Several years ago, I developed severe back pain and had to go to the chiropractor. My chiropractor taught me several things about my body during my visits. The two most important lessons I learned were:

1. The nervous system running up and down your spine controls everything in your body. Your spinal cord is the communication tool of the body. It connects everything.
2. When your back or spine is out of line, you will experience pain.

The church can learn a lot from chiropractic medicine.

The mission of your church is the spine of your church. Your church’s mission should be what connects all of the ministries together. The mission should drive ministry to children, youth, and adults. The mission should impact how the finance committee prioritizes spending, how the trustees improve the building, and what missional opportunities the church undertakes.

Just like our bodies, if any of the ministries are out of line, the church will experience pain. Sometimes, the pain is just discomfort. Sometimes, it is a sharp stabbing pain. Sometimes, the pain can be disabling.

Alignment is the key to a healthy body and church. When your back is in alignment all your systems communicate and work well together. When the ministries of the church are aligned with the mission of the church, everyone is working together to accomplish its purpose.

When my chiropractor evaluated my back, she found that I had some major issues that had developed over my life. She told me that the bad news was it was going to take some work to get me realigned. The good news was that when we got my back realigned I would feel better than I have in years. Over a period of three months, I went multiple times a week to allow her to push and adjust my back so that it could be properly aligned. Because I had lived in misalignment for years this was a long process because my body wanted to go back to its bad habits. The time, pain, and effort were worth it as my body has healed and now functions properly. I have found over the past two years that I need to go back in for alignment checks every six months probably because of bad posture, but a simple checkup will get me lined up again.

Most churches are like my back. They have been misaligned for years. They have learned to live with or ignore the pain. For a church to truly live into its mission, the Body of Christ must go to the chiropractor. Alignment within the Body of Christ is essential for a healthy church and ministry. Here are some of the steps or visits to the Holy Chiropractor (Spirit) a church must take:

• Create a vision and mission that aligns with Christ (who is our head)
• Buy in from church leaders
• Each ministry area develops ministries to fulfill the mission of the church
• Alignment checks must happen regularly to keep everyone in line with the mission

Is your youth ministry in alignment with the mission of the church? Is your church experiencing pain? Is the pain due to some area of the church being out of line with the vision and mission of the church? Maybe it’s time to take your church to the chiropractor and get realigned.

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