The Future of the Church (A Riff for Friends Suffering Far Away Places)

We know the painful truths. The church is declining. All mainline churches are losing. The ones with the highly-educated clergy. The ones organized for grand tasks on an international level. The ones that send good people great distances at great expense to grand workshops where they don't find the answers. Because the people leading them often don't even know the questions.
We're losing ground almost everywhere.
Meanwhile, this highly-educated, grandly-trained clergyman had lunch with Bob today.
Bob is 85. He is the proud owner of two new hips, installed over the last year. I buried his wife of 50+ years while I was his pastor at one of my previous stops. His son, daughter-in-law and grandchildren moved in with him a few years ago, so that when he needs a little more help, they'll be there.
He's also never been to seminary, isn't ordained, and hasn't attended any important workshops (and I dearly hope you understand that "important" is typed as sarcastically as my little fingers can manage).
What Bob knows is Jesus Christ.
That's why he declined to call the police a few years ago when, already into his 80's, as he was tending the little bit of yard that his church has, a couple of hispanic children who had moved into the neighborhood stole his lawnmover off the back of his pickup while he was using the weedeater. Oh, he made a very strong response; he just wouldn't put those kids in jail and give them a criminal record for the rest of their lives. Bob pushed, instead, to invite all of the hispanic children in the apartment complex next to the church to that summer's Vacation Bible School. And when a couple of those kids began to attend our church regularly, and later, serve as acolytes, he befriended them, asking after their families and schoolwork every Sunday. He may have been the only person in that church (outside of my household) that knew which name went with which boy.
See, Bob has never studied Current Something, Effective Whatever and that scourge of the faith and the faithful, Church Growth. He just happened somewhere on his journey through life to bump into a carpenter's son from Galilee, and his life changed. He loves as he has been loved. And it is just that simple, no matter how damned hard we sometimes try to make it.
The good news is that while Important People are figuring out Important Things to shower upon the rest of us dopes, simple everyday people like Bob are out there living the faith.
And some days, my better ones, I am pretty sure that the Bobs know more about the faith, the church and discipleship than any given barrel full of us well-trained, well-educated leaders will ever know.