A few years ago, I attended a rapidly growing congregation in California. Most of the newcomers fit one of two categories. They were either returning baby-boomers or spiritual seekers. Most returnees had grown up in a mainline tradition but quit church in their teens or early twenties. They had lots of emotional and spiritual baggage regarding the Bible, theology, and Christian tradition. Many of the seekers, often GenXers, had rarely been inside a church. One of those newcomers, a young man in graduate school, excitedly told my husband of hearing the Bible read from the pulpit for the first time: "But I don't know the stories the readings are part of." My husband quickly ran off to the local bookstore and got him a copy of Walter Wangerin's The Book of God to fill in the story gaps.

Those of us in congregational leadership quickly realized that we had a set of problems. How to honor the life experience and practical wisdom of the returnees while helping them to theological maturity? And how, at the same time, to introduce unchurched people to the fullness of life in God, the Hebrew and Christian scriptures, and the traditions of Christian community?

Our problem was not evangelism. People were coming to the church. Our problem was adult education.