The question in this movie is āhow to win ballgamesā with a very limited payroll budget.
Moneyball depicts how the Oakland Aās answered that question in 2001. They were a struggling team, with a small budget, in need of some good players.
Oaklandās manager, Billy Beane (Brad Pitt), was in a dilemma on how to get quality players in order to win games. How could he afford any of the marquee players with the smallest salary budget in all of baseball? During a meeting to talk trading players, he runs into Peter Brand (Jonah Hill). Brand is a baseball statistic geek who Beane hires to help him build the team.
The whole premise of the movie is about determining the right statistics to use in measuring a playerās ability to help the team win games. Instead of RBIās they use OBP (on base percentage). It doesnāt matter if a player gets on base with a hit, a walk, or is hit by a pitch. Itās getting on base that counts. No runs are scored unless someone gets on base first.
Other uncommon statistics are also elevated in their importance to player selection. Brand shows his manager how to find low cost players who have great statistics. Thus, the Aās acquire an unlikely crop of new players passed over by the rest of baseball. Some border on being misfits, but they have the right stats to win games.
So what does this have to do with the church?
Instead of āwinning gamesā, our question as a church is, āhow we winning at making disciplesā? Are we making progress in the great commission? And is what we are measuring helping us answer this question?
Most churchās Sunday bulletins have a little blurb about last weekās attendance and offering (including ours). Sunday school or small group attendance may also make it in there. While I have no problem measuring those things (being a former accountant), do these stats really tell us anything? On a small level they do. Certainly we would rather have āsomeā people attend worship, small groups, and Wednesday activities than ānoā people. And it does take cash to pay the electric bill, buy curriculum, and provide salaries. And we need to know how many people attended in order to manage our building, rooms and ministries.
But to really measure how we are doing āmaking disciplesā, these stats tell us very little.
Wouldnāt it be helpful to have a summary every Monday of how well our local church did last week in the ādisciple-makingā category? Stats that included sharing the Gospel as well as growing in the Christian life?
Here are some stats I would love to see each Monday morning; and admittedly they are heavily weighted in the āevangelismā area:
1. Friends:
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How many new friends did our church members make last week?
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How many members spent one hour with an unbelieving friend or neighbor (meal, coffee, playing games, etc.)
2. Gospel āAttemptsā:
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How many times did our members share the ābasicsā of the Gospel with someone?
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How many of our members had a 30-minute Bible study with an unbelieving friend?
3. Growth and Community
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Had a 30 minute Bible study with a believing friend (as a mentor or being mentored)
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Participated in a church small group (we call ours Gospel Communities)
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Attended one of our worship services.
4. Serving
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Served 1 hour in a church-based ministry.
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Served 1 hour in our community.
Tomorrow Iāll share why I feel these are some of the right statistics to measure; and the basis behind these stats being important.
Iām interested in your input. What stats do you feel would help measure a churchās progress in āmakingā disciples?
(psā¦for baseball fans ā check out the trailer for Moneyball here )
Photo Credit: Declan McAleese via Flickr (CC-By-NC-ND 2.0)