It’s hard to grow, improve, or mature without first being honest about the need for growth, the room for improvement, and the areas of immaturity. 

Being realistic is important for those who want to progress and, as a church family, that is exactly what we desire. We want to become a congregation that is used by God to lead more and more people from darkness into light. We want to be a people so being filled with the Holy Spirit that wounded, battered, discouraged, and questioning Christians can come and find healing care and restorative grace. We want to be an assembly that God increasingly uses to build up soldiers for Christ, strong, wise, and equipped for battle and to deploy those troops into the fray with surging effectiveness. Any church family that longs to grow in these tasks needs to be honest about ways they are failing, falling short, or being disobedient, and where they desperately need God to intervene, forgive, and restore.