LIBERTY UNIVERSITY JOHN W. RAWLINGS SCHOOL OF DIVINITY
10 Questions to Develop Transformative Ministry Innovation
CLED 700
A Paper Submitted to
the Faculty of the School of Divinity
in Candidacy for the Degree of
Doctor of Ministry Department of Christian Leadership and Church Ministries
By
Henry Edwin Shikuku
Lynchburg, Virginia
10/2022
10 Questions to Develop Transformative Ministry Innovation
Successful ministry innovation emphasizes process not product, transformation rather than
traditional metrics like participation numbers and money, and sees the launch of a creative idea
as just one component of effective innovation. The Innovation Laboratory guides congregations
through a five-phase, multi-month Theological Innovation Process that leads them beyond
preconceived notions about innovation within their ministry context. Each of the five phases of
the Theological Innovation Process centers particular guiding questions. Each question opens
doors to the creation of an innovative ministry with the audacious goal of transforming people’s
daily lives.
First United Methodist Church of Fort Worth (FUMC) participated in an Innovation Lab
cohort that ended in spring 2021. Using their experience as a case study, the following guiding
questions can begin to prompt innovative thinking in your own ministry.
Phase 1: Describing
1. What’s going on in the lives of people in my community?
2. What joys and challenges are people facing?
3. Where is God at work?
FUMC’s Innovation Team devoted multiple months to intentionally listening to teenagers
and adults in their community. Team members conducted countless interviews and explored
demographic data about their community. They observed a common theme in what they
learned: Teenagers were experiencing extreme anxiety, stress, and a crippling fear of failure.
What’s more, this fear of failure was keeping young people from trying new things or pursuing
activities and interests simply for enjoyment rather than evaluation.
Phase 2: Interpreting
4. Why is the dominant issue we’re observing in our community happening?
5. What’s the root cause?
6. What community assets are present?
The team then dug beneath the surface of teen anxiety and stress to unearth the root
causes. They realized that not only did young people experience the mental health impacts of a
fear of failure, but the problem ran much deeper. Teenagers in their community felt that if they
failed at anything (school, sports, extracurriculars, etc.), then they were fundamentally a failure.
The team also learned that this internalized belief wasn’t just a concern for teenagers in their
community but was also at play for adults.
Phase 3: Norming
7. What should be happening in our community according to God’s desires for people and
creation?
FUMC’s Innovation Team reflected theologically on how God might respond to the belief
that to fail at anything makes a person a failure. They discerned that the gospel story liberates
people from the fear of failure because God’s grace and love are freely offered, no matter one’s
performance. They realized that humans are created to enjoy life, to laugh, and to simply be
with one another.
Phase 4: Ideating & Prototyping
8. What innovation could we create that would address the challenges/needs identified in
our community?
9. How can we draw on the community’s assets as we innovate?
Out of the Innovation Team’s work in Phases 1-3 emerged an idea for an innovative
ministry that celebrated failure and created low-stakes opportunities for teens and adults to fail
alongside one another while prioritizing fun. “Fail→Safe Studios” was born. The team tested
various modalities for Fail→Safe Studios, including a series of one-off events during the
pandemic. This included a virtual series called “Quarantine Craft Time,” led by Innovation Team
members through Instagram Live videos. From their separate homes, participating teens and
adults made marshmallows from scratch, created yarn hearts, and did other activities together.
“Because we didn’t have a project idea going into the pandemic, all of Fail→Safe was
invented in and largely shaped by the creative, spacious, if bizarre, early months of the
pandemic,” said Kat Bair, FUMC’s director of youth ministries during the Lab cohort. “Baking
bread? Making papier-mâché? Crafting? Let’s do it! That has proven to be a key part of its
DNA.” In May 2021, the Innovation Team hosted the first In-Person Craft Time at their church
building. Signs were posted throughout the space that read: “No perfect beyond this point”,
“winning isn’t everything”, and “failure is always an option.” The event, and the underlying
premise behind it, have transformed the youth ministry at FUMC. More importantly, the
ministry is actively transforming how young people and adults think about themselves and what
it means to be worthy and beloved by God and others just as they are.
Phase 5: Implementing
10. How will we implement this ministry on a broad scale?
Although FUMC’s Innovation Team completed their official Innovation Lab experience,
Fail→Safe Studios continues to evolve and imbue other facets of the church’s ministry in
response to the shifting needs of their ministry context. “Fail→Safe is now a regular part of the
rhythm of community for teenagers and adults, and has generated beautiful and terrible art,
delicious and inedible snacks, and more,” Bair said. “It has worked its way into confirmation
curriculum, Vacation Bible School, and the community at large as not just a beloved program,
but as a way of being in all of the church’s programs. It was originally an occasional one off-
event for teenagers, and has now been a teen and parent event, a high school curriculum set, a
social media series, and more. While the core has remained the same, the implementation has
varied by time constraints, age group, and more to fit into different spaces.”
