Is your church growing, or is it a "Maintenance Church"? (One that maintains its size year after year.)

Are you, as an active member of God's family, actively persuing God's commandment of being evangelistic in nature?

Why does God bless some churches but not others?

I've seen all kinds of churches (Restoration Movement) that seem to be happy "Maintaining" their numbers... is this biblical?

Just a bunch of thought provoking questions.

By the way, if you ARE growing, what do you attribute it to?

-- Anonymous, October 14, 1999

Answers

Hey there Nelta, Just to provoke further thought,,, by what measure do we consider a church to be growing? What is the church to grow in? More food for thought... Dave

-- Anonymous, October 14, 1999

Hello again, Dave!

First of all....what is the *church*. What is this *thing* that is suppose to grow? Just a little background on the word *church*. (I know you know this.) King James has in his instructions on translating the KJV that the word *church* be left in the translation. He said not to translate that word *community* which in reality is the meaning of ekklesia. Why did he do that? He wanted it to be an *it* an institution that he could be the head of. Because of that and Rome...we have inherited that word *church* which is not what ekkelsia means. That is why we *plant* churches. In reality, if there is one person in a town that is a Christian he is the *church* in that town until others join him. And he is not an *it*.

What are we as individuals suppose to grow in??

-- Anonymous, October 14, 1999

Nelta, you make a very fine point on your explaination of who the "church" is. I also understand Nate's questions in light of "Modern Day" thinking, and I believe the answers to church growth lies within your remarks.

Personally, I have very little use for playing the "numbers game" in church. Neither do I feel that the typical church who only wants to or cares to maintain its current membership is being true to the Great Commission.

I approach the topic like this: 1) The "church" is the believers and followers of Christ. 2) Church growth would therefore actually be defined as the maturation of those believers - increasing in their knowledge and practice of the Scriptures. 3) As these believers draw nearer to the principles of the Scriptures and in their love of Christ - they should naturally take to heart the Commission to reach out to others with the Gospel. 4) As these embark on such personal evangelistic efforts - the church numbers will follow.

If you think about - this is the very same method that has brought people into the "church" for the last 2000 years - It Works. And that is why I encourage Evangelists (preachers) to put as much teaching into their sermons that they can. That way people learn more and mature faster and begin their personal evangelistic efforts sooner. One "Evangelist" in a church can reach a few people each week - 50 or 100 evangelists in a church can reach many, many more.

Plus, those that come to church through this type of teaching/maturing process tend to stay much longer than those who "join" because of programs (which is a whole other thread).

The Bottom Line, as I see, it is thus: Keep teaching and preaching the Word - God will work out the numbers.

A fellow servant, Mark W.

-- Anonymous, October 15, 1999

Paul said it best in the following Ephesians 4: 11 And He gave some as apostles, and some as prophets, and some as evangelists, and some as pastors and teachers, 12 for the equipping of the saints for the work of service, to the building up of the body of Christ; 13 until we all attain to the unity of the faith, and of the knowledge of the Son of God, to a mature man, to the measure of the stature which belongs to the fullness of Christ. 14 As a result, we are no longer to be children, tossed here and there by waves and carried about by every wind of doctrine, by the trickery of men, by craftiness in deceitful scheming; 15 but speaking the truth in love, we are to grow up in all aspects into Him who is the head, even Christ, 16 from whom the whole body, being fitted and held together by what every joint supplies, according to the proper working of each individual part, causes the growth of the body for the building up of itself in love.

When the church (you and I) do what the above says, we will not only maintain what God has given, but we will also reach out to the lost by allowing our lights to shine to give the glory to God. We will quit worrying about the minor things and begin to major in the business of our Father in heaven. Wow, what a NEW program for the church to be doing.

I have no clue as to why some churches are being blessed and some are not. I believe attitude might have something to do with it. I believe that some of the Lord's churches are more concerned with form than what is in the heart. Sort of like cleaning the outside of the dish before the inside is cleaned. Clean on the outside and dead on the inside. From the heart come our treasure. Where is our heart? Heaven or on earth.

I personally would rather see the church be slower in growth numerically and be growing in spirit so that they can handle the numbers. If we don't have maturity in the body as to handle all the baggage that new Christians bring with them, it becomes a mess. We also must expect the Christians to grow and become what God wants from them, and not remain as they were spiritually 10 years ago. Maybe that is the main problem with the church, that we don't expect people to grow in grace and in truth, but allow them to remain as they are, hence the maintance mindset. Maintance is like sin, it is now acceptable in many churches to allow sinful lifestyles. Like the church at Corinth, the man who had his father's wife. God does not like this. When will we wake up?

-- Anonymous, October 19, 1999

I believe that churches that "maintain" themselves to the point of no growth are not Biblical churches. God's will for His church is to grow.

At our church, we measure growth in a number of ways...our vision is to Bring People In, Build People Up in Christ, and Send Them Out.

If people are bringing their friends and sharing Christ with them, we know that we are helping people grow in their faith and they are sharing their faith with others. So, we can attribute growth by the number of people attending our services, but, more importantly, by the numbers who are giving their lives to Christ and who are actively involved in the church- growing in the Christian walk.

-- Anonymous, November 13, 1999

This title, "Maintenance churches" is an interesting title. If we could throw out the word *church* there would be no thought of maintence. The way discussions go the idea of what the people of God really are gets lost as the talk is about an *it*.

Again, we are all the universal body of Christ. It is when we break up into different groups (supposedly for encouragement and edification that we might go back into our daily lives and do good deeds) that the problems start. A name is given to the group, which in reality is simply Christians in a given location gathering or meeting together.

These groupings are not for the purpose of bringing sinners to *hear the gospel.* Not to say a sinner cannot come in, but not if it causes the Christians to NOT receive the encourgement, needed. Actually, a sinner would feel out of place in such a gathering because the Christians are there because of their Father and the sinner does not have God as a Father. When he is taught and he obeys and is added to the body then he can become a part of the gatherings.

How is he taught? The early Christians went about their lives telling the good news of the gospel. The community of believers grew by leaps and bounds, especially when persecution set in. Evangelists WENT to the sinners and taught them who Jesus was and what He did for them. Christ said *go*. Religion says, *come* to us in our buildings....etc.

-- Anonymous, November 13, 1999