Consulting, Coaching & Chatter

I heard it again today. “Youth are the future of the church.” Whenever I hear that I realize the person saying that means that if we don’t win the youth over to the faith that the future of the church is bleak. It’s a noble thought, but it’s not particularly accurate. Youth programming seldom grows a church with very few exceptions. First let me mention the exceptions and then I’ll elaborate on why youth don’t grow churches.

The primary exception for youth growing a church is when the church’s PRIMARY signature ministry is their youth program. What this means is that the youth programming is so well funded and so well known in the community that if you asked a pastor of any church in town “What church is known for it’s life-changing youth program?” that church is the one instantly named. Churches with youth as their signature ministry typically purchase or build a youth center off of the church’s campus and it is staffed daily and into the late evenings. The church would sponsor sports, concerts, and so on in the youth facilities. In addition, those that work with the youth ministry are focused on youth and family ministry, in that they are connecting intentionally with the youths’ families to help walk them into the larger church’s ministries. Typically, churches with less than 500 in weekly attendance and a 100% commitment to youth ministry (over any other ministry) are the only ones who can successfully use their youth program to significantly grow their church.

Before I go on, I need to clarify what I’m going to say next with this. I’m NOT saying that youth ministry isn’t important. I AM saying that it is a “mission” of the church that will drain resources, sort of like most men’s ministries. I’m not saying don’t do youth ministry … I am saying that it won’t grow the church. Youth ministry is not a growth strategy. An expected ministry of all programmatic churches, yes. A strategy to grow the church, no.

Here’s the reality. Youth programs are expensive in terms of funding and staffing if they’re done right … and honestly, even when they’re done poorly. The vast majority of churches provide youth programming to round out their family programming and the youth ministry primarily serves the youth members of the church. Few churches are able to compete with local non-church events and activities in terms of attractional qualities and so the local unchurched youth don’t even consider church events as a viable option. Providing pizza and Coke is no longer an attractive come-on for youth. They simply have better and more entertaining things to do.

However, let’s suppose for a moment that the handful of youth a congregation has as “members” or children of members/participants are willing to be evangelists for the youth program. Those of their youth friends that do attend rarely bring their families in tow. If the worship service appeals to their parents, it is unlikely to appeal to the youth and vice versa. Unless youth programming is offered simultaneously to worship, it’s difficult to provide worship opportunities that appeal to both. And so, with all that put together, almost no church that puts their church growth dollars into the youth programming will see a positive return. Are there exceptions? There are ALWAYS exceptions, but if you’re about to put all, or even many, eggs into the youth basket thinking you’ll be one … well, it’ll probably be a very expensive lesson.

At this point in our culture, only two “programs” grow a church. Incredible over-the-top worship in the language, style, and technology of the target audience. And incredible children’s programming. But if you don’t have #1, putting a lot of work into #2 will grow a church with a revolving door because the parents won’t hang around after the children are youth because they won’t be personally invested beyond their children’s needs.

I got a note the other day from a church pastor who asked me to explain to him and to his congregation why they should engage in an on-site consultation. His church is struggling with breaking the 200 barrier, has a large endowment fund that they’re unwilling to touch, and are living as if they’re broke. In other words, they’ve found themselves in “Survival Mode” and are panicking about their decline. In this transitional economic climate this is becoming a norm for many congregations today. And so I thought I’d share my response. Perhaps it will trigger some conversation in your context.

1. We’re no longer living in a culture where church is a part of the cultural conversation, whereas the church generally lives under the false presumption that, with the exception of progressive technology, people are still people and if they would just understand what the church is all about and what we have to offer they would line up to become Christians. People under 40 don’t think that way and we can’t reach them using the old standbys like “Pack a Pew” Sunday, revivals, or even crusades. Good marketing can gather a crowd, but the crowd will primarily be church shoppers who already believe. If the church is going to be serious about being the church, it has to come to terms with the reality that they generally don’t know what they need to know reach their communities. That’s where we come in (Easum, Bandy & Tenny-Brittian). We work coast to coast and understand the national ethos, the changing culture, and what it takes to help a church transform its thinking to become relevant and effective. An on-site consultation gives us the opportunity to adapt and apply what we know nationally to the local context and to help communicate that in ways your congregation can hear.
2. Eighty percent of church transformations fail in the US and the most difficult transformation of all is to break the 200 barrier. To break the 200 barrier a congregation has to move from a Pastoral organizational model to a Program organizational model. A consultation, when coupled with post consultation coaching, increases the odds of success by taking the pressure off the pastor to say what needs to be said. The move from Pastoral to Program is fraught with political implications because it necessitates the relinquishment of power, control, and management by the selected few in order to create a new system that facilitates growth. Few congregations and pastors understand the process and fewer still are able to negotiate the reorganization and behavioral changes. That’s why, at best, 20 percent of transformational attempts succeed. We’ve worked with over 1,000 churches to help them face issues like this one.
3. In tight economic times such as these, churches tend to “hunker down” to weather the storm. They take a look at their dwindling income and the escalating costs of keeping a building open, paying utilities, salaries and benefits, and they begin to wring their hands and make cutbacks, beginning with the church’s program (one of the few line items that appears discretionary). However, this is the one area by which a church is measured by a visiting guest. Cut the program budget in your church to your bane. One of the advantages to an on-site consultation is that we experience and evaluate your programming first hand - and because we’re in churches nationwide, we can offer creative suggestions that can bolster your programming to make it both effective and attractive to those in your community.
4. Most churches in the under 200 category are older … and churches over 40 years-old are in the steepest decline in the US. Further, these older churches have older members. If you create a graph and put the age of the congregation as one axis and time as the other, the escalating age of the congregation in relationship to time has a significant impact on membership. The graying of our congregations does not bode well for the future and many churches we work with discover they have only ten to fifteen years left to make whatever changes are necessary to be relevant to a younger, unchurched audience. Sadly, many of these congregations call us when it’s frankly too late … they need a miracle and we’re not miracle workers. Transformations take time. Significant time. Even a highly motivated congregation will be faced with several years of foundational work. Turning an ocean tanker around takes many miles and much time. An established church with your attendance tends to behave more like a tanker than a speedboat – it won’t turn on a dime. An on-site consultation creates an opportunity for conversations and the great Aha! moments that are necessary before a congregation is willing to invest heavily in their future.
5. Finally, when a congregation is faced with the reality of their graying and decline, they often fall into panic mode and begin to behave as if the Titanic is going down. Church leadership is faced with having to make changes, but they don’t have the experience nor resources to make timely and relevant decisions. Creativity is the first thing that disappears when panic sets in, and yet creativity is the only hope for most congregations. In panic mode, they’ll work harder at what they used to do, at what they have experience in, hoping that their renewed energy will grow the church. But what worked even ten years ago seldom works today. One of the fallacies of many churches is that they’ll send leadership to a conference or two or three that’s produced by large and successful churches. And though these events are motivational, the ideas they present work well for large churches, but rarely can be applied to churches with less than 500 in average worship. The ministry ideas were created for a Corporate organizational church model and though they sound good, they seldom transfer. We’re in hundreds of churches of all sizes and denominations every year, keeping our eyes open, and learning what’s working today in a variety of contexts. When we do an on-site consultation, we bring a breadth of knowledge that few have access to.

When you’re backed into a corner, it’s difficult to see options. That’s true for individuals and it’s true for organizations as well. If your congregation is in that boat, if the only option seems to be cut the program budget, try and do more of what you’ve already done, and if you’ve talked yourself blue in the face trying to communicate that to your congregation, it might be time for something a bit different. Maybe.

On top of being a transformational church consultant and involved in spiritual leadership development and training, I also wear a hat called the New Church Department Chair. In that role, I lead a small group of Christian leaders in the NE Area of Missouri who are committed to developing church planting. We’re currently seeking indigenous church planters and developing the assessment tools for selecting appropriate candidates. We could, of course, leave our denomination to do the assessing for us … but several of us on the New Church Department have had first-hand experience with their work and we’ve become committed to doing our own assessment. Not because we want to reinvent the wheel or because the denomination doesn’t have a good heart. But, like most mainline denominations, there’s suddenly a push to plant a bunch of churches and it’s very, very difficult to raise up highly qualified leaders. And so, rather than start fewer churches that might experience success, there’s a move to approve even marginally qualified people to start churches. I suspect the rationale is that by starting a lot of churches, that at least some will succeed. Those that don’t are simply acceptable losses.

The problem is, those “acceptable” losses are bankrupting middle judicatories as well as those churches and organizations who are funding failure after failure. And that doesn’t even take into account the carnage being wrought in the lives of the failed church planters and those few that they managed to gather to start a new church. I’ve repeatedly seen failed marriages, moral failures, and much stress-related disease ransack these poorly assessed “acceptable” church planters.

An effective assessment process is all about behaviors, not willing canon fodder. When we assess a candidate, we’re less interested in getting the candidate accepted and a lot more concerned with whether or not they have the behavior patterns not only to start a church, but to stay the course. The premise of the assessment process is that the best indicator of future performance is past behavior (Charles Ridley).

For instance, one of the questions that we ask is for the candidate to tell us about a time when they were responsible for gathering a crowd (of almost any size) for an event. If they’ve never done that, there’s a good chance it’s because they can’t do it. Most of us have had opportunities to gather a crowd for some sort of an event … birthday party, dinner party, backyard barbeque, etc. But doing it just once isn’t enough. We’re looking for patterns of behaviors. Do they gather crowds as a matter of course, or did they only do it once or twice. Patterns. Lifestyles. That’s the key to whether or not a candidate can do a church plant.

Other questions include asking them to recount times when they intentionally started a conversation with a stranger. If they don’t do that as a pattern, they can’t plant a church. We ask them about sharing their faith with others. If they aren’t doing that they can’t start a church. If they don’t behave as an entrepreneurial, crowd gathering, faith sharing, not-afraid-of-strangers kind of person, they’re not going to make it as a church planter I don’t care if you put them in a room with 1,000 spiritually starving seekers.

The reason so many mainline church plants are struggling is because their assessments appear to be based on education, desire, and whether or not the person is breathing and has a pulse. We’re so desperate for people willing to endure the difficulties of church planting that we’ll approve almost any candidate who is willing and “qualified,” typically meaning seminary educated. Of course all bets are off when it comes to ethnic minority candidates … apparently we don’t think that a seminary education is all that important for ethnic starts (hmmm, there may be a reason ethnic starts are significantly more successful and less expensive than Anglo starts in the Mainline).

What we’ve learned and experienced is that there are a number of church planter wannabes who “think” they could start a church. “How hard can it be? If I didn’t have to deal with the board, the deacons, and all the politics, it would be so easy to ‘run’ a church.” What they don’t realize is that if they can’t work through difficult people or if they can’t “sell” their vision to an existing church board, they probably don’t have the skills that will carry them forward in church planting. It’s just not that easy. If they can’t grow a church, if they’re not doing adult baptisms, if they spend more time behind their computer than with people, give them a miss. They just can’t do it.

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 that aficionado. And yet, the fact is, if you’re in the church leadership biz, whether you’re a pastor, a deacon, a board chair, Sunday school teacher, or bench warmer, we’re all playing a gambling game.

I’m not talking about whether there’s a heaven or a hell. It’s not whether or not there’s a God that your betting on (if you are, then let me try to put your mind to rest … there is and there is). Those are sure things. The gambling you’re doing is betting that your congregation’s strategic focus will transport you and your congregation into the future.

You may remember the dire predictions: 100,000 churches will close by the end of the decade (that rumor’s been going around for over 15 years now, according to Olson in The American Church in Crisis -p 118). The real numbers hover around 32,000 churches that closed in the past decade. That’s about 1.1%. On the other hand, in none of the 50 states did church planting and church growth keep up with the population. The good news is that the average size of church in USAmerica has risen from 54 to 124. The bad news is that it appears the reason for the “growth” isn’t because the smaller churches are growing, but because the smaller churches are ceasing to exist and the mega-churches are offsetting the losses and raising the stats significantly.

But I digress. If you’re a church leader of any stripe you should be scrutinizing whatever strategy your congregation’s is using to meet your mission (you DO have a viable mission, right?). And here’s the gambling part … few churches even think in terms of key strategies. Instead, most churches employ an almost random practice of bouncing between one tactic and another in hopes that something will carry the church into the future and reach the community for Jesus Christ.

I was reading in the September 2008 issue of the Harvard Business Review and came upon a sidebar that lists six questions every company should ask. The one that caught my eye included an interesting anecdote.

Would we bet on it?

Gordon Bell, a prominent investor who funds start-ups, is very blunt with executives of firms in his portfolio. For instance, when someone makes predictions for company performance, Bell will zero in on one number and ask the CEO, “Wanna bet? A side bet, you and me, for $1,000.” If the CEO gulps, Bell knows he or she has doubts. At least once, when an underperforming CEO didn’t take the bet, Bell had him fired.

Well, church leader … willing to make a bet that your congregational strategy is going to achieve your goals? (No goals? See The Growth Debate for why you need them.) If you haven’t developed a strategy yet, that may well be your next step. If you don’t know how (or what) a strategy is, check out the blog entry on Completing the Missing Genetics of the Congregation’s DNA. And if you have both … would you stake $1,000 of your own money that you’ll meet your predictions by, say, the end of the year?

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 lives of new Christians who have been severely wounded in the blast. The denomination was called in to do an investigation of the pastor’s alleged misconduct at the church.

This week the investigation of the pastor’s conduct came to an end. The over 60 charges of breaches of pastoral ethics were primarily dismissed, with the exception of a couple. Those charges are now formalized and being sent to the denomination’s ethics and discipline committee who will most likely find the pastor guilty of at least one of those charges and will probably slap him on the hand and stick a note in his records for the world to see. It will be difficult for this pastor to effectively serve another church anywhere.

Here’s the kicker … the pastor’s primary “sins” are all related to his good work of leading a congregation into the transformational process. He worked very hard at bringing in new families. He appropriately worked through his board and his elders to ensure the church was onboard with his plans. When the old guard of the congregation realized that they were fast becoming a minority and that they were losing “control” of the church, they started a $&*+storm. They reactivated old members, they began surreptitiously tape recording meetings, and they made allegations - allegations that the pastor was trying to take the church out of the denomination (a battle cry in this tribe), that he had fallen into the clutches of the “conservatives” and had “stacked” the board with his cronies - never mind that the congregation had elected them into those positions. Those who opposed the transformational efforts (that heathen music, the new-age projection, the new requirement that all leaders attend adult faith formation groups … or else they would be asked by the board to take a sabbatical until they had time to participate) organized and brought over 60 charges of pastoral malfeasance against him.

When the investigation began, the pastor was warned not to retaliate nor to tell his board or elders the nature of the investigation. He abided by that. So, when the investigative team asked for congregants to come and speak with them, the board and the elders were blindsided about what was going on. Across the aisle, so to speak, the opposition had no such gag order and they lined up a long queue of complainers. Not surprisingly, the investigators got a slanted story.

I wish I could tell you this kind of treatment is rare … but I can’t. The unChristian vociferousness of this church has gone to atypical heights, but pastors who dare to lead a transformation effort are putting their jobs, their futures, their livelihoods, and sometimes even the pensions on the line. Is there no wonder that we’re closing over 3,000 churches a year in USAmerica and the number of successful transformations are rare.

The cost of leading a church transformation is high. I know pastors who have literally had heart attacks, suffer clinical depression, have been physically attacked, have lost their marriages, and in some cases lost their faith because they attempted to lead a transformation. Oh, I didn’t mention how many choose to leave the ministry, but there’s a slew of them too. Burn out is the norm for pastor’s leading church transformations … and success is rare. We often cite the 80 percent rule … that’s the number of church transformation failures, but that’s probably an optimistic number.

Are transformations possible? Absolutely. I’m in the process of coaching a congregation through one right now and the pastor is fairing quite well. It’s a slow process and we spent almost eight months with the church’s council in developing congregational expected behaviors and a leadership covenant (that includes an expectation that all leaders will attend adult faith formation groups). There has been little fallout … so far … and because they’ve taken their time it looks like the new direction the church is about to embrace will “take.” It’s not a sure thing and the pastor is aware of the potential consequences, but so far so good. However, this congregation is a rarity. They have a long-tenured pastor who is well trusted and respected. They invited a consultant not only to coach the transformation process, but to do ongoing training with the church leadership so there are no surprises. They have taken the necessary time to process changes and have been serious about adult spiritual transformation as the bedrock on which all of this has been built. And most promising of all, they’re not only talking about the transformation process, they’re embracing, living, and modeling the behaviors of a transformed community.

If you’re considering taking on a transformational project as a church leader, consider carefully. You’re needed out there in the trenches, but be VERY selective about what church you choose to hook up with. Many of them contain Sirens singing from the rocks.

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 tell the story.”
“You can’t measure what’s really important.”

Yada yada. Excuses, every one of them. It’s clear that numbers are important enough to God that there’s even a biblical book named after them. And they’re important enough to Jesus and the apostles that they knew there were 12 apostles, 70 sent forth to preach, 4,000 fed, 5,000 more fed, 120 in the first Church meeting and 3,000 men baptized after the first public altar call. Oh, and just in case there’s any question about that was then … there are 144,000 marked and sealed saints in the Revelation.

Numbers count. Not because the size of the church is important. Jesus said that he shows up whenever two or three are gathered together (oh wait, those are numbers too). But numbers are important because each one of those numbers is a person who desperately needs the living God.

So, numbers are important. The question is which numbers? Well, IMHO the most important number of all is the number of the unchurched (define “unchurched” however you’d like - they’re all important). In most communities that number is about 83 percent of the population (if you thought the figures were more like 60 percent, make sure you take a gander at Olson’s The American Church in Crisis). So, if you live in a community with 100,000, as I do, then figure there are about 83,000 people outside the church. Now that’s an important number.

But let’s talk about numbers of the church. How can we faithfully and honestly measure growth or decline? What should we be measuring? I attend a church regularly that does a large number of baptisms and it’s membership rolls are swelling … but it hasn’t actually seen any growth in worship for almost a decade. They’re growing, but are they? And then I’ve worked with a number of churches that are quite large and have a growing worship attendance, but when the leadership has significant conversations with the attendees, they discover that the worshippers aren’t growing spiritually. So what can we measure?

Well there are any number of measurements that we could take, but there are seven key indicators that are the most helpful in measuring the growth or decline of a church. These indicators include (1) Average Worship Attendance; (2) Adult Baptisms (3) Small Group/Faith Development Participation; (4) Per Capita Giving; (5) Mission Involvement; (6) Personal Discipleship Practices; and (7) Reputation (I’m indebted to the Rev. Dr. Kris Tenny-Brittian of middle judicatory fame for quantifying this last measurement).

If there’s interest, we can talk about these more fully later, but let me conclude this post with a brief description of each of the Seven Key Indicators of Growth.

• Average Worship Attendance: How many people show up for worship services. Count ‘em all or just count adults - just be consistent.
• Adult Baptisms: Yes, officially any baptism counts, but adult baptisms measure conversion growth … or how many of that 83 percent you’re actually reaching. Biological growth is important, but as church leaders we don’t have much control over this one.
• Small Group/Faith Development Participation: How many adults regularly attend a small group or faith development group. Taking one course in Christianity doesn’t indicate mastery of the subject. The key is ongoing participation and attendance.
• Per Capita Giving: To find this number, divide your offering plate receipts by the average worship attendance. There’s an old saying that the last part of a person to be converted is their checkbook. If this number is increasing, that’s a good thing.
• Mission Involvement: How many in the congregation are involved in some hands-on mission work outside the church. It doesn’t matter if that involvement is with Habitat for Humanity or the local food bank. The question is … is the average person attending your church getting more involved in mission because of their faith or not.
• Personal Discipleship Practices: This measures whether the congregants are engaging in developing their personal spiritual practices such as Bible reading, dedicated prayer time, faith sharing, faith encouragement, and so on.
• Reputation: What is your church’s reputation in the community? The only way to find out is to ask - if you guess, you’ll be wrong. Most churches might be surprised to discover that if they suddenly closed and locked their doors, almost nobody in the community would even notice. Is your church’s reputation getting better or worse?

Well, that’s the seven measurements of a growing, plateaued, or declining church. Any one of those indicators doesn’t really tell you much … but taken in specific combinations, it will tell you plenty.

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 going to be pretty.

As I watch the winds whip through the trees and the birds and squirrels hanging on to the feeders (or hiding inside a feeder, as this squirrel did), I pondered and prayed “What’s worth saying in these days?” What’s worth reading? What’s worth writing?

That’s a question I have to help churches and church leaders deal with all the time. I’ve been invited into many conversations and heard a lot of monologues (sometimes called sermons) that communicated little and prompted me to ponder why I’d invested any of the limited time I have for such palaver. Just what is worth saying?

There’s a huge difference between what people “want” to hear and what they “need” to hear. However, that difference is ameliorated by the ability of one to communicate to another. In other words, if I try to tell someone what they desperately “need” to hear, but they’re not at a place where they can hear me, I’m wasting my breath and their time … and I might even be creating impermeable walls that thwart future conversations. If I’m going to have a meaningful conversation with someone, I’d better be cognizant of our relationship level and the “right” that I have, or have not, developed that might enable me to speak truth into their life.

So, what’s worth saying? If you’re a faithful disciples of Jesus, then you have a story to tell. You may be surprised to hear this, though. It’s not the historical story of Jesus your friends or your congregants are most interested in hearing. As important as that is - and it is important - that’s not what most people want or need to hear. The story you have to share is a much more personal and intimate one. What people want to hear about your faith, more than anything else, is how this Jesus guy turned your life upside down. They want to know that he’s for real in your life and that he’s made a real difference. They want to know there’s authentic hope in this God - not because some ancient book says there is (there are LOTS of sacred books that claim their god is powerful and great), but because you have the goods on this particular god. You know him personally and this God is awesome enough that it’s worth getting up in the morning and facing whatever storms that life tosses at you.

It comes down to what I call the ultimate question: “What is it about your relationship with Jesus that your neighbor can’t live without?” If you have the answer to that, you have something worth saying. If not … well, there’s always the weather, sports scores, and recent sitcom plots to fill in the time.

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 having with a local pastor, it got me to thinking about one of the most common misunderstandings about the early church.

There’s a saying that when you’re lost in the woods it’s hard to see the forest for the trees. That’s never more true than when the average Christian picks up the book of Acts and reads about the early church. Because we are so embedded in our culture, whenever we see the word “Church” our enculturation takes over. Sure, everyone knows that church isn’t a building, it’s a people … a called out people at that. But the fact is, I’ve yet to meet the pastor, let alone the lay person, who doesn’t slip by saying that they “go to church” or that there’s a meeting “at the church.” In our culture, church is a place and Christians are the people who go there.

And so when the average reader reads the book of Acts … or any of the letters following Acts … then it’s difficult not to allow the brain to impose much of today’s culture on yesterday’s church. So, try something. For a moment think about the church at Thessalonica. Paul wrote at least two letters to that church. What do you suppose that church was like? Ask yourself questions like (1) How many members did the church have when Paul wrote the letter to them? (2) Where did they meet? and (3) What would “worship” have looked like?

As for members, first remember that the New Testament never speaks of members … the elect, yes … members, no. There were definitely believers and non-believers, but that was pretty much the dichotomy. As for numbers, there were probably only a handful or two at first. Where did they meet? In homes, in the marketplace, here and there. What did worship look like? Good luck with that. Remember that they didn’t have Bibles … though they had a couple letters from Paul, they certainly would not have considered them holy writ … and the Hebrew Scriptures were pretty much reserved for the Jewish folk, plus you had to be fabulously wealthy (and literate) to afford a single scroll, let alone a complete set. So, no scripture reading, no psalms, etc. In fact, the clearest picture we have of their gatherings is found in Acts 2:42-47 and Acts 20:7-9. In both of those passages, we see that informal was the order of the day. They ate together, they hung out together, and when there was “preaching” it was dialog, not monologue or even “proclamation.” Conversation. Try that this Sunday during the “sermon time.”

Was the church a diverse community? In it’s larger manifestation, yes. In its local manifestation? Not very. Check out 1 Corinthians 1:26 where it’s clear the majority of the participants were of the lower classes. Because the local manifestation of the church met in homes, they tended to be more homogeneous than not. The larger church was clearly multi-ethnic, but there’s little evidence that this translated into the local setting. Indeed, the opposite is actually the case. Sure, some Jewish Christians hung out with some non-Jewish Christians, but that behavior was rare, as evidenced by the practices in Acts and the letters.

Now, don’t get me wrong. I’m not taking a swing at what we practice in our “doing” church today. It would be nice, IMHO, if the church practiced being the church rather than waiting until Sunday morning to “do” church, but that’s not the point. The point is that when the emergents and the incarnationalist and the organics talk about the early church, we can’t stop at the Reformation or even the early pre-Reformation church to get an idea of what the early church looked like. And we can’t presuppose that it’s anything like today’s church because it wasn’t (try telling your congregation that from now on they’ll be spending most meal times with each other and that they will need to hang out with each other daily from now on; that the local weekly meeting will be in homes, not a church building … and each local manifestation will only be as large as what will fit in a living room;  - oh, and no more preaching, but dialogos - conversations - beginning immediately; and I’m not touching the implications of Acts 4:34 where the church made sure that NONE of their brothers or sisters were in need).

One last comment … we are given very little guidance on how to “do” church in the New Testament. However, there is a LOT about how to “be” church in the New Testament. Perhaps that’s what’s really important. I’ve always thought that if God wanted to give us a model for doing church, our New Testament would look like our Old Testament and we’d even know what materials to build our baptismal fonts … or the dimensions of the baptismal pools.

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. When I suggest that a worship service become more focused in its approach to reach a particular segment of the community, or when an additional worship is warranted and I recommend a missionally focused service, there’s regularly some pushback. There are a number of ways church leaders have expressed why they think targeting is wrong, but ultimately it comes down to the fear that targeting is exclusionary.

I get that. I really do. In fact, I get that all the time. But the fact is, I’ve yet to attend a worship service that wasn’t targeted. Oh sure, some are more broadly targeted than others, but every worship service I’ve ever attended has, in fact, been exclusionary.

Take for example a “traditional” worship service. By traditional I mean that hymns are sung from hymn books; traditional instruments (or no instruments) are used; there may be responsive readings; traditional language is used such as doxology, invocation, and benediction; and prayers are often written rather than extemporaneous. Of course there are alternative practices that could be listed, but you probably get the idea. These traditions, as wonderful as they may be, presume a congregation that is both familiar and comfortable with them, in other words, a “churched” audience that has significant history of being churched. When a thirty-something family with no church memory shows up in a church like that, it’s not unlike dropping into your local Greek Orthodox church or a Mosque and then trying to figure out what’s going on, what’s being said, and then wondering how to worship in that setting. Everything would be foreign to us and the chances of us experiencing the wonder of worship in that setting would be slim.

But at least our traditional service is presented in the mainstream culture … the average person could understand it, at least. That’s not necessarily so. Traditional services often use words, traditions, and rituals that make no sense at all to the typical unchurched person who almost certainly hasn’t memorized the Lord’s Prayer and doesn’t even know enough to ask “Sins, debts, or tresspasses?” Today’s “mainstream culture” is media and image driven. That’s how people learn today, but the traditional worship is print and auditory driven. Today’s music (actually for at least the last 50 years) is beat driven. Traditional hymns are lyric driven. The differences can go on and on.

The point isn’t that traditional worship is outdated and ought to be ended. By no means. There is an important place for traditional worship and when a congregation is filled with those who appreciate and love traditional worship (not always just seniors), a lot of energy should go into producing an excellent traditional service. But let’s not fool ourselves: Traditional Worship Is Targeted.

What about a “blended” service? There are the exceptions (and almost every pastor who’s wedded to traditional churches think their congregation is one of them), but in the vast majority of cases, a blended service tries to please everyone and ends up pleasing no one. Regardless of the micro-culture that attends a blended worship service, virtually everyone is going to have to compromise their own proclivities to experience worship. Those who live and die by the organ are going to despise the guitar and keyboard. Those who value the freedom of expressive worship will resent the explicit order of service. Etc. Blended services try to target everyone but ultimately discovers there is no “everyone.”

Let’s be honest here. The Bible is exclusionary in its inclusivity. Even Jesus said that he’d come for the Israelite … but then he made sure that there were provisions made to reach each one. No single congregation can reach everyone, and they weren’t called to. The “Church” (capital C) is called to reach everyone, but we have to realistically share the load with one another. Targeted worship simple recognizes the reality that not everyone is going to relate to the style, methods, music, language, etc. of a particular worship service. As Paul said, therefore, we must become all things to all people that by some means we might reach some. That may mean we keep our traditional worship service - maybe even make it more traditional - and start something “new” that missionally targets a different micro-culture.

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 me offer a couple of observations. Churches that find themselves in this kind of dither would generally benefit from either an on site consultation or a one day training event. It’s really very difficult to offer specifics about what a church needs to do without knowing the church fairly intimately. If you’re interested in something like that, let me invite you first to visit the EBT site and get some information … or contact me directly.

With that said,I’ll make some general observations.

First, before you do anything, you have to check your hospitality level. Are you really as friendly as you think you are? Few churches are. The easiest way to discern your hospitality level is to get an unchurched person to visit the congregation (you might have to pay them), don’t tell anyone in advance that they’re coming, and then have them check out the congregation’s worship. Have them keep their eyes open for relevance, friendliness, cleanliness - in short, all the things they’d most likely be looking for anyway. Then meet them for lunch about a half hour after they’ve left and record the conversation. You’ll need to record it because nobody else will believe you when you tell them what they report.

Second, you have to determine whether what your worship is experiential for those who might visit. Imagine going to a worship service where the style of music was totally foreign, the words spoken were difficult to follow, and the customs were unfamiliar - for most people, even well churched people, the opportunity to experience a touch from the Holy would be slight. Same goes for an unchurched person. Our songs are often from two, three, or four hundred years ago, played on instruments that were last popular with the Doors (a mighty long time ago for many of us), and the style of communication and the traditions we practice can be difficult to follow (ask a thoroughly unchurched person to define “invocation” or “doxology” or if you really want to get an odd look, ask whether they can quote the Lord’s Prayer and whether they say sins, debts, or trespasses.

If your worship is meaningful to your community; if your hospitality is excellent, then follow-up is critical.

There are a number of ways to get contact information in worship, but in my experience, the most effective is a three-pronged approach. (1) Have a prominent, well staffed, attractive, relevant, up-to-date, Information Kiosk. There should always be two people at the kiosk who are more interested in being available to visitors than they are in each other. They should be so well briefed, that if a guest asks “What’s important to the members of this church” that they could recite from their heart the core values of the congregation. Those staffing this kiosk need to be the sharp pencils in the box and they should be trained not only to be founts of information, but have the wherewithal to get visitor’s contact information.

(2) Get rid of your pew pads … they’re only more effective than doing nothing, and that only just - UNLESS everyone in the congregation fills them out completely every single week. And I don’t mean they just put their name in the book and check the “I’m a member” box. Completely. And since that’s not going to happen, find a nice dark file box for them and tuck them away in the attic. The most effective way to get guest information is to have a registration and prayer request card (one card, two sides) that is included as a tear off in the weekly program. Then, during the service, a moment is taken for EVERYONE to fill out the registration cards (it won’t matter how much info the members put, so long as they are writing on the cards when everyone else is) and to add any prayer requests to the card. After a few moments, the cards are collected … preferably separately from the offering plates, but you can combine the registration with offering if needed.

(3) The third part of the trifecta is to raise up and train floaters. Your congregation will need a couple of these gregarious, charismatic folks (if they’re currently singing in the choir, kick them out - gently - so they can do what they really do best … connect with people) to float around the worship space to connect specifically and foremostly with visitors and guests. When they spot on of us, they go and introduce themselves and strike up a conversation. By the time they’re through, if they’re good (good does not include pushy), they’ll know which small group or ministry the visitor might enjoy or benefit from, has their contact information (which is collected at the Information Kiosk), and maybe even has a coffee date for later in the week.

One last thing about the floaters. If you do the standard “Greeting Time” where the majority of people somehow think there’s a contest on how many hands they shake during the two-minute period, then it’s critically important for the floaters to keep their eyes open for guests who came late and to get into their space to welcome them, find out if there are any questions they may have, and in general to be friendly.

Put the three of these together, you’ll find you get more contact information than perhaps you’re ready for. As for what to do with that information … if your church has less than 400 in attendance, the pastor visits first time guests within 24 hours. If there are more than 500, a visiting team will need to be developed, though if you can get a team of up-fronters to do the deed, all the better. Again … 24 hours.