I believe your small town church can grow; I believe this because I’m living it.
The small town church where I serve as Executive Pastor will turn 12 years old this year. In those 12 years we’ve experienced incredible growth in many different areas. We’ve seen hundreds of people experience salvation and take their next step through baptism. We’ve seen our giving increase tenfold. And we saw our average weekend attendance top 700 people, in a one stop light town with a population of 2,200.
I believe small town pastors have amazing opportunities to do big things in their communities. I believe your small town church can make a big impact, and I believe your small town church can grow; I believe this because I’m living it.
But, before I get you too excited, let me warn you that it wasn’t always this way.
When Strong Tower Church was launched in 2006, we only knew one method of doing church, the way everyone else in our community was doing it. We launched with 87 people in attendance at our first service, and at the end of 2006, we had grown to 86 people. Best-case scenario at this rate was closing our doors after 86 years. Not exactly what you dream of when you plant a church.
The Barna group said that in 2003, the average Protestant church size in America was 89 adults. So, after our first year of ministry, we had basically achieved average. It was at this point we knew we had to start making some changes if we wanted to see the church grow.
In the past 12 years, I can say almost everything about our church has changed. The one thing that has remained the same has been our passion to uplift the name of Jesus and our passion for loving people. I have no doubt that these two things have been the cornerstones of our success.
As far as the changes that have helped us grow, there are ...
from
http://feeds.christianitytoday.com/~r/christianitytoday/ctmag/~3/SpcvfIukFh8/five-decisions-that-helped-turn-around-my-small-town-church.html
No comments:
Post a Comment