This one’s for the pastors, especially those of you fairly new to the guild. It’s a little secret about church work: People make assumptions on the numerical status of your church based upon whether they like it. It’s not based on counting heads on Sundays or tracking the attendance figures in the newsletter. It’s based on how happy they are with their experience.
If people like their church experience, they will think the church is growing even if it isn’t. If people don’t like their church experience, they will think the church is declining, even if it isn’t.
In one church I served, the deacons were looked upon as a governing board, and a few made a failed run at ousting me. The real reason was that they weren’t getting their way, but their stated reason was that the church wasn’t flourishing. It didn’t matter that we saw a 20% increase in average attendance and more baptisms than any previous time in the 150-year history of the church. Those were pretty good figures, considering this was a church in a small town with a stable population, not one in a city’s suburbs where you have a lot of new families moving in.
But I guess it would be hypocritical of me if I were bitter of experiences like that when I benefit from the other side of that coin: Across 30 years of leading churches, I’ve also had my seasons when people clap me on the back and compliment me for leading a growing church when, in fact, the numbers have stalled. They see it as growing because they can’t imagine anyone not liking all the things about the church that please them so much.
If my remaining 20 years of ministry (God willing) are like the first 30, I can expect seasons of numerical growth and decline—because to everything there is a season. I hope I will have patience with folks who think their disappointment with my leadership is shared by everyone—and the humility with folks who think their happiness with my leadership is shared by everyone, too.
No comments:
Post a Comment