A pastor must make a concerted effort to resist the “small-church syndrome” which tends to include a defeatist attitude. Small church pastors often look at larger churches and sing the “if I only had” song: “If I only had a building like that, the leaders he has, all those saints to organize, the money coming in…” and that’s only the first…
Attitude in Church Growth starts with a ‘team ministry’ approach. Having an organized outreach with a relationship approach. Starting with family, friends, coworkers and neighbors and assimilating them into the church.
Growing churches come in all types and sizes. But one of the most consistent qualities of a growing church is a commitment to evangelism. Specifically, they tend to embrace a proactive approach to outreach. The involvement of churches in evangelism tends to fall into two broad categories: passive and proactive. Passive evangelism churches seldom grow, or if they do, tend to…
Church growth has sometimes been criticized for placing an undue emphasis upon numerical over spiritual growth. While this may have been true in the past, today the term “healthy church” is commonly used with an equal emphasis upon both. So at the risk of hearing, “I can’t believe you didn’t include <insert word> in your list!” I will give you my…
I encourage every church to consider establishing a Promotions/Public Relations Department. Within this department a number of critical areas are addressed: Special Event Promotion: Your most successful evangelism tools are church guests. 100% of all new converts come from visitors that come to your church or church activity. Therefore, every church event needs to be promoted well and in a professional…
I truly wish that church growth would happen by simply praying and waiting upon God. While faith can accomplish anything (Mark 11:22-24), the clear commandment of Christ is to carry the gospel into all the world (Acts 1:8). When we do our part, God does His (Psalm 126:6). If you want your church to grow, you must first pray and then…
The other day I went to a restaurant that had great food, but the service was so terrible that it made me not want to go back. As we left, I could not help but wonder how popular the restaurant would be if they only had put as much effort into the wait staff as they did in the kitchen. But…
In past columns, I have strongly emphasized four key evangelism ministries: (1) bringing guests to church and combining that with a comprehensive visitor follow-up ministry, (2) a thriving Home Bible Study ministry, (3) training and promoting saints for personal witnessing (which includes utilizing the CCC ministry), and (4) dynamic Sunday school growth. These four have resulted in more converts in Apostolic…