What metric do you use to measure success in the church that you serve?
Years ago while attending Liberty University I was taught in my homiletics class that the sermon is successful by how many people walk the aisle at the “altar call”. Read that again. I’ll wait.
We were taught that a successful sermon moved people to walk forward and confess sin, “rededicate” their life to Christ, need prayer, etc., etc.. As a senior pastor I have had probably 5 people walk the aisle in the almost 8 years pastoring my current church. According to my homiletics professor I’m a failure.
Notice that success depending on whether or not I delivered a powerful sermon every week that moved the masses.
That’s just one metric that is used in the church. We always use numbers to define success in what we do. “How many did you have Sunday” is a very popular question asked by pastors to each other. We can’t help it. If your church is full on Sunday morning does that mean your church service was successful? Seriously consider that question. The majority will say yes. Does a packed church mean a spiritual church?
Years ago I had someone in my congregation remark that “In my opinion we should have eighty people attend our church. I like that number because it’s not to small and it’s not to large. Eighty is the perfect amount for our church.”. What are we? Goldilocks and the Three Bears Baptist Church?
Notice though that it was “my opinion” and “I like”.
I have sat through many a meeting over the last twenty years that go something like this: “What are we going to do!?! Our attendance is down!” or “What are we going to do our attendance is up and we’ve got nowhere to put them!”. Notice how numbers create stress either way? Notice that numbers define whether or not a church is successful. Something else that I noticed as an associate pastor and personally experienced as a pastor: It was our (pastors) fault. It’s our fault that the church is in decline or it’s our fault that we are not doing enough to provide for the growth. It’s a clown show.
Now one would think that men and women who profess Jesus as Lord would actually read their bibles. You would think that those attending church want to be there to glorify and honor The Lord Jesus whether in a worship service or “business meeting” which is normally just a gripe session for the divisive Bettys. If you read your bibles then you would know first that the church is made up of people who are born again by Christ.
Church growth is about people being saved not new people coming to church. The “church” is made up of people who are born again - “Yet to all who received him, to those who believed in his name, he gave them the right to become children of God - children born not of natural descent, nor of human decision or a husband’s will, but born of God.” John 1:12-13 NIV
The Corinthian Church had it’s share of division. One of those divisions was over Paul and Apollos so Paul had to remind the Corinthian Church who was really in charge:
“What then is Apollos? What is Paul? Servants through whom you believed, as the Lord assigned to each. I planted, Apollos watered, but God gave the growth. So neither he who plants nor he who waters is anything, but only God who gives the growth. He who plants and he who waters are one, and each will receive his wages according to his labor. For we are God’s fellow workers. You are God’s field, God’s building.” 1st Corinthians 3:5-8 ESV Emphasis Added.
According to Scripture, who grows the church?
We measure success in the God’s church by what we do, what we say, what we think. We look to the latest books by the “Church Growth” experts who point you to their formulas to their programs and to their processes. How come no one points you to Jesus who is the “author and perfector of our faith”? I guess there is no money in that.
I receive emails from our BGAV field strategist several times a week and he is always pointing us (pastors) to the latest greatest articles of leadership, church growth, ways to keep church members, ways to get people back, etc.. But he never points us to Christ. I wonder why that is? Is Scripture not sufficient? Is Jesus not enough? or we treat as Christ the last resort. My gosh what have we become?
My point? We look to ourselves rather than Christ for our success in the church. We forget that the church belongs to Christ and it is His to do as He pleases. Or we do not want to acknowledge that truth. Which, by the way, is a lot more scarier.
Pastors, have you tried prayer? And then wait on The Lord? Aw… that’s the real issue right? Impatience? Either by you or your Bitter Bettys?
Our success is in Christ and not in ourselves. Point people to Jesus because it is all His anyway.