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How We Connect: The Decline of Denominations and the Rise of Size
We live in an increasingly post-denominational world. I don’t know if that’s good or bad, it’s just the way things are now. Years ago, virtually every friend I had in ministry was within my own denomination. Every program my church used came from our denominational headquarters. The idea of ministering in any significant way outside
Ministry Reality Check: We’re All Gonna Pastor a Small Church
Three facts sit atop my “things I wish someone had told me in bible college” list. Fact #1: 80-90% of pastoral ministry students will never pastor a church larger than 250 people. Fact #2: 99.9% of us will pastor a Small Church for at least some time in our ministry. Fact #3: You can pastor
Only In a Small Church: The Easter Sunday Blues
The resurrection of Jesus is the greatest event in history. But Easter has an unseen downside for many Small Churches. Right now, all around the world, churches are excitedly preparing for Easter Sunday. Lilies are being arranged, choirs are rehearsing, Passion Plays are being staged, Easter eggs being stuffed and hidden, extra services are being
How to Free Yourself and Your Church from Easter Insanity
Our church doesn’t participate in Easter Insanity any more. You know what I mean. Churches spend weeks of time and buckets of money for Easter Sunday services. Flyers go out to the neighborhood, ads runs in the “Easter ghetto” of the local newspaper (ask your parents). We hold extravagant musicals, add extra service times, perform
My Church Isn’t Growing – Don’t Assume You Know Why
New Small Church is not about putting others down for having opinions that are different than mine. And I’m not a fan of stirring up controversy for the sake of controversy. But I’m going to walk close to that line in this post. Stick with me, though. By the end, I hope you’ll agree that I stay on
How to Stay Motivated as a Small Church Pastor
Pastoring a Small Church isn’t for wimps. The hours are long. Everyone calls with urgent and not-so-urgent needs. And the to-do list never gets done. Or…not. The first six months I spent as a lead pastor of a Small Church were among the hardest in my ministry. Not because I was overwhelmed by the workload,
Only In a Small Church: Sometimes You Gotta Kill Cockroaches
Small Churches aren’t just smaller versions of big churches. They have unique gifts, challenges and methods of operation. But not everyone realizes that fact. Including some Small Church pastors. This often leads to frustration when we go to ministerial conferences or read pastoral books. Most (usually all) of the speakers and authors are from large
The Day My Church Lost Hundreds of Converts – And I Learned to Be OK With It
People can behave in ugly ways when we try to take the credit that should be God’s alone. This is a story of one of those times. It’s a story that might upset some people, because it airs some of our dirty laundry. (If the title hasn’t ticked you off already, that is.) But it’s also
If the Apostles Didn’t Teach Church Growth, Why Do We?
Why does everyone want to be like the first century church? From what I can tell, it wasn’t that much different from today’s church. They had large and small churches. Healthy, sick and dead churches. Churches with strong leaders, weak leaders and sinful leaders. They worshiped God imperfectly and fought over theology. Some churches gave
