Is your church too small to grow? Be careful before you say yes. The
first Christian church had only 12 members, and they turned a whole city
upside down. I suggest any congregation willing to pay the price of
change can grow with these four steps.
1. Prioritize meeting people’s needs.
God does not call every congregation to become a megachurch with 7,000
members like the one my grandchildren attend. Church growth does not
come by compromising with the consumerism seducing us today, nor by
simply choosing the right formula. Growth will come by observing the
process of life and understanding that God does not predestine the
majority of churches to necessarily remain small forever. The smallest
of congregations in the smallest of communities can experience exciting
growth, for where there is life, there will be growth.
The place to begin is to prioritize growth. Establish a ratio of at
least one outreach worker for every nine workers needed for
administering current programs. John Wesley knew the value of tithing,
and people who commit their time, talents and money as Wesley did will
see both change and growth. Any congregation willing to tithe 10 per
cent of its workforce to outreach will discover they can bring in all
the new people the other 90 per cent of the volunteer workers can
assimilate into ongoing ministries.
Unfortunately, many congregations fail even to tithe their outreach.
They plan and provide maintenance support for traditional programs but
give leftovers to outreach. Since it does not affect their survival, it
never becomes a priority. Thus, these congregations accommodate
themselves to a "maintenance" ministry that is self-serving at best.
However, it is not sufficient to simply enlist a full complement of
outreach workers. The congregation that does not seek ways to discover
people’s needs and provide for them will soon find many of those
entering the front door quietly exiting by the back door. On the other
hand, people who have little interest in the gospel message initially
often become quite responsive when they find the gospel relates to the
problems they face. Rick Warren refers to the time he realized a
pressing need for "potty training" in his community of young parents
with small children. By providing that service, Saddleback Community
Church opened a previously closed door and gained entrance into the
community. This allowed the church to follow through by planning a
contemporary worship service designed to make those young families more
comfortable at church.
2. Mobilize members around self-determined goals and objectives.
Small congregations frequently focus on everybody in general and nobody
in particular. That "shotgun approach" provides inclusiveness, they
argue, thinking that aiming at a specific demographic group of
somebodies narrows the command to go "into all the world" and shows
partiality. Quite the contrary: By focusing on a specific demographic
group and its need, the smallest of churches can maximize its greatest
strength. This is especially true where the pastor is the clerical "GP"
(general practitioner) and everyone demands his services. In such a
context, the focus generally remains on congregational needs, rather
than on mobilizing the congregation to meet the needs of the unchurched.
A congregation can take a giant leap forward by simply aiming its
biggest guns at that segment of the population it can reach most
effectively. No one will be refused or neglected; however,
congregational effectiveness will be greatly enhanced by concentrating
on that area or those areas where the congregation is strongest.
If your strength is older people, for example, specialize in meeting
senior adult needs. There will always be plenty of seniors, and these
people are often the most receptive to a church’s invitation. Moreover,
they need tender loving care as they adjust to aging, and TLC is
something the small church is especially good at giving.
3. Use church-growth measurements rather than institutional barometers
to determine your success.
Buildings and budgets reflect an institutional mindset more than a
mission and ministry mindset. As such, they provide a poor substitute
for what God has most on His mind - winning the non-Christian world.
When I consider the last decade of my own ministry, with its relocation
projects, budget increases and program expansions, I see success on all
fronts. I need to ask, however: To what extent did we improve and expand
our outreach skills? To what extent did we increase the number of
harvest workers reaping in the fields Jesus described as ready (John
4:35)? How much did we reduce the ratio between outreach and maintenance
workers? Did our growth percentage keep pace with community growth? To
what extent did we decrease the ratio of nonbelievers to believers in
our community? Did we plan our strategies by what we believed God
wanted, or according to what we thought we could afford? Frankly, I
don’t see such glowing success here.
4. Recognize no franchises.
Franchising is good business for McDonalds, but it has no place in
ministry. Jesus told His disciples, "Go and make disciples of all
nations" or ethnic groups (Matthew 28:19). As long as one lost person
remains in God’s world, the Good Shepherd searches for that person,
without respect for human walls and institutional ways. Every community
with an unsaved person in it deserves a vital Christian witness.
The biblical emphasis on evangelism makes us all "evangelicals" - people
who proclaim salvation by faith in Christ’'s death on the cross. Anyone
who in some way tries to convert a nonbeliever to personal faith in
Christ, either by word or deed (or both), becomes an evangelist. One can
scarcely become a Christian without becoming an evangelist.
Churches large and small face huge harvest fields. While many of us work
on our own turf and in our own language and cultural comfort zone, the
harvest fields offer no exclusive territories. No congregation has
exclusive rights (a franchise) to a neighborhood or territory. That
does not mean we become competitors, as in business. Rather, it means we
intentionally cooperate and work in concert to saturate our area.
Being small may offer some disadvantages. The only sin in being small,
however, is "thinking small".
Reprinted from the Mennonite Brethren Herald (www.mbherald.com).
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