Five Reasons Small Churches Don’t Grow

Came across this article on a blog that I follow and thought I would share it:

Five Reasons Small Churches Don’t Grow


1. Unresolved Conflict. Conflicted churches don’t grow. It’s never “fun” to deal with conflict, but in a smaller church there seems to be so much more at stake. The loss of a family or a whole family system in a medium sized church is unpleasant. In a small church, though, that same loss may mean half or more of the worshipping participants walking out. And so, rather than dealing with conflict effectively, the leaders and the congregation as a whole will choose to ignore the conflict. Of course, this can kill the church just as dead … it just takes longer.

2. Lack of Hospitality. First-time visitors decide whether or not they’ll return to your congregation within the first 10 minutes of their visit – and some experts suggest the decision is made within the first three minutes. Either way, you will never get another chance to make a first-impression, so make sure your guests are well received. Remember that Hospitality begins in the parking lot, not once a guest finds their way into your worship center. They generally come with pretty low expectations and an even lower opinion of churches and their members, so when they show up on your doorstep you’re already starting from a deficit. Thus, if there’s no safe, sanitary, and secure nursery for their little ones they are unlikely to be back. If they have to try and keep their older children and youth “entertained” during your worship service, they won’t be back … mostly because they were totally unable to worship or even hear the message, since they were continually distracted by their kids. And if you break any of the Platinum Rules of Guest Relations – Don’t Embarrass Me, Don’t Ignore Me, Don’t Overwhelm Me, and Don’t Confuse Me – they won’t be back. For the record, everything you do … from your choice of hymns to the content of your sermon … is related to hospitality. This is the number one reason first-time guests don’t return.

3. Inward Focused. Although it’s true of non-growing churches of every size, it’s especially hard to miss when a small church is more concerned with answering the question “What about us?” rather than “How can we be the tangible touch of Jesus for our neighbors?” When maintaining status quo outweighs faithful effectiveness, church growth is impossible. Please note this is not strictly a “style of worship” issue. Inward focus generally pervades every decision a non-growing small church makes from where the pastor spends her/his time to what events get on the calendar. Offer an early evening Family-Friendly Christmas Eve Service that will attract and reach the neighborhood? “We’ve always had a 7 PM service of Scripture and Carols with candlelight every year. What about us?” Indeed, even offering an alternative (two services!) will get shot down – “You expect us here two times on Christmas Eve?!?!”

4. Leaders Don’t Support the Growth. Someday we’ll write a book titled “Classic Textbook!” In it we’ll include those practices and results that are Classic Textbook. Like this one. Here’s the scenario that’s played out over and over and over and over in the small church. A new pastor arrives … or a long-time pastor gets busy … and suddenly there’s growth. There’s new people coming and the average attendance starts to swell. Everything seems fine. The new members seem to be well accepted by the current members who seem to be happy there’s new life. Within a couple of months attendance has almost doubled! The pastor starts writing articles for Net Results, the local denominational official is calling and congratulating the pastor, and dreams of becoming a keynote speaker on the Church Circuit seems almost with grasp. Then, out of nowhere, conflict breaks out over some seemingly trivial matter. In less than three weeks the congregation is pretty well back where it began, at least attendance-wise. This is Classic Textbook. It happens well over 80 percent of the time in small churches. What’s the root cause? The leadership wasn’t really onboard with the growth. Sure, they nodded at what seemed the appropriate moments, but when SUBCONSCIOUSLY realized they could be outvoted at an upcoming board meeting, that there really were new people who might actually become a committee chair, or worse the board chair, tensions naturally surface. Note, I’ve yet to work with a church where a church leader intentionally started a fight in order to sabotage growth … but it just happens … almost every time. Unless the church leadership is really on board, sustained growth isn’t going to happen.

5. The Church has Become the Walking Dead. If history has shown us anything, it’s that nothing we build lasts forever. The reality is, churches have a life cycle. Churches are birthed, they live, and they die. As wonderful as St. Paul was, not a single church he started exists today. Sure, some churches are born, get old, but find a way to be rebirthed. But in the end, even these churches will one day be history. In reality, there are many, many small churches that have died … they’ve reached the end of their productive life cycle and at best, they are on life support. But the few, the proud, the tenacious will continue to show up because it’s what they’ve always done and to do any differently is unthinkable. These churches need one of two things. In some cases, the remaining membership can be helped to see the congregation needs to be disbanded before they deplete whatever resources are left … and to leave those resources to support a new church start. This is the most faithful legacy a church can leave. On the other hand, some congregations are so steeped in denial and grief that the legacy option seems more like suicide than faithfulness. These churches need a pastor who can serve as their hospice chaplain – someone who’s greatest gift is simply to be there and prepare the dying for death.

On the other hand, if you want to know how to grow a small church – and it’s happening all across North America – we recommend a couple of resources. First, watch the Church-Talk episode on Smaller Church Leadership … and take a look at related episodes (there are a couple years of weekly Church Transformation episodes to keep you and your teams busy). Second, if you’re really serious about growing your small church, be sure to check out the Small Church Coaching network (www.SmallChurchCoaching.com) and the resources offered there to help you and your congregation go to the next level.

He's in town

This past Sunday morning as I was praying for the service @ LifeHouse Harvest before anyone else arrived, I remember specifically asking for a "manifestation" of God's presence in the service. We definately had a great service on Sunday as the Spirit of the Lord moved in our worship time and it was as if we felt those "Angels wings" brushing up against us as we took-in the presence of God.

I have begun reading a book that has actually been sitting on my book shelf a long time and, being prompted by the Holy Spirit, I picked it up and began to scan through it. I have quit scanning through it and have begun to "read" it and I wanted to share with you today an excerpt from chapter 2. The book title is The God Chasers by Tommy Tenney. The chapter 2 title is No Bread in the "House of Bread" and there is a couple of paragraphs from this chapter that I would like to share with you:

Do we even know when He's in town? On the day Jesus made what we call His triumphant entry into Jerusalem on the back of a little donkey, His path through the city probably led him right past the entrance to the temple of Herod. I believe the reason the Pharisees were upset at the parade in John 12 is because it disturbed their religious services inside the temple.
I can hear them complaining, "What is all this going on? You're disturbing the high priest! Don't you know what we are doing? We are having a very important prayer service inside. Do you know what we're praying for? We're praying for the Messiah to come! And you have the audacity to have this noisy parade and disturb us?! Who is in charge of this unruly mob anyway?" Uh, do you see the guy on the little donkey?
They missed the hour of their visitation. He was in town and they didn't know it. The Messiah passed right by their door while they were inside praying for Him to come. They didn't recognize Him. Had Jesus come on the back of a prancing white stallion, or in a royal chariot of gold with a phalanx of soldiers ahead of Him, the Pharisees and priests would have said, "That might be Him."
God is getting ready to break out in America, even if He has to bypass her stuffy churches to break out in the barrooms! We would be wise to remember that He has bypassed the religious elite before to dine with the poor, the profane, and the prostitutes. We need His presence. We need to decide that whatever it takes and wherever it comes from, we must have Him. And He wants to come - on His terms, not ours. We can be inside praying for Him to come while He passes by outside. Worse than that, the "insiders" miss Him while the "outsiders" march with Him!

As I read this chapter I was convicted about "not knowing Him as I prayed for Him to be manifest in my life!" I believe that a lot of times we pray for Him to show up in our services but on that note we don't allow Him to show up because of "religion", "schedules", "programs", etc... We, as a body of Christ, need to learn how to recognize Him when He is in our services. We must learn to listen to the Spirit and move with Him instead of asking Him to move with us. How awesome would our services be if we started recognizing the "Bread" instead of being selfish and wanting to have our way. It is my desire to know Him when He's in town! When He passes by in our services, no matter what is on the agenda, we must be able to "let Him pass by" for our nourishment and growth as Christians!

21-day commitment

In just a few short days we will be in the last month of the year 2010. My, how this year has passed by in a hurry! In the month of December my focus, as leading LifeHouse Harvest, will be on getting ready for a commitment, individually and corporately, to fast the first 21 days of the new year. As I was browsing through the different web sites that I like to visit for direction, inspiration, and encouragement I came across an article, or a brief introduction of a call to a 21 day fast to the COGOP from General Overseer R.E. Howard. I would like to share this with you today and will be posting more about this fast in days to come.


21 DAYS OF PRAYER AND FASTING


January 1—21, 2011

“Then you will call upon Me and go and pray to Me, and I will listen to you. And you will seek Me and find Me, when you search for Me with all your heart. I will be found by you, says the LORD, and I will bring you back from your captivity;” Jeremiah 29: 12-14a

"I invite every individual and local church to join me for 21 days of prayer and fasting, as we seek God’s direction and blessing in the New Year. I believe that a strength of the church is prayer, the ministry of intercession. What can defeat a church on its knees? All over the world God has rekindled the passion and call to prayer saying, 'My house shall be called of all nations a house of Prayer!' Join me and thousands of others from around the world as we unite our heart, minds, and prayers for our families, churches, and world." -RE Howard, General Overseer

Don't give up on me

For those of you that may actually read this blog I'm very, very sorry that I have neglected to post anything in quite a while. I have no excuses for not posting anything but I could conjure up some if it would make us feel better! There has been a lot of things going on and it's taken me away from the computer which doesn't allow me time to post. I have also found that I have neglected other things in my Spiritual life due to moving, planting, etc... but I'm being reminded by the Lord that I need to change some things so that He gets the time with me that I need!! Notice how that last sentence was put - "I need to change some things so that He gets the time with me that I need." God wants to spend time with us for our nurturing, strength, etc... When we spend time with God through prayer, reading the Word, meditating on Him or whatever avenue that is used to get alone with Him, it is for receiving what we need that we can't get anywhere else!!!
"Lord, help me keep my eyes, hands, ears, thoughts, feelings, emotions, desire, etc... on you! Please don't give up on me!"

Decreasing self image

As I write this morning I'm in awe of what God is doing! I've not really found ample time to sit and post anything until today for I've found myself pretty busy for the Kingdom lately and it's almost been overwhelming in a sense. I'm realizing that the more you do for God the more the enemy is against you and you find yourself having to overcome some obstacles that are in the way both physically and spiritually. I'm reminded of Paul when he wrote the words that we need to have etched inside our brains - "i die daily". Notice that I didn't capitalize the word i. This was intentional because I'm finding more and more everyday that i am nothing without God and that i can't make it everyday without His presence leading me and guiding me through every "moment" of my life. I believe it was John that said, "i must decrease so that He can increase." I want to be found guilty today of decreasing for Christ so that His image will be revealed through me.

One point heartbreak again!

Well, another football season has come and gone for the Jr. Pro League that Blake played for. Blake was on the Sr. Owl team and had a great season with an 8-2 record. It was almost like Dejua Vu from last year with the team making it to the championship game again, only to lose by one point (21-20). All in all, there were great life lessons learned this year and Blake will always have memories of Jr. Pro and those memories last a life time. Next football season he will be a 7th grader only to start yet another "season" in his life as a middle schooler! I'm proud of you buddy!!!

LifeHouse Harvest

"To everything there is a season, A time for every purpose under heaven..." Ecclesiastes 3:1

As I write this post today, I'm in awe of what God is about to do! This past Sunday night, a group of people (32 in fact) gathered in a small one car garage at a home just down the road to come together in worship, word, prayer and fellowship. After the last car pulled in the driveway and the families made their way into the garage, that had been made into a make-shift sanctuary, we began to fellowship and laugh and catch up on some lost time. As we sat in our "ball field chairs" and "plastic chairs" and enjoyed eachother's company, we began to get our mind on why we had gathered together.

I opened up "the service" with a prayer and some thoughts on what God was about to do within the group of people that had determind to gather, worship, pray, fellowship and seek God's face. We began to sing an old song by the name of "We have come into this place" which reminds us of "why we are gathered"... to gather in His name and worship Him...to lift up holy hands to worship Him...to forget about ourselves and worship Him...to concentrate on Him and worship Him. As that song ended, the Holy Spirit was already moving and impressed others to lead us in another worship song. We began to sing, "Lord prepare me to be a sanctuary" because we are in the process of realizing that we don't have to be in a man made sanctuary to worship. There we were in a man made garage worshipping Christ! What an awesome feeling it was. As I was opening up service the Lord impressed on me and reminded me that even our "Savior" was born in a stable and so we can worship Him anywhere, afterall, we are the sanctuary!

As we continued to sing, a presence of the Holy Spirit filled the room and there were crying, rejoicing, hands lifted high, and even some old fashioned "conviction" being felt. We had a young lady make things right with the Lord in this garage that we were worshipping in! Praise the Lord!! As the Holy Spirit moved and they continued to pray I was lead to just go ahead and preach a little bit so I did! The Lord reminded us that we are going to have to give something in order to receive something. In other words, an offering that doesn't cost us anything (not monetary), profits us nothing. But, when we realize that the offering in which we are to give to the Lord and the sacrifice we are to present to Him costs us then we will receive and profit from that offering with blessings and promises! Read 1 Chronicles 21.

So as it is, I believe history was in the making as it possibly was the official first meeting of LifeHouse Harvest Church. There is a field that is ripe for the harvest and we have to make every effort to go and be Jesus to a lost and dying world. To be continued...