My Greatest Ministry Mistakes
He watched his dreams crumble at Circle Church. Did that failure invalidate his ministry?
David Mains with Philip Yancey
April 1, 1980
When I was first approached to write an article on painful lessons I learned from ten years at Circle Church, my immediate reaction was to review instead all the successes. Pastors easily fall into the success trap that permeates our culture. We laud winning teams, fire coaches of losing teams. And while we read about "the largest Sunday schools in America," we rarely read about struggling or declining churches. They just don't make the news. I have already had my chance, though. I wrote the book Full Circle when our four-year-old church in Chicago was still moving toward its zenith. We had started with a few friends and a dream to establish a church in the infertile inner city. Ultimately, 500 people piled into a union hall ballroom each Sunday morning to participate in stirring, creative worship experiences. Circle was a beehive of activities: modules met on art, communications, music, outreach, and urban interests. A drama group wrote and produced several full-length plays. Our musicians gave professional-quality concerts. Prayer, social action, evangelism, and small groups were all finding beautiful expression Many of our members moved into the Austin community which then had the second highest crime rate in Chicago. Our people responded to the urgent needs around us with a legal clinic, a youth program, social workers, counselors, the beginnings of a medical clinic, and dreams of an alternative school program. In some ways Circle Church was viewed as a model of an inner-city church. We had a full-orbed ministry of creative worship and social outreach with a racially mixed congregation, and all this was accomplished without pouring money into a church building. Soon I was flying around the country to lead seminars on what ...
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