Small Church Thinking: A mindset that guarantees a church will remain small, no matter what efforts are made to the contrary.

There are many different mindsets that keep a church small, but I heard one just the other day … out loud in front of God and everybody else:

Why do we have to have two services? If we do that, we won’t be able to know everybody.

Exactly. That’s the point.

If you know everyone in the church, it means that you’re averaging under 125 in worship (and probably a lot fewer, given the frequency of church attendance anymore). In fact, several studies have suggested that we can only really know about 105 people … and most know fewer than that.

So, if you insist on “knowing everybody” at church, you’re guaranteed to never grow your church over 100ish … which guarantees your church will remain small and financially unsustainable.

All that’s to say … if you’re planning on growing your church, you’ll need to embrace the reality you’ll never know everyone. And that’s a very good thing!