The Turn-Around Church Challenge: Will you take The First Step to Turn Around Your Church?

Face it. Most congregations are declining or plateaued in attendance and membership. While some churches flourish, the attendance and participation in most churches has been diminishing for years. Some churches seem to be holding their own as they work hard to stay at the same attendance level. Many churches that are growing are doing so through transfer growth. That happens when people who are already Christians move into your church from another congregation. Transfer growth is relatively easy. It may take nothing more than having a better show than the church down the street. It’s a good thing if Christians transfer to your church because they have recently moved into the area. It’s not that great if the transfers come because they are disaffected or disappointed by the church down the street. Transfer growth, while it may feel good and look good in the statistics, does little or nothing to extend the Kingdom of God. It is far inferior to growth by evangelism. That’s when people who don’t know Christ become Christ-followers and identify with your church. Way too many churches haven’t had that kind of growth in years.

Turning a church around is very difficult. The hardest part is to get the people to want to turn around. Sometimes they know their congregation is in trouble. They see the empty pews. They realize that most of the congregation is made up of old people and that every funeral further diminishes the ranks. They are alarmed, but not alarmed enough to do the things that it would take to return their church to health. These diminishing churches die slowly. Their death is slowed because they either have a lot of money in the bank that they can slowly spend on safe things that enable them to get by, or they lure a naïve pastor to work there for nothing. They convince the pastor that he will be able to turn the church around and they will help him. Too often the congregation not only does nothing to help him, they stand in the way of the changes the pastor tries to initiate. If they make any changes, they are only small ones around the edges that only serve to extend the dying process.

The first step, the most critical step, for a church to turn around or get off a plateau is to admit their condition and seek help. They have to realize that it will probably take radical changes for the church to return to health. Long time church members have to willingly make those changes. They have to accept that the changes will probably be uncomfortable and things won’t be like they have always been. The changes will make them uncomfortable, but they need to become more uncomfortable with the fact that people are going to hell that they could be reaching. These long-time Christ followers need to become more desperate to let God use them to build His Kingdom than they are for their church to stay the way it has always been. The desire for their church to return to being a place where lives are changed and people find Christ must override the desire for “the good old days.” They need to begin to see their church and their community from God’s point of view. Finally, they need to be brokenhearted over the opportunities they have missed to reach people with the Gospel, and dedicate themselves to seeing that happens no more.

God sent His Son into the world to die for our salvation; that had to be uncomfortable. Jesus died a horrible death on the cross; that couldn’t have been comfortable. The early Christ followers suffered sever persecution, torture and death; no way that was comfortable. Yet many church people today are unwilling to sacrifice their comfort for the souls of people they can reach with Gods’ help. Church people need to resolve to become Kingdom builders. That means to choose to do whatever God asks of them to help Him build His Kingdom in their community.

It’s time to step up to the challenge to be witnesses. It’s time as the old hymn says, “be done with lesser things.” It’s time for the church to rise up. The world desperately needs our Savior and His love, hope and salvation.

Hope for the Church (Part 3) The Church Must be willing to Change Priorities to Make Disciples

This is my third post in a series that is intended to give some reasons for hope in plateaued and declining churches. Not only must the pastor be willing to pay the price (part 1), and the congregation must be willing to pay the price (part 2), but it also needs to examine its priorities and adopt ones that will enable it to accomplish the mission God gave it.

Let’s look at some priorities that congregations need to change to accomplish its mission:

1. Congregations need to quit choosing neatness over usefulness. Some churches are so afraid that children or youth, or families will make a mess in their building that they prevent many programs designed to reach the very people they say they most want to reach. These churches may be in pristine condition, but if they’re not careful, they may find that they are also empty.

2. Many declining and plateaued churches hold the convenience of members as more important that attracting the lost. One example is the church that decides it wants to attract young families by starting a contemporary service. Then it schedules the contemporary service at 8 a.m., leaving the traditional service in the 11 a.m. time slot. Anyone who ever had children knows that’s not the best time to attract either young families that have to get little ones up and dressed, or the college age/twenty-something age range.

3. Churches that aren’t attracting people who don’t know the Lord tend to forget how to be good hosts. A good host/hostess does whatever he/she can to make the guest feel comfortable. All regular attenders should see themselves as hosts and go out of their way to make guests feel accepted, comfortable, and loved from the moment they come on the church campus until they go home. Some of these things are obvious, like not taking a seat away from a visitor because “I always sit there” or long time members taking up all the parking spaces close to the building. It could also mean doing some things that take organization and work, like valet parking and coordinated greeting. There are many ways to help guests feel welcome, if you are willing.
(If you are interested in more stuff I have to say about this, take a look at four blog postings I did titled “The Winsome Church” in the spring of 2010.)

4. A congregation will not get unstuck from the plateau, or turn around from declining, if it finds its traditions to be more important than doing what needs to be done to share the Gospel in a relevant way. Many times the schedule of the church is pretty much the same year after year, and if something new is added and is successful, the church feels it has to do that event every year. Consequently, the schedule is ruled by stuff that may no longer be helpful in reaching new people. One example is the evening service. A half century ago the evening service was often the “evangelistic service.” It was well attended, people brought friends, and folks found the Lord, but, in most congregations, that ended many years ago. Consequently, church staffs spend time to prepare a worship service that few people attend. Also, Sunday evening might be a good time to have small group studies or fellowship events that could help make new disciples and/or train church members. Why do churches keep having an evening service? “Because we have always had one.” It is an example of tradition taking precedence over effectiveness.

5. This leads to a broader “must” for a congregation that hopes to return to effectively expanding God’s Kingdom by making disciples: Churches need to get their priorities right. If making disciples is the top priority for the congregation, all other priorities must fall in behind that one, and be in support of it. Here are some observable wrong priority mistakes that declining or plateaued churches often make:
a. Some choose neatness over usefulness. (ex. The church that gets a new carpet in the fellowship hall then bans eating or drinking in there)
b. Others choose the convenience of the members over attracting the lost. (as in #2 above)
c. Many congregations choose to satisfy the preferences of the members over making changes designed to communicate in a way that is relevant to people who don’t know Christ. (classic example: traditional vs contemporary music)
d. The overall mistake concerning priorities that declining and plateaued churches make is choosing to focus inward on those who are already members (and should be part of the process of making disciples), over focusing outward on attracting, converting, and assimilating new disciples.

Turning a declining church around is tough, and so is getting a plateaued congregation unstuck, but if a church is to do God’s assignment of making disciples, it must get serious about doing the difficult work. Being committed to God’s priorities is the place to start.

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Next time: Part 4 - “The Church must be willing to Choose Appropriate Methods” to hope to accomplish God’s assignment for her.

A Winning Strategy

I recently heard a teacher of church consultants who seemed to me to be saying that older, established congregations are doomed. They will cease to exist within the next fifteen to twenty years, because they are aging and becoming irrelevant to the next generation. I agree that many churches are on this track, but I don’t think their doom is a foregone conclusion. I think some of these churches can refocus and begin reaching the next generation. I know for sure that there is at least one path that can return a church to relevance, lower its average age, and help it to grow.

Children’s ministry in itself is a vital part of the church’s arsenal of weapons to win the world. Most people who choose to follow Christ do so before the age of 13 (estimated at 75%). Effort, dollars, and imagination that are invested in children guarantee future benefits for the Kingdom of God. In addition, the effects of children’s ministry can be more immediate. If a church is willing and prepared to take advantage of the opportunities that come from an effective children’s ministry, the kids’ ministry can lead them to refocus and to grow, spiritually and numerically.

Visit established churches today and you will find lot of gray hair and very few children. There are often rooms set aside for children. Many of them are furnished, some even decorated for Sunday school classes that don’t really exist. It’s eerie and sad. These churches don’t have young adult classes either. People have said things like, “Why don’t younger people come and bring their children to church. I used to make my kids sit right with me and behave, too.” The answer I give is, “If you have an excellent children’s ministry, then the kids will bring their parents.”
It’s true: If you love kids consistently and seek to do excellent children’s ministry the kids will get their folks to come. Can a church that has few or no children do this? I’ll give you a simple answer. The simple answer is; yes, it can be done. There are seven steps that a church will need to take. You may find some of these steps not so simple. To do it a church must be committed to doing whatever it takes to share the message of God’s love, hope, and salvation with the next generation.

Some steps:

1. Find some people who love kids and want to share Jesus with them. Start them praying and planning.

2. Identify someone to be the leader. This should be a person, not designated to do the ministry, but to lead a team to do the ministry.

3. Get some training. There are a lot of very good children’s ministry training opportunities available.
a.) You can spend a lot of money, send your leader, and maybe some of the other interested people to INCM’s Children’s Pastor’s Conference, the Orange Conference, D6 or a host of others.
b.) Better yet, you can find a trainer (perhaps someone who teaches at one of those big events) and have her/him come to you church to train everyone from your church who is interested for the cost of one person going to a big event.
c.) Or you could take a group to a training event in your area.
(For full disclosure, my wife, Tina, is a great children’s ministry trainer. There are others, but in my biased opinion, she’s the best.)

4. Plan some special events for kids in your community. Many times churches have special events for the kids of their members, but if you want to grow, you must put the emphasis on kids in the area. Whatever you do, do it so well that kids will want to come. For example: Vacation Bible School is not a new idea, but it can make a splash in your community if you make it excellent. To impact community kids, have it in the morning, so you don’t have to compete with Little League in the evening. Use your imagination, and make it fun. Go over the top with your decorations. If you use a VBS that comes in the box, be creative and don’t limit yourself to what’s in the box.
Other Special Events:
Christmas Craft Making Day
Trunk or Treat
Easter Egg Hunt
Sports Camp or Clinic

5. Keep careful records of everyone who comes. (Tip: offer a door prize so that you can get everyone’s information.) Get the name of the parent or guardian they live with, their address, phone number and e-mail address. Send the kids a thank you for showing up and with some information about the next special event, as well as the ongoing stuff at church. Add their parents to the regular mailing or e-mailing list. This is critical. Follow-up, follow-up, follow-up. Kids may come to several special events before they ever show up on Sunday, so be persistent. That first special event plants the seed, the follow-up waters, the next special event fertilizes, then eventually the fruit of seeing them in church will blossom.

6. Make children’s church excellent. Give the kids that come to the special event something super to participate in at church on Sunday morning. A good way to do it is encourage the kids to sit with their parents in adult worship until the message; then, dismiss them for children’s church. The workers will have them about 30 to 45 minutes, and they should make it exciting. Teaching kids at church is different than teaching them at school. At school they have to come back the next time,; at church, if they don’t like it, they don’t have to return. Make them excited about coming.

6. Develop your Sunday school so kids will want to come to see what else is going on. When you do this, make sure you are ready to start a new class for their parents. Get their class started with a subject that is important to them, i.e. parenting, marriage, or a beginning Bible study.

7. The church needs to expect young families to come and design the church to make them feel comfortable enough to not only become members, but also invite their friends. This will mean looking at the décor, the worship style, and the preaching topics. You will probably have to make changes, perhaps some major changes. Changes are not comfortable, but so what? Is the purpose of your church to make you comfortable, or to win people to Christ? Do you really want to reach the next generation, or do you just want to complain because the world is going to hell? I am much more uncomfortable about the fact that young families don’t know the love of Jesus than I am that I will have to learn to like a different kind of music, or a different church schedule, or that the building may be used a different way.

If you do these steps you will not only have an effective children’s ministry, you’ll find that your church has become more relevant to the current culture. You’ll not only win whole families to Christ, but you’ll find entrances to parts of the community that you never before imagined.

Check out Tina Houser’s web site: tinahouser.net

For a full step-by-step description of how to build or rebuild a children’s ministry, see her book "Building Children’s Ministry". (available at the website)