SMALL GROUP DISCIPLESHIP #6: What should small group software do for you?

Hi all,
Just a reminder that this blog is about what I am learning right now.  So we are continuing this series on small groups, based on things which I have learned and am still learning.  Many churches have a dream of "being a church of small groups",  but they often fail to make this happen.  What goes wrong?

We've looked at a lot of different elements necessary for a successful small group ministry in your church.  To be successful, you need to understand the power of Christian community so much that you are committed to it as a church.  You need to apply the four core parts of small group life.  You need to follow the Old Testament principles for long-term group care.  You need to make some functional infrastructure changes in the way you do small groups in your church.  And last week's blog was really important; you must have coaches, and appropriate spans of care, and - most importantly - constant care and attention, like a gardener.

This last point is really important.  When you are running a decentralized ministry like small groups, you must have somebody (or some bodies) who are responsible to simply oversee the whole process.  If everybody is so busy leading their own small groups that they cannot look after the small group system, then the entire structure is likely to fall apart.  Now in most cases it won't collapse instantly;  it will simply begin to fray at the edges, and then people will start to drop out of groups, and then leaders will drop out and not be replaced, until the entire system has fallen apart, and you no longer function as a "church of small groups"; you are simply a church with a few disparate small groups scattered helter skelter throughout the body.  That is not what you want to have happen.

The way to prevent this from happening is through constant care and attention.  As I've said, somebody must be responsible for the care and oversight of all the small groups and leaders.  And once you have that person, you need to equip them with the tools to help them succeed.  Now the tools for success will begin with good training curriculum, regular group meetings, and some sort of small group tracking software.

It is the small group tracking software which I want to focus upon.  Here's why:  when I was serving as Pastor of Disciple Making at Wheaton EFC in Wheaton, IL, I was responsible for building up the small group ministry.  It was a church of 1,000 people with a very strong Adult Bible Fellowship system in place.  They had a handful of small groups but wanted to have more.  So we started working at it, and eventually had 25 groups before responsibilities took me elsewhere.  So these were 25 small groups in addition to the dozen or so ABF's, all of which I was responsible for.  It didn't take too long to begin to lose track of which people were in which groups.  Or which groups were still meeting consistently.  Or who was the current leader of one of the ABF's this week.  Oh, we could muddle along, but that didn't feel like excellence to me.  I thought it would be important as a caring shepherd to know what was going on.

Here's a verse that relates to this:  Be sure you know the condition of your flocks, give careful attention to your herds.  (Proverbs 27:23).

A good small group software tool at that point would have been very helpful.  Now, no group software can replace good leadership oversight; but it can make the job easier.

So what should small group software do for you?


It should ease the burden of oversight in the following ways:
Small group software should:

1 - Give you a quick overview of EVERY PERSON WHO IS LEADING a group in your church

It all rises and falls on leadership.  Your leaders are the shepherds of your sheep.

2 - Give you the names of EVERYONE in a small group in your church

This is important, but it is also kind of a preparation and set-up for the next point.

3 - Give you the names of everyone NOT IN A SMALL GROUP in your church

If you are not constantly being reminded of who is not yet in a small group, your people will fall through the cracks.  This is where the health and growth of your church is determined.  You need to help the people who are not in a group to find a group.

4 - Easily communicate with all of your small group leaders at once

Communication is important, but it can be time-consuming.  A good small group software should let you contact your leaders directly from the software.  

5 - Easily communicate with an entire small group

If you distribute your group software to the group leaders, then they can just contact their group as they are updating the group contact information, or filling out the monthly report for the small group coach.

6 - Track a history of each person's small group involvement

We quickly forget what someone is capable of, or what they have learned, or achieved, unless we have an easy way to remember.  Good small group software will show you a history of which groups your various members have been a part of.  This also assists your efforts to link people relationally or to provide pastoral care.  If you know what other groups they have been in, you will know who they know and can continue fostering those relational connections in times of need.

7 - Easily move people from group to group en masse

Rather than having to go to each person's record individually, and marking them as in a new group, small group software should be able to do this in one action.  If the entire class completed a course and then all moved on to another one, you should be able to easily "promote" everybody into the next class with one click.

8 - Track whether or not prerequisites have been completed before assigning someone to the next class in a course

If your church uses a small group system which requires completion of certain prerequisites (101 before 201, for example), then your software should prevent people from registering from one class if they have not completed the previous class.

I've been thinking a lot lately about small group software, and what it should be able to do.  There have been some churches helping me to work this out, and we have now nearly completed the work on Shepherd Care Group Discipleship Software.   We'll let you know when we get it done.

What about you?  If you lead or manage small groups, I would love to hear from you about what you need or want in small group software.   Send me a reply if you can.

Thanks and God's best to you and your ministry,

Dr. Bill
HighPowerResources.com
SermonBase.com

SMALL GROUP DISCIPLESHIP #5: Critical elements for small group success

Hi All,
Many churches have a dream of "being a church of small groups",  but they often fail to make this happen.  What goes wrong?

Keeping a small group ministry running well is a full-time job.  What makes a small group ministry distinct from other church ministries is that it is decentralized.  You could run a youth group, or a children's ministry, or a men's ministry, and basically have everyone together in the same room for teaching or worship.  But a small group ministry, by its very nature, is going to be spread out all around your city or county as people meet together in their living rooms.  The role of a small group director does not involve the same skill set as that of some other program director.  S/he needs to be much more of a nurturer, or gardener, rather than a rancher.  It involves carefully inspecting each small plant or bush, and seeing how it is progressing or growing.  The work which needs to be done is best accomplished with a small gardener's implement; not a backhoe.

So a good small group director needs to be constantly in contact with his or her various leaders.  Now, depending on the size of the church and ministry this may mean that the Director has contact with each small group, or what is more likely, the Director has contact with Coaches, who then oversee and help each specific small group.  But the point is, that since small group ministry is a decentralized ministry, you need to make accommodations for an appropriate span of care.

What do we mean when we refer to a small group coach?  A small group coach has a responsibility to oversee from three to six specific small group leaders.  The Coach needs to be there to help with problems, come up with creative ideas for outreach or service, help with 'strays', and to provide accountability.  A small group coach does not lead a small group.  His or her job is to shepherd the small group leaders within his/her span of care.  If the span of care is too large, then the Leaders aren't cared for properly.  If it is too small, the Coach may try to squeeze in another ministry focus, and then the small group focus will suffer.

If you want to know how to train the small group coaches, a good place to start would be my four-part series on coaching from earlier in the year.

So the key idea is this: if you want to have a successful small group ministry in your church, then your small group leaders will require constant attention.  This means that either you hire a staff person to oversee your small groups, or you assign a high capacity volunteer, who is not involved in any other ministries in the church, to oversee your small groups.  

And of course, the senior pastor must be involved in some significant way.  This would mean at least two things:  First,  the senior pastor is in a small group.  Second, the senior pastor must, in some small but important way, be a part of the small group leadership meetings.  It could be just a greeting, a devotional, or a teaching, but the shepherd needs to keep a close eye, and have a good relationship with the under-shepherds who are helping to care for the flock.

Next to the role of quality Biblical preaching, the health of the small groups within your church, is a deciding factor on the health of your church.  And the health of your small groups is impacted by the spiritual health of your small group leaders.  So, how are you caring for them, recruiting them, training them, and coaching them to succeed?

So, some of the critical elements for success in your small group system are:

• Decentralized Ministry Skills
• Appropriate Span of Care
• Coaches
• Constant Attention
• Senior Pastor Involvement

In summary, this is a lot of work!  But it is important work to the heath - and growth - of your congregation.  So see that it is done well.

And please, please, don't deceive yourself into thinking that things are going 'just fine' and people will talk to you if there are any problems.  Things may not be going fine, but you wouldn't know, if you don't have a good care system in place.  And people will eventually talk to you about problems, but usually not until it is too late.  That is what good small group coaches should be helping you with.  They should catch a hint of trouble early so that you can deal with it before it gets out of hand.

When your church gets to a certain size, then some good tracking software would help the task as well.  The small group director needs some tools to help oversee the flocks well.

So, I've just touched on a few of the key elements for small group success.
What else have you found is critical for success?  Send me a note.

In the mean time, God's best to your small group ministry,

Dr. Bill

SMALL GROUP DISCIPLESHIP #3: The Old Testament Pastoral Care Plan (Exodus 18)

Hi All,
This story in Exodus 18 known as "The Jethro Plan" has always fascinated me in terms of its potential for successful small group ministry.  God has revealed the plan for providing care for all the people, without burning out the pastor, and yet it seems that many churches have a difficult time putting this plan into reality.

It is a key method, not only for protecting leaders from burnout, but for applying to your church's small group ministry and care plan.

Now, here is how NOT to do it.  Many people, in reading this plan, simply decide that "what we will do is to simply divided the congregation into six or eight or ten groups (depending upon how many leaders we have in our key oversight board), and everybody will be responsible for a set number of people to call and check up on."  Has that EVER worked for anyone?  I've never seen it work.  Why?  Because it is not ORGANIC.  It is not natural; it is not in harmony with the natural human need to connect with others through a true and living relationship.  It often turns into a perfunctory phone call from one relative stranger to another relative stranger to talk about how things are going.  How successful do you think that will be?

What people often forget when they read Exodus 18 and then try to apply it to their church by this kind of artificial division is that all throughout the pentateuch, as the children of Israel were wandering around and trying to live their lives, is that they did everything in the context of family relationships.  The people were grouped by tribes, and the tribes represented actual bloodlines of relational connection to each other.

Now we obviously can't do that in the local church, but we can follow other relational connections.  For example, there is no natural relational connection between everybody whose name starts with A through D, for one elder, and E through L for another elder.  But you can begin to get some hope of relational connection if you organize the oversight of your people through your small group relationships.  At least there, we know that the people feel a connection for each other.

So organize your small group system this way.  That is, not only does each small group shepherd care for their own group, but you have some other overseers, or coaches, who care for the small group shepherds.  Who cares for your small group leaders?  What kind of span of care do you have?  That is, how many small group leaders is each one of your coaches/overseers responsible for?  Span of care is a huge issue if you want to successfully oversee your small group ministry.  When Carl George wrote his books on small groups years ago, he recommended a span of care of 5 groups per oversight shepherd.  However, Bob Logan, in the context of his coaching ministry recommends a span of care no greater than three, and often two.

Here's why:  if you want to have a successful small group ministry, which helps your leaders to overcome their problems, provide care for their people, teach, visit, outreach, etc.  then you must implement a leadership coaching plan.  That is, you must have trained coaches whose sole job is to come alongside two or three small group leaders and coach them to success.  And these coaches have to make this their primary ministry in the church.  If they try to squeeze it in with everything else they are doing it will not work.  The reason is that it takes a lot of effort to do it well.

So, the span of care needs to be small enough to work, and these overseer/coaches must be trained on how to be a good coaches so that they help the small group leaders to be stronger and better group leaders.  What you don't want to have is a case of reverse delegation going on, such that the overseer/coaches think that their job is to solve the small group leaders problems.  It's not.

So, put this all together and what do you have to provide a good pastoral care plan for your church, using the Jethro Plan of Exodus 18?

• 1st - you must have organic relationships between leaders and people.  

That is, no arbitrary lines can be drawn (at least with an American church); there must be actual relationships.

• 2nd - you must implement overseer/coaches for your small group leaders

• 3rd - you must have a small span of care of about two or three leaders per coach

• 4th - the overseer/coaches must be trained in proper coaching techniques

In my experience, I believe that these are the four principles of implementing an effective Jethro Plan in your church's small group system.

If you want to see a Bible study on small group principles from the Scripture, I have a free "Small Groups in the Bible" study in the Coaching section of HighPowerResources.  Just go to the Coaching section, and find the category on the right entitled, "Small Groups".  You will see several free resources there to help you with your small groups, including an SG Covenant, and a guide for communion in your small groups, as well as said Bible Study.

What do you think?  Is there anything that we can learn from the Jethro Plan for our churches?

By the way, our Shepherd Care Discipleship Group Software is going to be released soon, to help with this oversight process.

God's best to you and your ministry,

Dr. Bill

SMALL GROUP DISCIPLESHIP #2: How Necessary are Small Groups?

Was C.Peter Wagner right or wrong?
I had the privilege of receiving most of my doctoral courses from Dr. Wagner, and I, like many others, have read and consumed his many volumes on church growth.  One very influential book which he wrote was entitled, Your Church Can Grow.  It was originally written in the '70's and then revised in the '80's, and republished in 2001.  It is a GREAT book.  It covers the seven vital signs of church growth.  It has wonderful church growth principles in it.  It was in that book, and probably some of his others in which he talked about the need for a C-C-C church structure.

This is a reference to the three key structures necessary for a healthy church:

• C - Celebration

This is your typical Sunday or weekend worship services where everybody gathers together to worship.

• C - Congregation

This is your mid-sized group; typically a Sunday School class or Adult Bible Fellowship.  Please note that even though he uses the word  "congregation" he is not talking about the church worship service, but a gathering of part of the church.

• C - Cell

This is the small group.

Wagner's contention is that you need all three of these to have a healthy and strong church.  And he is, no doubt, right as usual, for most churches.  (Although I have read some who contend that it is very difficult to find a church which does all three of these well.  For example, when I was serving a major suburban church in Wheaton, IL, they had a very solid ABF ministry.  It was completely a part of their church culture, so much that anytime you met someone new, the second question after asking their name, was "Which ABF are you in?"  But they had a rather weak small group ministry, for a church of 1,000 people.  Even a strong effort to start small groups was met with limited success.  And the reason was that most people's social needs were met through their ABF's, which functioned as mini-congregation's within the church.  Why did they need a small group?  They had their worship, Bible teaching, fellowship, and outreach needs  (all four elements of true Christian community from last week's blog)

But my question about him being right or wrong, is specifically this:  Is that middle C (the 'congregation') absolutely necessary for church growth?  A lot of churches have pretty much focused just on the main worship service and small groups, and have done just fine.  Many of them pursue the 'two-winged' model of church, where Celebration is one wing, and Cell is the other.  And their church is able to fly quite well, thank you.  

So, is there any guidance from Scripture on this?
Well, here is one verse that makes me think:

Day after day, in the temple courts and from house to house, they never stopped teaching and proclaiming the good news that Jesus is the Christ.  (Acts 5:42)

This is a great verse that highlights the balance experienced by the early church between large group life ("in the temple courts"), and small group life ("from house to house").  This clearly points to the Celebration & Cell concept, but doesn't do much for supporting the need for the mid-sized Congregation group life.

Small groups are clearly a powerful tool for people to experience Christian community, as I mentioned in last week's blog, and they are a critical element in church structure.  So is the middle-C, that is, the mid-size Congregation even needed?

But perhaps there are many churches out there who do just fine without small groups?  I'd like to hear about churches that are able to fulfill their mission without small groups.  Maybe they only need the Big C, and the Middle C?  What has worked for you?  

We will continue talking and thinking together about small groups next week as we look at the Old Testament plan for pastoral care.

Until then,
for Christ and His Kingdom,

Dr. Bill

SMALL GROUP DISCIPLESHIP #1: The Power of Christian Community (Acts 2:42-47)

The Power of Christian Community (Acts 2:42-47)

I have a suspicion that most Christians have never experienced the power of Christian community.  And this is a big problem if you are trying to create a robust small group ministry in your church.  If most people have never experienced deep Christian community, they are not likely to easily jump into the small groups that you are offering.

What percentage of people in a typical church participate in small groups?

I went to the HighPowerResources.com Church Growth Factoids page, entered "small groups" in the search field and found this:  In 1992, Leith Anderson of Wooddale Church in MN said the following:

"Small groups are not for everyone. Even those churches that heavily promote them often do not exceed 50% of their overall constituency who regularly participate in small groups."  (A Church for the 21st Century)

But I recently finished the book "Sticky Church" by Larry Osborne (see my blog post on "Sticky Church vs. Simple Church").  And in that book he speaks quite a bit about how many adults are involved in his small group ministry (partly because they apply Simple Church concepts).  Here's what he says, 

"Without cutting the competition so severely, there is no way we could have reached an 80 percent participation rate in our small group program. And without keeping things trimmed back, we wouldn't have been able to sustain it, either"  (Sticky Church).

So we have two viewpoints here.  One pastor says 50% small group involvement is tops and another says that they have reached 80% small group involvement.  I would guess that Anderson's comments about 50% is probably closer to the average success experienced by most churches, and Osborne's numbers at 80% are an exception that proves what you can do if you stay focused on it for decades as he has in his church.  But please remember that these are the best rates experienced by these churches.  What this means is that for most churches, a very large percentage of their adults, probably more than 50% have not been in small groups.

But what is it that we want them to be experiencing when they get into a small group?  Christian community.  That ideal, as I see it, is best expressed in Acts 2:42-47:

2:42   They devoted themselves to the apostles’ teaching and to the fellowship, to the breaking of bread and to prayer.  43 Everyone was filled with awe, and many wonders and miraculous signs were done by the apostles.  44 All the believers were together and had everything in common.  45 Selling their possessions and goods, they gave to anyone as he had need.  46 Every day they continued to meet together in the temple courts. They broke bread in their homes and ate together with glad and sincere hearts,  47 praising God and enjoying the favor of all the people. And the Lord added to their number daily those who were being saved.   (Acts 2:42-47)

And as you know, most people see four key elements of Christian community here:
1.  Biblical study  ("devoted to the apostles' teaching)
2.  Fellowship
3.  Worship & Prayer
4.  Outreach ("And the Lord added to their number")

This is the church in microcosm.  I really believe that if we can get most people together into their living rooms to really BE the church together, they will be hooked; they will choose to stay together in Christian community because it is so fulfilling to their souls.

In my personal experience of being in small groups, I have felt more love, affection, both given and received, when in the company of a small band of brothers and sisters who take the time to get to know each other, and share honestly about what God is doing in our lives, than in most other contexts of church life.

I believe that if the pastor believes in the power of small groups, because s/he has personally experienced it, then much of the Body will follow.  Of course, as Osborne has indicated, you as the pastor also need to be making some good programming choices for your church to make it easy for them to get into a small group.

Q:  What do you think?  Do you agree or disagree that most Christians have not experienced the power of Christian community?  How about pastors?

For the Kingdom of Heaven,

Dr. Bill

Book Review: "How the Mighty Fall"

Hi All,

I really like Jim Collin's books; they are very readable with a lot of great business anecdotes and real-world applications - for those in business. But, the question I always ask, as I'm sure you do too, when reading a great business book like this, is how does it relate to the local church?

The full name of Jim Collin's book is "How the Mighty Fall and Why Some Companies Never Give In". The bulk of his book summarizes "The Five Stages of Decline", which are:
Stage 1: Hubris Born of Success
Stage 2: Undisciplined Pursuit of Moore
Stage 3: Denial of Risk and Peril
Stage 4: Grasping for Salvation
Stage 5: Capitulation to Irrelevance or Death

The first question I want to ask is whether or not it is even possible for a book squarely aimed at business leaders, and filled with business stories and illustrations could have ANY application for the local church. To this, I have to say that 'yes, the principles apply for one primary reason: both businesses and churches are filled with human beings! Human nature being such as it is, people are people wherever you are.'

Now, as Christians, we believe in the power of the Holy Spirit to help people to overcome the less positive sides of their personalities, and to overcome temptations. But this book is specifically about people who, because of great success are more prone to the temptations of pride or hubris born of success, or to a greed for more, whether money, power, or fame. It has to be admitted as we look at the history of the Christian church in recent history, that it is just as possible for Christian church leaders to be overcome by pride or greed. Although the Holy Spirit is there to provide guidance and wisdom and humility, we see that not all church leaders avail themselves of His help and support.

That is why, then, I believe that there are some lessons which can be learned for us in the church from this book. So let's look at each:

Stage 1: Hubris born of success
We only need to read a few editions of Christianity Today, or USA Today, to find stories of churches which are incredibly successful, and whose leaders begin to display a taste for the trappings of success. It could be boards which give them an unprecedented raise in salary; it could be leaders who buy mansions for themselves; or begin wearing tons of bling as a conspicuous statement of success. Or in less visible displays of hubris, it could simply be the pastor of a large and fast-growing church who is walking with a little more swagger than appropriate for a Christian leader, and is a little too quick to tell you the attendance numbers of his church.

It happens. And when it does, we don't even need Collins to remind us of the consequences. For three thousand years the Holy Scriptures in Proverbs have reminded us that pride comes before a fall. (A man’s pride brings him low, but a man of lowly spirit gains honor. Proverbs 29:23)

Stage 2: Undisciplined Pursuit of More
I've seen churches get into this when their success causes them to begin to focus on other things other than making disciples. We are here to fulfill the Great Commission of Matthew 28:19-20 and make disciples. Many churches in their youthful stage focus on the main thing, but then once they become successful, they start putting on conferences, hosting seminars, and basically telling THEIR story to other churches, instead of telling HIS story to the lost.

I'm not trying to be judgmental here; just making some observations which are hard to avoid. The vast majority of churches are faithfully serving Jesus and the exceptions which make the headlines are a really small percentage.

Stage 3: Denial of Risk and Peril
I don't have as much experience with this one in the church world, but knowing something about human nature, I can see that there are things to learn and remember and apply to our churches from this section as well. This one could be evidenced in cases where the church begins to plateau, and maybe even decline, but the leaders are not concerned. The may believe it is only temporary, or they believe that it is unspiritual to be concerned about numbers. But if somebody doesn't get concerned, the trend is only likely to continue to go downward. It is the role of pastoral leaders to assess reality and not deny it.

Stage 4: Grasping for Salvation
Hey the church is all about helping people to find salvation, but I don't think that is what Collins has in mind here. What Collins is referring to is when the organization begins to decline and everyone knows it; it can no longer be denied. So the organization starts taking drastic action to try to address it, sometimes veering way off course from the central mission in an attempt not to die.

I've seen churches that do this in various ways. At one point, I was providing some guidance to a couple of churches that were considering a church merger. And the reason they were thinking about merger was the same as the number one reason why most churches consider the same - because they had small attendance each, and they felt that by combining they could get big, and do big things. Wisely, this merger did not happen. And the reason I say that is that you don't get big to do big things; you do big things for Jesus, and then sometimes, as a result, you get big.

Stage 5: Capitulation to Irrelevance or Death
Businesses do this every day, and so do, unfortunately, churches. I have a factoid in the Church Growth Factoids section that says this: "Almost three times as many churches in America are closing (3,750) as are opening (1,300) each year." [LOST IN AMERICA, Tom Clegg & Warren Bird, p. 30].

It happens, but what Collins is saying in the final chapter of his book "Well-founded Hope" is that it doesn't have to. He makes the statement, "If you've fallen into decline, get back to solid management disciplines - now!" [Jim Collins, How the Mighty Fall, p. 119]. This could be easily applied to churches. If you are experiencing decline, you need to get back to solid discipleship principles. Assess the needs of your people and start meeting them, both spiritually and otherwise.

Jesus has called us to "make disciples" (Mt. 28:19). That is the number one calling of every church. Jesus has set the mission, and we need to make certain as churches, whether we are experiencing success or decline, that we focus on this goal. Jesus has called us to win people to faith and then to teach them to follow Him. It's really a pretty simple idea, but the execution of it gets extremely tricky for churches; no doubt about that.

What I learned in reading this book is to focus on, "the main and the plain"; do what Jesus called us to do: Make Disciples.

I know it is not easy, but I wish for God's best for you in doing exactly that.

For Christ and His Kingdom,

Dr. Bill

How to decide if your church needs a coaching ministry

Hi All,

How would you know if your church needs a coaching ministry?
Just try this test; has this ever happened to you?

Someone approaches you about a new ministry idea, and you think it sounds great. So you encourage them to get started. They find a couple of other team members, start making their plans with great excitement and zeal. They meet for a few weeks and then with great fanfare announce the start of their new ministry to the church and community at large. Their first meeting goes pretty well; not quite as great as they hoped, but OK. So they continue with the ministry and you check in with them every now and then, assuring them of your prayers. As the weeks go on, the ministry continues, but it seems from your perspective as an outsider, that some of the enthusiasm is beginning to fade a bit. Then you hear that one of the key leaders has a scheduling conflict, and cannot continue with the ministry. The ministry continues on for a while longer, but they don't seem to be having the attendance they once did. And then eventually, you hear that they are going to discontinue the ministry, because they have too many scheduling conflicts and not enough attendance. And this happens again and again with various ministries and groups in your church.

And if this experience is yours, then that is exactly why your church needs a coaching ministry!

Consider this scenario again if you had a coaching ministry:

Someone approaches you about a new ministry idea, and you think it sounds great. So you encourage them to get started. But this time, instead of just sending them on their way with a prayer and a blessing, you assign to them a Ministry Coach. Because your church has a coaching ministry, you are able to supply coaches for any new small groups, or ministry teams, that want to get started. The Ministry Coach meets with this leader, and asks some basic planning questions that helps them to lay a good foundation. What's more, the Ministry Coach continues to meet with them during the planning questions, and helps to provide loving accountability, so that they follow through on all of their plans before launch. They meet for a few weeks and then with great fanfare announce the start of their new ministry to the church and community at large. Their first meeting goes pretty well; not quite as great as they hoped, but OK. So the Ministry Coach helps them to examine their first meeting, and what went well, and why, in particular, some parts did not go as well as they had hoped. By asking powerful questions, the coach helps them to see their ministry in a new light, as it might really be to someone who attends that ministry. And the Ministry Coach not only asks powerful questions, but doesn't solve their problems for them. By forcing the ministry team leaders to find their own solutions to the various problems they face, the Ministry Coach helps them to 'own' their own ministry; to take responsibility for fixing things and making them better.

As the weeks go on, it seems from your perspective as an outsider that the enthusiasm is actually growing. The leaders are excited and actually seem to be getting a deeper sense of satisfaction from their ministry. Yes, they encountered problems, but with each one their Ministry Coach helps them to find the cause of the problem, and brainstorm possible solutions, and set deadlines for accomplishing those solutions. The ministry goes from strength to strength, and you as a pastor couldn't be happier.

So, because you have a functioning coaching ministry in your church, your small groups and ministry teams are achieving success and people are growing spiritually, and your church is growing.

So, how do you decide if your church needs a coaching ministry?
If your experience is more like the first story, than the second, then you need a coaching ministry in your church.

That's all for now. We'll talk about coaching some more in my next few posts.

Yours for the kingdom of heaven,

Dr. Bill

Sticky Church & Simple Church

HI All,

If you've read this blog for a while, you know that I am a fan of the Simple Church concept. The book Simple Church has really changed the way we do things around at my church. Although we read the book three years ago, we are still applying its principles today. They seem to get truer the older we get as a church.

Well, I have recently finished another great book, called Sticky Church by Larry Osborne. The focus of this book is on the power of sermon-based small groups to make your church "sticky"; that is, the sort of church that people don't easily leave. Larry Osborne has been the pastor of North Coast Church for years, and his wisdom and experience as a pastor comes through many pages of this great book. It is filled with good insights about how church works and doesn't work. It is not faddish. It is based on years of personal experience. He shares in this book how his church implements sermon-based small groups and how such a focus has helped to provide both spiritual growth and assimilation 'stickiness'.

He makes an interesting observation in chapter 12, "Overcoming the Time Crunch". Here's what he says:

"As I travel across the nation, speaking to leaders from various denominational, theological, and socioeconomic backgrounds, I've found they all say the same thing. As a rule of thumb, most people will participate in only two time slots a week. No matter what the third meeting is for or when it takes place; it's hard to get anyone to show up."

(p. 92, Sticky Church)

This, of course, ties in perfectly with the insights of Thom Rainer and Eric Geiger in Simple Church.

I am learning again and again the importance of stream-lining the church calendar so that we as a church can focus on that which is most important. And for us that means weekend worship and one spiritual growth opportunity mid-week. For us that may be a small group or a short-term discipleship course. But if we add too many other events, we distract our people from what they most need for spiritual growth and events.

The question I would ask you, as I ask myself now, is 'Does this plan (for some ministry event) fit with our 'two-slot paradigm'?

If there are only two slots in most - not all - people's lives, what do you want those two slots to be? You need to make a determination of this as the pastor of the church. What is important for the spiritual health of your people? As I ask myself that question, there is not a lot that I feel is worthy of pushing out their need to fellowship and pray each week with some close Christian friends as they support one another in a small group, in the hopes of living a successful Christian life. What is more important than that?

For most churches, if they are forced to choose -- and the pace of life in most communities IS forcing you to choose -- they would pick as number one, the weekend worship, and as number two, some form of small group community for spiritual life and growth.

We all need to keep this reality in mind as we make the programming choices for our busy, busy, busy church calendars.

Yours for the Kingdom of Heaven,

Dr. Bill

Pastor's and Technology

Hi All,

I've got a special word and thoughts for the pastors reading this post. This blog is all about what I am learning related to church growth & church health, and related topics. One issue that is tangentially related to this is the issue of technology in churches and in ministry. Now by 'technology' I am not referring to all the gadgets that are being used, or could be used, for ministry enhancement, such as the accessibility provided by cell phones, or the usefulness of video projectors for class teaching purposes. No, the area I am talking about is the issue of software for ministry.

Many pastors could have their ministry enhanced and strengthened by using software tailored to their needs.

We are moving from the era of the massive software suites to the niche software targeted to specific needs. Software suites like Microsoft Office are gigantic pieces of code designed to meet the needs of everybody. And if you must meet the needs of nearly everybody, that means that it will not perfectly meet the needs of anybody. For example, look at the area of word processors. Microsoft has created Word and filled with it with tons of features so that should anybody out there possibly look for that one particular feature it will be there. But the era of the massive software suite bloated with tons of little-used features is fading away. We are now moving to more customized or niche type of software options. Instead of just a generic word processor, for example, now there are specific word processors plus, such as some designed for screen writers, which combine elements of word processing and data processing into one piece of software. Or there is the highly specialized word processing required for writing doctoral dissertations. These are examples of customized niche software for sub-groups who are looking for something more specific than just a 'word processor'. And now we have that same type of niche specialization for pastors in a piece of software called "SermonBase Message Planning software". It is a word processor plus a database combined together so that a pastor can both create a sermon using the typical word processing features for text creation and highlighting, but it also contains a database so that a pastor can archive and search for sermons based on multiple criteria including Scripture, Topic, Title, Date, or several other options. SermonBase is just one example of the way that pastor's can do a better job at ministry by accessing and using software specifically designed for what they do. Why continue to use a generic word processor which is designed for nobody in particular, when you could have something specifically designed to help you do a better job at the one activity you spend more time on than any other in a typical week: sermon preparation. Something as important as the Word of God deserves a better tool for preparing to deliver it. That is the benefit of a specifically-targeted software like "SermonBase".

Or consider the important pastoral function of tracking people who are in your church in the various small groups. Most pastors need to know who is in which group and how things are going in that group. And can you believe that some churches still try to track those groups by using an Excel spreadsheet? Why?? When there are customized tools out there specifically designed to help churches do that very important function well. There are a lot of tools out there, and you are free to research one that fits for you. But I couldn't find any that I was totally happy with, so I made my own. I call it "Shepherd Care Discipleship Group Software" (yeah I like long names). It helps to track people in the various groups, and where they are in your discipleship system or your small groups. Using the shepherd metaphor it tracks the "sheep" in various "flocks" headed by various "shepherds" (or teachers) in your church. It is made for churches so that they can do a good job at fulfilling Jesus' command to care for the sheep.

There are other things I could say about this, but I am really convinced that the church needs software specifically targeted to help the church be the church. That's why I've been working on HighPower Resources software for some time now.

For the Kingdom of Heaven,


Dr. Bill

Leadership Development: Part 4, Supervise

Leadership Development is a four-part process which includes: Recruit, Train, Delegate, & Supervise.

It is critical for churches to practice leadership development because the future of their church depends upon the capacity to add quality, spirit-filled leaders to positions of influence throughout the church.

This final week we are looking at Supervise. Many people will interpret the word 'supervise' to refer to telling other what to do. But if we are truly developing leaders, and not just workers, then another type of supervision must be put in place. Leaders have the capacity to make their own decisions, set their own goals, and execute them. So if the person you have been working on in the previous three stages of this developmental process of Recruit, Train, Delegate is a leader, you need something consistent with who a leader is in this, the final stage, of Supervision.

The way to supervise leaders, I've found, is to exercise my coaching abilities and help them to discover and find their own way through difficulties. Leaders need a coaching form of supervision. I've blogged about coaching quite a bit in this blog, because that is a key area of learning for me in the last several years.

If you want to Supervise your high-powered leaders in your church, you will need to learn how to coach them. (Please do a search on this blog for other articles about 'coaching'. Also we have many free coaching resources here.)

The end result of good coaching, is a stronger leader. If you tell, instead of coaching, what you end up doing is weakening this leader whom you have been working on for so long, and helping them to develop as a leader. Telling them what to do makes them dependent upon you. Once they've done the one task you told them to do, then they have to come running back to you like a lapdog saying, 'OK, I've done that; now what do I do next?' You don't want that. You want people who have their own dreams and goals for a particular ministry, who have enough initiative to make it happen and even invite others to make it happen.

Coaching maintains this internal drive within a leader, not by telling them what to do, but by asking, and coaxing it out of them as to what their dreams and goals are. Then coaching simply consists of helping them to develop action plans to achieve THEIR goals, not YOUR goals. That's a big difference. And that is effective supervision.

So leadership development is a critical need in churches today. Many church leaders just hope and pray that God would send them leaders. But those who know how to raise up leaders through the Recruit, Train, Delegate, and Supervise process, will be able to 'grow their own' in the name of Jesus and for His kingdom. And that makes church leadership really satisfying.

Yours for the Kingdom of Heaven,

Dr. Bill

Leadership Development: Part 3, Delegate

Leadership Development is a four-part process which includes: Recruit, Train, Delegate, & Supervise.

It is critical for churches to practice leadership development because the future of their church depends upon the capacity to add quality, spirit-filled leaders to positions of influence throughout the church.

This week we are talking about the Delegate portion of the leadership development process.

So far we have looked at the first two parts of the leadership development process, which were to Recruit & to Train. Once you have discovered someone who has leadership gifts, and have begun the process of training them, the point comes where they must actually be empowered to do the job; and that is called Delegation.

Delegation is not as easy at it looks. If your goal is to actually develop leaders, and not just lighten your work load, then delegation actually takes some planning and follow-through to do it well. You want the process of raising up leaders in your church to be successful, and you want those up-and-coming leaders to enjoy the experience of leadership development.

There are some common mistakes that many leaders make when they are attempting to delegate a ministry responsibility to someone. If the goal is to develop leaders, then here are Four Mistakes to Avoid When Delegating:

Mistake #1 - Dump & Delete
D & D means that once you hand off a ministry responsibility to someone, you pretty much wash your hands of it, and forget it. You don't want to be bothered by the responsibility anymore, and so you "dump" it onto someone, and then you "delete" it from your brain. As far as you are concerned it is gone for good.

This happens when a leader is short-sighted about what s/he is actually trying to do. If you are just trying to lighten your work load, then Dump and Delete does the trick. But if your goal is to help another Christian brother or sister in your church, to grow and develop as a leader, then D&D is totally unacceptable.

You will need to follow-up and check-in with this person to see how they are progressing. You will want to coach them through any problems and help them to feel successful.

Mistake #2 - Micro-Managing
This is the opposite of the Dump & Delete problem. Micro-managing occurs when the pastor or leader just cannot really let a responsibility go. They don't trust anyone else to do the job quite as good as they do. Their favorite phrase is 'if you want something done well, you have to do it yourself.' Micro-managers are constantly stepping in and tinkering with somebody else's ministry in an effort to 'help them out'.

The problem with micro-managing if you are truly interested in leadership development, is that your up-and-coming leader never has a chance to really learn how to lead by themselves. This robs them of self-confidence and undermines the leadership development process in their lives.

The solution is a willingness to trust people. Pray like crazy to God, and then trust the person as they serve. Check in, and keep an eye on things, but resist the urge to guide every detail. There are many ways to get the job done. Let your new leader discover their own.

Mistake #3 - Reverse Delegation
Reverse delegation occurs when your new leader encounters a problem that they don't feel they can handle alone. So they come back to you as their trainer and describe the problem to you and then ask for help from you. If you at that point say something like, "Here let me help you with that", then they have just handed their job back to you. You gave it to them when you initially delegated the responsibility, and now that they have a problem, they have, in essence, come back to you and handed it back to you and said, 'Here, fix it." That is reverse delegation.

Rather, what you should do when they encounter their first tough problem, is to practice some of your coaching skills (which I have written about quite a bit in this blog). You would respond by asking them to brainstorm some possible solutions to solve this problem. Then after they list a number of potential steps which could be taken, you ask them which one of those they want to try first. After they have selected one, you encourage them, bless them and pray for them, and then let them solve their problem. It is, after all, theirs to solve and not yours since you have delegated the ministry to them.

That is, if you did truly delegate the ministry to them. Which brings us to our fourth and final delegation mistake:

Mistake #4 - Responsibility without Authority
This occurs when someone is given the task and job to accomplish a ministry, but no true authority to make it happen. For example, they are not given financial control of the project; they must come back to someone else anytime they want to spend any money on the project or ministry. Or any significant decisions must be run through some other committee which is not even directly involved in the ministry they are trying to run.

This situation occurs very often in paid staff situations in which a staff member is hired to do a job, but then must report to a committee of volunteers for approval for most ministry actions of significance. Although the staff member is involved in the ministry every day of the week, s/he must get approval for key actions from a group of people who only attend a committee meeting once a month, and then never give a thought to the ministry in-between time.

So, in the process of training up leaders, there are four parts involved: Recruit, Train, Delegate and Supervise. Delegation is an art that requires sensitivity to the needs of the person who is getting trained. It is one part of a big goal to ask God to help raise up more leaders in your church who can serve the church, and God, well.

Next week we will look at the final part of the leadership development process, which is supervision.

Yours for the Kingdom of Heaven,

Dr. Bill

Leadership Development: Part 2, Train

Leadership Development is a four-part process which includes: Recruit, Train, Delegate, & Supervise.

It is critical for churches to practice leadership development because the future of their church depends upon the capacity to add quality, spirit-filled leaders to positions of influence throughout the church.

This week we are talking about the Train portion of the leadership development process.

Many people will automatically equate this with a lot of intellectual content. While that is a necessary part of leadership training, it is not the most important part. Adults, however, learn best by doing. So the focus for adult leadership training, rather than having a classroom, teaching sort of feel to it, needs to be more focused around "Apprentice Systems".

So what are the elements of successful Apprentice Systems:

1. Coaching -- this involves not 'telling' but 'asking'; Where do they feel the need to grow? What do they want to do to learn the leadership skills necessary?, etc. Coaching involves asking powerful questions to help others grow and develop. You can check out other blogs on coaching on this site by entering "coaching" in the search dialogue box in the upper left. I've written quite a few blogs on coaching.

2. ShowHow Training -- this involves the training method explained in 2 Timothy 2:2: "And the things you have heard me say in the presence of many witnesses entrust to reliable men who will also be qualified to teach others." That is, Paul who was writing this verse to Timothy said, "I taught you; now you teach others, who can teach others." This is called ShowHow training. It goes like this:
Step 1 -- I do it & you watch;
Step 2 -- You do it & I watch;
Step 3 -- You do it & someone else watches

3. Ministry Descriptions for everything
Pastors tend to underestimate the amount of uncertainty and nervousness which the average layperson feels when encountering a new ministry job. For most people, who have not served much in the ministry before (and if you are training leaders, you will be having an increasing number of just those sort of people), they need some specific guidance on what is expected for certain key ministry jobs. That is why you need Ministry Descriptions for everything. HighPowerResources.com has a great template for writing Ministry Descriptions. It's in the Coaching Resources section here.

4. Internal Farm Systems
A ministry culture needs to be developed which has the expectation of "each one teach one"; that each ministry is training leaders for their own ministry. A number of ministries do it this way: they form a leadership team of three people: Chair, Vice-chair, and Past-chair. After the Chair of the ministry has served for a year, they move to the Past-Chair role, so that they are still available to help the Vice-Chair, who has now moved up to the Chair role. Then a new person is added to the Vice-Chair role, and they have a year to watch before they are expected to lead (Show-How Training). And even when they become Chair, they know that the former Chair is always there in case they need help. It's a good systems and results in real strength and longevity for ministry leaders.

5. Ministry Placement Interviews
We use a system at Crossroads with a team we call the "Ministry Way Team". (It ties in to our metaphor for discipleship: Main Street, Community Circle, Ministry Way.) The team serves up spiritual gift inventories, both individually and in our SHAPE class to help people discover their calling. Then a spiritual gifts interviewer meets with them and helps them to discover the best place to use their gifts in ministry. They are armed with Ministry Descriptions, listing the spiritual gifts needed (See sample here), and open positions and contact information. It works.

Training is the second part of the four-part Leadership Development process of Recruit, Train, Delegate, and Supervise.

Next week we will cover Delegate.

Yours for the Kingdom of Heaven,

Dr. Bill

Leadership Development: Part 1, Recruit

HI All,

Leadership Development is a four-part process which includes: Recruit, Train, Delegate, & Supervise.

It is critical for churches to practice leadership development because the future of their church depends upon the capacity to add quality, spirit-filled leaders to positions of influence throughout the church.

The first part of this process is to Recruit.
I do not use the word "recruit" in the typical fashion envisioned of begging people to "fill empty slots" until they give in. Rather, I think of it in terms of Calling. This is all about calling; discovering God's calling in people's lives. The best indication of someone's calling from God is their spiritual gifts.

The Recruit portion of leadership development must be tied in to helping people to discover, understand, and use their spiritual gifts. When you find someone with spiritual gifts that can be used for leadership, you can begin the process of helping them to unwrap those gifts for the glory of God and the growth of the church. Spiritual gifts which would help in this regard are: Leadership (obviously), but also Teaching, Administration (which means 'organizing people for ministry'), and also some aspects of Exhortation & Encouragement. If someone has gifts related to Service or Helps, they may be great servants in the church, and willing to work very hard, but are probably not suited for leadership roles, which require more initiative than perhaps someone with Helps may have.

So Recruiting involves helping people to discover their gifts, and then to understand them. Some people don't know where or how or if they should use their gifts. I had one potential leader in a church, who was very, very good with up front ministry roles, tell me that he felt guilty because he liked to be in charge and be in front and talking to people. I told him there is no reason for him to feel guilty because he is simply relishing in his God-given capacity to lead people. So people have to understand the gifts which God has placed in them.

And then after discovering and understanding, they have to actually use them. This is where your role as pastoral leader comes in. You need to help the people with leadership gifts to be placed into roles where they can be used. If you don't use their gifts in the church, they will naturally gravitate to situations where they can express and use their gifts, whether in the church or not. So help them to use their God-given gifts to make a difference for eternity by leading key ministries in the church.

Recruit is the first part of the four-part process of leadership development. Recruiting is all about Calling. Your job is to help people to Discover, Understand, and Use their spiritual gifts for the glory of God and the growth of the church.

Next week we will discuss the second part of leadership development, which is Train.

Until then, for the Kingdom of God,

Dr. Bill

Leadership Development: A Four-Part Process

HI All,

You probably already know that most churches never get beyond the 150 mark. But did you know why?

There are a few key factors to help a church break beyond the so-called "200 Barrier" (more like 150 - 250). One of those factors is the pastor's leadership. The pastor has to want to, and be able to, develop leaders. Some pastors don't want to develop leaders, because they are insecure. They want all decisions to go through them, or they want to be in the 'know' about anything happening in the church. But lots of other pastors do want to grow, but don't really know how.

In both cases, if they can not or will not develop leaders, it is nearly impossible for the church to grow beyond the 200 Barrier because about 150 people is getting to be the limit in terms of most pastor's administrative and leadership and interpersonal limits. Any more than that, and the work, the decisions, the interpersonal demands begin to mount up along with everything else a pastor is required to do, besides Sunday preaching. Thus between 150 - 250 gets to be the limit. That's why 85% of churches are at or below the 250 mark.

But if you want to get beyond this, there are some things which you can do.

Let's talk about some of the steps necessary to develop more leaders in the church to help you carry the load.

If we want to break it down into its elements, leadership development has four elements: Recruit, Train, Delegate, and Supervise. (I want to thank my friend, Bill Price, Executive Pastor of Autumn Ridge Church in Rochester, MN for summarizing these for me. This blog is about what I'm learning, and currently I am learning this.)

Four parts of leadership development: Recruit, Train, Delegate, Supervise.

Ephesians 4 says that God gave some to be apostles, prophets, evangelists, and pastor-teachers "to equip the saints for ministry".

The mission and the task of the church leadership is to equip others for the work of ministry. Leadership development is about equipping the saints for ministry. The way you equip saints for the ministry is through the four-part process of Recruit, Train, Delegate, Supervise. They each have a biblical form and function.

Pastors - and their staff - should be spending a significant portion of their time developing leaders. According to Dann Spader of Sonlife, it should range in the order of at least 15% of their time. Some business leaders, like Jack Welch I am told, spent the majority of their time developing up and coming executives, because they know that leaders are the future of any successful organization. As Bill Hybels says, the church is the hope of the world, and the hope of the church is its leaders.

Pastors, do you hire your staff to DO ministry or to EQUIP for ministry? Are they spending all of their time doing the Bible studies, leading the groups, presenting the talks, etc. How much time do they take to train others to do ministry? Are they practicing "Show-How" ministry training? (I have several other blogs over the last couple of years focusing on apprentice training.)

If the staff is not developing leaders, and if the pastor is not developing leaders, then the future of your church is in jeopardy. Leaders must be constantly moved into the pipeline and developed and trained and be given leadership opportunities so that your church tomorrow will be as strong or stronger than it is today.

In the next four blog posts, we will talk about each of these four elements of leadership development: Recruit, Train, Delegate and Supervise.

Until then, for the Kingdom of Heaven,

Dr. Bill

Why I need Shepherd Care

Hi All,

Coincidentally, I also have a comment this week about some other software I am developing. I mentioned SermonBase Message Planning Software last time, because I was preaching and needed some old files that I had developed before SermonBase. Well this week, something cool happened with another piece of software which we are developing, called "Shepherd Care" Group Software.

Here's what is my problem, maybe it is yours: tracking the various people who are in the various groups in the church. I've tried other software to help make this happen, and have not been satisfied. Mostly the software is overkill - both in price and installation and usability. Most of the group software which I have found is one 'module' in a gigantic software package that tracks all aspects of church life: finances, membership database, giving, groups, emails, directories, etc. But in some cases this is way more trouble than it is worth. I know, because we have some of this at our church now, and it is very cumbersome to enter & manipulate information and get reports.

Installation is overkill too, because often they are either server-based, which means I must be at church and hooked into the church's main server; or else they are web-based and slow.

I needed something that was nimble and quick; easy to access, desktop-based, and inexpensive to deploy. So then I was contacted by "Pastor Pete" from a church called "Cowboy Fellowship' in Pleasanton, TX that was growing gang-busters and needed a software package to track their progress. So we are developing a tool which I call "Shepherd Care" and it is group tracking software. It uses the metaphor of Shepherds, Sheep, and Flocks for tracking groups, and classes, and small groups in your church.

We are testing it right now in both churches and making usability improvements as we go along.

Well here is what happened just a couple weeks ago with Shepherd Care, and which is convincing me that this could be really useful software: One of the reports we've included in Shepherd Care is a monthly "Flock Report" which is emailed to the leaders each month. They complete it and send it back. One of the questions on that report is 'who did not show up this month at your group?' And the name of a particular young man was listed on the report. So our discipleship team gave that leader a call to check on why this individual did not show. When the follow-up call was then made to the young man, he said something like, "I'm going to take a break from church for awhile." The leader was able to lovingly let that young man know that that wasn't really OK with him or the group because they loved him and would miss him. Because of that conversation, the man stuck around, and it was really a joy for me to see him in church last week!

Shepherd Care helped us prevent one of our sheep from straying.

Now you may say, "Well any alert small group leader should be able to do that on their own!" And that is true; but you and I both know that doesn't always happen. People are busy, and sometimes they either don't notice, or don't get around to contacting a straying member. The value of having a piece of software like "Shepherd Care" is that it helps provide redundant systems of care, so that if one person misses the chance to follow-up a straying sheep, through monthly reports like the "Flock Report" someone else might notice a pattern and catch it. And in this case it works. It is an example of how the right easy-to-use software can make your life as a caring leader easier, not harder.

It convinced me that we need to keep fine-tuning it and getting it ready to release to churches soon, because it is useful for kingdom work. And that is what it is all about.

Yours for the Great Shepherd of the sheep!

Dr. Bill

Church Growth & Assimilation, Part 4

This is our final installment (for now) on the topic of assimilation.  We've already examined in the previous posts the topics of how to know if assimilation is happening, how to identify people who don't identify themselves as guests, and who you should really focus your assimilation efforts upon.  

Now we have to address this tricky and difficult subject of 'churn'.  Churches don't make a lot of reference to this topic, but businesses do, especially subscription-based businesses like Netflix, for example.  Customer churn in the business world is also referred to as attrition or turnover.  It is the recognition that it is much easier to keep an existing customer than to acquire a new customer, which makes this an important concept in the business world.

How does that relate to the church?  In the church it is not about customer acquisition, or retention, it is about loving people in such a way that they feel they are cared for and a part of the family.  If they feel like they are both loved, and they have a purpose in this new-found family, then they will stick around. If either one of those two factors are not realities for them, then they will leave.   

"Churn", to use the business term, occurs after assimilation has been successful.  You can't lose them if you never had them, so churn as a concept can only occur if you have been successful at your mission to win them over to be part of your church family.  Once having done that, you might be tempted to sit back and relax and say, 'Mission accomplished.'  But such is not the case.

Let's say that you define assimilation in your church as successfully welcoming a guest into your church family, so that six months after their first visit, they are now a member of your church.  That is successful assimilation.  But the next period of time of maybe six-months to a year, are also important that you continue to help them in two areas.  They need to continue to feel cared for, and they need to have a sense of purpose in your church.  They need to know how they are an important and contributing member of the body.

This is important because sometimes churches make guests feel really welcome and in the excitement of joining a new group of people and finding out all the things your church has to offer, they jump on board with both feet, and sign up as members, and start attending regularly, and bring their kids to children's or youth events.  But once that initial warm glow wears off, they need something sustainable for the long haul.  They need to have real friends, and they need to have meaningful ministry jobs.  If either of these two are not solidly true for them, they may become your next 'churn' statistic.

So it comes down to this: church health includes having the sort of relationships and ministry in your church that are actually healthy!  That is, there must be more there for the long haul than just the initial excitement.  Your church needs to be able to have the sort of environment that helps new people to develop long-term sustainable relationships, and long-term meaningful ministry.  

Some churches have great assimilation rates, 20%, but also really high churn rates.  They keep a large percentage of guests, who join the church, but then 12 - 18 months later, the people have become inactives, or have left to go elsewhere.  Other churches may have a modest assimilation rate, like 10%, but then they seem to keep their people forever.  Which would you rather have?

Experienced people in both the business and the church world will tell us that it is much easier, and satisfying, to keep people for the long haul.  In the church world, this means that people have found their home with you, and you are becoming increasingly the family of God that Jesus wants you to be.  And that is what it is all about.

Yours for the Kingdom,

Dr. Bill

Small Groups vs. Sunday School - The Main Event

Hey All,

Just heard about this debate between Rick Howerton, Small Groups Expert & David Francis, National Sunday School Director.  You can find it here:  http://www.lifeway.com/sundayschoolvssmallgroups/?CID=SSVSSG-LWCMain-UpcomingEvent-20090502 .

Rick recently sent me an email asking for my thoughts on the subject.  Here is the email interview:

HI Rick,

Thanks for contacting me.

I'll be happy to give you my answers to your questions, but I do need to say that some of these decisions took place before I got here three years ago, so I'll give you my best guess for those that preceded me, as well as our current thinking.  Since I've served in several churches (Wheaton EFC, church plant, old traditional church, etc.), some of these comments are based on combined experiences...

1) What brought you to the point of deciding to switch from Sunday School to Small Groups? 

Crossroads is 13 years old and from day one made the decision to only do small groups.  Part of that was necessity, because for the first 8 years they had no building.  After it was built they decided to continue their small groups focus by hiring a small groups director.

2) Has your church grown since you made the change? Do you think switching from Sunday School to Small Groups was key in the growth of your church? If so, why? 

Since we didn't switch it's a little tough to answer this, but I will say that participation in a small group is definitely a major factor in our retention rate.  Those who join a group (small group, Ministry Team, men's/women's group) stick around.  Most of those who do not, don't stay.  

My guess is that participation in a sunday school, or ABF, would also help retention, but not as much.  And the reason for this is two-fold, which are the two problems I have with SS/ABF's.  First, they are often large enough that if someone is missing they are not noticed, or it is not perceived as a big deal.  Whereas if someone misses a small group, the question is always asked, 'Where are they?' and 'Why are they missing?'  

Second problem with SS/ABFs is that the DNA or prime purpose of those groups is in most cases just content dumping; learn more.  Unless you have a very focused outreach/group/assimilation orientation which is constantly taught to all SS/ABF leaders, they are just there to teach, so if someone is missing, it doesn't interfere the with true purpose of the group.  Whereas in a small group a key purpose is fellowship, so if someone is missing, it impinges upon your very reason for being.

So that's my case for why participation in small groups is going to have a better impact on growth than participation in a SS/ABF.

3) How has the environment at your church changed since you have become a Small Group church? 

We have always been a small group church, but what I think is interesting and a little scary is the constant gravitational pull to become a SS/ABF church.  We constantly have people who want to teach in a SS/ABF context.  And their motivation for this is not so that we can grow the church; it is so that they can teach something.   We will have the occasional Sunday morning or Saturday night class, but we make sure that they are always short-lived, and focused on a key subject.  We don't want people to replace their small group with a  class.

4) What would you tell other churches who were considering switching from Sunday School to Small Groups? 

It is a major cultural shift, not to be under-estimated if you make such a change.  Besides the good reasons people have for wanting to be in a medium to large SS/ABF, you must also be aware of darker motives such as people who would rather sit semi-autonomously in a SS/ABF and absorb, than do the hard work of being in a small group which will hold them accountable for attendance and personal growth.  

God's best to you Rick.  Hope you win the big boxing match!

FYI, I'm currently working on a piece of software to help churches track people in both small groups and discipleship classes.  It's called "Shepherd Care" and I hope to release it soon.

God bless,

b

Church Growth & Assimilation, Part 3

Hi All,

Assimilation is one of those difficult to track tasks that absolutely must happen if your church is going to grow.  Moving people from being 'guests' or 'visitors' to becoming 'regulars' and then 'members' is what assimilation is all about.  Every successful church finds a way to do this well.

We've talked about how to know if assimilation is happening, and how to track people who don't announce their presence to you, in the previous two blogs on this subject.  Now we need to ask the question, 'Which visitors should I pay attention to?  Are some guests more important than others?'  (Yes, we know that everybody is important; but where should we focus our assimilation energies?) 

In this case, we must say that the second visit is the most important visit (not the first).

Now some may say that if we do a poor job on the first visit, then they will never show up for the second visit, and that is true.  No one here is suggesting that you perform a slouch job on the first visit.  But what I am suggesting is that all other things being equal, and assuming that you lovingly welcome everybody who steps through the doors of your church, visitor or not, the one you should really keep your eyes on is the person who has come back for a second look-see.  They are key to your growth.

Second-time guests are more important than first-timers for several reasons:

• First-timers can be just casual visits for any number of reasons, but a second-visit reveals a serious interest in your church.  Think of it like dating.  You might go out with him or her once, but you'll only go a second-time if you really like something about them.  
  
• Especially key is if the second visit is in the next week or two following the first visit  (of course, you won't know that unless you follow the steps outlined in part 2 of this blog)
• Second-timers are where your growth as a church will come from.  In my readings on this subject, stats show that 5-20% is good assimilation for a first visit, but if someone comes back a second time, there is more like an 80% chance they will become a regular at your church.

So, the natural question is, 'What is your plan for second-time visitors?'  You might be sending them a letter, email, or phone call for first visit.  But what about the second one?  Are you doing anything differently?  

If it is true that a second-visit indicates a more serious interest in your church, then your response should be ramped up a bit as well.  Maybe just a letter or email isn't sufficient.  It may be time for a personal phone call, or a FaceBook visit.

We have a guest card that allows indications if they are a 1st, 2nd, 3rd visitor and we have a separate response for each of those.  What's your action plan?

Next blog, we will address the final topic related to assimilation, which concerns the dark side of the assimilation problem:

• What's your "churn rate"?

Until then, God's best to you and your ministry,

Dr. Bill

Church Growth & Assimilation, Part 2

How do you track people you never see?

Here's the problem I face; I'm wondering if you have a similar problem.  A number of people who visit our church never sign the guest register; never shake the pastor's hand; never indicate their presence, because they want to be anonymous.  Now, I have no problem with this, as that is exactly how I feel when I visit a new church.  I want to check things out first, get a lay of the land, before I step forward and introduce myself.  So I understand this from a visitor perspective; but as a pastor, it's a bit of a different story.  I want to meet the new people and make them feel welcome, and greet them.  I also want to know how many guests we have each week, and how many of them come back.  But how can I track people that I never see?

Here's a few ideas, of varying success.  But put them together, and you may have a pretty good network for identifying newcomer's.

1. Guest Parking 
2. Parking Lot Attendants
3. Consistent Greeters
4. An Awesome Guest Bag
5. Mid-service Meet & Greet Time
6. Pastor at the Door

1.  Guest Parking -- Get some guest parking with reserved signs just for guests.  Want to know how many guests?  If you don't actually see them park and get out of their car, then count the cars in those spots, & multiply by 3  (2.5 is national average for church attenders per car).  Of course, this won't work for guests who don't park in those spots.  

2.  Parking Lot Attendants -- Put some guys out there with walkie-talkies, and when a guest pulls into the spot, have them notify the greeters, so they can give them a warm welcome.

3.  Consistent Greeters -- don't rotate your greeters!  Get one or two people who do it every week, so they can identify newcomers.  If you rotate a different couple every week, they will not be able to see when a guest returns the following week.  Get some consistency.  Find some people who truly have the spiritual gift of hospitality and put them at the door.  Watch out who your greeters are!  Not everybody is qualified to do this job.  Put your best faces out there. Train them not to be Nosey Nellies, and pummel guests with questions.  Give a loving warm greeting, let them move on, but remember them for next week.

4.  An Awesome Guest Bag - We can identify the guests in our church, because they are carrying lovely pastel-colored gift bags.  Put some real goodies in there; not a just a bunch of church brochures.  We've got CD's, certificates for coffee, a "First Impressions" guest card (I talked about this in a previous blog  ("Your Church's Image in the Community, Part 2") and some brochures.  You can add candy, or whatever. Make it good, and then put a notice in your bulletin of all the goodies you have for guests so they pick one up.

5.  MidService Meet & Greet -- It's never a bad idea to be friendly.  So take some time between one of the songs, and let people say hi to each other.  Great way to break the ice with guests.

6.  Pastor at the Door -- It may seem old-fashioned to some, but it works.  People like to say hi to the Pastor.  It gives him a chance to meet potential guests, who would not otherwise introduce themselves to anyone else.

So there you have it, six ideas to identify guests.  We need to respect their desires to be anonymous if they want to be, but we also need to make it very easy for those who are just shy to feel welcomed by the church.  Take these steps, and then enter their names in some good church management or shepherding software, and you will be on your way to increasing your assimilation rate as a church.

Next blog post we will talk about some more insights about assimilation.

Next topics:

• Which visit is most important?
• What's your "churn rate"?

Yours for the Kingdom of Heaven,

Dr. Bill

Church Growth & Assimilation, Part 1

I've been thinking about assimilation...

Assimilation is the process of moving people from being guests or visitors in your church to becoming regular attenders at your church. How do you know when someone has been assimilated as a regular at your church?

• First, when they start saying, "My/our church" instead of "your church"
• Second, when they start attending the weekend services more than twice a month
• Third, when they start getting recognized by non-staff members

What's a great assimilation rate? In a conversation with one of the pastors at Kensington Community Church, up in Troy, Michigan, he indicated that they had a 20% assimilation rate. (Note that 'assimilation rate' is not the same as 'growth rate'. See the April 19th, 2009 post on "Church Growth Math" for the difference.) If you can keep 20% you are doing great. When I was Pastor of Disciple Making at Wheaton Evangelical Free Church, the best guess I could make of the assimilation rate was 5%. Now that was a church of 1,000 people, near Wheaton College. We had tons of visitors who would come and go, especially students, so the assimilation process was a little tricky. Your church may not have as many guests come through the door, and so finding out your assimilation rate may be a bit easier.

This is a really hard stat to get your hands on. In order to measure it, you need to do two things:

• First, track the date your guests first came to your church.
  
• Second, select a consistent length of time after that first visit, that you do the measurement, like six months later.
  

You'll need some good membership software for this, unless you are small enough to "eye-ball" this. But you have to make some assumptions to do this right. First assumption, that all your guests register on their first weekend with you. And we know this is not true, so you are going to have to make some guesses, like maybe 50% your guests register their presence. We then run a report called the 'newcomer's report', which tracks all people in the last six months. This gives us a better idea of who is new, and a rough guess at our assimilation rate, based on our weekly guest rate. (Total guests per weekend x 26 weeks divided by how many new regulars are on the six month newcomer's report.) But it is at best an educated guess.

Some people never register until they decide this is home. Or if your church doesn't use any form of registration cards, you need to find other means.

Another way to track your assimilation process is at the membership class time. Have each person answer this question: When did you first attend our church? Compare this to the current date, and you will have a chronological assimilation rate; for example, six months from guest to member; or 9 months, etc. (By the way, the next chronological stat you will want to have is how long from first visit to ministry involvement? And then, how long from first visit, to church leadership?)

What this doesn't tell you is how many people you are losing, whom you never see because they don't come back, they don't sign up, and you never knew they attended your church at all. How do you track them?

Next blog post we will talk about that, and some more insights about assimilation.

Next topics:

• How do you track people you never see?
• Which visit is most important?
• What's your "churn rate"?

God's best to you,

Dr. Bill

Church Growth Math

Hi All,

I know that most of you have finished with math classes long ago, but it's time to go back and consider some basic principles of church growth. If you follow along with this, you will discover why assimilation of your guests is absolutely critical to church growth.

First, some basics: if your church grows at a rate of 10% a year, then you will double in 7 years. So if your church is 200 and you grow by 20 your first year, 22 your second, 24 your third, etc. in 7 years, you will be a church of 400. If your church is 500, and you grow by 50 the first year, 55 the second, 60 the third, etc, you will be a church of 1,000 in 7 years.

Now, this new growth can come from three primary sources: births, transfers, conversions.

-- Births - The national birth rate is at just over 2% right now. Your area may be more or less than the national average. If you have many young families in your church, you may have a 3% birth rate.

-- Transfers refer to Christians who move into your church from other churches.

-- Conversions, of course, are people from the community who your church reaches and brings to salvation, who then begin attending your church.

Put these all together, and if you can reach 10% a year, you are experiencing healthy growth; 5% a year is fine, and 15-20% is phenomenal growth.

However, and here is where it gets tricky, you must also factor in your loss rate. Your church is shrinking at the same time you are trying to help it to grow. It is losing people through death (1-3%), through moving away (2-5%), and through fall offs of people going elsewhere or not attending anywhere.  You could be shrinking at 5-10% a year.

When you add these into the mix it becomes, as you would expect, rather difficult to maintain growth in your church. Your net loss has to first be met, and then you need to gain enough additional people to move beyond your losses into the realm of growth. That takes some work.

Since the experts tell us that most churches are plateaued or declining, if you are experiencing any attendance growth at all, you are already in the minority.

The key to experiencing growth then, is to make sure you do a great job at assimilation. It is hard enough to get people to visit a new church. When they do, you need to make sure that you do all you can to retain them. Here's how the math works on this, in terms of church growth assimilation.

Let's say your goal is 10% growth per year, and you are a church of 500, so you hope to have a net retention rate (after factoring in the losses we mentioned above) of 50 people this year.

(I recite all these numbers simply so that you can compare your church to this 10% standard and see where you fit in comparison. I'll use a church of 500 in the following, and then you can factor your numbers up or down for comparison...)

And then let's say you have 10 new people per Sunday visit your church. That would be about 500 people per year who walk through the doors of your church for the first time. Now please note that in order to achieve this desired goal of 50 people per year (with a 10% assimilation rate), you will have to have 10 totally new people each and every Sunday. That means that the 10 new people who came to your church last weekend, don't count if they show up again the next Sunday. That would be great, but you will need 10 totally new people the following Sunday.

You need to have an assimilation rate of 10% in order to attain your growth goal. So for every 10 people who walk through your door, you need to keep 1 of them. That's 4 new people a month; that's 13 a quarter. That means if you have a quarterly membership class, you should be having about 13 people in each class who sign on for membership.

But let's say that you don't have 10 new people a Sunday. Let's say you only have 5 new people per week. That would be 250 visitors a year. If you want to retain your growth rate of 10% growth, and you are a church of 500, then you will need to keep 20%! of your guests. Since you are only attracting 250 visitors a year, or 5 a weekend, you must keep more of them every week to achieve 10% growth.

The other option, of course, if you cannot achieve a 20% assimilation rate, is to increase your visitor rate. If you are not retaining that many guests, then you need to increase the number of guests coming through the door. So if your outreach is poor, you need to be better at assimilation.

Which are you better at, getting people to visit your church for the first time, or keeping them once they show up?

(I know the goal is to do both, but let's look at what you can do right now, and then work on the rest.)

This has been a little church growth math to help you think through some of the details involved in making it happen at your church.

Next week we will talk about some key aspects of assimilation, or visitor retention.

Of course, we must remind you that the ultimate goal here is disciples of Jesus Christ. That is why we are even talking about it. We want to fulfill Christ's words in the Great Commission to "make disciples of all nations". Why are we talking about church growth? Because each one of these people represents a person for whom Jesus died. Let's reach them in His name for His sake.

For Christ and His Kingdom,
Dr. Bill

What is your definition of Church Success?

Hi All,

How you define success as a church affects almost everything you do, so you need to make sure your get it right. Get it wrong, and you will be leaning your proverbial ladder up against the wrong wall. Get it right, and you can make a difference for eternity in the lives of many, and earn yourself a "Well done, good and faithful servant" from the Lord.

I'm going to cut to the chase and give you this definition as revealed in "Entrepreneurial Faith". The full name of the book is: "Entrepreneurial Faith: Launching Bold Initiatives to Expand God's Kingdom" by Walt Kallestad, Kirbyjon Caldwell, and Paul Sorensen. It's a great book; maybe I'll do a review soon. But for now, I just want you to see this definition of church success from them (in my own words as a formula): "Success = Obedience + Faith.

OBEDIENCE: Jesus told the story (Matthew 21) of the father who asked each of his sons to do something. The first son said "I will not" but then later on changed his mind and went to work in the vineyard as asked. The second son said "Yes" right away when asked, but then never did go work in the vineyard. Question asked by Jesus, "Who obeyed his father?" Summary: Obedience is key to church success, and life success. If you do not obey, nothing else matters.

But here is where we part with the clan of Christians who believe that obedience is enough. They couch it in pious terms like, "Jesus didn't call us to be successful, just faithful." And by 'faithful' they mean obedient at best, and at worst, if we just go through the motions of doing what God has called us to do then that is all He asks of us.

But this sort of mentality forgets other important verses, like the parable of the talents, in which the master was not content that his servants took care of what was his and just kept their nose clean. He was looking for a profit, for a benefit, for a result from the talents he entrusted to his servants. Those servants were expected by him to go out and invest and risk and try to do something with the vast sums of money to which they were entrusted. They were required to walk by faith and make something happen. That is, obedience alone was not sufficient; he was expecting some initiative and some valour and some courage to make a difference. Obedience for the sake of the status quo would not be enough. They were expected to exercise FAITH.

FAITH: Obedience is needed, but not only obedience. And faith is needed, but not only faith. We need them both. "Obedience puts faith into action" is one of the statements that Caldwell and Kallestad make in their book. James said "Faith without works is dead."

Why are these both needed? Because faith is what energizes all of our obedience with spiritual power. If we just dully obey God without any faith, we are like the elder brother in the parable of the prodigal son, who dutifully obeyed his father by working in the fields as he should, and yet he had no love, no joy, no sense of life. The prodigal son at least sinned boldly and learned his lesson. The elder brother was just as miserable in a long-term chronic way.

Put them both together, friends: Obedience + Faith, and you've got a winning combination for Christian success and church success. BTW, if you want to buy the book you can get it in the HighPower Books section here. It's on page two of the "Church Growth" section.

That's what I've learned this week, and it's making me think.

For Christ and His Kingdom,

Dr. Bill

Your Church's Image in the Community, Part 4

Hi All,

Finishing up some thoughts on how to shape your image in the community, this week, How long will it take? That is, how long will it take for you as a church to become known for what you want to be known about (assuming you know what that image is)?

This is influenced by the following factors: the age of your church, the growth/transience of your community, the size of the large, community-shaping events you choose, the amount of press coverage, or word-of-mouth buzz you get, and people's memories.

If you are a church plant, you have an (almost) clean slate to work with; if you have been around for awhile, you have your previous image to overcome or change. Both of these can be shaped rather quickly with a large, community-image shaping event, if you can get good coverage or buzz because of it. In some communities all this will take is a couple of good newspaper stories; in larger communities it will take some TV time. Our church plant was in a smallish Chicago suburb, meeting in a 30-screen movie theater complex. It took just a couple of newspaper articles about interesting series we were doing, to get the positive buzz we needed to bring in new people.

If you are in a town with a good annual parade, be sure to take advantage of it, to present the image you want seen about your church. Want to emphasize your family ministry? Get a float and fill it with kids in bright clothes singing happy fun songs. We did a couple of parades in our town with some memorable floats for two years in a row. One year we made a giant golden pyramid, and put up a banner that said, "Let my children go, to __________ Church!" The kids were dressed up like Egyptians and singing fun songs like "King Tut". We made the front page of a large suburban newspaper!

If you have been around for a while, this will take longer. You will have to work harder to remake your image. This make take some large, newsworthy event to help reshape your image. For example, when we were doing a series called "Big Questions from the Big Screen", we did a theme service on the Wizard of Oz, and brought in one of the original munchkins from the show. This was newsworthy and got us some press coverage, and a number of new visitors.

The growth/transience of your community is also a factor. If you are a new church, and the community has slow growth, this works in your favor. Because you are new in a community without a lot of change, you will be the current local buzz for a while when you start. If you are in a community with a high growth or transience rate, then you will be on more of a level playing field with everybody else, trying to get the community's attention.

Finally, concerning people's memories, if you are in the unfortunate situation of being in a church that has had a traumatic past; either a church split, or God forbid, the death of a child or teenager in your ministry, you have a situation that will work against you for years and years. You will constantly have to be demonstrating how you are not that church of the past anymore. This will set back your efforts and make it more difficult to determine the image you want to present. But it can be done by establishing some annual traditions that set your church up as family-friendly. Every Memorial Day in one church, after 9/11, we invited in all the police & fire departments to our church. We invited in the boy scouts to carry the flag and the local VFW bugle group to play "Taps". We made Memorial Day a can't-miss event for our church full of pageantry, patriotism and meaningful reminders of sacrifices for our country, combined with the Great Sacrifice of Jesus. It not only shaped our image in the community, but helped our congregation to own some important values.

But the area in which you have the greatest control is the Series topics which you choose to focus upon. Make some promo cards for every series you do; print and mail them to thousands of people in your community, or hand out small business-sized cards that your people can hand out to their friends. Run some newspaper ads along with it. If you do these consistently for a year, for about four times throughout the year, with some well-chosen topics, you will begin to reshape the focus and image of your church in your community.

I share all this simply because we want to glorify God and make Jesus look good. Do what you can to lift up the name of Jesus and exalt Him and what He can do for your community. Let the children come to Him; help marriages to be rebuilt by Him; let lives be filled with joy because of Him. Lift Him up. He is the best focus and image you can have as a church! Lift up Jesus!

For Jesus and the Kingdom,

Dr. Bill

Your Church's Image in the Community, Part 3

Hi All,

We are continuing on with some thoughts related to your church's image in the community.
We are talking about this because image is important. Jesus had an image in Israel as the one who came to proclaim release to the captives and hope for the widows and orphans. Your church has in an image in town as well. It is what and how people think of you. People will never attend a church which is incompatible with their own image of what they believe is important and good. So your church's image must appeal to that which is highest, truest, and good. Help people to envision who they might be if only they were to include God or Christ in their life.

We've already talked about why it is important, and how to find out your church's image in your community. Now, our concern is How to Shape Your Church's Image in the Community.

This is the slow part. You cannot instantly reshape or reform a church's image, if you have been around for a while. Now, if you are a church plant, you have an (almost) blank slate before you, and there is a lot you can do right at the beginning. But even church plants begin to shape a community image by the name they choose, by the location they choose to meet at, by the type of advertising they do, by some of their early events and message series. When we were launching a new church at one point, I did a phone survey of random strangers in the community we were targeting. I asked them their preference for various church names, giving them a sample of three to choose from. I learned a few things in the process. For example, a number of unchurched were quite favorable to any name which had the phrase "Community Church" in it. One person said to me, "I like that name, because that means anyone in the community can attend, and you don't have to be a member of a denomination." Apparently, there are a number of unchurched out there who believe you can't even attend a church unless you are already a part of "the club" or the denomination.

But for those churches that have already been around for a while, the process of shaping your community image will take a bit longer. But the steps for both new and existing churches are the same:

First, (if you can control it) pick a name that will help, not hinder your cause.
A name that will help is easy to pronounce, communicates your values ("family church" "community church"), or connotes positive image ("sunrise church"). Drop the denominational label if you can. You may love your denomination. You can tell the people all about it in your membership class. But they'll never get to your membership class if you turn them off by your denominational title. We are part of the Evangelical Free Church. That's a mouthful. After a recent addition to our church the news ran a piece about it. The newscaster, who is a paid professional, stumbled over our full name "Crossroads Evangelical Free Church". (Guess which word she messed up?!) We changed our name to "Crossroads Church". While we still retain the full name for internal and legal documents, all public documents and advertising are now with the shortened name. Try it. It will help.

Second, improve your building.
Now there is only so much you can do here in the short run. You have what you have. But you can clean it up; fix it up. Even a small church building can be clean and cute. But make plans for the future that match your image goals as a church.

Third, start hosting community groups.
If you want to start developing a positive community image, then open your building up to the community. Host the Red Cross blood drive. Let the boy/girl scouts meet in your building. Let the local school use your building for events. When I was in Wheaton, our church had the largest auditorium in the neighborhood. The local elementary school started using it for their Winter Concert. That was great PR! Make it available to any groups in your community that represent that good and positive image we talked about in part one. Yes, this may take some effort and even money. You will need to get a good host who can welcome these groups to make them feel at home and meet their needs. You will need to clean up after them. But even as you are cleaning up after them, you will be cleaning up your community image.

Fourth, Offer Message Series that match your image goals.
If you want to be known as a family church, then start offering series of interest to the family: marriage, parenting, finances, etc. If you want to be known as a Bible Church, then focus your series on complete books of the Bible, or How to Understand the Bible. If you want to be known as a church that can relate to the problems of the world around you, then do some series on Divorce, Financial Stress, Working Too Hard, etc. Put these series titles on the first page of your website. People will start tuning in to your topics.

Fifth, put your website to good use.
Your main page, the first page people see when they come to your site, should NOT be targeted at your regulars or members. Your first page is for the community. Watch what you put on this page. Don't give in to the desire of every ministry in the church to have a link from that page. The main page of your site is all about making it easy for your guests to come to church this week. Put your message series and big events on that page. Make sure you have links for: "Welcome", "First Time Guests", "Map", "Contact Us", very easy to find and access. Maybe you want to make your sermons easily accessible, so people can get a listen first; or samples of your music. Just this past week my son's gym teacher, told him that his wife had listened to my sermon on money. Neither of them attend our church, but now I know that they listen. Your community is watching and listening, if you are making it easy and anonymous to do so, via your website. Use it to your advantage.

Ok, of these five, some you can start doing right now. Some will take longer. But it takes a while to reshape your image. We will talk about that next time in the final part of this series.

Next, HOW LONG WILL IT TAKE?

Until then,

God's best to you,

Dr. Bill

Your Church's Image in the Community, Part 2

Hi All,

Last week I began sharing a few thoughts God has given me relative to your church's image in the community.
This is important because people will never visit or attend a church which is incompatible with their image of themselves.
You as a church will want to appeal to that which is highest and noblest and good as you present yourself to the community.
"Finally, brothers, whatever is true, whatever is noble, whatever is right, whatever is pure, whatever is lovely, whatever is admirable — if anything is excellent or praiseworthy — think about such things." (Philippians 4:8) (See last week's blog for the rest.)

If one's church image is important, how can a church know what is the image the community holds of them?

HOW TO KNOW WHAT IS YOUR COMMUNITY IMAGE

This is going to require a lot of listening. There are three sources you can call upon to discern community perceptions:
First, Ask your guests.
"How did you hear about our church?", quickly followed by "Why did you decide to visit us?"
Listen to what they say, and what they don't say.
Sometimes people will say something like 'a friend told me about it'. Sometimes they will say 'I drove by', or 'I saw your newspaper ad'. If they say, "a friend told me', then probe a little bit more. Was it a friend who attends the church already, or was it just somebody in the church who was talking about you. This is especially helpful, as it reveals that there is some positive buzz going on about you.

Listen for common themes.
One guest does not a theme make. Your guests are solid gold when it comes to first impressions and image of your church. Here's an idea we got from John Maxwell: Make a "First Impressions" card, with three questions on it. "1. How did you hear about us? 2. What did you like? 3. What would you change?" You will get more real help from that card through your guests than a year's worth of observations from a regular. We used these cards for years, and found them very valuable. Make sure they are self-addressed and stamped on one side, so all your guests have to do is drop it in the mail.

Second, ask your congregation.
But how you do this is key. Gather a group of insightful people together, as if doing a focus group. Get them talking about your church and create an atmosphere where honest sharing can take place. Then begin questions like, "What do your friends think about our church? Especially, those who do not attend anywhere? Also, how about those who attend elsewhere? What brings them to another church, (unspoken assumption 'that our church does not offer?'). But the real concern is what do those who do not attend anywhere have to say about your church? That is the gold.

Third, ask the community at large.
There are two ways you can do this, the expensive way, or the easy and cheap. Expensive: hire a focus group consulting firm to bring in random, unchurched people to a neutral place in town and ask a series of questions which you and they design together. You will get more brutal honesty this way than any other way. Or the easy and cheap way is to set up a survey form on your church website, and ask for honest feedback from people who do not attend your church. You do not need to know anything about web database or PHP work to achieve this. There are free on-line survey tools that you can locate and just include in your church's website. Try "eSurveysPro.com" for a robust survey tool, or "GrooveySurveys.com" for a quick and easy tool. Just ask visitors who do not attend your church to fill it out.

And that's how you find out what they are saying about you.

Next time...

HOW TO SHAPE YOUR COMMUNITY IMAGE

HOW LONG WILL IT TAKE?

Your Church's Image in the Community, Part 1

Hi all,

If your church wants to be effective at reaching newcomers, then one of the key issues you need to get a handle on is: "What is the image of our church in the community?"

WHY YOUR IMAGE IS IMPORTANT
When we refer to 'image', we are not talking about some fluff, or some smoke and mirrors, or referencing some slick marketing campaign image. Maybe 'image' is the wrong word, because of all the negative connotations, but it is also the right word, because it very quickly communicates exactly what is essential about your church. You may call it a 'reputation' or 'character' if those words are more palatable to you. But image does it for me, because the fact is, before anyone in your community ever sets foot in the door of your church, the image of your church in their mind, has to be compatible with the sort of person they want to be.

If your church has an image as a feisty group of people that are constantly upset by what is happening in your city, then you will attract others who are upset with the status quo.
If your church has an image in town of being a safe place for children, then you will attract young parents who are concerned about their children's safety.
If your church has an image in town of being filled with people who know their Bible inside and out, then...

Image, impression, reputation - it all matters.

Jesus had an image in Israel. It was described in Isaiah as the one who would proclaim release to the captives, who would care for the widows & orphans, who would declare the day of the Lord. When Jesus came into a village, people would come running from everywhere to be with Him. He was surrounded by crowds. They wanted to be there.

Your image, like Jesus' must be attractive to the values of your community.
A great definition of 'glorifying God' is "to make God look good".

What does your church do really well? How do you make God look good?
That can be your image in the community.
Jesus said to let your light shine before men, so that they may glorify your Father in heaven.

Your image is important because until and unless people can accept your image, and own it as part of their own values, they will not come by to visit. Now, we certainly don't mean that you should choose an image which is the lowest common denominator of the day. Focus on that which is true and lovely. Appeal to the highest good in the heart of the people in your community. Draw them upward to something to which they aspire. Make them dream a little bit about who they could become as a person or a family, if only they would include Christ in their life.

Next time...

HOW TO KNOW WHAT IS YOUR COMMUNITY IMAGE

HOW TO SHAPE YOUR COMMUNITY IMAGE

HOW LONG WILL IT TAKE?


Until then,

Yours in Christ,

Dr. Bill

Church Health Resources

Hi All,

There's a lot of great help out there for pastors who want to make their churches strong and healthy.

Recently I was reading "Winning on Purpose" by Kaiser, and he had a section entitled, "Training and Coaching for the Team". He provided a list of the following sites for congregational ministry help:

Accountable Leadership (Kaiser) www.accountableleadership.org
ChurchSmart Resources (NCD) www.churchsmart.com
CoachNet (Logan) www.coachnet.org
Easum, Bandy & Associates www.easumbandy.com
GHC Network (Church Multiplication) www.ghnetwork.org
Gospel Communications www.gospelcom.net
Griffith Coaching Network www.griffithcoaching.com
Leadership Network www.leadnet.org
NexStep Coaching (Hoyt) www.nexstepcoaching.org
PastorPreneur (Jackson) www.pastorpreneur.com
Purpose-Driven Church (Warren) www.pastors.com
Willow Creek Association (Hybels) www.willowcreek.com

And, of course, my favorite, www.HighPowerResources.com, where you can find the Software, Sermons, Seminars, and Coaching to empower you for church success.

These are all great helps in building a great church.

Remember, we are all working for King Jesus to build up His Church for which He died.
We didn't die; He did.
So it matters to Him how you lead HIS Church.

God's best to you,

Dr. Bill

Simple Church Synchronicity

Adopting a simple church philosophy is the easy part. Making it work with your already existing ministry systems is the challenging part. Unless you are a church planter with no currently existing ministries to deal with, you must consider this factor if you hope to adopt a simple church model at your church.

(“Simple Church” is a reference to the book by Thom Rainier & Eric Geiger, Simple Church.)

Here is a recent discussion about applying Simple Church concepts to your announcements:

Simple Church Advocate: we don’t do any announcements unless they relate to our two core distinctives

Listener: “What about your men’s and women’s ministries? What do you do when they want to announce a new Bible study or a men’s retreat?”

Simple Church Advocate: “I ask them what the purpose is. If they say, ‘The purpose is because we’ve done it every year for the last 10 years,’ then it’s denied.

Listener: “Why would you do that?”

Simple Church Advocate: “We don’t think it is fair to our newcomers and seekers to distract and confuse them with too many messages and options. If we provide 10 different options during announcements, what are we saying about the discipleship ministries we believe will give them the most help spiritually?”

Listener: “Sounds like you are going to organize yourself simply out of existence!”


So, who is right in this exchange? It presents the challenges of synchronizing the Simple Church principle of Focus (Clarity, Movement, Alignment, Focus) with any church which already has programs in existence.

What is the best way to handle this dilemma? Is it a free-for-all for anybody who wants to promote their ministry event? How do you decide which ministries to promote or not promote, or (the unheard of), cancel a ministry that has been in existence for years?

Just a thought….

Dr. Bill

CHURCH POLICY GOVERNANCE STRUCTURE

Hi All,

We have been in the process for the last couple of years of transitioning our church from an action-based Board model, to a policy governance structure. We have been helped by this through the Carver model of policy governance. The Policy Governance model as defined by the Carver website says this: "Policy Governance is an integrated set of concepts and principles that describes the job of any governing board. It outlines the manner in which boards can be successful in their servant-leadership role, as well as in their all-important relationship with management...." Let's put some flesh on that esoteric definition. For our church, this model is making a difference; let me tell you why.

First some background:
Most people are familiar with the '200 barrier' of church growth; not as many are aware of the '800 barrier'. While the 200 Barrier is all about moving from a single-celled church leadership to multi-celled, the 800 Barrier is about larger issues of leadership. Specifically, for a church to be pro-active and to have a long-range vision, they must move their Board from an action-based Board that works IN the church, to a policy-based Board that works ON the church. Now, there are other factors that have to happen to break through the 800-Barrier, but this leadership issue is one of them.

It basically means this: somebody has to tell the forest from the trees. If the leadership of the church (both pastor and board) are focused too much on the detailing of the ministry, they never get to step back and look at the big picture. In a policy-based governance model, the Board becomes much more responsible for helping to set the direction, policies, and major initiatives of the church. Other details such as starting up & recruiting for a ministry, or promoting and pushing 'the next big event', or worry too much about the facilities all distract from the primary function of a policy-based church board. I think you get the picture.

So what have we done about this? Our church of 700 has been operating with the same patch-work quilt of a By-Laws that they started with from day one with 100 people. So in order to develop new By-Laws, we first spent time on developing a policy-governance document for our church. It has four parts: 1st - It defines the Board's relationship with the Senior Pastor & any staff; 2nd - it defines the Board's relationship with the Congregation & individual members; 3rd - It defines the Board's relationship with itself; 4th - it clarifies the specific rules of operation within the Board.

One of the key guidelines, for example, is that the Board has only one employee: the Senior Pastor. The other Staff have no policy-based relationship with the Board. The Board does not oversee the Staff; the Senior Pastor or his designee does that. The Staff do not report to the Board, the Senior Pastor does. All of this simplifies the direction and planning for the church. It also enhances the Senior Pastor's role and authority with the Staff. They are accountable to him; he hires and fires; it diminishes much of the politics out of staff-board relationships.

So, we developed our policy-governance manual. We had this approved by the Board. Then, having gained their acceptance of the general direction, we worked for the next year on redesigning the By-Laws to match the policy-governance model. We are now in the process of presenting it to the congregation for approval this December. So far so good.

That's how we are growing in terms of our infrastructure. If you have 'functional structures' according to the Natural Church Development survey, you have one of eight key planks in place for growth. This move to a policy-based governance model is one of those functional structures which we have found important in keep the growth and direction of our church on track.

That's all for now.
In Christ,

Dr. Bill

CHURCH ATTENDANCE STATS

Hi all,

Just came across some recent stats on current church attendance numbers. (Most of these stats come from the book, "Confessions of a Reformission Rev" by Mark Driscoll) See where your church fits in the following list:

--> Churches with 75 people or less = 50% of all churches
--> Churches with 150 people or less = 75% of all churches
--> Churches with 250 people or less = 85% of all churches
--> Churches with 800 people or less = 98% of all churches
--> Churches with 2,000 people or more = .22% of all churches
--> Churches with 3,000 people or more = .11% of all churches


Said another way for example, if you are in a church of 250 people, you are in the top 15% of all church sizes.

Now, while the smaller churches dominate the overall percentages, the situation is exactly reversed when you start looking at attendance of people in those churches: For example, While about 60% of churches are 100 people or smaller, those churches represent only 41% of all attendance. But churches of 1,000 or more, which are only about 1% of all churches, hold 12% of the population of U.S. church-going adults.

As Rick Warren has said, it takes all kinds of churches to reach all kinds of people. So it is not that being big or small is good or bad. The real question is, Are you being faithful to teach and shepherd the people whom God has sent your way?

Psalm 78:72 says of King David:
"He cared for them with a true heart
and led them with skillful hands."

Are you applying a "true heart" and "skillful hands" to the people God sends your way?

For the kingdom of God,

Dr. Bill

FINANCES: How to Budget with Care

The basic rule of church financial health is that you can't spend more money than you take in. But this simple principle can get very cloudy in the rough and tumble process of annual budget negotiations. This planning process alone is tricky, but when you add in the "living by faith" principle, Christian leaders are sometimes tempted to make unwise choices in their financial planning.

Everybody seems to insist that their ministry just can't go on unless they receive a budget increase. And so it goes... By the time all the numbers and needs are in, most budgets are larger than is fiscally prudent. Many churches budget with a 'best case scenario' in mind, rather than a 'worst case'. That is, they assume that everything will go perfectly in terms of giving and expenses. And if everything goes perfectly, then they can make budget for the year. But if anything goes wrong they are in trouble. So is it better to think positively, or 'realistically'? Is one more Christian than another? Some will argue for faith as the guiding principle of budget preparation, while others will remind us that Jesus told us to count the cost and used the example of someone building a tower and not having enough money to finish it.

So, how do you put together the budget on an annual basis in such a way to meet needs, but not get into trouble?

There are several parts to this answer:
1st -- You Can't!
No one but God can predict the future. Every budget is an educated guess at best, and a shot it the dark at worst.

2nd -- Expectations must be managed.
You need to help your people face the fact that there will always be more opportunities (that is, more ways to spend money), than there will be money. This needs to be said at the outset to all involved in the ministry budgeting process.

3rd -- The most important part of the budget process is the Bottom Line.
There are many parts to a healthy budget; and most ministry leaders believe that their ministry budget line item is the most important part, and therefore they will all lobby hard to have their portion of the budget increased. But there must be one person on your budget planning team who has no allegiance or loyalty to any one ministry; his/her allegiance should only be to the bottom line. That is, you need to give one person permission to 'hold the line'. You have to let them be 'the bad guy', the person who says 'no', the person who draws the line and says "Here and no further!" Who in your church is responsible for the Bottom Line?

Next question: So how do you determine an effective Bottom Line? And by "Bottom Line", I mean this, the final figure that represents the total budget increase; the maximum amount of new dollars which you can expect from God's people in the new year. How do you determine that?

There are a number of 'rules of thumb' to guide this process:
1. $1,000 per capita
To determine the total number of dollars you can expect in the new year (not just new dollars), you can simply take the total attendance of your church (babies and visitors included; just count everybody who comes on a weekend), and multiply that average by $1,000. There's your budget. Now in some areas, this will be too high, and in others too low. And of course, if you have done church for more than one year, you have the benefit of history to compare giving and attendance in the past to determine the expected per capita giving for your particular congregation. (These numbers will be somewhat askew if you have a small congregation, and/or a congregation with a particularly big giver.) But over the years, as I have used this guideline, it has been surprisingly helpful. For example, while serving in a large suburban congregation, it actually averaged out to about $1,100 per person, while serving in a less well off congregation, it came out to about $875 per capita. Find your norm, and use it as a guide.

2. For the new year, when you expect attendance growth, use this:
Determine your Per Capita and multiply by attendance plus add in the per capita giving x the expected increase in attendance for the new year, divided by two. So the formula looks like this: (P/C x ATT) + (P/C x ATTgr / 2) = BL.

P/C = per capita giving
ATT = average annual attendance
ATTgr = expected attendance growth for the year
BL = Bottom Line

You need to divide your expected growth by two given the fact that your increasing attendance will spread out throughout the whole year. You also need to recognize that newcomers may not start giving for about a year! so don't put a lot of hopes on their giving prospects, unless you can quickly get them into membership as a church. (Remember, giving is the last to arrive and the first to go, in a family's church-going lifestyle.)

So there you have it; some rough guidelines to get on top of the numbers.
But most important: you need to pray, and seek God's leading, not only for expected giving, but for how you should spend the Lord's money.

Blessing in Christ,
Dr. Bill

Simple Church & REVEAL

Willowcreek has just released an awesome new book which "reveals" some important discoveries they have made about how people grow spiritually, and what is the role of the church in helping them to grow. It is going to be blockbuster dynamite which will alter the way churches do ministry for years to come. They just released it, and talked about it at the Leadership Summit this year. You need to read it. It is available directly from Willowcreek.

But one of the interesting aspects of this book is how closely it is tied in to "Simple Church" by Eric Geiger and Thom Rainer. In the most recent edition of the "Willow" magazine, from Summer of 2007 there is a quotation by Greg Hawkins, the Executive Pastor of Willowcreek. Here is what he says,
"We had a long-standing belief that the more involved with church activities people were, the more they'd be growing spiritually. We found that wasn't the case."

Where have you heard that before? That was totally the thesis of "Simple Church", (which you can buy from the books section of HighPowerResources.com). So the "Simple Church" message is being spread and gaining major credibility with the likes of Willowcreek coming on board.

So take a look at their new book "Reveal"; it will rock your world!

For Christ and His Church,
Dr. Bill

Time for Restructuring at your church?

A lot of churches could drastically improve their health and growth by doing a complete retool of their entire ministry operation.  Businesses do this on a regular basis when their old ways of doing things are getting stagnant.  For various reasons, we never seem to admit to the need or possibility of this in the church life.  Part of this is because we sanctify everything about the church, that to alter it would be to, somehow, mess with the will of God; as though God were personally responsible for how your particular church is designed.  But while Jesus Christ is the Lord and the head of the church, and the foundation and cornerstone, that does not make Him the author of your Constitution and By-Laws, and it may just be time to admit that those very human documents are out of date.  It's not a sin to say so.  Come on, say it with me:  "Our Constitution and By-Laws are out of date."  There was that so hard?

Once you've admitted it, you are on your way to a healthy restructuring of your church.

Here are some signs that it may be time to restructure your church:

(The headers (but not the comments under each) are taken from the July/Aug 2007 edition of 'Your Church' mag, which quoted from the Vision Training edition of BuildingChurchLeaders.com)

#1  - Rapid Growth

If your congregation has crossed any of the key growth barriers of 200, 500, 800, 1,000 or more, it is time for a retool.

#2 - Development of a Multi-Pastor Staff

Many times By-Laws are written to govern the development of various committees before multi-staff are hired.  Then when they are hired, there is often an overlap between what committees are tasked to do, and what staff are hired to do.  This develops an unhealthy situation where the lines of authority and control are unclear.   In many cases, it also puts your associate staff in the unenviable position of reporting both to their Senior Pastor, and to a previously established committee. 

#3 - Conflict between major boards or committees

Some C&B's simply have too many boards and committees on paper, and the entire organization needs to be streamlined.  Unclear lines of authority are a major cause of division and conflict within the church.  And too many governing boards and committees will cause overlap and confusion.

#4 - A clear gap between formal and informal leadership

Formal leaders are elected (or hired), but every church has those informal, non-elected people of influence who need to be approached before any major decision is enacted.  This would indicate that the election or nomination process is not sensitive to the leadership gifts which God has already placed within your church.  The nomination process may need to be retooled to include recognition of spiritual gifts, and informal leaders, who are true leaders, and not just church bosses, need to be placed on leadership boards.

Many of the issues related to restructuring need to be talked out thoroughly before embarking on such a dangerous journey in the life of the church.  A good coach can be a sounding board to allow the senior pastor to weigh the impact of church-wide changes to the Constitution or By-laws.  Contact me at DrBill@HighPowerResources.com if you want to talk about this.

Remember that the reason you are considering a restructure is not to 'consolidate power' or 'take over the church' or any of those crazy objections that people throw around when considering a revision of the By-Laws.  You are restructuring for growth, so that your church is more effective at reaching people for Jesus Christ.  So you are streamlined and smart and not weighed down with bureaucracy when you want to move your church forward in the cause of the Great Commission.  No other reason would justify the sometimes daunting task of restructuring an entire congregation, unless we are talking about making a difference for eternity.

Yours for the Kingdom,

Dr. Bill

SIMPLE CHURCH, p. 5: FOCUS

Simple Church, Part Five: Focus

I want to keep sharing with you what I have been learning from the book Simple Church, by Eric Geiger and Thom Rainer (which you can now buy from the HPR site under "Books"). This is a great book, because it really makes you think about church systems.

In our final look at the book Simple Church, we look at what is probably the most controversial part of the book; I know it is in our church.

The chapter is entitled, “Focus: Saying No to Almost Everything”. And THAT is a hard proposition in most churches.

The book flows like this: Clarity ⇒Movement ⇒ Alignment ⇒ Focus.

Focus means eliminating everything that doesn’t fit in with your discipleship plan. Geiger states, “People assume the more that can be squeezed into the menu, the better.” But as they make abundantly clear in the book, that is not always true.

They spend some time talking about the “one thing” principle, quoting various Scripture (Psalm 27:4; Phil. 3:13-14 “But one thing I do…”; Heb. 12:2 to “fix our eyes only on Christ”)

Focus is defined as “the commitment to abandon everything that falls outside of the simple ministry process.” And that ministry process has already been clearly defined as the church has worked on Clarity – defining what they are trying to achieve; and Movement – making a simple process to move people through the discipleship process; and Alignment – brining everything to work together toward that goal. That just leaves this final step, which is eliminating those which do not apply to the discipleship process.

This is backed up by research: “According to our research there is a highly significant relationship between church vitality and the church’s focus on the process” (Simple Church, p. 203). They also quote a doctoral study (Travis Bradshaw, University of Florida) which assumed that the more programs a church had, the healthier it would be. But what the researcher actually found out was that healthier churches had LESS program than non-healthy churches.

So how do you achieve focus?
1. Eliminate – “While eliminating programs is difficult, the data indicates that vibrant church leaders have the discipline to do so” (Simple Church, p. 205). You can eliminate programs by emphasizing stewardship. To be a wise steward of your people’s time, money and energy requires that you eliminate programs which consume too much of any or all three of these commodities. Simple Church is your church’s means of safe-guarding your resources for that which is truly important.

2. Limit Adding – as hard as it is to eliminate existing programs, then make sure you do not easily add new programs.

3. Reduce Special Events – These are the events that do not fit in the normal church calendar, nor in the streamlined discipleship plan, but someone is just so excited about them that the church decides to squeeze it into the calendar. But don’t do it! Rather decide how to use the event strategically by maybe combining it with another event or tying it together with the discipleship plan. With a little work this can be done.

I’ll close by quoting the German poet Goethe who said, “The key to life is concentration and elimination.” -- German poet Goethe

Eliminate the non-essentials, and concentrate on the most important aspects of making disciples, and your church will do OK.

Later,
Dr. Bill

The Problem with "Sandwich Services"

You know what I'm talking about - the "sandwich services" occur when a church squeezes a slice of Sunday School between the early morning and later morning preaching bread. Even though I went to seminary, and there should be some special theological term for a church with two services and Sunday School in the middle, I don't believe I ever heard one. Even in sem it was called 'sandwich services'. So, what's wrong with this arrangement for Sunday mornings? Nothing, IF YOU DON'T WANT YOUR CHURCH TO GROW.

Here's why: first some background; why does a church even consider the sandwich service approach? Typical little church has one service w/ SS either before or after; little church grows and needs a second service; typical conversation between members of the church is that 'if we go to two services then we won't get to know everyone, or see everyone each Sunday' (Which by the way is the number one mentality that will limit your church's growth forever; you must break away from modality thinking, and become a sodality (see C.Peter Wagner's works)). Someone suggests that if they do a common Sunday School, then they will still have a chance to see people; everyone agrees to this idea as a great way to meet the need for for two services and still see each other. But they are wrong.

Here's why: you are mixing philosophies which will limit your growth. Going to two services is a Growth Philosophy, but maintaining one SS is a 'Family' Philosophy. The Family Philosophy is the mentality that wants to keep one service and everybody together, while the Growth Philosophy says that since we need to reach more people for Jesus let's open as many services as we can to reach more people. But these two philosophies crash into each other - and the place where they crash is usually the parking lot. Yes, that's right, and more embarrassing than a Sunday morning crackup at church. Because what these people forget when they try to merge these two competing philosophies together is a basic law of physics: two objects cannot occupy the same space at the same time.

For while you rightly make room for extra bodies to dwell in the same pew space by having multiple services, you can't do the same for Sunday School if you want to just have one Sunday School session, using the classic 'sandwich services' approach. If your church is tapped out w/ one service, then it is quite likely that your parking lot will be very close. The only exceptions would be a church with a huge amount of parking space (maybe somebody in a rural area). But most suburban churches are limited in the amount of space for parking. So if the desired goal is that all the early morning people are supposed to stay for SS ("so we can see everybody together"), then when the late morning people show up, they are quickly going to run out of space for parking.

Then you will be encountering the problem known as 'sociological strangulation' (again, see C.Peter Wagner's works). People will try to park, not find a spot, and drive away. You will never know they were there. The end result of this is that the growth you were hoping would occur by adding a second service will be slowed (I'm not going to say eliminated, just slowed down).

There is a reason why 85% of the churches are 250 or less, and this is one, but not the only factor.

If you really want your church to grow by adding two services, then you just need to bite the bullet and go for two Sunday Schools too. Yes, that's right, you need another theological term known as 'flip-flop' Sunday School, where you have both a worship service and Sunday School at the same time, and then the next session, you 'flip-flop', do it again, encouraging those in worship to go to SS, and those in SS to head to worship. I know it's harder. But if you want to grow, it is also more effective.

I'll share some more thoughts on competing philosophies of ministry in the future.

Until later,
Dr. Bill

THE TWO HALVES OF CHURCH GROWTH

Most people only focus on half of the church growth equation, and therefore get less than stellar results. If you can focus on both halves of church growth, you will see your attendance numbers rise.

Everybody knows, and focuses on getting more VISITORS to your church. People may do outreach programs of various types, or spend money on advertising, or developing such exciting events that the positive buzz just keeps new people crossing the threshold into your church. And that is all great and necessary and important. But that's only the first half of church growth.

The second part, is not about increasing the number of visitors that come to your church, but about increasing the FREQUENCY of attendance by your REGULARS. You see, for many Americans now, "regular attendance" means only 2 or 3 times a month. Some even view themselves as regulars if they show up once a month at the same church. In fact, in one article I read by Lyle Schaller, he stated that a large percentage of Americans consider two different churches to be their "church home". For example, they may go to one church for the preaching and worship service, and go to another church for the youth program. Yet both churches consider them to be 'regulars' and mark them as such on the rolls. And then each church wonders why their attendance is not any higher.

In one large suburban church where I served, the attendance was averaging about 800. But when I checked the database for a list of regulars, it came out to be 1200 people! So their entire consituency as a church numbered 1200, but they only had about 66% of that constituency show up at any one time. This brings a lot of wrinkles into program planning. That means that if you wanted to make an announcement that you wanted the entire church to hear, you had to make sure you stated it for two weeks, and thereby have a better chance of all your 'regulars' knowing what's going on.

So if more of your regulars show up at the same time - that is, if you increase the frequency of attendance - you will increase your average attendance. For example, if those other 33% of that suburban church were to show up every week, they would be running an average of 1200 instead of 800.

So how do you increase frequency? Here are a few ideas:
1. You have to increase ownership. You have to help everyone in your congregation to feel the importance of their attendance each week. First for their own sake. They need to grow spiritually. They need to meet with the Lord. They need to worship and praise and fill their lives with joy. They need to serve somewhere.

2. Teach in sermon series. Emphasize the connection of all the messages together. Give a little intro tease for next week's message, and explain why it is critical that they come back for more.

3. Sign more people up to serve more frequently. In many churches, when people are making sign up lists for services like ushers, communion servers, coffee preparers, cookie bakers, etc. they sign up a huge crew of people, so that people 'don't have to do too much'. So they get signed up for something like once every three months. That doesn't do much for encouraging frequency does it? But if you pare those lists down, you increase the frequency of times people must show up to fulfill their obligations, and then you help them to develop healthy habits.

We need to realize that as church leaders, as shepherds, we are here to care for the people. And that means helping them to "flee temptation". People are tempted by the world to do many other things each week, rather than worship. But the Lord commanded us to rest once every seven days and to come into His presence for worship and prayer. When we help people to develop healthy habits of service or attendance, we are enabling them to overcome the natural lethargy of the human condition and to make a commitment to something that is true and good and noble (Php.4:8).

And that is the real reason to pursue church growth. Numbers are a by-product of a healthy church of regular attenders who know how to worship.

In Christ,
Dr. Bill

Grow your church by adding a Saturday Service

We have just added a Saturday night service to our line-up and the results so far have been great!

Here's the background: we are a church of 700 people with two Sunday AM services. Both services were experiencing the classic 80% problem. Not every week, but often enough for us to realize that we are 'full' (by North American standards of comfort). So we debated whether or not to add another service on Sunday, or a Saturday night option. We chose Saturday to provide another option for people who work on Sundays; medical professionals, firemen, police, and some butchers! who work on Sundays.

Results after two weeks have been very good. We have had 188 and 185 coming each week. Our average attendance has jumped up by 70-100 people per week. (We have a lot of overlap right now. That will shake out in the next several months.) Our two morning services have softened up a bit and provided more room for people who want to come in the morning. We already noticed that the demographics of this Saturday night service are considerably younger than our morning services. When asked why they chose Saturday night over Sunday morning, several young families said that it was much easier to get the little kids to church on Saturday, than to wake them up and get them ready Sunday morning.

We also have noticed that we are getting some new seekers from the community at this service. They saw the ad in the paper, or they came for the coffeehouse we run beforehand. The atmosphere on Saturdays is more casual, relaxed, and fun.

So that's all for now; I'll keep you posted.

Dr. Bill