Today I read a fantastic blog post by Skye Jethani. Skye is the managing editor of Leadership and a teaching pastor at Blanchard Alliance Church in Wheaton, Illinois

Early on he writes this…

…most American churches have based their mission on the assumption of affluence. That doesn’t mean every church is living large. Rather, it means that our churches expect people to give their surplus time and money to fuel Christ’s mission. But what happens if there is no surplus? What if people can’t give more time or money? Like our economy, has our church built its mission on a foundation of sand rather than stone?

In other words, it is built on people’s extra.  And here is one of the problems with that.  (He covers several.) Skipping down…

…if leisure time ever shrinks the church will find its mission severely affected. We may be facing that situation as the recession deepens. Just ask pastors in parts of the country where unemployment has accelerated. People who could previously spend multiple hours each week in church programming are now holding down part-time jobs, job hunting, spending more time at home cooking rather than eating out, or taking classes to train for new careers. Some retirees, who are often the most available and celebrated volunteers at churches, are now having to return to work.

Finally, and I am skipping a whole bunch of great stuff, he suggests building people’s faith on their core time, not their extra time.  If we do this, we may reap this benifit…

A church built upon people’s core time rather than leisure time will not only maximize its missional impact, but it will also be far less susceptible to the unstable foundations of our debt-based economy. It would mean fewer churches fearing economic recession because they’ve build their missional strategy on the foundation of ordinary life rather than institutional programs, buildings, and staffs.

You can (and should) read the whole post here.  Best thing I read today.