What is Building Brothers here to do?
Building Brothers' desire is to serve the local church by assisting them in developing a leadership core of men who are pursuing God, becoming spiritual fathers and capable of reproducing that pursuit in the lives of other men within the church. A key element in this reproduction process is establishing a clearly defined pathway within the church to lead men from spiritual immaturity to spiritual fatherhood and developing leaders who can minister to others.
Why are we doing this?
During the period of the '90s, with all that was happening in the men's movement, George Barna found a net decrease in church attendance by 10%. In 1991, 42% of the men attending church were involved in the life of the church. By 1996, the number had dropped by 14% to 28%. All of this occurred at a time when hundreds of thousands of men were attending various Christian events around the country and were encouraged to become more involved within their local churches. From Mr. Barna's statistics, it is apparent that there was a crisis in the church as men's involvement was actually declining.
Men returned home from these events perceiving (consciously or unconsciously) that in order to have a "successful" men's group at their church, it was vital for them to administer a series of programs and events for the men. In reality, this led them down a dead-end street. Each program or event needed to outdo the previous one or the attendance began to fall by the wayside.
A critical question one may ask is:
Why was there a crisis within the church when so much seemed to be happening in men's lives?"
Building Brothers believes that the primary reasons for this crisis within the church are:
- There are very few viable models for men to follow.
- Churches are not considered as a masculine (safe) place for men.
- Churches need to build a leadership core of men that the rest of the men can trust.
- There is little expression of male identity within the church.
Why Building Brothers?
Building Brothers is dedicated to working with the local church to remove the various barriers that keep men from being involved within the life of the church. These barriers are addressed and can be removed as a leadership core of men model the principles:"
- Understand and deal with the father vacuum.
- Establish a safe, masculine environment within the church to deal with issues.
- Develop men into leaders who can be trusted.
- Help men in their pursuit of God.
How does Building Brothers do this?
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