11.04.04

The Rev. Dr. Gregory Tournoux

Returning Ford Lecturer describes healthy alternative to church decline

The Rev. Dr. Gregory Tournoux, delivering this year's Ford Lectures, continued a presentation that he began during last year's Ford Lectures on developing the small congregation through cell group ministry.

"The response to his visit with us last year was overwhelmingly positive, so we invited him back to finish what he started," Professor of Christian Education Dr. Steve Lowe said as he introduced Tournoux in Bowie Chapel Wednesday.

Tournoux, currently on sabbatical and working toward a second doctoral degree, began by stating what he sees as the aim of church development. "We're trying to inject health into the local church," he said, adding that about 80 percent of churches in the United States are either "plateaued out" or on the decline rather than growing.

For the "cell-based and celebration 21st century church" described by Tournoux, eight elements of health include "empowering leadership, gift-oriented ministry, passionate spirituality, functional structures, inspiring worship, holistic small groups, need-oriented evangelism and loving relationships."

Tournoux believes cell groups of three to 12 people living basic Christian community are central to this dynamic model of the church, which offers "a way of life radically different from buildings or institutions or programs."

"Multiplication of holistic cell groups is the top factor for growing the church spiritually and numerically," he said. "To grow a church larger, you've got to grow it smaller."

In his lecture and accompanying outline, Tournoux focused on how the cell concept is carried out in congregations and stressed that Christ must be at the center of such work. Tournoux said he often reminds parishioners that Jesus Christ is the head of the church.

"Don't expect to build on your own human efforts alone," he said. "We need to be a praying people."

Tournoux said God's kingdom is extended through the lives of individuals, and participation in a cell group cannot take the place of personal spiritual discipline. "Private devotional life feeds the life of the cell for prayer and worship," he said.

As a congregation moves toward a dynamic model of the church and cell groups take hold, "new Christians are being made because Christians are being made new," Tournoux said.

Bible study and other learning in the church is not just sitting in a class soaking up information, Tournoux said. Christian education helps church members translate orthodoxy, or right belief, into daily life.

"Learning is change and transformation," he said. "People are encouraged and exhorted to put orthodoxy into 'orthopraxis.'"

Tournoux served for more than a decade as rector of Christ Episcopal Church in Owosso, Mich., where Sunday worship attendance tripled and the budget more than doubled during his tenure. He holds the B.S. degree in special education from Slippery Rock University, a Master of Divinity degree from Virginia Theological Seminary, and a Doctor of Ministry degree from Trinity Theological Seminary in Indiana. He and his wife are the parents of four children.

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