Questions for Church Evaluation
Christians tend to think that they are practicing forgiveness just because they are Christians. Leaders can think that their church or organization is a community of forgiveness just because it is populated by Christians. But Christians must learn to develop a lifestyle of forgiveness. It does not happen automatically. And when the majority of people in a church or Christian organization do not have a lifestyle of authentic forgiveness, then that church is not yet an effective community of forgiveness.
The following questions are for leadership consideration and discussion. They are designed to help you evaluate the condition of your church or organization in regards to the practice of forgiveness among your people. Remember, groups do not practice forgiveness. Individuals do. You may download this questionaire by clicking here. (You have our permission to make copies of this document and use it with your leadership team.)
You may also want to download, print and distribute the “Questions for Self-evaluation” and “Identifying Your Personal Substitute for Forgiveness” documents to a representative group within your church, asking them to give you feedback on their practice of forgiveness.
Are we a community of forgiveness? Yes or No?
Our people work to restore broken relationships. ________
Our people are free from anger. ________
Our people feel loved by God. ________
Our people do not practice self-condemnation. ________
Our people eagerly welcome others who are different from themselves. ________
Our people empathize with hurting people, including offenders. ________
Our people practice church discipline when necessary without feeling guilty. ________
Our people do not withdraw from each other when conflicts arise. ________
Our people are becoming emotionally healthy. ________
Our people do not bring up past sins and failures to manipulate others. ________
Our people can disagree agreeably in real love. ________
Our people refuse gossip. ________
Our people work to appropriately restore long-damaged relationships. ________
Our people know how to receive God’s comfort in their pain. ________
Our people actively love their enemies. ________
Our people are becoming increasing free from self-destructive behaviors. ________
Our people are quick to develop honest, loving, practical relationships. ________
Our people help each other to receive God’s forgiveness. ________
Our people help each other to forgive other people ________
Our people help each other to ask others for forgiveness ________
Our people have dealt with our church’s history with real forgiveness. ________
We actively train people to develop a lifestyle of forgiveness. ________
We regularly hear about receiving forgiveness, forgiving others and
asking others to forgive us from the pulpit. ________
When we participate in the Lord’s Supper, we emphasize both receiving
God’s forgiveness and forgiving others because of the Cross. ________
We reach out to our community with opportunities that would help
people to learn how to forgive those who have hurt them. ________
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