Small Churches

The World’s Best Small Churches

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No one will ever make a list of the best small churches in the world.

And they shouldn’t.

After all, a great urban small church looks very different from a great rural one. Same with a great Baptist and Methodist church. Or a great small church in Japan or Costa Rica.

Even if there was a way to figure that out and put it on a list, it would be a really bad idea. I can’t imagine all the arguments, ego and pettiness that such a list would provoke.

But what if there was such a list? And what if that list could somehow be an accurate one? In this make-believe scenario, could you imagine your church being on the list of the world’s greatest small churches?

If not, why not?

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Coming In 2018, “Small Church Essentials” Is Just Around The Corner

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It’s coming!

Yesterday, I sent the manuscript for my next book into the publisher.

After decades of living it, years of teaching it, and months of writing it, “Small Church Essentials” is in the capable hands of the great editors at Moody Press.

Here are some details.

The full title is “Small Church Essentials: Field-Tested Principles For Leading A Healthy Church Of Under 250.” (Yes, that includes churches that are way under 250.)

It’s a continuation of the ideas I wrote about in The Grasshopper Myth. While that book was mostly a statement about the value of small churches, this book has a more nuts-and-bolts approach to pastoring a small church well.

It’s set to release in March 2018.

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Is A Successful Small Church An Oxymoron?

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If we hope to overcome the perception that “successful small church” is an oxymoron, we have to redefine success the way Jesus did. And that starts by answering the question in the title with another question. Namely, “what is a successful church?”

The answer to that question is not found in buildings, budgets or butts in the seats. It’s found in the simple, two-part formula for success laid out by Jesus himself. The Great Commandment and Great Commission.

Are we loving God? Loving each other? Making disciples? Sharing our faith? Any church that’s spending its time doing that instead of obsessing over budgets, building projects, making a name for the pastor, petty infighting and the like, is a successful church. No matter how big or small it is.

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6 Ways To Leverage Your Church’s Limited Resources For Greater Ministry Impact

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No church can respond to all emergencies. So every church needs a plan that helps decide which needs they’ll respond to and which ones they won’t. This isn’t easy, but it’s important.

Sometimes a church’s priorities will be based on the severity of the need, but we also should make some of those decisions based on which needs we can make the biggest difference in.

By setting those priorities, a church is less likely to run out of resources on lesser needs (or needs they have less impact on) before coming across a need where they can have a huge impact.

It’s better to prioritize our resources to maximize our ministry influence than to have those decisions made for us by running out of funds.

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Real Church Growth Doesn’t Just Make Bigger Churches, It Heals Hurting Ones

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How did the church of Jesus grow for the first 1900+ years of its existence without any megachurches around?

That’s how long it took for the first megachurches to appear on the landscape. They’re the new kid on the church block. Until the middle of the 20th century, the relentless growth of the church moved forward, not through growing bigger churches, but almost exclusively through the multiplication of smaller congregations. And that’s where most of the growth of the church still happens today.

The church must always grow. The church will always grow. We know that because Jesus said he’d do it. In some places, that means larger congregations. In most places that means more healthy small congregations.

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5 Ways Small Churches Help Big Churches Without Getting (Or Asking For) Credit

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Big churches and small churches all have something to contribute to the body of Christ.

But, because of their size, the contributions of big churches tend to get noticed more. That’s okay. We don’t do this to be seen. (At least we shouldn’t).

And sometimes the attention that’s received from the glaring spotlight on big- and megachurches is unfairly harsh and critical. So our big church brothers and sisters need our prayer and support, not our jealousy and criticism.

But there’s an interesting side-story going on in the church that no one but small church pastors are in a position to notice. Small churches don’t just contribute good things to the body of Christ in general, we’re providing ministry for big churches that no one else is aware of.

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Big Churches And Small Churches: Contrast Without Criticism

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Sometimes we need to highlight the differences between church sizes in order to lead them properly.
“Big churches do something this way, while small churches do it this way” needs to be a regular part of our leadership learning and dialog.

But highlighting those differences should never be done in an ‘Us vs Them’ manner.

We need to learn how to contrast without criticism.

People in almost every other field of endeavor (like cooks, contractors, publishers and scientists) know this. They regularly compare, contrast and utilize different ingredients, tools, fonts and methods to become better at what they do. Leaders within the body of Christ need to have a similar approach to our extra-biblical differences.

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The 3 Biggest Problems With An ‘Every Number Is A Person’ Approach To Ministry

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When a pastor says “we count people because people count” and “numbers matter because every number is a person,” I agree.

Everyone in a church service, a discipleship class or a small group is a person for whom Jesus died. And knowing how many of them are in the room is a vital first step in ministering to them.

But it’s just a first step.

Every healthy church knows this, both large and small. But when we’re constantly bombarded with the importance of numerical growth, it can be easy to forget that attendance figures are only the first – and often the least helpful – step in determining how well we’re meeting people’s needs and challenging them into a deeper walk with Jesus.

As important as it is to keep accurate records, there are three big problems with allowing attendance figures to become a primary determiner of effective ministry.

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