Bells Ringing in My Ears
I had to vacate my house for the night because some remodeling was being done, so I checked into a Holiday Inn. While I was out walking my dogs, one of the biggest mainline churches nearby began to ring out old hymn tunes. I was a block away and it hurt my ears. I went into […]
Growing Your Church? You’ll Need Alliances
The following post is a rough draft of a section in the book 21st Century Strategies for Church Growth that I’m in the midst of writing. Your feedback is appreciated. If you’re with me so far, then I’m guessing you’re pretty serious about growing your church. One might think that everyone in the church would […]
Career or Call (from 21st Century Strategies for Church Growth)
In the introduction of 21st Century Strategies for Church Growth, my primary purpose is helping a pastor decide whether or not they can handle the heat in the kitchen of church growth. The following excerpt challenges each reader to question themselves about why they’re in ministry in the first place. It comes across as a […]
21st Century Strategies for Church Growth
Over the next several months I’ll be working on what we consider the foundations for church growth. It’s based on the nine strategies we’ve identified as the core for faithful, effective, and sustainable church growth in the 21st century. As I write, I’ll be posting segments here … and I’ll endeavor to post something from […]
New Year, New You
And by “new you” I mean “new congregation.” With over 85 percent of all churches in North America either in decline or on a plateau (and those on a plateau are generally those on the precipice and about to go over the cliff of a decline), a makeover of your congregation is probably in order. […]
How Do You Measure Success for Your Church?
Welcome to 2013. How are you going to measure the success of your church this year, and every other year, for that matter? Worship attendance, finances, Sunday school and/or small group attendance, the number of baptisms, the number of new leaders raised up? What if I told you that even though these are all important, none […]