I’m not much of a bettin’ kind of guy. I played the ponies once in the UK … I won and decided to keep my winnings and never played again. Did the same at a casino playing the slots. I won and walked away. When it comes to gambling, I’m a been there, done […]
What are the costs of transforming a church? They can be steep … very steep. I got word this week of a church that engaged a pastor to help them grow and transform has essentially imploded … no, it’s really an explosion that may be responsible for killing a career and perhaps tainting the […]
I had a conversation recently with a small group of mainline pastors and the conversation naturally turned to church transformation and church growth. When I asked how they measured whether their churches were growing, plateauing, or declining I started getting the typical excuses and defensive posturing I so often hear.
“Numbers aren’t important.”
“Numbers don’t really […]
It’s a rainy and stormy Saturday morning here in Columbia, Missouri. It’s Hurricane Ike weekend, so I have nothing to complain about. I’m relatively cool (though humidity sux), I have power, and my home is dry. As I write this, it’s too early to gauge the devastation of Galveston and Houston, but it isn’t […]
Bill Easum and Tony Jones are in the midst of a conversation about the Emergent Church at the Emergent Village website … it’s called a Blogologue. I’m keeping up with it and enjoying the ride. One of the comments on “Part 2” caught my attention though, and in the midst of another conversation I’m […]
I’m in the midst of a fantastic conversation with a pastor of the Reformed persuasion and the topic of targeting worship for particular demographics, micro-cultures, etc. came up. He suggested that some consider targeting to be less than okay and that he “resists” the target terminology.
That’s not an uncommon notion in the church today. […]
This post started off as a response to a comment left by Frank in the Churches That Don’t Want To Grow post. He attends a fifty year old church in a fifty year old neighborhood that’s suffering from decline. He wanted to know a bit more about visitor follow up and so on.
So, let […]
I had a GREAT conversation with the pastor of one of the churches I mentioned in my post Churches That Don’t Want to Grow. It probably won’t take you long to guess which of the pastors contacted me, since only one even had any way to know that I was there! So, this pastor […]
Those who’ve read any of my church renewal/small group books or who are familiar with my work with Easum, Bandy & Tenny-Brittian know that when I speak about DNA, I mean the six strands that answer the question “Who is this congregation?” A congregation’s DNA can be found in every part of the local […]
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