In a follow-up to my post below, I ran across a post by Bishop Will Willimon on church growth on his new blog. In contrast to my rant below, Bishop Willimon says that we must have new churches in order to grow because older, more established congregations are incapable of generating enough growth to stop the decline in the Methodist Church.
We all know that new churches demonstrate explosive growth, but I would like to see some research on where this growth is coming from. Is it coming from evangelistic efforts, or are we merely seeing "sheep-rustling" from other established congregations? Perhaps the growth in these new churches is being driven by those on fire for the Lord who are being stifled in their quest for true worship in established congregations?
Perhaps the growth in these new churches occur because it breaks up the entrenched power structure in a lot of our local churches. I know of a church in my District that has had four pastors in six years. Each of these pastors has been ineffective in getting the church to respond to calls for spiritual growth and maturity or in numerical growth. Membership has declined. Why? Could it be that the power structure of the laity in the church has stopped the pastors from initiating revival and renewal? What's the current answer to that problem from our leadership in the denomination? It's simple -- create a new church with a new administrative council and with new leaders and leave the problem children at home.
If you take this call for new churches to its ultimate conclusion, couldn't you reach the thesis that perhaps we need to abandon all the older, established denominations and start new denominations with new structures in order to grow? From what I've seen in my area, when the non-denominational/Vineyard-related churches began to spring up with more contemporary styles of worship and less bureaucratic and rigid organizational structures, people flocked to these congregations. Why not do the same with our denomination? (Please note I'm saying this tongue-in-cheek)
At the last General Conference, a call was somewhat put forth to create a new denomination in answer to the "irreconciable" differences in theological leanings by some in our denomination. What would be the end result of that move? A renewed excitement and an increase in membership as Christians from other stressed denominations moved to join these new movements, bringing new energy to both the right and left theological camps?
I still maintain that just creating new churches is not the sole answer. I think we need to look at what it would take to revitalize our existing congregations. Look at the explosive growth in the Southern Baptist Convention over the past couple of decades. From what I witnessed, this did not come about solely by creating new churches, but from a revival within established congregations. Then, as these congregations grew, they produced daughter churches as mission projects.
In our Wesleyan Christian Advocate newspaper, they publish a section on historical news from the Georgia Methodist Church, at 25 years and 50 years and 100 years ago. I have always been amazed that 50 and 100 years ago, established churches were reporting dozens of professions of faith following revivals. Why could established churches grow 100 years ago but established churches can't grow now? Perhaps the real reason that we've quit growing is that we've quenched the power of the Holy Spirit in our congregations. I maintain that older established congregations can grow and be renewed, but only through the power of the Holy Spirit working through us. Are we going to trust in the power of God to move in our established churches, or are we going to spend our time and our energy chasing after the new? Build the new, plant the fields, but don't forget to fertilize the faithful that remain.
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