A young man of my acquaintance (by "young", I mean probably 20 years younger than I am; by "acquaintance" I mean that I have known him 20 years or more) went to seminary and graduated with an MA in Theology. He has ended up in the state of Washington, where he works at a local government agency and is pastor of a church. This week he posted the following quote:
I can assure you from what my acquaintance posts he is passionate about his calling but also not in a position that it is his only means of supporting him and his family. The church, from what I can gather, is a small one in what is likely a converted office or warehouse or even a home. His theology is sound (knowing both him and where his degree is from). And yet, he has confessed to more than once feeling discouraged in his calling, partially by his situation - or rather, about how his situation is perceived in the larger Christian world.
The quote and his situation does make me wonder how we assess and judge the "success" of a church.
We live in an age where mainline churches of my youth are fading fast and they seem to have no concern about it at all (although with their legacy expenses, they might want to think about it) and where large scale churches that either have huge facilities or congregations or have multiple sites are in vogue.
Where does the role of the small church come in?
For full disclosure, my formative years were spent in small churches, the Episcopalian (where my maternal grandparents and my parents had gone) and the American Lutheran Church (before it merged into the ELCA). As an adult I have spent time in larger churches, from 500 to 2000.
Inherently I do not have a problem with either kind - frankly, different sizes of congregations work for different groups of people and the major concern at any time should be fidelity to Scripture, not necessarily the size of the congregation.
And yet I sympathize with my acquaintance. In point of fact - to quote Friend Of This Blog (FOTB) Leigh from Five Acres and A Dream, we are too often consumed by the "bigger-bigger-more-more" syndrome - which at least in the US, also seems to extend to our places of worship.
Think about it: we have an actual industry that is focused on church consulting and church growth. Some of it is to combat what churches perceive to be a loss in membership, but some of it is also driven by churches wanting to expand and get bigger. And some of it, perhaps, is driving by a belief that the fastest way to success is using the world's tools.
I can come up with all sort of commentary from Scripture on the matter and how God views congregations - most Christians can. But in point of fact the question - to the quote - goes deeper: do we (as Christians, at least) celebrate and encourage small churches as much as we do big ones? To the quote above, do we "despise" small churches? Or have we - as in so much of what else we do - become just like the world in our desire to judge success only by the size of the endeavor and its perceived impact that we can outwardly see?
It does strike me as remarkably odd that, given the history of the church and its humble beginnings, it is even a matter we would have to consider at all.
Wish God would visit a scourge on whomever posts something promising umpteen dollars an hour for clicking on somewhere on the Web.......... :) A neighbor of mine is a minister in a growing church that has multiple locations and has gone to a number of places overseas many times. Too many people are impressed with quantity over quality.
ReplyDeleteTo the first point Nylon12, I cannot disagree. I cannot believe it is even an economically viable advertising program - perhaps they get paid based on number of "postings".
DeleteI am not inherently biased by large churches - indeed, there are large churches with very sound teaching. What is off-putting the confusing size with actual quality and Biblical accuracy.
I am of the opinion that organizations that focus overly on growth eventually reach the point where they are too big to acknowledge the humanity of the individuals that comprise them and that they supposedly serve. Hence we have the phenomena of Big Government, Big Business, Big Pharma, Big Church, etc. Our Big Government has exacerbated this by tilting the playing field in favor of consolidation, so ideals like maintaining a small family farm are almost impossible to maintain. I'm not sure where the line is drawn between healthy thriving and oppressive bloat, but it's easy to spot when the line has been crossed.
ReplyDeleteWarren - To your point, there is a general law I have seen more than once saying that at some point, bureaucracies (of any kind_ exist solely to insure that their own survival. It may be that different types have different break points, but indeed once they have passed into the point of oppressive bloat, they are very easy to recognize, even if almost impossible to undo at that stage.
DeleteI have never been a member of a church with more than 300 parishioners and on our most attended Sunday, we are likely to have south of 200 attending. Average attendance is probably 100 people. All these numbers have continually been decreasing as the years go by. We are in the process of consolidating two churches but I still would be surprised to see 200 plus on a non holiday Sunday.
ReplyDeleteEd, I recently read of a study that said the "ideal" human group size for functionality was around 250 - much more than that and interests become too distinct.
DeleteBy contrast, our current church easily sees 800 people in a weekend and possible up to 1,000 - yet I only know a handful of these people. It is as if I was in the mall, except that it is church. I do not find this to be a great deal more engaging.
For sure. I could name probably 1/2 of those people that attend my church by name. Partly that is because due to our small community, at least compared to yours, I will run into many of them through the course of the week outside of church. On occasion, we do attend other, much larger, churches when on the road and I get the sense that I could go there for years and not be known to too many of the other parishioners.
DeleteHonestly Ed, that is the sort of environment I think I do better in.
DeleteHuh, my first instinct is to be wary of huge structures. I mean, how many guys were with Jesus at his last supper?
ReplyDeleteI tend to as well John, although to be fair that is true of almost any aspect of my life. But to Bob's point below, large churches do fill a need as well. The question, I suppose, is fidelity of the message and teaching, not inherently the size.
DeleteI have belonged to what would be commonly defined as a megachurch for most of my adult life. The first one is where I met my wife, and the next one, where I still attend, we helped start. We started with about 40 and it quickly grew to about 4,000. As you note, there are advantages and disadvantages to both small and big. If you want to go to a big church and all you care about is going and listening to a message, that's certainly an option. But if you want to know and be known, you have to get involved in some type of small group, or in a ministry of some sort. My wife and I have been in the same small group for about 15 years, and those people are our "church."
ReplyDeleteBob - Thanks for the perspective. That is my interpretation as well; you have to find the "group within the group".
DeleteEither version is fine, as you say. What prompted my original thought was the fact that one group seems (note the use of the word "seems", which may not be reality) to be celebrated, while the other can often feel ignored. The reverse is true as well of course, people decrying "mega-churches" simply because of their size not because of anything they are doing.