What is The Goal?
It's so easy to get off-target.
I recently read an old business book called “The Goal.” It’s a fictional story about a man who is the top executive at a manufacturing plant. Early in the story, his mentor asks him the question:
What is the goal? Why does your manufacturing plant exist?
Hilariously (almost), the main character can’t actually answer the question. He and his executive team are pursuing things like cost reduction, increasing efficiency, technology, automation, and inventory. They are using metrics to track how they are doing in each of these areas.1
And the whole time they pursue those metrics, the plant is losing money.
The goal of the plant, the main character discovers, needs to be making money. Without money, the plant will close (and almost does). Seems obvious? But it’s so easy to get distracted.
Got the back story? Okay, let’s pivot:
What’s The Goal?
In your life and ministry, what is The Goal? Lest we scoff at the simplicity of the question, let’s throw out some alternatives that might get us distracted.
Planning a Sunday morning service.
Giving a good sermon.
We probably know these aren’t the goal, but are we practically living and working like they are?
What about these?
Spending time with lost people. (Is that the goal?)
Sharing the gospel abundantly. (Is this the goal?)
Building your specific movement tribe. (Have you focused on that first?)
Starting a house church. (Am I messing with you yet? Is that the goal?)
What else can you come up with? If we’re honest, we can chase a lot of metrics that are not The Goal.
“Go, therefore and make disciples of all the nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit, teaching them to observe all that I commanded you;” - Matthew 28:19-202
Simply stated: The Goal is Making Disciples.
To reach that goal, we’ll need to spend time with lost people. We’ll need to share the Gospel. We may find that a house church is one of the best ways to make disciples. But none of those on their own are The Goal.
We may need to surrender our house church so we can join an existing church so we can train more broadly and make more disciples. Or we may need to leave our legacy church to start a house church where we make disciples.
We may need to sow the Gospel way more abundantly. Or we may need to invest deeply in a spiritual seeker who hasn’t yet come to faith.
I don’t know what you need to do, but if you’re like me and are easily distracted from The Goal of Making Disciples, it’s important to hit pause and make sure you haven’t made something else The Goal.
Let’s end with this quote:
When a measure becomes a target, it ceases to be a good measure.3
I read the book “The Goal” by Eliyahu Goldratt. I used claude.ai to help me remember this specific list.
NASB
This was a footnote on page 26 of the book “Reset” by Dan Heath. It has stuck with me more than most footnotes.