My purpose here is to glorify God by helping you to discover yourself, build you, train and impact you with the necessary information that will change your life, finances, career, relationships, business, ministry and family; to make of you a success before God and man through proven Biblical and life principles.
Let’s talk about common barriers that keep
churches from growing. These are barriers you will have to address,
particularly if you want your church to continue to grow after doing a
campaign, such as 3, 4, 7 or 40 Days in the Word.
Remember that a church becomes healthy by
removing the barriers and balancing the purposes.
There are 10 common barriers that keep our
churches from growing. They are:
1) Members won’t bring their friends to
church;
2) People fear that growth will ruin the
fellowship; and
3) Churches are driven by tradition rather
than the purposes of God.
4) Churches are trying to appeal to
everybody. If you ask the typical church, “Who are you trying to reach?” they
will answer “everybody.” That sounds good, and it’s biblical, but the fact is,
no church can be everything to everybody. The moment you determine what style
of church you’re going to be, you determine whom you’re best going to reach.
Can you imagine a radio station that played techno one minute and classical the
next? What kind of audience would they have? None! You have to define your
target. Start by asking three questions:
Who is like me? You can best reach people
like you. What’s the likelihood of farmers reaching a group of scientists? Or a
community of military personnel reaching a community of peacekeepers? The first
question people ask when they visit your church is not a theological one. The
first question they ask is, “Is there anyone else here like me?”
Who is already in our church? Whoever you
want to reach, you need to put those kinds of people onstage in your service.
If you want to reach families, make children visible.
Who makes up the community around us? If you
find that people in your church are not like those in your community, you have
two options: Keep doing what you’re doing, but do it better. There is still a
possibility for limited growth. Or, you might look at relocating. I once helped
three or four churches make a move at the same time, one African-American, one
Hispanic, one Asian, and one Anglo. In one weekend, to better reach their changing
communities, they all switched buildings! At Saddleback, we speak over 70
languages among us. But we didn’t get there overnight; we built it one target
at a time.
5) Churches are program-oriented rather than
process-oriented. Program-oriented means you build your church on a Sunday
School program, a women’s program, a children’s program, a singles program, and
so on. There’s nothing wrong with programs, but you don’t build your church on
programs. You build it on the process of bringing people in (evangelism),
building them up in Christ (discipleship), teaching them how to do service
(ministry), sending them out (mission), and all for the glory of God (worship).
Saddleback has been doing this for 32 years; the process has never changed.
When someone asks, “What are you going to do
next year?” I don’t wonder what program we’re going to do or not going to do.
We look first at our process and ask how we can better bring people in, build
them up, teach them how to serve, send them out, and all for the glory of God.
We use a baseball diamond as a visual, and, using it, everyone in our church
can explain our process. If people don’t have a track to run on, they don’t
feel like they’re making progress. Once you have a process, then you build your
programs around it.
6) Churches focus on meetings rather than
ministry. Jesus didn’t say, “I have come that you might have meetings.” When
you measure your church solely on attendance, you know that you’re making this
mistake. Attendance is an important qualifier, but it’s not the most important
one. Focusing on meetings creates a passive church. We don’t need more
meetings; we need to meet more needs. I believe a lot of churches can cut half
their meetings, and they will be healthier for it. If I have a sharp individual
who comes to church, the last thing I want to do is stick him on a committee
and turn him into a bureaucrat. I want him serving in ministry.
The difference between meetings and ministry
is that meetings discuss what other people should be doing, and ministry just
goes out and does it. You have to turn every member into a minister.
7) Churches have teaching without
application. Interpretation without application is abortion. You are aborting
the text, because the Bible was not given to increase our knowledge, but to
change our lives. Focus on obedience in your message. Take the Word and make it
come alive.
8) The congregation doesn’t trust their
leaders. Everything you do as a leader is built on trust. If you lose their
trust, you may as well resign. It takes years to build trust, but you can lose
it in an instant. You must build credibility to earn the right to lead. When
you go to a bank to ask for a loan, the first thing they do is check your
credit. If you are creditable, then you are worthy of the bank’s trust. People
are doing a credit check on your leadership every second of your life. You
build trust by loving people and liking people. How do you get people to like
you? Like them!
The more you trust your people and show your
vulnerability, the more they’re going to trust you. We actually help people
more through our weaknesses than our strengths. If I share my strengths with
you, it doesn’t help people. But if I share my weaknesses and how God came
through in spite of them, it encourages people to keep going. You get people to
trust you more by authentic and humble leadership.
9) The Church is being killed by legalism.
Many churches are more interested in keeping rules rather than relationships.
Jesus always chose relationships over rules. People mattered more than keeping
the Sabbath. There is a difference between acceptance and approval. Jesus
accepts me completely, but he doesn’t approve of everything I do. Acceptance
doesn’t mean approval, but it does mean love.
10) Churches are structured for control
rather than growth. This is a big issue, one that we’ll have to come back to
next week.
Thank you for learning with me here:
Join me her again
tomorrow for another biblical inspired lesson.
John Olanrewaju
Pastor, Author, Poet, Creativity, Business, Career, Ministry & Life Coach
Feel free to give
your comment, suggestions and questions.
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