Church Growth: It's about the PEOPLE!

During the last weekend in September, I went to a "church growth" conference sponsored by the Diocese of Nebraska in a town called Grand Island (it is my personal mission while I'm here to find out why on earth there is a town called "Grand Island" in the middle of NEBRASKA, but that's beside the point).

The event was quite an eye-opener. There were probably only around 15 people of the nearly 200 people at the conference who were under the age of 60. Just looking around the room, it was obvious why the Episcopal Church needs to worry about church growth.

It was very strange to sit in this room and listen to a bunch of older people scratch their heads about what the "young people" want in the church and realize that I was one of those "young people" being objectified and discussed as if I wasn't even there. It was a similar feeling I'd felt in some interfaith conferences where they were SO excited to welcome the "young people," it actually made you feel like there was something STRANGE about you for being a young person involved in this group, when previously you had just been feeling like a normal human involved in something meaningful to you. But now, suddenly, the spotlight was on. "What do YOUNG PEOPLE want?" "Oh, we're so glad to have the YOUNG PEOPLE involved!" There's definitely an element of tokenizing going on there. Maybe these experiences can give me some glimpse into how minorities can sometimes feel tokenized!

In any case, it was also very strange to me, given my Evangelical background, to see a room full of people utterly puzzled over church growth. What a different picture from the evangelical, non-denominational churches I used to attend, which were teeming and bursting at the seams with the under-40 crowd. The focus at those churches was on evangelism -- sometimes a bit TOO much, I thought, but it was never unclear why we were there -- to share the love of God in Christ with our fellow human beings. This was the root and ground of everything that was done in those churches.

By contrast, when our keynote speaker, Charles Fulton, the director of congregational development at the Episcopal Church's headquarters in NYC, asked the group why they wanted their churches to grow, people started offering responses that were very telling:

"To get someone else to take over all these programs I don't want to do anymore."
"Um... it's more fun when more people are around?"
"Because we need more money!"

Not ONE SINGLE PERSON in the room said ANYTHING about sharing the love of God with people as a reason they wanted to grow. NOT ONE.

This was HIGHLY disturbing to me. Now, granted, I didn't say it either (although I was about to), so maybe there were some other people in the audience who felt the same way as I did but just didn't speak up out loud. But these answers, I thought, were very telling about what "the church" as an institution has become bogged down in -- the minutia, the details, the finances.

But somehow, Evangelicals have managed not to fall into this trap. They maintain HUGE buildings and still maintain a strong sense of purpose. Now, they might not have as much of a focus on social outreach as I might think they should, but that's really more a matter of interpretation about HOW to share the love of Christ verses losing sight of the fact that we're even supposed to be sharing the love of Christ at all and not just maintaining some kind of non-profit organization.

This kind of thing is one of the reasons why I left mainline churches in the first place -- because there seemed to be a lack of passion, a lack of feeling, a lack of really UNDERSTANDING the message of the Gospel. Now, I have since found people who really "get it" in mainline churches -- there ARE people who really love Jesus and wish to share God's love with others in mainline churches, believe it or not! (Evangelicals out there -- it really is true, I promise!) But there are also people who go to church just because "that's what you do" or because it's tradition... and these are the type of people I think most easily get bogged down in details and make comments like, "um.. it's more fun when more people are around?" or "We need more money!" when asked about why they want to bring in more people to their church. If you don't have a personal, vibrant faith informing your actions, church IS going to turn into a social club or a non-profit organization.

Now, praise God, Charles Fulton gets it. He immediately struck down their responses, saying that those kinds of responses were exactly the type of attitude one should NOT have if one really wants to grow their church. If you approach someone for their money and their time, they're not going to see right through that. "Welcome to our church -- come join us and we'll make you tired and poor!" Who would want to sign up for that?!

And I would add, my GOD, people. This is as bad as the "friendship evangelism" that always made me uncomfortable amongst the Evangelicals -- making friends with someone for an ulterior motive (just to convert them to Christianity), not out of a genuine desire to know them and respect them for who they were. With some of these mainliners, they're reaching out to people JUST to get their money and make their budget. It's just this type of mindset that makes people like my father suspicious of all organized religion. What about reaching out to people just to show them that an authentic community can exist where they are accepted for who they are, about sharing the message that God accepts them for who they are and loves each individual, unique person? What about ACTUALLY CARING about the PEOPLE instead of seeing them as a number, either as a notch in the "convert belt" or as a dollar sign on the budget?

I nodded vigorously as Fulton talked about approaching people as PEOPLE -- if we show we care about the PERSON, all the rest will follow. If they find a place where they feel they are truly cared for and spiritually fed, they will WANT to give their money. But they're not going to join a church just to give their money away! You have to start with the person and not focus on the monetary aspects. That can't be the focus of your evangelism efforts if you want to be able to authentically share the love of Christ with people.

Fulton called everyone in the room back to our mission as the church in the world -- why do we (the church) exist? he asked us. What is our purpose? What did Jesus die for? "Our ministry is about PEOPLE," he said, "it's not about buildings, it's not about programs, it's not about dioceses, it's not even about the Episcopal Church!" Amen, Charles! Preach it, brother!

It's about sharing the love of God with others. Sounds pretty basic and foundational to Christianity, huh? Disturbing how easily we can lose touch with that purpose.