When You Don’t Know Who’s Worshiping
…our church. Now, of course, this we isn’t static; there are always people coming in and out of regular attendance and membership. But still, those who have been around awhile…
Search Results: attendance (229)
11 Provocative Thoughts and Questions About What’s Next
…type. It will probably be well into 2021 before large-scale physical worship attendance becomes the norm. 2. Adaptive change is the new reality. This means that the adaptive change lessons…
Are Your Pandemic Giving Systems as Effective as the Offering Plate?
…be in attendance any given Sunday. Vital churches provide their members with a variety of ways to give. One positive consequence of the coronavirus response is that many churches that…
3 Ways to Reset Your Stewardship Ministry in the Midst of COVID-19
…of online worship attendance? Most local church pastors I know are reporting a great increase of focus on pastoral care. Online worship is calling for greater focus and development by…
Is Nostalgia Sabotaging Your Church’s Future?
…some investigating, churches often find that their memory of past glory is not really accurate. (I have often looked back over church statistics to find that the attendance was never…
New Questions for a New Day
…our worship has gone remote, many churches have had the unanticipated surprise of finding that attendance has expanded, not constricted, and that the gathered community is geographically scattered to the…
We Can’t Compete with Sunday Sports if Worship is Boring
…into the presence of the living God is anything but boring! Church leaders will often blame our culture for a lack of Sunday attendance, claiming that the other activities —…
5 Practices for Fruitful Congregations in a Post-Attractional Era
…with scripture, and have never once stepped inside a church? The culture provides an ever-increasing number of competing activities on Sundays that are more compelling than church attendance. When people…
9 Ways Leaders Can Respond to Conflict Constructively
…off the wall, confusion is always in attendance. Ask questions. Weigh whether information is reliable and congruent. But also remember that clarity won’t always be comfortable for everyone. Some people…
6 Ways to Know If Your Church is Overstaffed
…acute in declining membership churches trying to maintain a level of programming that no longer fits their current attendance. Although it is painfully difficult, churches in this situation need to…
Succession Planning for Larger Churches
…and vulnerabilities in the next five to ten years. Many of these churches will change pastors in the next ten years. And churches are particularly vulnerable to dropping in attendance…
When a Pastor Serves a Church of a Different Racial or Cultural Background
…as broken. It’s often stress or tragedy that cause us to sit up and pay attention to the need for change — when worship attendance gets low, when money gets…
Boring Announcements? Try Fun Video Announcements
…is announced each week (welcome, attendance, etc.) and no more than two or three announcements specific to what’s coming up in the life of your church. 3. Think creatively about…
The High Price of Division Historically
…churches in the United States with an average membership of 79 and an average attendance of 107. The Nazarene Church has 626,811 members. Would these numbers be the fate of…
3 Ways to Extend the Impact of a Sermon
…it also helps drive attendance in weekend worship, since persons will be discussing the message in their midweek gathering. The result of this alignment is akin to a diffused light…
Free “50 Ways” Resources
…growth. Topics include 50 Ways to: Welcome a New Pastor; Improve Your Annual Stewardship Campaign; Welcome New People; Increase Worship Attendance; Strengthen Ministry with Children; plus many more. Read now…
Stewardship in Times of Transition
…their allegiance to a particular ministry or a particular person, giving is rooted in personality rather than faith in Jesus. As pastors come and go, ministries change, attendance rises and…
Honoring the Context of a New Ministry Setting
…time. But there was always a time crunch, and, with extra attendance, families of confirmands were not always able to sit together. So the congregation shifted the reception of confirmation…
Prayer is the Spiritual Electricity of Congregational Revitalization
…in the importance and value of prayer. Prayer might open and close meetings in your setting, for example, including naming prayer concerns by those in attendance or asking God to…
4 Tips for Experimenting with Change This Summer
…in attendance and giving. It is a perfect time to try an experiment. Here are four things to keep in mind when doing an experiment. The truth is, many of…
5 Lies We Like to Tell About Church Growth
…over 20 years as a consultant. One of the consistent patterns is that churches are more diligent about keeping records of attendance, membership, and giving when the numbers rise than…
Who is Looking for a Church Home?
…Grow: A Guide to Building Attendance and Participation by John Zehring, copyright © 2018 by Judson Press. Used by permission of Judson Press, www.judsonpress.com. Related Resources 4 Clues for Inviting…
5 Steps for Putting Good Ideas into Action
…to increase worship attendance, and more streamlined administrative processes. But too often, these ideas never get off the ground. Executing a vision or plan can be a refreshing and invigorating…
8 Trends Impacting Church Leadership for 2021
…digital meeting spaces, electronic giving, and social media connections in the face of the pandemic. Many congregations report that their worship attendance and participation in meetings and groups have grown…
5 Steps to a Fruitful Restart
…blocks away and eventually partnered with the elementary school. Since the restart and launch of Northwest Community Church, nearly 60 people have been baptized. Attendance has increased an average of…
How Do Conferences Pay 100 Percent of General Church Apportionments?
…half the churches choose to pay. How Likely Is It that Conferences Can Sustain 100 Percent? Based on conference attendance and financial trends, the Lewis Center projected that there was…
Reaching New People This Christmas Is More Important Than Ever
…The ease and comfort of “virtual evangelism” may explain in part why many congregations have enjoyed increased attendance for online worship services. (See “Online Worship Makes Evangelism Less Intimidating for…
Building Thriving Rural Congregations
…not experiencing rapid growth. So, they’re not going to increase their average worship attendance by a significant amount. If you’re in a town of 7,000 and you have 47 churches,…
There’s No Going Back to the Pre-Pandemic Church
…average worship attendance as the standard barometer for health. Rather, they will be focusing on engagement. How people are engaging in the church through ministries such as discipleship, service, worship,…
5 Guideposts for Reshaping Your Staff Team
…your future, not your past. Many congregations have experienced significant numerical decline over the past three years — in both attendance and operating budgets — and now are coming to…
