11 Characteristics of Effective Smaller Churches
Some years ago, I traveled across the United States, west to east and north to south, and back north, visiting twenty-one smaller faith communities that…
Browsing: Small Membership Churches
Articles
A New Way to View Vitality in Smaller Congregations
I spend my working days as a pastor trying to name reality for my congregation as we wind a precarious way between the heights of…
Intergenerational Ministry and the Small Church
Church leaders typically consider it a liability when they are unable to provide focused age-specific ministry to every demographic in the congregation. But in large…
Doing Community Ministry in the Small Church
Sometimes I interact with small congregations that assume that any significant community ministry effort is beyond their reach. They often keenly feel their limitations as…
Small Churches, Belonging, and the Harley-Davidson Funeral
There is much confusion among churches today resulting from the painful reality that much of our sense of belonging was dependent upon the status and…
Review of Imagining the Small Church: Celebrating a Simpler Path
A previous generation of students such as Carl Dudley, David Ray, and Anthony Pappas have catalogued the unique culture of the small church, here defined…
The One Room (Church) Schoolhouse
My mother attended a one room schoolhouse for all but the last two years of her public education. As a Baby Boomer, I grew up…
The Soul of a Small Church
These are anxious times for the lay and clergy leaders of small congregations. The repercussions of a disappointing economy, aging and shrinking membership, and a…
A Better Script for Small Churches
I have served as pastor of small, mid-size, and large churches. And some of them grew, especially the larger ones. Large churches that grow larger…
Preaching in the Small Membership Church
Lew Parks’s newest book is ostensibly a preaching primer with good, solid advice on some of the basics, such as selecting a good biblical translation…
Leading the Small Membership Church
Small membership churches have a history of making do without a lot of leadership from persons outside. Many were started by laypersons gathered in homes,…
Who is Visiting Small Churches These Days?
When small church lay and clergy leaders gather, the first comments you often hear reflect an understandable anger, defensiveness, and dread of an imminent future.…
Small Churches as Healthy Family Systems
Lewis Parks examines basic concepts of family systems theory as a positive framework to understand the dynamics of small membership churches. While teaching pastoral care…
Multicultural Church Offers a Distinctive Gift for Children
A small membership church finds a distinctive gift in offering a multicultural environment for children and learning. I have found an important starting point for…
Opening Up the Small Membership Church
Drawing on Anthony Pappas’s work, Lovett Weems names factors important in helping small churches embrace change and new people. Anthony Pappas is area minister for…
New Life for a 100-year-old Church
A pastor who went to a 100-year-old church in serious decline tells a story of renewal that came about by focusing on strengths not what’s…