Five Disciplines that Promote a Learning Church

"Not that I have already obtained this or am already perfect, but I press on to make it my own because Christ Jesus has made me his own. Brothers, I do not consider that I have made it my own. But one thing I do: forgetting what lies behind and straining forward to what lies ahead, I press on toward the goal for the prize of the upward call of God in Christ Jesus."

Philippians 3:12-14

Habits can be very hard to change. Ask anyone who smokes or bites his nails. So how can churches change their resistant response to problems? How can they move from firefighting to creating truly innovative learning environments for spiritual growth?

Dr. Peter Senge has worked with hundreds of organizations. His experience allows him to articulate what he calls five key disciplines. These are five philosophies that organizations, including the church, can adopt to become learning organizations. These disciplines are deeply practical. They can only work if they become part of the church’s culture. So, what are these key disciplines? Let’s go through them one by one.

First, churches should promote personal growth and competence for their employees. What does this mean? Senge defines personal mastery as being committed to learning and growing. He also describes mastery as ensuring you’re always doing your best. When people work like this, they often feel a deep sense of fulfillment. What’s more, it keeps employees motivated and excited. Instead of thinking that we have it all figured out, we keep pressing on toward the perfection of Christ and strive to contribute to a Learning Church.

Second, churches need to examine their mental model. Each of us sees the world through a certain filter. As Senge sees it, this filter – the organization’s mental model, comprises judgments, assumptions, and life experience. If you can identify your mental model, you’ll become more open-minded and learn to become curious about your thinking. One thing that keeps us stuck is the familiar images, paradigms, and practices of our past. While heritage is a taproot from which we draw stability, we must also let go enough and live in our current circumstances, interpreting the best of our past into our present and innovating from the deep truths that have been passed on to us. Always striving to be better is profoundly Christian and rooted in the Reformed Tradition of "Reformed and always Reforming." Re-forming makes us a Learning Church.

Once people become aware of their mental model, the third discipline comes into play. That discipline is team learning. Team learning happens when employees enter into a real dialogue with each other. As a team, we critique, ask probing questions, and examine our own biases and assumptions. When this happens, team members think together. They develop a combined intelligence that can achieve much more than individual effort. "We are all members of the Body of Christ and individually members of it." Team learning blends individual contributions into something more profound, even an expression of Christ's being in the world today. When we are working together, we are a church learning together.

Team learning builds the foundation for the fourth discipline, shared vision. A genuinely shared vision doesn’t revolve around a charismatic leader. Instead, employees have a sense of ownership over what they do and what they contribute to the ministry. We strive not for our own understanding but to fulfill the call of Christ Jesus to be a healing, helping, reconciling, peacemaking force in the world today. To create a shared vision, we must listen to each other and to the Spirit of God. This kind of dialogue makes us a Learning Church.

Finally, the most important discipline of all is systems thinking. This means examining problems as a whole. When you practice it, you consider how one aspect will influence something else – something that may initially seem entirely unrelated. This fifth discipline integrates all the others. Again, think Body of Christ, not just individuals saved and called. When we recognize that we are striving beyond our individual selves for the greater perfection of Christ, we become a Learning Church.

The next five blogs will look at these disciplines in more detail.