I am drawing a circle around an audacious prayer request about out church growth. I am reading a powerful book on prayer and I am in prayer, trusting and believing that before the first snow falls in the Triangle area of NC this year, I will stand before over a congregation that averaged over 100 people in our Worship Center for Sunday worship. Read about it here. Join me in this prayer and invite others to join you in church. God is already at work. My vision is increasing for our ministry.
Here is an article that peaked my interest:
Why
Is My Church Not Growing?
Question: My church is not growing. People come but they do not
stay. We’ve analyzed all the majors and feel we are doing what we should but
they do not stay. Any thoughts please?
Response: I receive something similar almost weekly. I wish I had
answers every time. I don’t. Most of the time I know many times they can’t
afford a consultant (or don’t think they can, but should consider the
investment), so I try to give them a few suggestions, in the limited time I
have, to think through their issues.
Here is an expanded version of my typical answer:
It’s hard to diagnose here without more information. I do
believe God wants the church to grow. We are to make disciples and part of
discipleship is make more disciples. That in and of itself is growth.
A few quick comments first:
◦God is in charge of the numbers. People can disagree
with me (and do) when I say I believe healthy churches are growing. Some grow
in different ways. Some internally and some by raising up people who go outside
the church to make disciples. Regardless of how growth occurs, all of us must
agree God is ultimately in control.
◦The Holy Spirit grows people and therefore the church.
We aren’t without responsibility in doing our part. We’ve been given an
assignment to be a body with many parts, but we don’t ultimately grow people or
churches.
◦Churches go through seasons, just as individual
believers do. There are seasons we grow more than others and seasons we are
simply maturing to grow later.
◦There are no cookie cutter answers. Just as God makes
people unique, churches are unique because they are comprised of unique people.
With those clarifications, here are a few quick thoughts
to help you discern your particular situation:
1. Do a survey of anyone who visited in the last year.
Ask them why they stayed or didn’t stay. Ask them for ideas they have to
improve a visitor’s experience. Ask them how they found the church. Be prepared
for some hard answers, but you may discover things you aren’t seeing.
2. Do a church wide/or leadership wide half day
brainstorming session, depending on the size of your church. You want enough
people to have a wide range of ideas, but not so many that you never get
anything accomplished. I’ve done this with 12 and I’ve done it with 100. That’s
getting a little large, but you don’t want to exclude people who are genuinely
concerned and want to help the church. I prefer people who have positive
dispositions, but you need a range of thought. You might even bring someone in
to facilitate this process. Many times there are answers in the room that come
from collected thinking. Ask, why aren’t people staying and what can we do?
You may need to do a second half day, perhaps with a
smaller group, to summarize and make conclusions from the feedback of the
larger group. In my experience, you will produce some key thoughts from an
exercise like this which will spur momentum, in addition to creating renewed
energy among these key leaders. (But you’ll have to act on some of the
suggestions.)
3. Pay a community member (or a professional consultant
if you can afford it) to “secret shop” your church and give you honest
feedback. You can often find someone to do this free of charge simply to help
the church, but there are professionals who know what to look for in a church
visit. Many times we can’t see what’s missing on our own.
The bottom line is that you’ll have to do something
intentional to get the answers you don’t have. There are good church
consultants out there if you want to take that step. Let me know if you want
some names and contact information. But, keep asking the questions you’re
asking. Our mission as a church hasn’t changed, but the culture around us is
changing rapidly. We must continue to grow as church leaders in order to
continue to make new disciples.
Praying for you.
How would you respond?
Posted from: Ron Edmondson: Church planter and pastor with a heart for
strategy, leadership and marketing; especially geared toward developing
churches and growing and improving the Kingdom of God.
