Articles for tag: Church growth

Prayer Worship & Prayer

Life Lessons on Prayer

By Brian Giese It is easy to neglect prayer. The devil does all he can to distract us from it. We can rationalize it to the back burner because of our busyness. We can go day after day without anybody other than God knowing we have neglected prayer. This writer has been a slow learner in the school of prayer. I had been preaching 15 years before I began to take prayer seriously. That was 30 years ago, and God has taught me a few things about prayer during that time, for example: Prayer deserves priority. A national poll

August 10, 2011

Church Leadership

Feed My Sheep

By Bill D. Hallsted The dream came again that night. It was always the same dream, with minor variations. In the dream, I was asked by some friends to care for their animals while they were gone. I don”t remember whether the dream even included why they were gone, or for how long. What was clear was my failure. The request, or my agreement, was not at all foreign to my experience. With my background in ranching, it was natural. I knew how to take care of animals. I was also the preacher. Who better to ask for a favor

July 13, 2011

Giving & Fundraising Stewardship & Generosity

The Marriage of Resources and Passion

By Bert Crabbe One of the greatest growing challenges for church leaders is to figure out how to put the resources of older churches into the hands of younger ones. And when I say older churches, I mean those that have a building but don”t have enough people or income to keep the lights on. And when I say younger churches, I mean those that are bursting at the seams but can”t yet afford to own property. And yes, I know just because a church is older doesn”t mean it”s dying, and just because it”s younger . . . you

July 12, 2011

Church & Ministry

When Churches Close

By Justin Horey Everything that begins also ends. We may recognize thatÂ fact when we”re talking about businesses or vacations orÂ even relationships. But what can we do when it”s time forÂ a local congregation to shut its doors? PJ”s Abbey has been one of many distinctive restaurants in Orange, California, a town that bills itself as the antiques capital of Southern California. With “an eclectic mix of old family favorites and creative cuisine,” PJ”s Abbey was notable for its menu, but most widely recognized for its facility””an old church building. It”s an unusual concept, to be sure, but certainly not a unique

July 8, 2011

Our “˜God Is Able” Verse

By Dennis Bratton He walked into the classroom and drew three stair steps on the blackboard. On the bottom rung he wrote “To Know.” On the second rung he wrote “To Feel.” And finally the third rung received the phrase “To Do.” This was J.B. Richardson”s formula for Christian education, and I never forgot it. I like things that are simple, make sense, and work. When preaching, for instance, I would use the “stair steps” to evaluate the sermon. To Know“”what is the truth this sermon exposes? To Feel“”is the truth presented in a way that can reach the heart

July 1, 2011

Church & Ministry Community Outreach

A Church Planting Milestone in Canada

By Jennifer Taylor According to Jim Tune, senior minister with Churchill Meadows Christian Church and director of Impact Ministry Group (both Ontario, Canada), the area is home to only six other Christian churches””and their combined attendance is less than 500. So CMCC”s new building””and the more than 1,200 people who attended the opening services in March””is a milestone for Canadian church planting. “Churches are closing faster in Canada than any other area, including Western Europe,” Tune says. “Church just isn”t on the radar. In fact, people assumed our building was an industrial complex or school because they don”t have

May 4, 2011

Church & Ministry Community Outreach

Shifting the Focus to Neighborhood Ministry

By Jennifer Taylor “Neighborhood Ministry has become our nerve center,” says Ashley Wooldridge, executive pastor at Christ”s Church of the Valley (Peoria, AZ). “It is the reason our church is growing.” CCV senior pastor Don Wilson created Neighborhood Ministry three years ago to more effectively accomplish the church”s mission of winning people to Christ, training them to become disciples, and sending disciples to impact the world. Each person at CCV is encouraged to join a neighborhood group””a weekly gathering of people who live in the same neighborhood or subdivision. The groups meet each week in a study based on the

April 28, 2011

Growing Church, Part-time Staff

By Kent E. Fillinger When Don Hill started a new church in Harrodsburg, Kentucky, he wanted it to appeal to ordinary people. Hill wanted people to remember that before Jesus was the Messiah, he was an ordinary carpenter. This concept was reflected in the new church”s name””The Carpenter”s Christian Church. Carpenter”s began with a core group of 30 people and held its first worship service in the show barn at Anderson Circle Farms in March 1999. In its early days, the church met in rented facilities throughout Mercer County. In August 2003, when Greg Warren became the church”s second senior

April 22, 2011

Christmas or Easter?

By Kent E. Fillinger Why do churches pay more attention to Christmas than to Easter? If you surveyed a group of church leaders, the common response probably would be, “Evangelism””we want to create welcoming environments for people to bring guests, and Christmas is an optimal opportunity to do so.” Really? Businesses measure “return on investment”””whether a product or venture yields a return that warrants the investment required to offer it. From the standpoint of a return on investment, Easter consistently dominates Christmas in attendance. For example, the average megachurch experienced a 74 percent increase in attendance on Easter, compared with

April 20, 2011

The Church Size Matrix (Part 2)

By Kent E. Fillinger The Church Size Matrix looks at six types of organizational change that take place as a church grows. In Part 1 of this article (April 10/17), we looked at two of these changes, Orientation and Structure. This week we consider the remaining four. Minister”s Role In his book One Size Doesn”t Fit All, Gary McIntosh wrote, “As the size of a church increases, the perception of a pastor changes from an emphasis on relational skills, to functional skills, to leadership skills.” It is essential, therefore, to understand the progression of roles required by the senior minister

April 19, 2011

The Church Size Matrix (Part 1)

By Kent E. Fillinger Less than 20 years ago, a megachurch was an anomaly. Today there are roughly 1,500 Protestant megachurches””56 from among the Christian churches and churches of Christ, representing a 250 percent increase from the 16 megachurches recorded in 1997, the first year Christian Standard reported megachurch attendances. But while the number of megachurches has dramatically increased during the past decade, the size of the average church has not changed since 1998. The median conservative Protestant church in the United States has 117 regular participants in worship on Sunday mornings. The median refers to the point at which

April 18, 2011

Making Disciples?

By Kent E. Fillinger What about small groups? Should they be “euthanized,” as Brian Jones asserted (January 23) or promoted, as all the writers in Christian Standard”s March 6 issue suggested? We asked the churches we surveyed for their answer. For the first time, the churches that participated in this study were asked: “What is the primary method for adult discipleship (spiritual formation) at your church?” Churches were given these three choices to select from: Sunday school classes/adult Bible fellowship classes, small group Bible studies, or a combination of classes and groups. Here are the findings. Not a single megachurch

April 17, 2011

Church & Ministry Church Planting

Interview with Justin Miller

By Brad Dupray At an annual growth rate of 65 percent, Real Life Christian Church of Clermont, Florida, was the fastest-growing megachurch in Christian Standard”s survey a year ago. Justin Miller came to Christ at age 9 at First Christian Church, as Real Life was formerly known. As Justin describes it, he came into ministry “through the “˜doggie door” of church leadership.” Asked to serve the youth of the church as a volunteer, he eventually was called to serve as senior pastor in 2002. Since that time the church has grown from about 200 to its current attendance of about

April 6, 2011

God Is Giving the Increase

By Kent E. Fillinger A Dilbert cartoon recently featured Dogbert, the consultant, standing in front of a projection screen asking, “Where does your company fit on this comprehensive list?” The list on the screen included, in order: “Facebook, China, Irrelevant.” The next frame showed three bug-eyed employees, followed by a third frame in which Dogbert says, “Now let”s form breakout groups to fantasize about being relevant.” Just as Dilbert”s mythical company is identified as being irrelevant in the business world, the church has been declared irrelevant by our culture, and even by other Christ followers for decades. A quick scan

April 6, 2011

Counter Culture

By Mark A. Taylor “I”m an editor. I work with words.” I”ve used that excuse more than once when I”ve miscalculated or misunderstood or misapplied some list of numbers. (My wife says she hopes I don”t die before her, because it would take her a month to figure out what”s going on with our checkbook!) So if you prefer ideas and expressing them over numbers and analyzing them, I understand. But I urge you not to ignore all the facts and figures in posts we”re planning for the next few weeks. Here”s why: We serve a God who keeps track

March 22, 2011

Another Statement About What”s at Stake

By Mark A. Taylor A longtime reader of CHRISTIAN STANDARD paid us a wonderful compliment earlier this year. “Thank you for giving us a magazine that makes us think,” he said. This likely would have seemed a small achievement just a generation or two ago. There was a day when many in the Christian churches and churches of Christ spent more energy defining orthodoxy than questioning tradition. But fresh winds are blowing today””new churches, growing congregations, multisites and multimedia and external focus””all of it energized by a crop of younger leaders sold out to finding new ways to evangelize. “It”s

February 21, 2011

Miscellaneous

Interview with Dudley Rutherford

By Brad Dupray Dudley Rutherford is a third-generation minister who has attended the North American Christian Convention for more than 40 years. He is in a family that produces ministers: both brothers, both brothers-in-law, both uncles, and his cousins are also ministers. His ministry of 24 years at Shepherd of the Hills Church in suburban Los Angeles has challenged him to think creatively and diversely. The church has benefited, having grown from 300 to more than 8,000 during his tenure with an ethnic mix that goes beyond just reflecting his community. Dudley earned his undergraduate degree at Ozark Christian College,

February 6, 2011

Church & Ministry Youth & Children's Ministry

Pep Rally Jesus and Other Youthful Myths

By Jim Herbst Imagine the Sermon on the Mount this way. The people are seated on the mountain. They use a tent as a staging area. Ten apostles start playing drums. The apostle John comes out to the beat. He encourages the crowd on their feet and leads the chant, “We will, we will, rock you.” Next the apostle Peter comes out dancing. Mary and Martha run out from behind the tent and start doing backflips. Finally Jesus comes out and gives high-fives to the waiting crowd. The crowd, still chanting, goes wild. Peter starts the wave. And then Jesus

January 24, 2011