Surviving or Thriving: Options for the Declining Church

Here’s the bad news…

 

• 65-90% of American Protestant churches are plateaued or declining in attendance.

• 1% of America’s Protestant congregations close their doors each year.

• The average congregation of about 75 in Sunday attendance wins less than one adult unbeliever to Christ per year.

• Most churches believe that they can keep doing the same things in the same ways but will at some point magically begin getting different results.

• The typical church plant becomes inward focused in a few years and goes most of the way through the lifecycle (see diagram), from birth to death, in about 30 years. We cannot plant enough new churches to compensate for this problem and many of us are uncomfortable with simply “disposing” of older churches.

 

But here’s the good news…

 

• Churches which began with a dream of conversions and changed lives, but have grown old and tired, can experience vibrant new life with the help of God and God-empowered leaders.

• Dying churches can become REALLY GREAT CHURCHES because they love and serve a GREAT GOD, who, by His GREAT GRACE is able to make His people into GREAT PEOPLE.

• Even the smallest church in the smallest town can claim promises such as “I will build my church and the gates of hades will not prevail against it” (Matthew 16:18) and “…all authority in heaven and on earth has been given to me. Therefore go…and surely I am with you always, to the very end of the age” (F/Matthew 28:18-20).

• Congregations which practice passionate, desperate, prevailing, prayer – along with bold, strategic leadership and bold, strategic disciple-making action – testify that they experience “the manifest presence and power of God” (Dann Spader) and “Jesus Christ, obviously present and actively in charge” of their churches (Oliver Price).

In short, Jesus sometimes “removes” congregations, but this is not usually necessary.  His desire is to restore declining churches to vibrant, joyful, disciple-making health and He has given us the resources to make this happen!

 

Let’s look at our options…

 

Most of the terms used here are, unfortunately, used in a variety of ways by today’s authors and church leaders.  I’ll try to be as clear as possible with just a few words.

 

I’ll say this twice: Any of the options described below are greatly helped by the coaching of an outside-the-church consultant or denominational leader.  In other words, I can help you with this, so let’s talk.

 

• REVITALIZATION (a.k.a., church “turnarounds”) – A church revitalization or turnaround involves an intentional, strategic process of prayerfully taking a church through an honest evaluation of its practices and values followed by significant change, resulting in new life, new love, new joy and new disciple-making effectiveness.

• RESTART – This is a more intensive and extensive version of revitalization and often involves a new senior pastor and a “shut down” period during which the church reinvents itself.  Think in terms of the restaurant makeover shows on television.

• THE REDEVELOPMENT OR STRATEGIC TRANSITIONAL (INTERIM) PASTORATE – This option is for the church which does not currently have a long-term solo or senior pastor.  An interim specialist takes the congregation through the initial stages of the revitalization process described above. Since a complete church turnaround typically takes about seven years (think in terms of an aircraft carrier needing seven miles to make a U turn), the turnaround adventure is continued by the new, long-term pastor whom the transitional pastor helps the church to locate.

• REPLANT – In a replant, the congregation is legally dissolved and a church planter restarts a new church with a new name in the existing building, theoretically at least, with a different group of members.

• FOSTERING – This involves a struggling church “handing over the reins” of its leadership – for a limited period of time – to an outside entity such as: a denomination, a larger, healthier church, or a team of board members and pastors from several, nearby congregations.

• ADOPTION OR OTHER TYPES OF MERGERS – Jim Tomberlin and Warren Bird (Better Together: Making Church Mergers Work) are “bullish” on the value of church mergers and identify several types: Rebirth mergers, Adoption mergers, Marriage mergers and Intensive Care Unit mergers. Many successful mergers today result in the formerly struggling congregation becoming a multi-site location for a thriving church.  Done poorly, church adoptions and mergers work poorly.  Done well, the results can be very exciting.

• THE LEGACY OPTION – In this option, members who care about the Great Commission but feel that their churches have shrunken beneath the level of a “critical mass,” sell their assets and give them away to new church plants and/or other Christian ministries.  Some congregations have been delighted to see how many ministries could be richly blessed by their assets.

I’ll say it again: Any of the options described here are greatly helped by the coaching of an outside-the-church consultant or denominational leader.  In other words, I can help you with this, so let’s talk.