The Danger of Baby Steps to Drift and Decline

By Dr. Barrett Mosbacker

November 10, 2018

“Not Here!”

How many times have you listened to a tragic news story and heard someone proclaim, “I thought such a thing could never happen here,” or “I never thought he could do such a thing — he seemed like such a nice person,” or some variation of shattered expectations? Shattered expectations arise from naiveté regarding the nature of sin and complacency about people and the world around us. The uncomfortable truth is that violence and tragedy can happen to anyone, anywhere, anytime — including in our Christian schools.

While violence is a real threat to our schools, we face a far more lethal, subtle, and pernicious danger. This danger does not arise from the government, from violence-prone individuals, or even from disgruntled employees or parents. It arises from within. The greatest threat we face is mostly hidden until it is too late. I am referring to the threat of small compromises made for good reasons.

The First Steps of Drift and Decline Are Small

We are repeatedly warned that pride comes before a fall. The first step toward that fall is assuming that we cannot or will not fall.

Sin is dreadfully deceitful. More often than not, it starts small — almost innocuously. Murder seldom begins with a knife thrust to the chest, and adultery rarely starts by jumping into bed. Instead, most sin begins with the first look, the first feelings of anger and hatred, and then proceeds to grow, entangle, and eventually kill. James warns:

…desire when it has conceived gives birth to sin, and sin when it is fully grown brings forth death (James 1:15).

Sin is like the first cancer cell. It starts small, unseen, and unfelt. Eventually it grows and multiplies, and if not destroyed, it kills.

Mission drift works the same way. It begins with small steps. As the journey continues, the steps grow faster and longer, and before long the organization has drifted far from its founding mission and values.

Where Drift and Decline Begin

Mission drift begins with small steps: compromising immutable principles, compromising in hiring, and adding courses taught by non-believers.

1. Compromising Immutable Principles

Compromise is essential in human relationships. It is impossible to sustain healthy and effective relationships or institutions without the art and skill of compromise. A healthy marriage, a growing business, a fruitful church, and governance at all levels all require it. Without compromise, everyone scatters into his own tribe and the machinery of leadership and governance grinds to a halt. Sound familiar?

To build healthy, vibrant, and innovative Christian schools, we must never compromise immutable principles — but we should and must compromise on policies, practices, programs, preferences, personality styles, and traditions. Unfortunately, we tend to confuse principles with preferences, practices, programs, and policies. They are not the same. There are relatively few immutable principles.

Principles are timeless and immutable. They are not subject to change based on one’s time and place in history, on new leadership, circumstances, personality, preferences, or any other reason. For the Christian school, immutable principles include fidelity to God’s Word, biblical integration in every subject and program, hiring only Christian staff with mature and maturing Christian character, and faithfulness to the school’s role in preparing young people to glorify and serve God, to love God, and to love their neighbors. Most anything else may be subject to change. For example, a school may elect to enroll the children of non-believers or restrict enrollment only to the children of believers, depending on what school leadership believes the Lord has called that school to do at a given time and place in its history. A school may also decide to integrate learning technology comprehensively into its curriculum, or choose not to do so. Dress codes, policies, rules, regulations, programs, and more may and should be updated from time to time to ensure that the school remains compelling and relevant in accomplishing its mission of serving contemporary students, families, and the culture.

I have created a simple formula to guide my thinking on principles and practices: Immutable Principles + Innovative Practices = Faithfulness and Fruitfulness.

When we are uncompromising on immutable principles, we are faithful. When we are innovative in our practices, we will be more fruitful. Leaders must never compromise principles but must always seek to innovate on everything else.

2. Hiring: “Eat the Whole Enchilada, or Go Somewhere Else”

Failing to hire those who embrace the whole mission is the compromise most likely to produce mission drift. Leaders set the pace and missional direction for the organization; all staff implement its mission and values. When we compromise in hiring, we compromise the mission — the raison d’être for the school’s existence. In their excellent book, Mission Drift: The Unspoken Crisis Facing Leaders, Charities, and Churches, Peter Greer and Chris Horst warn:

As much attention as technical competency receives, screening for culture and mission should receive even more. Mission True organizations we interviewed tended to have a “hire slow and fire fast” mentality and grasped the consequences of having the wrong person representing the mission. They also seemed to have a diverse selection committee and always included “mission fit” as a key part of the interview process. “Close enough” just isn’t “good enough” for Mission True organizations, said Phil Smith, who has served as CEO and chairman of several publicly traded companies. “It is not your enemies you have to worry about, it is your supporters and employees who ‘almost’ have the vision. Eat the whole enchilada, or go somewhere else” [emphasis added].

One of the primary reasons for Mission Drift is that people join your organization who are very excited about portions of your vision, but are either opposed to or don’t care about the rest of it,“ noted Phil Smith. The drift at Big Idea (Veggie Tales), Harvard, and ChildFund was connected to their people. As shared earlier, Derek Bok, president at Harvard from 1971–1991, wrote a letter to Harvard’s board and key supporters about the university’s departure from its roots. Among other reasons, he described the hiring philosophy change. ”The practice of looking at the personal character of candidates for faculty appointment fell into disuse,“ Bok wrote. ”Intellect and technical proficiency had decisively triumphed as the preeminent goals of the professoriat.“ Harvard’s leaders cared more about credentials than Christian character. These staff members liked Harvard’s intellectual rigor but did not buy into the full mission. They ”almost" had the vision. And those hiring decisions, compounded over time, led Harvard to a place where they could no longer turn back to the values of their founding.¹

Mission drift starts small — one hire, one step, and then another. To avoid it, hire only those willing to eat the whole enchilada of the school’s mission.

3. Adding Programs Taught by Non-Believers

Closely related to hiring is the offering of external or auxiliary programs not taught by Christians. Using non-Christian textbooks and other resources is, I believe, acceptable. By common grace, truth is truth no matter who says it or who publishes it. Sadly, some Christian curriculum is pedagogically sub-par, and the “biblical integration” it offers is often more ideological and political than genuinely biblical.

The issue here is not so much the curriculum used as who is using it. A Christian curriculum taught by a theologically weak teacher still fails to provide a robust Christian education in which God’s Word is intelligently, thoughtfully, creatively, and effectively integrated. On the other hand, a highly gifted and theologically astute teacher can use non-Christian curriculum to significant effect — helping students discern truth from error, identify worldview presuppositions, and learn how to think through them.

The same cannot be said about using non-Christians to teach units or entire subjects. When a Christian school offers courses not taught by Christian instructors, it has compromised its mission in those courses. It is a step toward mission drift. A non-Christian cannot teach Christianly. The same principle applies to dual-credit classes taught by non-Christian professors. (Dual-credit courses approved and taught by the Christian school’s own teachers and subsequently accepted by a college or university are not a compromise and offer great value to families.) There is no meaningful difference between hiring a non-Christian to teach in the school building and engaging a non-Christian to teach in another format. Neither is capable of teaching Christianly, and both undermine the school’s mission. As Jesus said, “Whoever is not with me is against me, and whoever does not gather with me scatters.” Wherever instruction occurs, unbelievers cannot gather students to Jesus or integrate biblical truth into the curriculum. Therefore, non-Christian teachers scatter students away from Jesus and his truth. According to Jesus, there is no neutral ground.

Drifting to Shipwreck

This charge I entrust to you, Timothy, my child, in accordance with the prophecies previously made about you, that by them you may wage the good warfare, holding faith and a good conscience. By rejecting this, some have made shipwreck of their faith (1 Timothy 1:18–19).

Souls are not the only things that can be shipwrecked. Schools can be as well. Our schools can drift and crash upon the rocks of small compromises. Mission drift begins when school leaders assume that their school could never drift, and when immutable principles are compromised. Hiring staff who are not willing to eat the whole enchilada, or allowing non-believers to teach, are steps toward drift and decline.

Remember the words of Harvard’s former president, Derek Bok, and never let this happen on your watch:

Intellect and technical proficiency had decisively triumphed as the preeminent goals of the professoriat. Harvard’s leaders cared more about credentials than Christian character. These staff members liked Harvard’s intellectual rigor but did not buy into the full mission. They “almost” had the vision. And those hiring decisions, compounded over time, led Harvard to a place where they could no longer turn back to the values of their founding.

Never let this happen to you and your school. Guard the immutable principles — especially when it comes to hiring and whom you allow to teach. The uncomfortable truth is that mission drift can happen to anyone, anywhere, anytime, including in our Christian schools, when small compromises are made for good reasons.