Ministry 101 - Dead Churches (2)

Why would I begin writing about things I have learned in ministry by writing about dead churches? It's crazy and no one wants to read about that. That is exactly why I'm writing about it. In my years as a ministry consultant, I encountered too many dead and dying churches that no one either realized were in that state, or didn't care. I care. God cares! We should care!

I love church planting. New churches are great. I've had the privilege to be used by God to help start a few churches. I'll write about that later, but new churches are a lot more fun and exciting than dead or dying churches. They are filled with new life. So why shouldn't we let dead or dying churches go and simply start a new church in its place? Sometimes we need to! However, as any church planter will tell you, starting a new church is extremely difficult, and few make it. It makes sense to make every effort to resurrect a dead or dying church instead of starting a new one. But just like church planting isn't for the faint of heart, either is resurrecting churches. So how is it done? Here are a few steps:

1. Pray

2. Pray

3. Pray. I really mean it. The first three steps are to spend a significant amount of time in fervent, concentrated prayer. This isn't just shooting up a "God help this church" prayer, it is spending hours, days, weeks, on your knees, in tears, pleading with God for His direction and power to accomplish His purpose in that place.

4. Cast vision. Every church and everyone in it must understand, and support, the vision that God has given the church. The church exists to fulfill the great commission (make disciples) and the great commandment (love one another). Colossians 1:28 summarizes this in saying that we are to present everyone complete in Christ. The problem with dead and dying churches is that they have forgotten and ceased fulfilling at least one of these two mandates.

5. Love one-another. Often, the beginning of the end starts with disunity and dysfunction. Infighting and dissension kill the ability of a church to reach the lost. It instantly turns the focus inward from outward. While some d&d (dead and dying) churches love each other, most don't! This is the painful part. Sometimes you have to let people go to get healthy. The easy answer is to fire the pastor, but often it is a handful of people (about 5) that are causing the problems. These people may not even be in official leadership roles, but it is clear that they have a great deal of influence over the church.

6. Be strong, for the Lord your God is with you! It takes strength to confront people. It takes conviction to ask someone to leave the church because they are causing dissension, but sometimes it must be done.

7. Love one-another. I'm talking about Biblical love, not an "us four and no more" love. That is selfish love. True love is given to others. Jesus used the parable of the "Good Samaritan" to show how we need to show love beyond those we want to love.

8. Seek out lost people. People in d&d churches don't know or associate with non-believers. They feel that they need to focus on their growth and faith and non-believers pull them away from God. This is plain disobedience to Jesus' command to make disciples (MT 28:18-20). This is disobedience that needs to be confronted. There is great joy in seeing people come to Christ. If you aren't joyful when this happens, you need some spiritual renewal yourself!

9. Find purpose. Every church has a larger, universal purpose, and a specific individual purpose. Each church must prayerfully discover what unique role God has called it to fulfill in its community.

10. If you want to be alive, live like it! In the body, new cells replaced d&d cells. In the church the same should happen. There should be a fresh look, fresh messages, fresh music. I'm saying you have to spend a ton of money, in fact, you don't necessarily have to spend any money at all. It may simply be an attitude change that brings smiles. Get rid of the look and stench of death! Jesus is alive, live like it!

Most people know these things. They aren't new. They aren't profound beyond the fact that they are Biblical and churches should already be incorporating them. The issue is that many churches aren't doing them! Lazy people or weak leaders can paralyze a church. Growing churches require action. If you won't act, stop fooling yourself and get out, seek Christ to fill you, and energize you before re-entering the battlefield.

Ministry 101 - Dead Churches

Contrary to what my heart says, sometimes churches die, and that's not always a bad thing!

First, what is a dead or dying church?
A dead or dying church is one that is no longer fulfilling it's mandate to fulfill the great commission and great commandment (Making fully devoted followers of Christ - see Colossians 1:28- by loving them to Christ)

Second, how do you know a church is dead or dying?
1. There are only occasional visitors. The visitors who come are typically new to the area and found the church in the phone book. If the church has stopped advertising and people have stopped inviting friends, these are clear signs that the church is dead or really close!
2. No one can remember when someone other that a church leader's child accepted Christ or was baptized. This is the point when the "us four and no more" mentality is really evident. Churches often don't even realize that they have hit this stage. A church can have several hundred in attendance and still be dead or dying, the people are typically too self-absorbed to notice.
3. Weekly addendance is completely predictable. Counting isn't necessary, you could use the church almanac to determine within ten what the attendance will be on any given weekend. The variable of ten is nearly always less, not more.
4. No one can remember when the last change occurred or new program launched. There is nothing wrong with consistency, but complacency and staleness are sure signs of death, think rigermortis!
5. The pastor (if there is one) hasn't heard anything new from the Lord about direction or what needs to be taught. This is an indicator that their own spiritual life is dead or dying!

Third, what do you do with a dead church?
1. Sometimes, you have to let it die! In fact, sometimes you have to gracefully help it through the process. A church that has been around forever and has not responded to change in its community may have nothing left but a few elderly Christians who love the Lord, put don't have the ability to impact their community for Christ. Don't disrespect that they have been faithful in their lives and their leadership didn't lead. If the bills are paid, let them continue. A great transition would be to help them see the need to reach their changed community and actually start a new church in that place.

2. Sometimes there is so much disfuntion and the stench of death is so overwhelming that disbanding the church and selling the property is the best thing that could happen. I know of one church who had so much infighting that they never noticed that the culture around them had completely changed (including the language of the people). Mercifully, they were dibanded and the property sold to a new church that was reaching the community.

3. Sometimes, a dying church can be resurrected! God has the power over life and death, even for churches. He can resurrect a dying church. It may take a great change of heart in the people and perhaps even a change of leadership (I'm not just talking about the pastor!), but churches can change. For a church to change from near death to strength, it takes reliance on God's power (which the church probably hasn't done in some time, so it will be a paradigm shift). I'll write more about resurrecting a dying church soon.