Category Church

Jan 4 2010

Rediscovering Our Focus

Few stories in the Bible pull at the heart strings like the one found in Luke 15, the story of the Prodigal Son.  Every time I read it, hear it, listen to a sermon on it, or even think about it, I can put myself into all three of the main character’s shoes.  This story has power, meaning, and truth buried in so many pockets that it seems as though one is always able to pull a fresh idea out of it, or at least revamp an idea that one has heard.

As I was preparing for the sermon I preached yesterday, I could not help but go directly to this story.  You see, we’re going to have a theme for the year in 2010 here at the West University Church of Christ.  It is simply “Rediscovering Our Focus”.  Who did a better job of rediscovering their focus in the Bible than the Prodigal, Lost Son?

This young man went from rags to riches in no time, but immediately went back to rags as he squandered his wealth on wild living.  I wonder sometimes if the church isn’t in a similar predicament.  According to the Christian Chronicle, since 2003 there are 526 fewer churches and 78,436 fewer people in the pews.  Now, granted, this number does reflect one church with 5000+ members in Richland Hills being “dis-fellowshipped” by the Mac Lynn Churches of Christ book, but that only accounts for a few of the near 79,000.  Could it be that in the years when the Church of Christ was growing, we didn’t realize how great it was until it was too late?  Did churches get to a point where they stopped evangelizing and just expected people to come to be with them?  Did we waste away the good ripe years of planting seeds because we were enjoying the harvest?

I think the best part about the story of the prodigal son is found in verse 17, where it says “He came to his senses”.  At one point, he looked up from the pigs he was feeding, and had to realize that enough was enough.  Going from being the one everyone respected and wanted to be with because of his wealth and lifestyle to living with the pigs must have been hard, but that’s what happened.  He could have continued to wallow in self-pity, but he did not.  Verse 17 simply states that he came to his senses.  He realized there could be more to his life.

John Reuben, a contemporary Christian artist, sings a song entitled “Nuisance”.  The words go:

So here we are in this same old spot
Knowing something needs to happen but our mouths are locked
Tongue tied closed tight sealed shut
I tried hard but it just wouldn’t come up
It’s on the tip of my tongue it’s in the front of my mind
Yet the words were still so hard to find
Finally the reality of things to come pushed me to the edge
I jumped off the cliff into the abyss as I said

chorus
I’m not trying to be a nuisance
I just think we can do better than this
that was simply my two cents
you can take it or leave it

Let’s think about this path that we’re taking
Let’s think about this future we’re creating
Let’s think about this life that is fading
Think about it, come on think about it now
Let’s think about this time that we’re spending
Investing in monetary things that are ending
Let’s think about it and let’s think together
And let’s think about what we can do to make it better

What can we do to make things better?  I think we can again look to the prodigal son to find our answer.  After he came to his senses, he did the most logical thing any of us can do — he came up with a plan.  His plan was to simply go to his father and ask if he could work as a servant.  His only goal was to get out of the mess he was in, not to seek out his place as a son, but simply to be a servant.  Of course, we read on the chapter to discover that he was given so much more than just a job.  All of that happened because he had a plan.

If we don’t have a plan, what kind of hope to we have?  God blesses those who have a plan.  Our plan here at the West University Church of Christ is to simply rediscover our focus.  We’re going to look at all sorts of things that we need to rediscover a focus on – leadership, love, worship, emotion, giving, evangelism, grace, baptism, and family…just to name a few.  We’ll start next week with Rediscovering our Focus on Leadership, and we will begin the process of appointing new deacons.  We have to let go of the things that have entangled us in the past, and rediscover our focus.  We need to embrace our plan, and work together.  Forget petty differences, forget legalistic arguments, forget about selfish ambitions, and focus on the fact that there are lost souls in this community.

Let us all rediscover our focus in 2010.


Dec 4 2009

Sure-fire Ways to Help Your Congregation Grow (whether you’re a minister there or not!)

10.  Be involved in at least one thing/ministry outside of normal scheduled worship/class times.

9.  Talk about your congregation in a positive way to your friends, co-workers, family, and anyone else who may not be a part of the congregation

8.  Pray for the Shepherd’s, the Ministry Staff, the administrative staff, the Deacons, and anyone else who serves in a leadership position.

7.  Stop being concerned about the actual numbers who are not there, but focus more energy on loving and serving those who are there.  It will be contagious.

6.  Live the Christian life wherever you go.  You never know when someone may notice and want to talk about it.

5.  Encourage as many members as you can to participate in a Small Group (if you have them), or form a discussion/small group outside of service times where you can meet together away from the building.

4.  Don’t reject any idea the first time you hear it, unless it is truly unscriptural.

3.  Be positive, no matter what.  If someone is negative to you, return the attitude with positivity

2.  Support as many mission efforts as possible.  These can be foreign or local.  Put God’s money to work.  Don’t be the 1 talent church.

1.  Get out of the way, and let God work.

Nov 30 2009

The Death of Sunday School and Wednesday Night Class

The Barna Research Group in a 2000 study found that:

  • Only 19 percent of church members attended Sunday school in 2000. That figure is relatively unchanged since 1991.
  • Thirty-three percent of born again Christians and 60 percent of evangelicals attend Sunday school in a typical week.
  • Married individuals are more likely than single adults to attend a Sunday school class in a typical week.
  • Sunday school remains a draw primarily in the South, where nearly three out of 10 adults attend weekly.
  • Contrary to popular opinion, there is virtually no drop off in Sunday school attendance during the summer.
  • Nearly one out of 10 adults is currently involved in teaching a Sunday school class, a catechism class or other type of Christian education class.

I don’t know where the church you attend is at in their Sunday School situation, but it seems like Sunday School is getting less and less of a priority today.  People tend to show up 10-15 minutes late, and by then they’ve either missed the beginning, or the teacher has waited to start, and they don’t get a full 45 minutes to an hour.  You can’t discipline them, because its their prerogative to be there or not.

I feel like the reason most Sunday School programs may lack attendance is two-fold:

1.  Lack of options for classes

2.  Lack of commitment and dedication among members.

If you attend a church like most, you will have very few adult options for classes.  In fact, in the churches I have worked at, there has been very limited options for adult classes.  You always have your typical “Adult Auditorium” class, where more often than not, it is a textual study that is verse by verse, or is using a rather boring curriculum.  These classes are effective for those that want to attend, but those that want to attend are growing fewer and fewer.  While these classes should be some of the best, and most attended, they are not.   Sadly, most younger people, young adults, and even middle aged adults are not seeking heavy textual classes anymore, but rather are seeking classes that are fresh, topical in nature, or directly affects them and their niche in life.

Even in the last church where I worked, where there were over 350 in attendance, for adult classes there were only 3 options.  On top of that, those 3 classes were taught by the same 3 people, over and over and again.  And that’s how it typically happens.  Therefore, new styles, thoughts, or direction from different teachers were never an option.

I remember in college I had one semester where I had the same teacher for 3 different classes.  It was horrible.  Its not that I didn’t like the teacher, its just that no matter what the subject matter was, the style was exactly the same.  Many of the same illustrations found their way into the lectures.

If Sunday morning is a problem, Wednesday nights are even harder.  Its growing more and more complicated to find people who willing to teach on Wednesday evenings due to a growing demand on their schedule.  If you attend a smaller congregation, you find yourself pulling from the same pool of Sunday morning teachers, thus overwhelming them and burning them out.

Smaller churches also have a hard time finding different teachers for their children’s classes.  It grows even more complicated for finding teachers for Junior High and High School classes.  Sadly, this task falls solely on the youth minister, if there is one.  The youth minister then never has a chance to connect with people his own age in an adult class setting (which is why I’m a firm believer that a minister should only teach either Sunday Morning or Wednesday night, never both, or at least get a quarter off from teaching each year).

The second problem is you may have a lack of commitment.  We’ll discuss that later.  Your thoughts?

Nov 19 2009

Churches “Clinging to a Bad Location”

I know many churches that have been blessed with a wonderful location.  Churches that are in a good location are easy to get to, easy to see, and have an aesthetic appeal to them.  People may drive by them and think “there’s a church I’d like to visit” just because they see it in a good location.

However, some churches are in a terrible spot.  When you have to make 7 left turns and one right turn by the log that looks like a spatula right past the “holler”, you’re in a bad spot.

I think about our church right now in West University.  Theoretically, we’re in a wonderful location.  We’re literally a stone’s throw away from one of the largest churches in the world, Joel Osteen Ministries Lakewood Church.  Tens of thousands of people gather to worship there each Sunday.  However, he also meets in a former NBA arena, and it is a high profile spot.

Our church sits along a busy Bissonnet Street almost in the heart of Houston, TX.  Hundreds of cars pass by our place each and every day.  However, we are located in a spot of town that at the heart of rush hour, people avoid like the plague.  We are near the Highway 59/Interstate 610 loop interchange.  We’re also near the Galleria.  While these may be places that a lot of people are located, they are very transient areas.  These are areas that people are going away from, not an area people are coming to.

So on Wednesday nights, our 6:30 service is very low in attendance.  Its not because people don’t want to come, but after people leave work at 6, they want to be able to go home.  If they wanted to come back to service, they would have to get back out in the terrible traffic, that sometimes can add up to an hour on your commute home, and they would be right in the thick of it.  We’ve had teachers that have called and said they can’t make it due to traffic, that by the time they got here, the service would only have 15 minutes left.

But, on Sunday mornings, there is no traffic.  You can breeze in on any interstate or major highway, 288, I-45, 59, 610, 10…you name it, no traffic.  It actually takes you less time to come from a long distance on the interstate than from 5 miles away in the city, due to all the redlights.

So at times, we have a good location, and at times we don’t.

But at some point, a church has to realize that they may be in a bad location.  Sure you want to minister to everyone around, but you have to understand that if you building is located in a less than desirable area, people may not come, no matter how positive the message is.

If your church is located next to a prison area, it may scare people off.  If you church is in a high crime area, people will be reluctant to park their cars there.  If the building is hard to get to, then people won’t come.  There are many reasons why you church may be in a “bad location”.  If you’re in a bigger city, and you haven’t experienced much growth in a while, you may need to consider that you’re no longer in a fertile area.  This chapter dealt heavily on these things.

 

Nov 15 2009

Promoting Talent Over Integrity

For chapter 5 of Geoff Suratt’s book “Ten Stupid Things That Keep Churches From Growing”, we look at a chapter that I’m not completely familiar with as far as the situation is concerned.  That’s not to say that I don’t know of churches who have promoted talent over integrity, but I have not dealt with it that much.

This chapter really looked at some examples such as worship leader/band leader for a denominational church, which I don’t have too much familiarity with.  However, the best example the book refers to is the Duck Test.  This refers to the duck test in the movie “Monty Python and the Holy Grail”, when people were trying to figure out if a lady was a witch or not.  Ultimately, the conclusion was that if she weighed the same as a duck, then she was a witch.

I don’t believe churches spend enough time really hiring ministers.  When I was hired at Guntersville, it was a marathon.  While I didn’t appreciate it at the time, I look back at it and realize that it was a good thing.  They wanted to make sure I wanted it, and that they wanted me.  We interviewed there 4 different times before we were offered the job.

But for most churches, they bring the group of selected individuals in for a try out, and after all of them try out, they bring back the one candidate they like the most.  All this is, typically, is a chance for these candidates to show off, try out, and show how much talent they have.  You really can’t learn a lot about who a minister is by one or two weekends with the church.  This is typically placing talent at the top of the list.

This doesn’t always bite you in the rear end, but it can.  I’ve known churches to fire someone a year or even 6 months after they are hired, because the had the ability, or the talent, to preach and teach, but did not have the integrity behind it.

If you are in a church where a minister lacks integrity, maybe because they have had an affair or hurt the church in some way, this chapter would be a great read.  However, like I mentioned, this chapter did not deal with any real situation I’ve ever been in.

Coming up tomorrow is the chapter on “Clinging to a Bad Location”.

Nov 12 2009

Settling for Low Quality in Children’s Ministry

childrenminThis post will explore chapter 4 of Geoff Surratt’s book “10 Stupid Things that Keep Churches from Growing”.  This chapter is about Children’s Ministry.

After I finish reviewing most of the chapters in this book, I may go back and give my feelings on youth ministry.  However, this chapter deals with children’s ministry.  Its an area that most churches are finally realizing they are not putting enough effort and money into.  I know children pretty well.  In fact, I am one class away from having an Elementary Education degree.  My wife has a Child and Family Studies degree.  I may not be an expert, but I do know a little something about children.

We have a Children’s Minister at our congregation here in West University Place.  Christy works many hours a week preparing big events and service projects.  However, she is only one person.  I’m starting to realize that all ministry is much larger than any one person.  For our Children’s Ministry at West U to be successful, it can’t be only Christy.  She knows that, I know that, but sometimes parents don’t realize that.  For a program to be successful, it needs to be supported by everyone.

Another thing I’ve learned is that in ministry, no single minister is good at everything.  That’s why we equip other people to help and serve.  Areas I may not be good at, you may excel at, and I need you to help me.

 

 

Children’s Ministry is more than:

–  Sunday School
–  Wednesday night class
–  VBS
–  Parties
–  Children’s Worship or Bible hour during service
–  Gathering all the kids and singing and playing games

Children’s Ministry is an area that affects the entire congregation.  If a child is not happy, or not learning, the parent may pull that child out of the program, and go look for a place that will influence or teach their children better.  Others will follow, and before you know it, you’re left with a small group of kids, but even worse, a whole lot of your volunteers are gone.  When visitors with children come to your service, they will notice a lack of people in their children’s age range, but also in their own age group as well.  Its a snowball effect that a church can hardly ever recover from.

One problem that I have noticed recently in Children’s Ministries across the board is that they are using the wrong curriculum.  Some write their own that have no business doing so.  Others use a curriculum that doesn’t fit their church.  Some problems with that are that some curricula call for large groups for the class, acting out a skit or playing a big group game, and you’ve got Junior and  Susie, and no one else in your classroom.  This won’t work for that class.

I think we don’t give kids enough credit.  Children are smart, and are sponges.  They listen better than we think they do.  We may think that children have to be entertained, but in reality, children are extremely flexible in their learning styles.  As long as someone is prepared, children will listen.  The problem arises when a teacher shows up at the last second without preparing.  Children know when someone isn’t prepared, and they will take advantage of the situation.

If you come to kids with a plan of attack, and things to fill the entire hour of their time, they don’t have a chance to get distracted.  There is no room for error when teaching Children.  If you give them an inch they will take a mile.  Teachers being prepared is the single most important thing.

But you also need to understand that you can’t put all your eggs in one basket.  Don’t focus too much on the big events and overlook the weekly activities and classes.  Classes should be the bread and butter of any children’s ministry.  At the same time, you can’t just put all your effort into classes and expect children to stay happy.  They do need the big events such as VBS and festivals and parties, but don’t overdo it.

A strong, vibrant, and exciting children’s ministry will be an outreach tool on its own, because children will want to bring their friends with them to class, to events, to church, and anything else going on.  With their friends come parents who may not belong to a church.  Maybe  a refreshment in your children’s ministry is what you need to start your church on a path to revival.

Nov 11 2009

Providing a Second Rate Worship Service

worshiphim1Think about it — the worship service takes up a big bulk of of our Sunday morning.  If a typical morning service lasts an hour, probably 20 minutes of that will be devoted to singing, scripture and prayer time.  Ten minutes may be devoted to Communion.  20 -25 minutes will be devoted to sermon time.  5 minutes will be devoted to announcements.  This post is to discuss the thoughts of chapter 3 of the book 10 Stupid Things That Keep Churches From Growing” by Geoff Surratt.

I could very easily rant about this one for a very long time.  Worship in song and scripture and prayer has always been a very important thing to me.  I remember sitting in chapel at Friendship Christian School, when no one else would sing, I would be singing.  I was the go to worship leader for our youth group at Maple Hill.  On mission trips, if you volunteer one time to lead songs, you’re stuck with it.

At three of the four churches I have worked for now, I have been a worship minister.  I may not be the best singer in the world, but I feel like I have a talent for putting together a worship service effectively.  I started doing this when I was a child, singing and performing in front of others.  I used to think that if you had a desire, and you had a decent voice, you could lead worship.  I also used to think that if you just had a good voice, you could be a song leader.  I’ve learned that this is simply not the case.

I prefer the phrase “leading worship” or “worship leader” over “leading singing” or “song leader”.  When I put together a service, its much more than just songs.  Its scriptures and prayers and songs all combined.

For one to just randomly pick out songs and throw them into an order of worship is just not right in my opinion.  There needs to be purpose.  Verses of songs need to connect together.  Scriptures should tie in.  It should take the worshiper to a place where they can let the Spirit of God overflow out of them, and not just sing a few songs that sound nice.

Too many leaders just pick out a few songs that go with an agenda, such as make sure you pick out an invitation song that tugs at your hear, lead a song with the same key word as the sermon in the title before the sermon, and make sure the closing song is peppy.  Be sure the Communion song makes you focus on the death of Christ.

I don’t subscribe to that theory.

Worship should flow from one end to the other.  It should encapsulate the entirety of heart and mind.  We should have a purpose and direction with our worship.  If the theme of the day refers to all older and slower songs, then use those.  If the theme of the day is upbeat and talks about new ideas, maybe new songs with a fresh take on things are the prescription.

I talked about this before about trying to balance new songs and old songs in a worship service.  Ultimately, if there is no heart or dedication behind the service, none of it matters.  A worship leader can not expect the members of the church to really get into their worship when the worship leader himself has not even gone over the songs.

This topic also encompasses a right or wrong mentality of whether we can clap or not, whether we can use instruments or not, whether we can have a praise team or not, etc, etc.  I grow so weary of the church majoring in minor issues over whether these things are doable, acceptable, or sinful.  Some people act as if when you lead a new song that you may as well go ahead and sign up the whole church for failure.  If a child, or even an adult, claps during a song, there are people who will literally stop their own worship, and enter into the sin of judging.  If a person feels the need to raise their hands to God, whether all the way or just out in front of their own personal space, other people may think they are trying to show off.

When a congregation asks people not to do these things, they are guilty of telling people how to worship God, which I don’t feel is out place.  Yes God said to worship in truth, but before that he said to worship in Spirit.  We are called to make a joyful noise to the Lord.  David danced before out God in a time of worship.  Teenagers are dropping out of church after high school in record numbers, and all some churches care about is making sure they don’t clap on their way out.

So what would happen if all worshiped in spirit and truth.  What would happen to our worship if we removed the stigmas placed on songs we don’t like, people we don’t like leading the worship, time restrictions we put on the service, or even the physical acts of worship we can participate in?

haiti

Jason, with Jean Robert, teaching the men and women at the Preacher's Training Seminar in Haiti.

I’ll never forget being in Port-au-Prince, Haiti with my good friend Jason.  We were conducting a preacher’s seminar there.  Neither of us spoke the Haitian Creole, which is a blend of French, Spanish, Portuguese, English, and some African languages.  People had traveled from all over Haiti to be there. Wives sat in the back, husbands sat in the front.  The building was reminiscent of a covered shelter at a state park.  The floor was part concrete, part packed down dirt.  There were primitive pews and broken chairs crammed into this small worship space, that could not have been more than about 1800-2000 square feet.  Inside, there were about 200-250 people packed tightly.  Jason and I, getting rather claustrophobic, but also not understanding what was going on, decided to step out the front door and just listen.

The singing that night was mind-blowing.  Never had I experienced such a euphoric worship service.  There was swaying, dancing, clapping, foot stomping, hand raising, but most important – joy and emotion.  There wasn’t one person who refrained from giving themselves completely over to God in that worship service.  There came a time when everyone was to pray.  I have to admit, at first it was a bit scary.  Everyone started talking, with their eyes closed and hands raised.  We asked our translator what was going on, and found out they had asked everyone to pray to God on their own.  That experience was phenomenal.  Men and women, on their knees with tears streaming down their faces, praying out loud to God, all at the same time.  People were even coming in off the street to experience  this.

I had a moment that night as well.  I realized that I would never experience that.  Not in that way.  Its just not how we do things here.

When we have someone who just gets up and picks a few numbers out of the song book, and someone who just gets up to pray, and someone to ask God to help us remember the sacrifice of Jesus during communion, and we do this over and over and over and over again, I gotta tell you, it gets old.  And if our heart never changes or grows, and if our heart is never filled while do this, I’m afraid it gets old to God as well.

There’s a great blog entitled “Upgrading a Church of Christ Worship Service Without Buying a Guitar” that you can read.  I find it to be pretty descriptive about how things are in our brotherhood.  I hope all of you will understand that it is up the entire congregation to make the most of your worship service.

I have many many more thoughts on this, but I will stop for now.  I welcome any and all comments.

Nov 9 2009

Establishing the Wrong Role for the Pastor’s Family – Chapter 2

Continuing in our review of the book “10 Stupid Things That Keep Churches From Growing”, we look at chapter 2 – “Establishing the Wrong Role for the Pastor’s Family”.

In my career as a minister, I’ve heard it said every time during an interview, whether jokingly or not, that the church hoped to get a “Two for one” special with my wife.  Sadly, there are many churches that expect the family of a minister to have as big a role in the their ministry as the minister himself.  It is not the job of my family to preach, teach, clean up, set up, organize, follow through, establish, maintain, or anything else with the church.  Their place in ministry should be strictly voluntary, and not mandatory.

Too often times, a minister’s wife has a full time job, and then will teach a class, sing on a praise team, work in the nursery, and host a fellowship meal all on the same Sunday.  It has gotten to the point where we have set priorities in our family.  My wife will not teach on both Sundays and Wednesdays.  In fact, she has taken over the responsibility as the ministry leader for our Women’s Ministry.  While my wife loves working with children, and has a degree and experience in that field, that role is filled with a Children’s Minister at our congregation.  She has found a different way to serve.  But that was her decision.

I’ve known many ministers who have lost their families due to an unnecessary amount of stress placed on the family.  This may not be on an actual role for the family, but for the minister himself.   The role in that situation is that the Family assume the role of second place.  That could be even worse than expecting the family to do extra things for the church.

I think the role of “Minister’s Wife” or “Pastor’s Wife” could be one of the most challenging roles in the world.  We as ministers need to realize all the stress they go through.  As a worship minister, I do not get to sit with my family hardly ever on Sunday mornings during the service.  We’ve tried, but our daughter is at a point where she needs to be close to a door to be taken out at any moment.  My wife does so much on Sunday morning, but there’s little we can do to change our situation.

So, my wife selflessly gives of herself for my ministry on Sunday morning.  However, I know I’m one of the lucky ones.  My wife knew what she was getting into, and accepts that there will be times like this.  My prayer is that churches and ministers alike will understand that it is all too easy to just assume that the minister’s family is at their disposal.  God established the family before the church was ever established.  Let us never forget how important our families are in our ministry.

Nov 8 2009

10 Stupid Things That Keep Churches From Growing — Chapter 1 — Trying To Do It All

As we begin this review, we start with the first chapter entitled “Trying To Do It All”.   I think the funny thing about this chapter is the inevitable fact that all ministers in churches that are small understand exactly what this means.  Let’s just look at it from the example of the church I work for now.  My title is Associate and Worship.  However, I am in charge of Life Groups, finding teachers for our Teen group, preparing all the slides for our worship service, running and maintaining the website (www.westuchurch.com), working with our families, occasional bulletin editor, in house technical guru, class teacher, and many other things.

Our minister is the same way.  Not only is he the preaching minister, but he’s the office manager, bulletin editor, class teacher, sounding board for disgruntled members, and many more things as well.  When you work with a small church, you have this dilemma because there are much fewer workers in the church.

The author Geoff Surratt makes 4 points about “How to Give Away Your Job in 4 Simple Steps”.  His ideas are:

1.  Connect the Dots –

“Your people want to be part of a big mission.  Simply teaching a class, sweeping a floor, or printing a bulletin is not a big mission.  people will grudgingly do theses types of menial tasks until they can find a way out.  On the other hand, when they can see theses tasks connected to a bigger vision of changing their family, their community, and their world, they will arrange their lives around making sure the work is done.”

2.  Make the Big Ask –

“Don’t expect the right people to come forward on their own accord.  Often the people who step up initially are the least qualified for the task.”

3.  Show Them the Ropes –

“The biggest mistake we make as pastors in this area is that we don’t had off ministry; we abandon ship.  Once we find a willing volunteer, we hand her the teacher’s guide adn the class roster and run like heck before she changes her mind.”

4.  Quit –

“Realize that you are currently doing some tasks that you should pass on to someone else, while you are doing other tasks that nobody should be doing.  Pastors who are overwhelmed by ministry often pastor churches with too much ministry.”

I think the hardest part of this is the idea of asking, because many ministers have the attitude of “If I want it done right I’ll just have to do it myself”.  Even if we do realize that its okay to give up something, we too often do exactly what is step #3.  We rush it, and then the ministry fails completely because the person we’ve handed it over to has no clue what they’re doing, and it dies a slow death.

I like the last part of the quote in the 4th step of quitting is amazing, and hard to swallow.  “Pastors who are overwhelmed by ministry often pastor church with too much ministry.”  With churches that are smaller, we really do overwhelm ourselves with too much.  Maybe, the idea of this chapter could not just be pointed towards the leadership, but towards the whole church.

We have 150 members at our congregation.  We’re lucky to have about 40-60 for class on Sunday mornings.  Out of those, about 20 are involved with Sunday School for children.  We then have a Ladies Class, an Auditorium Class, and usually one other adult class.  For the fall quarter, we tried to add a fourth Sunday School class, and it was met with tough times.  We’re not ready for a fourth adult class, and we have realized it.  We are going back to only three in the Winter quarter.

What things are you doing at your church that you are overwhelmed by?  Quit trying to do things that only a larger church can do.  Make sure you are not overwhelming your staff, your elders, your ministers, or your members.  When we burn out on something, its hard to regain passion for it again.

Chapter 2 to come tomorrow.

Nov 7 2009

Book Review: 10 Stupid Things That Keep Churches From Growing by Geoff Surratt

To be honest, I saw this book in a catalog from Group, and thought it was a humorous title, and picked it up thinking it may be more of a comical book than serious.  While the book tends to bring a gentle sense of humor with it,  the 10 chapters of this book are spot on.

Over the next few days, I think I would like to review each particular chapter in this book, and add my thoughts to the author’s thoughts.  This book was written from the perspective of a Pastor in a multi-site congregation in Charleston, South Carolina.  What I really liked about it was that it was not just from his perspective, but at the end of each chapter he asked a different Pastor/Minister to give his thoughts about that particular point.

Pastor’s contributing include Craig Groeschel, Pastor of LifeChurch.tv, Mark Batterson of National Community Church in Washington D.C., and Perry Noble of New Spring Church in South Carolina, who you can link to on the right.  There are 7 others in the book as well, a different one for each chapter.

I’ll start the reviews of each chapter next week, but I thought I’d go ahead and give the chapter names so you could be thinking about them.  In order, they are:

1.  Trying to Do It All
2.  Establishing the Wrong Role for the Pastor’s Family
3.  Providing a Second-Rate Worship Experience
4.  Settling for Low Quality in Children’s Ministry
5.  Promoting Talent over Integrity
6.  Clinging to a Bad Location
7.  Copying Another Successful Church
8.  Favoring Discipline over Reconciliation
9.  Mixing Ministry and Business
10.  Letting Committees Steer the Ship

I’ll try to begin this review Sunday afternoon or Monday.  Till then, Roll Tide.