Tuesday, October 27, 2015

The Fallacy of Measured Success by Garris Elkins


I have come to dislike the word "metrics" - a word used by organizations to measure people and the success of their efforts. It is a business term that has crept into conversations within the church, especially where organizations need to measure a certain level of visible success to justify their continued existence to a donor base. 

This need to always be measured becomes a slow and corrosive drip in the spiritual stomach of those who live under its open faucet. When the Church begins to measure and validate its existence using the same tools as the business systems of the world we put ourselves in a place of jeopardy. This jeopardy requires that we align only with those who support our desired metric of success. This becomes a masked form of dishonor. In the end, the very ones who may carry the potential to bring breakthrough have been excluded from the conversation because they do not measure up to our predetermined metric.  True significance in God’s Kingdom cannot be measured by the metrics of success.  It can only be measured by faithfulness.

If your significance in any group is determined only by the metrics of visible success you may be working for the wrong people. Ask God to lead you to a group who are not consumed with the production of these metrics and who understand your true value apart from the limits of measured productivity. Jesus Christ and His first followers failed to measure up to the success metric of their day, but in the end, they changed the world.

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