and worship?
Posted By: Beverly Downs on Oct 02, 2009 10:25PM
I enjoy the solos and I feel there are ample opporutnities for congregational singing. Stand up, clap your hands and let the music embrace you. It is wonderful. I feel like worship is great, not only do we have wonderful sermons, but great music!!! Wonderful Blessings for all! The bottom line is not that we go to be entertained, but what we can get out of worship to take outside to the rest of the world for our Heavenly Father.
Posted By: Julie Wogoman on Oct 04, 2009 07:36PM
Mike, I think this is an accurate read on many young adults of today inside and maybe even outside of the Church. I personally desire this kind of micro-level ministry/community rooted in personal relationship and intimacy (both as recipient and as minister). I appreciate your willingness as the pastor of a large church to say that the church you lead isn't necessarily the "right" model and will always need reformed by asking and answering critical questions. I hope that the Ginghamsburg community and other churches will continue to look hard at what it means to follow Jesus and keep leading people in that direction no matter what it requires personally or organizationally. Thanks
Posted By: Rusty Eshleman on Oct 05, 2009 12:23AM
"The eighteen- to thirty-five -year-old generation in particular is seeking more intimate, relational places for connection that also allow for local, environmental, and global contributions of significance, especially as they relate to social justice, poverty, and making a real difference in their local community and world."
THANK YOU!!
Posted By: Jonathan on Oct 27, 2009 12:53AM
 Each Monday night, Ginghamsburg servants host a free meal and worship experience called Gateway Café for our food pantry clients—just one of hundreds of ways that Ginghamsburg disciples live out God’s call to serve others. |
Too many churches have mission, vision, and purpose statements that few members can articulate and are rarely translated into action. A church may have a multitude of programs, but no one is really sure how they connect together for one strategic, overarching purpose. Disciples replicate themselves. Programs don’t make disciples. Disciples make disciples. For this to happen, every local church needs to have a strategic and repetitious system of training that is clearly laid out for the initiate. The discipleship strategy must address how, why, and in what a person is expected to be involved.
At Ginghamsburg we articulate a simple strategy for participation at the visitor orientation we call “Pizza with the Pastors.” We communicate “here is the expectation for every person who seeks to follow Jesus in the path of discipleship at Ginghamsburg.” The strategic practice needs to move people in their development to love God, love people, and serve the world.
To accomplish this, we ask people to live in the life rhythm of celebration, cell, and call.
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Celebration. We learn to love God as we worship together in community and experience the teaching of God’s word and sacrament. Participation in weekly public worship and daily personal worship is essential to the process of transformation. Cell. We learn to love one another as we meet together in cell community. The life of the body is in the cell! In small, intimate communities, we learn to respect differences and realize that our unity is based not in our ideology but in the redemptive work of God in Christ Jesus. Relationships are crucial to the process of discipleship, but small groups must be about more than fellowship. They must lead these disciples out into the world. Call. We serve God by serving the world through our individual calls and gift mixes. Doing is the ultimate form of learning. Every member of the body of Christ is called to be a functioning member serving the world in Christ’s mission. The strategy of a church’s discipleship process must keep in mind the end goal. Too many churches make the mistake of measuring input, the number of classes or programs being offered, rather than results. Remember, it is not about the number of people who are coming to your church, but the number of your people who are actively and effectively serving Christ’s mission in your community and the world. Church leaders, I would love to hear about your process! Please comment on this blog or join me for dialogue at the Change the World conference on Ginghamsburg’s campus this October 22-23. For anyone new to Ginghamsburg who would like to learn more about our discipleship strategy and opportunities for connection and growth, attend Pizza with the Pastors this weekend on the Main Campus: Saturday, September 26, 6:15 p.m. in Main Campus 117 or Sunday, September 27, 12:45 p.m. in Main Campus 117. No RSVP necessary. God bless…
Sounds well thought out. Blessings.
Posted By: Michaiah Combs on Sep 28, 2009 08:36PM
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