Small Congregation, Big Potential: Ministry in the Small Membership Church
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Concluding that their gifts for ministry are not really valued in this place, they begin to seek a call elsewhere. On the way out of the church they give it a kick, letting the parish know in subtle ways that they are a miserable example of Christian community. These small congregations have endured such recriminations for decades.
The message they get from their executive is that they are a failure because they fail to grow while consuming inordinate amounts of time. Middle judicatories try to merge them, yoke them, close them-mostly to no avail. Large churches are far more vulnerable. An exec can place an incompetent pastor in a large church and lose members in one year. Yet the same exec can throw incompetent clergy at Family Churches, leave them vacant for years, ignore them-all with little effect, The Family Church has learned to survive by relying on its own internal leadership.
These congregations need a pastor to stay and love them over at least ten years. At about year four or five, when the pastor did not leave, the congregation might find itself in somewhat of a crisis. No clergy stay here. There must be something the matter with you. You are going to leave us like all the rest.
Shopbop Designer Fashion Brands. More is required than simply changing ones behavior. The parish has little difficulty filling the many volunteer jobs needed to run a Corporate Church. He was the author of dozens of books, including From Geography to Affinity , also published by Abingdon Press. Schaller bills himself as "the country's leading interpreter of congregational systems and their vitality," and I see no grounds to quibble with that claim. That was eight years ago. The chair may include both of them in an opening prayer.
Would we invest in the next pastor who came to us? It would be simply too painful. The Family Church may have invested in one five years ago, only to find that the pastor left just when things started to move. Basically these people have learned not to trust clergy who repeatedly abandon ship when they see no evidence of church growth.
I conclude that we need to refrain from sending these congregations seminary trained pastors. History demonstrates that these churches have not been served well by full-time ordained clergy. The Episcopal Diocese of Nevada and the North Indiana Conference of the United Methodist Church are among judicatories experimenting with employing persons indigenous to the communities, providing them with some basic training to give long-term pastoral care on a part-time basis.
If denominations and middle judicatories persist in placing newly ordained clergy in these parishes, they should do so only after laying out this theory for these clergy, helping them discover who indeed are the patriarchs and matriarchs of the parish, suggesting some strategies for working with them. If these clergy find it simply too difficult to work with these parental figures, they need to let their executive know promptly.
Rather than leaving these newly ordained clergy regretting they pursued ordained ministry in the first place, the exec should move them out of the Family Church. Clergy are usually at the center of a Pastoral Church. There are so many parental figures around that they need someone at the center to manage them. A leadership circle, made up of the pastor and a small cadre of lay leaders, replaces the patriarchs and matriarchs of the Family Church. The power and effectiveness of the leadership circle depends upon good communication with the congregation and the ability of the pastor to delegate authority, assign responsibility, and recognize the accomplishments of others.
Without such skill, the central pastoral function weakens the entire structure. The clergyperson becomes overworked, isolated, and exhausted, may be attacked by other leaders, and finally the harmony of the fellowship circle degenerates. A key feature of a Pastoral Church is that lay persons experience having their spiritual needs met through their personal relationship with a seminary trained person.
In a Pastoral Church it would be rare for a Bible study or a prayer group to meet without the pastor. The pastor is also readily available in times of personal need and crisis. If a parishioner called the pastor and indicated that she needed some personal attention, the pastor would drop over to see her, probably that afternoon but certainly within the week-a qualitatively different experience from being told that the first available appointment to see the pastor in her office is two weeks from now. The time demands upon the pastor of a Pastoral Church can become oppressive.
However, most members will respond with loyalty to a reasonable level of attention and guidance from this central figure. A second feature of the Pastoral Church is its sense of itself as a family where everyone knows everyone else. If you show up at church with your daughter Julie by the hand, everyone will greet you and Julie, too.
When congregations begin to have to people coming every Sunday morning they begin to get nervous. Are they beginning to lose the intimate fellowship they prize so highly? Clergy also begin to feel stressed when they have more than active members whom they try to know in depth. In fact, this is one of the reasons why clergy may keep the Pastoral Church from growing to the next larger size congregation-the Program Church. If clergy have the idea firmly fixed in their head that they are ineffective as a pastor unless they can relate in a profound and personal way with every member of the parish, then active members plus perhaps an even larger number of inactive members is about all one person can manage.
There are some clergy who function at their highest level of effectiveness in the Pastoral Church. Given the different clusters of skills required for other sizes of congregations, some clergy should consider spending their entire career in this size congregation. Since the Pastoral Church can offer a pastor a decent salary, clergy do tend to stick around longer. Two thirds of mainline Protestant congregations are either Family- or Pastoral-sized churches.
Clergy with strong interpersonal skills fare well in the Pastoral-sized church. Clergy who enjoy being at the center of most activities also do well. There are lots of opportunities to preach and lead in worship and to serve as primary instructor in many class settings for both young and old.
Outgoing, expressive persons seem to be the best match for the style of ministry in the Pastoral Church. An open, interactive leadership style also seems to suit this size church best.
Enrichment Journal - Enriching and Equipping Spirit-filled Ministers
Growth in the Pastoral Church will depend mainly on the popularity and effectiveness of the pastor. People join the church because they like the interaction between pastor and people. When new people visit the congregation for the first time, it is likely to be the pastor who will make the follow-up house call.
Unfortunately, this strategy will have limited success. To begin with, when you hire additional staff you then have a multiple staff, which requires staff meetings, supervision, delegation, evaluation, and planning. These activities draw the pastor deeper into administration. One can expect enormous resistance on the part of a Pastoral Church as it flirts with becoming a Program Church. Many churches make an unconscious choice not to make the transition and keep hovering around the level of active members. The two treasured features of a Pastoral Church that will be lost if it becomes a Program Church are ready access to their religious leader and the feeling of oneness as a church family, where everyone knows everyone else and the church can function as a single cell community.
Two things prevent a congregation from making that transition. The first barrier is found in the clergy. When clergy hold onto a need to be connected in depth to all the active members, then they become the bottleneck to growth. The second barrier is found in the lay leaders who are unwilling to have many of their spiritual needs met by anyone except their ordained leader.
It is most helpful to put this theory up on newsprint before the chief decision-making body of the church and ask them where they think they are as a parish. Churches tend to grow when parish leaders, fully aware of the cost of growth, make a conscious decision to proceed.
How To Minister Effectively in Family, Pastoral, Program, and Corporate-Sized Churches
The Program Church grows out of the necessity for a high-quality personal relationship with the pastor to be supplemented by other avenues of spiritual feeding. Programs must now begin to fulfill that role. The, well functioning Program Church has many cells of activity, which are headed up by lay leaders.
These lay leaders, in addition to providing structure and guidance for these cells, also take on some pastoral functions. The Stewardship Committee gathers for its monthly meeting and the committee chair asks about a missing member. The chair may include both of them in an opening prayer. If the teacher of an adult class notices that someone in the class is feeling depressed, the teacher will often take the class member aside and inquire about his well-being.
Even if the teacher eventually asks the pastor to intervene, the pastor has already gotten a lot of assistance from this lay leader. Clergy are still at the center of the Program Church, but their role has shifted dramatically. Much of their time and attention must be spent in planning with other lay leaders to ensure the highest quality programs.
The pastor must spend a lot of time recruiting people to head up these smaller ministries, training, supervising, and evaluating them and seeing to it that their morale remains high. In essence the pastor must often step back from direct ministry with people to coordinate and support volunteers who offer this ministry.
There are many questions that leaders of small-membership congregations ask themselves about their church's future. Lyle Schaller suggests that two in. Small Church Essentials and millions of other books are available for instant . for Leading a Healthy Congregation of under Paperback – March 6, by . The Grasshopper Myth: Big Churches, Small Churches and the Small Thinking that Divides Us . Karl Vaters, a leading voice on small church ministry, shares.
Unless the pastor gives high priority to their spiritual and pastoral needs, those programs will suffer. To be sure, a member can expect a hospital or home call from the pastor when personal crisis or illness strikes. To see the pastor about a parish matter, they will probably have to make an appointment at the church office several weeks in advance. When clergy move from a Pastoral Church to a Program Church, unless they are able to shift from a primarily interpersonal mode to a program planning and development mode, they will experience tension and difficulty in their new congregation.
It is not that clergy will have no further need for their interpersonal skills. Far from it-they need to depend on them even more. But now those interpersonal skills will be placed at the service of the parish program. Key skills for effective ministry in a Program Church begin with the ability to pull together the diverse elements of the parish into a mission statement. Helping the parish arrive at a consensus about its direction is essential. Next the pastor must be able to lead the parish toward attaining the goals that arise out of that consensus.
In the Program Church, clergy need to be able to stand firmly at the center of that consensus.
To wilt in the face of opposition to this consensus will be seen as a lack of leadership ability. The Program Church pastor will also need to be able to motivate the most capable lay persons in the parish to take on key components of the parish vision and help make it become a reality. Developing the trust and loyalty of these parish leaders and ensuring their continued spiritual growth and development is another key part of the cluster of skills needed in the Program-sized Church.
For clergy who get their primary kicks out of direct pastoral care work, ministry in a Program Church may leave them with a chronic feeling of flatness and lack of fulfillment. Unless these clergy can learn to derive satisfaction from the work of pastoral administration they should think twice about accepting a call to this size parish.
The quality of Sunday morning worship is the first thing you usually notice in a Corporate Church.
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Customers who bought this item also bought. Page 1 of 1 Start over Page 1 of 1. The Small Church is Different! Help for the Small-Church Pastor. Creating Strengths and Health for Your Congregation. About the Author Lyle E. Don't have a Kindle? Try the Kindle edition and experience these great reading features: Share your thoughts with other customers. Write a customer review.
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There was a problem filtering reviews right now. Please try again later. Small Congregation, Big Potential is Lyle Schaller's latest examination of the world of the small church. His previous works on the subject include The Small Church is Different! David Ray, The Indispensable Guide for Smaller Churches - Takes the best concepts covered by most other authors on the subject and ties them into the closest thing to an encyclopedia of small church development.
Diagnosis and Treatment for the Big Issues - Presents a health-based model of small church development, assuming that if a church is healthy, it grows and thrives as naturally as any healthy living organism. Becoming a Missional Community — Focuses on creating missional vs. Bierly, Help for the Small-Church Pastor: Unlocking the Potential of Your Congregation — A strong call for small church leaders to appreciate the unique dynamics of their congregations and tailor their approaches toward responsible revitalization. Ron Crandall, Turnaround and Beyond: A Hopeful Future for the Small Membership Church — A theoretically rich, research-based summarization of growth factors based on a study of over successful small church pastors.
Daman, Shepherding the Small Church, 2nd edition: Daman, Leading the Small Church, How to Develop a Transformational Ministry - The sequel to Sheperding the Small Church, encourages ministers to lead through spiritual activities like preaching and discipleship instead of professional leadership strategies. Getting Your Church in Gear - A comprehensive guide equipping the entire congregation to work together on renewal in ways that not only benefit the congregation but also rebuild trust in ministerial leadership.
Not limited to small churches. Not addressed to small churches exclusively, but a good read regardless of church size. See especially Appendix on Rebirthing Churches. Schaller, The Middle-Sized Church: Problems and Prescriptions — Addresses the unique issues of member churches. Schaller, Small Congregation, Big Potential: Schaller, The Small Membership Church: Tyson, Administration in the Small Membership Church Ministry in the Small Membership Church Series - Helps ministers create and maintain effective structures that will enable them to spend most of their time on what they truly value.
Bickers, The Bivocational Pastor: Two Jobs, One Ministry - Conveys a special focus on the person who does bivocational ministry. Dorsett, Developing Leadership Teams in the Bivocational Church - Good advice on how to train others to preach and provide pastoral care. Children and Youth Ministry in the Small Church: More Activities, Plus Mission Ideas — A follow up on the previous volume for volunteers in churches with as little as one or two youth.
Rick Chromey, Youth Ministry in Small Churches - Addresses the challenges and opportunities of youth ministry in churches of members or less. Achieving Big-Time Success in a Non-Mega Ministry — Good ideas overall, with special feature of three main approaches or program models that a youth worker may adopt depending on the context.
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