Some years ago, I read that the average stay for a Southern Baptist minister was 18 months. Now I have read from an article that that is for all denominations. This is a marked change from the average stay of five years, itself an average stay that was considered a bad sign thirty years ago. What is to be done? And should anything be done? Here are some thoughts on this state of affairs in the Church of God.

Career Mobility ~ Folks are just not staying with companies for fifty years anymore. It used to be that you came out of college, you signed up with a company, and barring some unforeseen change, you stayed until the pension started. Not anymore. Clergy may still stay with the same denomination, sometimes. But when it comes to the congregation, the folks clergy serve aren’t staying with the same company, so why should they? This leads to the next point.

Geographic Mobility ~ While the WWII generation more often stay where they have been, the younger generation is not doing so. This means that, while you have a substratum of the congregation staying in the same church for years, the younger generations are moving. Since the congregations with the WWII generation are tenaciously holding onto the family church with some of their children and grandchildren (those few children and grandchildren who have not moved) younger generations when moving into a new town do not seek out those churches where the WWII generation are – and this is not just because of the antiquated worship – it is because these folks are new in town and will more likely attend church with the other folks who are also new in town. Because those folks who are new in town are younger, this inevitably draws some of the local young folks to those very same churches who cater to those who are new in town, diminishing the number of younger folks in the older churches in town. This leads to a sense of abandonment and irrelevance amidst the older churches in town. It starts a downward spiral towards pessimism and a series of brief (and often failed) attempts to revive the older congregations in town.

We need young people! ~ There are far more churches in town than there were in the baby boom generation. At that time, like housing developments, churches got built, and built, and built. But as denominations were building churches like crazy to deal with all the returning veterans of WWII, social upheavals in religion and secular culture were splitting church and forming new denominations. The same social upheavals resulted in a culture shift away from church. This resulted in a vastly smaller “cliental” (church shoppers) for a vastly larger set of “businesses” (churches) all vying for the same business. Thus, unless you are one of the few pastors able to secure one of the few churches in town that has been able to break into the new-in-town crowd, you are probably struggling with a pessimistic congregation. They are afraid that their grandchildren are going to be heading off to the congregation that built itself off of the new-in-town crowd (and which has subsequently had the numbers to have the energy to hold the programs that it is believed the younger generation wants). This results in a pastor being stuck in a time crunch. He has a limited time period in which to attract and hold the few children left in his congregation and turn the tide so that he can be competitive with the church that has tapped into the desired demographic. He has a limited time period, because if he or she can’t do it, the congregation will find somebody else who can. Why? Because finances are tight!

Finances are tight! ~ While young families have no money to give (or can’t figure out how to fit it into the budget), the older crowd has (a little bit more) money – due to the fact that, even if some of them might be on a fixed income, they probably don’t have student loans, no mortgages, a pension, a nest egg, and an empty nest and have a lot more practice budgeting. Nevertheless, they are dying off. So again, time is of the essence. To repeat, the vast majority of churches in any single town are in this condition, even if they have endowment funds. Therefore, the salary is kept very low to try to make what is considered a finite amount of money over a finite period of time last as long as possible. Add to this fact, the fact that whatever money does come in over and above budget seems to get carefully hidden, for a rainy day or a new roof, lest it get used on lights and heat and… salary. This leads to the next point.

The Pastor’s finances are tight! ~ Because the extra money is hidden away (often times understandably) lest it get used on something non-essential (defined by whoever is determining what “non-essential” means), the pastor, even if growing the church, is not seeing a raise commensurate with the (very difficult) “sales” work that is being accomplished. Although no pastor is in it for the money, no pastor can live without money, especially while paying off student loans and growing a family.

Since the Pastor has a limited time to grow the congregation (to some extremely ill-defined ideal size) and there are limited finances and limited financially-solvent, elderly givers dying faster than your minister can replace them with the desired, and poorly contributing, younger families, the Pastor is really in a bind. Generally speaking, the Pastor has to add quite a few young families for every older member that passes away. That, of course, is the goal. But then, the Pastor isn’t seeing his salary raise in a consistent way.

So the Pastor is left with the possibility of slugging it out in a salary that isn’t, usually, keeping up with inflation; while what extra comes in is hidden away for a rainy day. Or that Pastor can use the present position as a “star” on the resume to get a different ministry, and thereby get a raise by taking a higher-paying ministry. Furthermore, leaving a position will provide the Pastor a much needed vacation – either while figuring out whether or not to go back to school or to take a higher paying position, or a congregation that is more patient, or some slightly different dynamics where there is a greater possibility of success.

It can also be said here that it takes a while in the ministry to figure out that the grass really isn’t greener on the other side. It takes a little while in the ministry to figure out where you are fit. So this, also, no doubt, affects the turnover rate and the average stay, because a Pastor might have a few stints that are short before settling down and grinning and bearing it for a longer stint. Few of these problems are all that new. Nevertheless, many things are happening at a much faster rate – and that includes clergy turnover.

What can be done? We might start with five simple (although not easy) steps.

Think sales, not salary ~ So often, salary packages can be seen to be rounded off to easy figures (e.g. $30k. $36k. $48k.) Here it would appear that the congregation is giving a good safe salary, something that it knows it can deliver, with an (often overly) prudent amount of padding. Certainly, nobody wants to offer something that can’t be delivered on, but what Pastors so often find is that slowly that little extra that they desperately need because the baby needs a new pair of shoes is getting squirrelled away by the congregation for a rainy day. This is all very understandable. The general plan is that when the projected increase, given the Pastor’s excellent skills, arrives at a sustainable and stable level, the Pastor’s salary will be increased. Real church finances, however, are up and down, all the time. Of course, the church board has their area of concern and the pastor has a household to finance. But when the Pastor watches extremely hard-earned (and often very slight) increases in giving go to make the congregation feel more financially secure, the Pastor eventually has to work very hard not to get slightly angry with the congregation and this can eventually and often does lead to an early departure for a higher salary.

Why not say that money given over and above budget by newcomers gets given to the Pastor? This too can be done prudently, safely. For example, what if one month newcomers put an extra $173 in the plate? Come on - give the Pastor an extra $150 that month. The treasurer doesn’t have to divulge how much extra was actually given, but it is going to make a world of difference to the Pastor that month. It is going to motivate your minister to keep putting in those long hours and doing a great job. It is going to be a great incentive not to go searching the internet in spare moments of cynicism looking for a better position. If the next month that amount doesn’t come in, oh well. It is going to motivate your minister to have an even better month the following month. Trust me. And, of course, if you really think of ways to make this principle work, I am sure there is one that will fit your congregation’s specific situation.

Inevitably, if you raise this idea in the church board meeting, you will get met with “That isn’t in the budget.” No. But neither was the extra-giving. And, sure, next month giving from the regular contributors might be down and you might need that extra $173 that a newcomer gave. But hey, you have to ask yourself: there is always a difference between proposed/projected and actual budget, so why is it that, at the end-of-the-year report, the Pastor’s salary is about the only budget line that is no higher than any other projected budget line year after year? If giving goes down, won’t the Pastor’s salary? Then why isn’t it going up when giving is up? It is because the Pastor’s salary is the one constant, constantly flexible and negotiable, constantly low, constantly ready to be lowered again if and when utilities goes up or membership goes down. It is the elephant in the room that the Pastor doesn’t do it “for the money” – but, eventually, your minister is going to need more money (inflation affects them too) so why not have a real plan in place for incrementally increasing it, instead of some ill-defined, pie-in-the-sky, “some [day] over the rainbow” approach. If you have a real plan, it is less likely that the Pastor will leave.

Get the taxes right, don’t tax the Pastor’s mind ~ Clergy taxes are complicated, unique, and important. When the taxes aren’t done right, the pastor pays, literally. Just because the treasurer is a CPA, doesn’t make that individual an expert on clergy taxes. Get with the experts and disseminate the information so that all the church board is on board. Doing the taxes properly and to the benefit of the clergy can maximize a small salary and keep your pastor pastoring on at your parish.  

Think Faith, not Fundraising ~ Thinking prudently and squirreling away money is a sound, financial move. A church is a non-profit organization to the government; but it is a Faith-based organization in God’s eyes. A church board can only financially step out prayerfully and in faith at the rate of the weakest member. This is why folks with business backgrounds but without faith can’t see past the fiscal quarter, while a widow who struggles on faith every month to make it can see far into the future. Any such strugglers? – Get them on the church board and listen to them occasionally.

Save it ‘till after the Sabbath ~ There are two points here: If it can wait until after Sunday, don’t mention it on Sunday. That will keep to a minimum the barrage of information that just happens to be given the Pastor on Sunday. The second point is that your minister needs to have a Sabbath and needs a vacation. You should check regularly to make sure that your Pastor has taken one and have a few people in the congregation who run interference. When a member mentions something to you that they are going to make clear to the Pastor, think about running interference – ask them to wait until after your Pastor has had a day off. Also make sure your minister goes on vacation. Anybody loses their sense of perspective without a break and is subject to burnout. You don’t want your minister needing to resign just to get a vacation!

Support your local… Pastor ~ Four words that can make all the difference in the world. Most pastors are self-starters, sensitive and need all the encouragement in the world. Their ideas are not always feasible, but most are, because pastors wouldn’t be trying something that wouldn’t work, because they’ve got the most to lose. What has the average congregant got to lose, a friend in the pew? A tough budgetary meeting might ensue if the attendance or giving is down. What a headache! But the Pastor has the most to lose or gain. So why micro-manage? Roll with the creative energy coming from your Pastor and move forward. You’ll be amazed how much your minister is willing to stick around if the congregation is supportive.   

 

It was a celebration of my 40th anniversary to the priesthood. A young woman unknown to me came in and sat in the back. At the end of the service when l shook her hand l thanked her for coming and said l would see her in the parish hall for coffee and cake. When l came in later l found her sitting alone. I sat down with her and began to talk. She was in the army so l introduced her to a parishioner who was a retired officer. I also beckoned to the senior warden, since he has children in the Navy. If l had not done this, she would have been left sitting alone.

The people at the service that day were among the most faithful and active of my parishioners. But once inside the parish hall they sit at the same tables, with the same people, and seem not to notice anything else. If they have cake and ice cream in front of them it is even more true.  We are our own worst enemies. Perhaps even the enemies of God? Whatever happened to "zeal for Thy house has eaten me up"? Unfortunately, we are too busy eating the cake and the ice cream.

In my years in interviews with churches and in my work as deployment officer, l have heard the same statements over and over: "We want to grow." "We want more young people." To be frank, no, you don't.  Most are not willing to pay the cost.

What you want is your regular routine, comfortable worship, and a religion that doesn't demand too much from you. ( I suppose that goes for all of us, actually.) But we seem to expect good things to take place in church without our active participation. In the least, we assume someone else will do it.  Over the years, people have complimented me on our youth programs at St. Bart's and admired our youth ministries. They ask how it is done. I could say "We have a parish life center." (We don't.) I could reference our stage and theatre, our basketball court and soccer fields which are kid magnets. (They don't exist.) Having a forty-thousand dollar youth budget has certainly been asset. (Actually, the discretionary fund is in the red.) But the true answer is, you have to be married to my wife. (Try it and I'll shoot you.)

I have seen my wife spend hour after hour making phone calls, organizing events, sending out flyers, assigning  food donations, setting up or giving rides .Sometimes over the years we have asked parents to do some of these things and have heard “I called several times and they weren’t at home.” “They said they would be there.” (Did you ask if they needed a ride and said that you would provide it?) “They said they would get back to me.” (Did you get back to them?) My wife, on the other hand, is like the hound of heaven.  She calls, she cajoles, she smiles and never gives up.  If the child is hesitant, she overcomes their arguments.  If the parents are less than responsible, she talks about how much we need their children to attain critical mass.  She is more persistent than a Rottweiler and more loving than a dachshund.

I have had priests tell me they want their young people to go to St. Michael's Conference. I give them applications and they set them out on a table. Perhaps an announcement is made. And there it ends. That is not how it is done. That is not how anything is accomplished in ministry. And one must expect that there will be constant resistance, strong resistance, for a variety of reasons, not the least of which is spiritual. I am going to use youth ministry as an example, but the principles apply more widely.

Remember how St. Augustine said, "Lord, make me chaste, but not just yet." I suspect many parents, in their secret hearts,pray, "Lord, Make my child a Christian, but not TOO Christian. My mother-in-law already thinks it strange that a Christmas Pageant should take precedence over family celebrations. I don't want to get up to take them to Sunday school EVERY Sunday, especially after driving all over the state for sports tournaments, paying for hotels and restaurants. I can't afford to buy a 5-pound hamburger donation for the weekend retreat after spending several hundreds of dollars on soccer/band/pom-pom camp." Is the church our first priority for our children or somewhere at the bottom?

When l was growing up outside of Philadelphia, in a mostly Catholic area, all my Catholic friends were required to serve at one 6 a.m. mass a week. Now l know priests who have trouble getting their acolytes to show up 15 minutes early. But coaches of high school football teams can demand attendance at 6 a.m. practices nearly every day of the week and parents nod meekly while extolling "discipline" to their offspring, discipline in everything but being disciples. I sometimes fantasize about God entering bedrooms 5 minutes after church starts, carrying a clipboard and blowing a whistle, using a megaphone to announce to the bleary-eyed, "You're off the team!"

The same applies to the importance of Christian knowledge.  I don’t mean memorizing the books of the Bible but questions such what is the Trinity?  What is Holy Communion? It is called catechesis. When I was a young foolish priest in a small parish I decided that we would show off what the children were learning in Sunday school.  You see when they called me they told me the first priority was building up the Sunday school.  In six months it went from three to eighteen.  So the children would come up and I would ask them these simple questions.  There was a clinker.  If they didn’t know the answer, I would ask their parents.  After all, they were supposedly going over this material with their children.  I still remember the look on the Warden’s face when I asked him, “What is the Trinity”? 


There is one very simple factor about youth ministry which is frequently forgotten; you have to put up with young people.  Babies scream, toddlers toddle and knock over hymnals, elementary school children giggle and teenagers look unhappy and are sometimes disrespectful.  But if you want a youth program you need to put up with children.  No one has found a successful way to have a youth pageant or junior choir vaporize as soon as they have entertained us and made us feel as if we meet the “needs of youth”.

We also must deal with sin.  Sorry about that.  I remember one parent hearing about our lessons where we talked about Christian chastity.  Do you know the response we got from the parents, “We did it. They will, too.”  I really wanted to say, you complain constantly about your husband and your marriage.  Perhaps if you had spent more time in conversation and prayer than you did in bed before marriage you might have truly known each other.

Christians fight against the world, the flesh and the devil.  Nowhere is this battle seen more clearly than in youth ministry.  Parents resist.  Young people complain and our own parishioners want worship without babies crying.  The leadership of a parish must constantly confront and challenge.  They must realize that unless they persistently pursue the education and formation of young people the parish will not grow. But, after the retreat, the teens are ecstatic and they develop a prayer life. The babies and toddlers add life to the service in many ways. Kids in Sunday school often teach their teachers about wonder and devotion. I pray that you find within your midst a hound of heaven and that you have the fortitude to support their ministry.

The generation leading up to the Reformation is rarely studied as carefully as the Reformation itself, with a resultant convoluted presentation of the various woes and ills of the Medieval Church. Certainly, the rise of Indulgences is mentioned, the Renaissance as well. Sometimes the Turkish invasion of Europe is harped upon, but rarely do we delve into all the factors when seeking the cause(s) of the Reformation of the Western Church. (Truly, to delve into all the factors is a voluminous undertaking.) Let us cut slightly at an angle to an odd line-of-inquiry in the direction of Romania.

The life of Vlad Tepes, the infamous Dracula, can help us understand both the political science behind those princes who accepted the Reforms, the fears that prompted them, and the ills that impassioned them. Such is helpfully brought to light (with a little help from your humble reviewer) through a biography of Dracula written by a Romanian aristocrat, an actual descendent of Vlad, Radu Florescu, and a sometime Boston College professor, Raymond McNally.

Let us review the situation: Romania is separated into various areas, Moldavia, Wallachia, etc. But the people of this language group are very loyal to the Greek/Russian Orthodox Faith and still are to this day. In the midst of Romania, Saxons who are loyal to a German Roman Catholicism are living. In Hungary, there is a strong presence of Roman Catholicism. The King of Hungary, often attempting to attain the German Emperorship, is fighting against the disciples of John Huss, a proto-movement of the Reformation. The Polish Kingdom is likewise loyal to Rome. Muscovite Russia is crouching to move towards ascendency among the Eastern Orthodox as Constantinople falls to the Turks. Greece is compromised and many Greeks, Bulgarians, Serbs and Romanians have fallen down to the Sultan’s will. The situation is desperate.

The age of Crusades is not at an end. Rome continues to declare them. But Italy plays the political games that make that peninsula the stage of the Borgias, Machiavelli, the martyred Savanarola and the good, the bad and the ugly of the Vatican. The Germanic kingdoms have their own drama. And in the midst of all of it, the Balkan Peninsula to the Black Sea is the scene of slaughter unbridled and blood up to the bridle. Is the world coming to an end?

Folks must have wondered if it were so. But a man stepped into the picture who, while only leading the people of Wallachia (in between various exiles) less than a decade, would become a figure of such political science as to make Machiavelli a midget and Ivan the Terrible almost tolerable. Vlad was inducted very young into the Order of the Dragon, one of the semi-secret military orders like the Knights Templar of a previous century. Loyal to Rome, they were supposed to fight the Turks and stop the Hussites. When he began to rule Wallachia, he became Romanian Orthodox. When he wanted to marry into Hungarian royalty, he became Roman again. He impaled a lot of people. He sometimes persecuted the Church, whether loyal to Rome or Constantinople. He sometimes upheld the Church, both Roman and Byzantine. Was Vlad of Wallachia a monster? Yes. Was he a hero? Yes.

Let us fast forward a generation: The rebellion of John Huss has been hijacked by Martin Luther. Some of the princes of Germany, for whatever reasons, supported Luther. Henry VIII remained loyal to Rome for a bit, debating Martin Luther. Henry VIII needed a divorce so that he could have an heir and so that he could separate from the Spanish whose allegiance had perhaps become oppressive. The Spanish, having recently ousted the Moors, had become Roman Catholic fanatics. He was aware of the way the Emperor of Byzantium had had some measure of control over the Orthodox Church. He knew the claims of previous monarchs of Europe concerning their right to rule their local part of the Church. His scholars sought means to divorce him from his wife. He crushed his enemies: St. Thomas More’s head rolled, the Holy Maid of Kent prophesied no longer, the Carthusians of the London Charterhouse were drawn and quartered. So very like Vlad, his reign became bathed in blood. Yet, unlike his daughter, Queen Mary, “bloody” was not his undying suffix; she was Roman after all, not Reformed. And she, like her Spanish husband, was certainly bathed in blood, just not dead spouses.

Henry VIII stripped his monasteries – but he intended to build them back up again as non-Papal places of prayer. Henry VIII utilized something of the Eastern Orthodox idea of Divorce, declaring it for himself as a Pope-of-sorts, and he did so to a fault. He persecuted the Church. He built the Church up. He supported the Crusades against the Turks along with Roman Catholic nations. Indeed, he never left the Roman Communion just had himself declared the head of the Western Church in England. He dwelled, like Vlad, in a nowhere land, not between Rome and Constantinople, but between Rome and Reform. He didn’t make the situation. He just reacted to it, the way a leader has to – bearing the consequences along the way.  

When we seek to crucify or congratulate some political leader, to declare him or her a monster or a model, we should look very carefully at the complex scenario and the propaganda of that leader’s friends and foes. It isn’t easy. But I think that when we look at whether a man is a tyrant or just a terror to his enemies, we need to consider all sides. As the recent movie Dracula Untold attempts to do, we should begin to understand that a leader can easily become a monster for the sake of his own people. One would not wish to make excuses, but one might beg to point out: It is a duty very clearly outlined in a coronation oath – one is to defend the people committed to one’s rule, with sword, with scepter, by blood.    

            

We live in a post-Christian society. So how do you get back into society? Here are some thoughts....


1.      Change your signage. People notice change. If it is the same all the time, they stop looking. Then when you have something to announce, they don’t notice it. You don’t have to have a wacky message or pithy saying, but there are plenty of dignified ways of keeping it fresh.

2.      Keep your website updated. This keeps getting said, but websites keep not getting updated. If a volunteer doesn’t get it done, hire someone. (If you don’t know who to hire, contact the webmaster of this website.) One article on this subject said that you should at least spend as much money on your website as you do on coffee and donuts for fellowship. You could spend as much time updating it as you do editing your bulletin, because more people might well see the website than the bulletin.  

3.      Volunteer somewhere, doing something. The community is used to pastors coming in and trying to grow their congregation and impress their people and thus keep their job. If you have some extra time (yes, that was a joke), you could volunteer because people want to know that your congregation wants to be of service to their community and that you want to take the lead in that.

4.      Find a group to have coffee with. From town to town, across the land, elderly men (and women), and young people too, get together for coffee in the (early) morning. That is a constant. Do you drink coffee in the morning? Great. You can have some company while you sip.

5.      Read your community newspaper(s). Do you enjoy the Wall Street Journal and consider the local paper “a liberal rag”? That’s okay. It is still your community, the community where you’ve been called to preach the gospel. Check the activities, the obituaries, the articles. That way, when somebody in the community talks about what’s in it, they know that you care about what goes on in your community, instead of what goes on somewhere else.

6.      Go to activities. You don’t have to spend money. There are historical society meetings, bingo opportunities, community meals, and genuinely interesting things going on at the library. It works better if the activity is something in which you are (somewhat) interested. But if you can be interested in somebody else being interested, then you can attend just about anything that a Christian can attend.

7.      Join the local chamber of commerce. If you join the local chamber of commerce, you can go and exchange your business card with folks. Not many clergy do so. I was trained by my bishop to do that and, in one community, word got around that I did and other clergy started to too.

8.      Let organizations use your building. The church isn’t a social club. It isn’t a community center either, but that doesn’t mean that the community can’t use it. The more people who feel comfortable walking into the church, the more comfortable they feel walking into the church. Plus the community wants to know that your congregation wants to be of service to the community, so be of service. Is your congregation a cult? Then why might it be appearing like a cult to the community? Maybe because people aren’t allowed inside.

9.      Business cards. Have them stocked and ready to go on a daily basis. This is one feature of the professional world that has not gone out of fashion. It connects your face to the place, the place to your emergency contact, your email, your website.

10.  Become the chaplain of something. There are plenty of organizations that need chaplains. They may never join your congregation, but you might evangelize them, serve them, minister to them. And that is the point, isn’t it?

11.  Have the emergency number readily available to the public. Don’t like getting calls from people looking for money or drunks needing rides? Understandable. Nevertheless, I have noticed that after a while the freeloaders figure out that you don’t own a money tree and the alcoholics learn that you won’t budge until they start to go to A.A. But, after a while, the folks who need a minister learn how to find you. That’s a wonderful, wonderful thing.

 

From church to church, throughout the country, we have a lovely tradition: The Tradition of the Guest Registry. Eclipsed by other technology, this lonely book stands in the back of the church/nave/sanctuary/auditorium, a tribute to a bygone era. What is that era? It is the era of the home visit and the calling card.

            My best friend, when church hunting, was surprised to find that the preacher called very soon after his family’s visit. Some of those leaflets stuck inside the pew holder can indicate “Visit Desired” or something to that effect. But mostly these slips of paper or cardstock succumb to the onslaught of toddlers’ crayons, the crumpled results of mistaken identity (mistakenly identified for some hymnal or other) or because of years of being ignored and stressed by various bodies resting against pew backs.

            Can anything save the waning age of the guest register, a register that so often stands in the back of the church in the opposite direction of the way to the fellowship hall, to which congregational conclave visitors are eagerly pressed by well-meaning congregants? Probably not, but you can, for the time being, before your guest register rides off into the sunset never to be seen again, like the All-American cowboy, stave off this unhappy departure and make it more useful in the interim.

            How can you do this? You can do so by purchasing a new guest register (one that doesn’t sadly show how few visitors have visited – or rather taken the time to sign [not quite the same thing] – the guest register since 1984.) Can the home visit ever go out of fashion? Not completely. It is always sophisticated when done well. Can the note thanking a visitor for gracing your church go out of fashion? Never! But you can, as the business world says, “increase your email capture” with the new (2011) Guest Register from Franklin X. McCormick, Inc. out of Milwaukee.

            Not only is it noticeably different – and thus more likely to draw the “church shopper’s” eye, the shopper who has been so used to seeing the same register time and again - it is new, period. So many guest registers have been worn out from years of use, or lack thereof. I highly recommend this gold-lettered edition, complete with scripture verses at the bottom and the email slot clearly marked before the address line. Why? This is because so many will more likely share an email address, while remaining concerned about an address, not least of which because it might lead to a visit. Of course, if they should like a visit or wouldn’t mind one, they can always share their address. At least it shows that a church is aware that the internet age is upon us, whether that is to our pleasure or woe. Is it the answer to all church outreach issues? No. But evangelism is all about the little things.

            While you’re at it, it is always nice to make sure that the pen is of a dignified make, such as one sees at the guest register at the funeral home. And, when somebody inevitably steals that pen to write a lovely check with, replace it with yet another dignified make and model. Furthermore, have you thought of how wonderful it is if you have the email address? It means that you can keep that potential parishioner/congregant “in the loop” on various matters. You can send him a lovely pdf version of your newsletter (which, incidentally, you can send to a great deal of parishioners and save on stamp and paper and ink). Yes, I think that this leads to a lot of good things.

You may see the reviewed guest register here.

I found this lovely volume among some books given to me by a predecessor at one of my parishes. It is by the clergyman who wrote “Onward Christian Soldiers” and it is really excellent.

Rev. Baring-Gould was born in 1834 and entered Cambridge University in 1852, earning his Bachelor’s and Master’s degrees there. As a curate, he met the love of his life, Grace Taylor, with whom he had fifteen children all of whom lived to adulthood! To add to his unconventionality, even for those days, she was quite a bit younger than he and low-born, while he was of the country gentry. He became a Rector of a parish in Essex and then when his father passed away, he inherited the family estate and then, being the local squire, he was able to appoint himself to the parish connected with the estate when it became vacant.

His works were varied and, some would say, eccentric. He, surprisingly, wrote the most widely read (to this day!) source on Lycanthropy, yes, on werewolves! His works often deal in the realm of folklore.

His devotional book, The Golden Gate, has excellent catechetical material and is not unlike The Practice of Religion and The St. Augustine’s Prayer Book – although it is distinctly more Anglo-Catholic and less Anglo-Papalist. For example, his treatment of the Angelic Salutation clearly prefers the Medieval form that lacks “Holy Mary, Mother of God, Pray for us sinners now and at the hour of our death.” Rightly so, he states that this was not added until the Fifteenth Century. Indeed, Savanarola was the first to put that phrase and request for intercession into a devotional work. (The original form, as it was used in Medieval England, is totally scriptural and cannot be debated by any Anglican as to its legitimate use.)

He is a bit hard on Roman Catholics in England as well as Dissenters from the Church of England and even Lutherans. Yet there is a charity pervasive in most of the work. He includes the Liturgy of the Hours, Family Prayers, and personal sets of Morning and Evening Prayer, in some respects similar to Lancelot Andrewes Preces Privatae – although distinctly more accessible. There are Litanies abounding and Collects galore and it is well worth a purchase.

The book is available for purchase here.

The Anglican Church is not a large church – at least in America. As the third-largest tradition of Christians in the World, it is, in fact, pretty big. But there is something rather disconcerting about explaining to your community who you are, day after day. If one looks at the history of Anglicanism in America, there has rarely been an area where that tradition has been well represented. After the American War for Independence, most of the Anglicans went to Canada, or Barbados, or back to the Blessed Island, England. So it is hard to find anywhere where we are the “religion of the masses.” For people proud of their tradition, this can be a let-down.

            The answer is not church growth. The answer is church witness. We do not exist in a “church growth crisis.” We rather have a witnessing problem. Witnessing will usually (emphasis – usually) result in growth, but growth should not be our main objective anyway. As long as a church is witnessing to its community and being holy leaven in our towns, then it is successful – period. Size doesn’t matter. There is a word for little churches that have no positive, cultural, gospel-centered influence on their communities – that word is “cult”. There is a word for large churches that have no positive, cultural, gospel-centered influence on their communities – that word is also “cult”. Size doesn’t matter.

            Witness-Paralysis comes because we focus on the fruits instead of the seeds, on the results rather than on the realization that we are really not in control, Jesus and His Holy Spirit and His Heavenly Father is. Youth are not the future of the Church, Jesus is. Young families are not the vehicle by which the Gospel is preached to our communities, the Holy Spirit is.

            The word “Magic” in Greek is strongly connected to attaining a certain result through a certain technique. Church-Growth gurus have a lot of magic; they have a lot of techniques. So did the Baal prophets. They cut themselves and made loud noises and ran around trying to attract a dumb idol’s attention. Elijah had faith. The Egyptian priests had a lot of magic. They could turn staves into serpents and mimic Moses’ miracles. But Moses’ miracles devoured them up.

            The Wesleys, good Anglican clergy who wanted to see the Church witness more effectively to their communities, had holy clubs, leaven for the lump. Does your congregation have “Witness-Paralysis”? For example, you feel in a slump, at a dead end, ineffective in your communities. Or, you feel as if church growth is working for everybody else in town but you. You say your congregation is “graying.” You say you are the youngest member in your church – whether it is true or not. “Nobody wants to do anything.” If this sounds like you or your church, then you probably have “Witness-Paralysis”. More shockingly, you probably have C.G.A. – Addiction to Church Growth. Here is a 12-step process for overcoming this destructive pathos. Yes, it is based on The Twelve-Step Process.

1.     We admit that we are powerless over our addiction to church growth and need help. Clergy, adults, even teens, play the “numbers game”. When I was in elementary school, being destined for ministry, I had already “caught the bug”. I checked out the attendance every week to see “how we were doing.” It is exciting. It is quantifiable. It is addicting. And it is sinful. We seek to win God’s favor by showing how well we are doing in the right stuff: Youth and Money. Besides being a wrong way to approach God, being outside of His holy blood-shedding, it isn’t even the stuff He likes. He says, “To what purpose is the multitude of your sacrifices unto me? saith the LORD: I am full of the burnt offerings of rams, and the fat of fed beasts; and I delight not in the blood of bullocks, or of lambs, or of he goats” (Isaiah 1:11). Basically, the number of cattle that you bring to His temple doesn’t matter to Him, and neither do the number of people. The Prophet David says, “For thou desirest not sacrifice; else would I give it: thou delightest not in burnt offering.” God wants a changed heart. “The sacrifices of God are a broken spirit: a broken and a contrite heart, O God, thou wilt not despise” (Psalm 51:16-17). And this step is an essential first-step to a changed heart on this matter.

2.     We admit that God, utterly and completely, is in control of revealing to us our Gospel witness to our communities. God is in control of what our witness is. When one starts a ministry, one has a very specific idea who one’s target audience will be. Or, at least, usually we do. Our family. Our friends. People who need healing. People who are down-and-out. People at the country club. God is probably happy about this zeal, until it starts to get in the way of His divine will. But often the people He first puts in our heads as the reason “for” the ministry is the only thing He could put in our heads, because we don’t know what we don’t know. And what we don’t know is the wonderful thing that He has planned for His ministry through us. “For since the beginning of the world men have not heard, nor perceived by the ear, neither hath the eye seen, O God, beside thee, what he hath prepared for him that waiteth for him” (Isaiah 64:4).

3.     We make a decision to turn our wills completely over to Him and the direction of our church witness completely over to Him. It is His church. We know this. Decisively turning this over to Him is hard, however. But He can’t do much with the church to which He has led us (it’s not our church) - He can’t do much if we keep a tight grip on it.

4.     We make a complete moral inventory of our faults and failings, especially the seeking after false means (magic) by which to achieve a distorted end (church growth instead of Gospel witness). Besides the importance of confession in Methodism, Charles Finney in his “Revivals of Religion” utilizes the ancient catholic concept of self-examination and confession of sin as a necessary step in preparation for a revival in our congregation. When the inordinate desire for revival (in the guise of “church growth”) is the thing that needs to be confessed, the self-examination process takes on a certain irony. Let’s embrace the irony, chuckle at it, and confess our sins. I overheard once at Valley Forge Christian College a Pentecostal professor talking about how old Pentecostal churches, when they weren’t growing, would fast and pray until they figured out why. I think that one of the things that would be revealed to us if we did fast and pray is that we wanted church growth inordinately.

5.     We confess these sins before others and before God. Confessing it means sharing it. Let’s “spread the bug” that we’ve wanted church growth inordinately and for the wrong reasons.

6.     We truly intend amendment of life concerning our sins, especially seeking after church growth instead of Gospel witness. We need to actually desire to change our ways. This is hard, which leads to the 7th step.

7.     We humbly ask Him to remove these failings. Prayer and fasting here would be very helpful.

8.     Make an inventory of all the people we have hurt by seeking church growth instead of the witness of Faith, Hope and Charity. Many churches are the wreck and ruin of desiring church growth, but desiring to control it more. We have sinned against charity time and again by thinking that our ideas (not God’s) are the ways to grow the church; that our ideas will keep the church accounts balanced; that our ideas and our type of people are the right type of people to evangelize. I confess that I have hurt people this way. I have also been hurt this way. We need to make an inventory of the people we have hurt. Some of those people are in churches we’ve left. Some have left our church. Tragic of all, some have left THE Church. Either way they carry wounds and are tempted with bitterness often because of our lack of charity.

9.     Make direct amends to those souls who have been hurt by such activity. At the very least, we need to pray for those people. But also pray for insight; See if there are any ways that you can make direct amends to those people, except where doing so would hurt them or others.

10.  Continue to seek and destroy sin in our lives, noting lapses in which we slouch towards a distorted understanding of church witness, and promptly confessing such sin, admitting that we are wrong. These tendencies creep up and creep in. The opportunity to fall back into wrong thinking happens every time the pews fill up or don’t, every time the church budget balances or doesn’t. It is a constant struggle.

11.  Seek out spiritual growth through prayer and meditation. Resting in the Lord is the best way to overcome the inordinate desire for a little extra, for that little cherry on the top. The Lord wants us. We know that He has called us to be numbered in His flock. He does not wish to lose us. He doesn’t want us to be the one sheep out of the ninety-nine to go astray because we were seeking one more sheep to show Him how much we love Him; or, heaven-forbid, because being with Him wasn’t enough, wasn’t enough to fill the void in our hearts. Let Him do the evangelism. If evangelism is a source of temptation, let it alone for a while and just sit with Him. You’re His.

12.  Share this message with others.

Our congregations are a mess. They are a mess often because God wasn’t enough. We had to have a “successful” church too. This is an addiction, just as much of an addiction as alcohol and drugs can be. For the alcoholic, regular life isn’t enough. Family, friends, a job, all imperfect, aren’t enough. For the person addicted to church growth and success, regular Christianity isn’t enough. Regular Christianity, like family, friends and work, is imperfect. There are two ways to deal with imperfection: Take care of it or let God take care of it.

            I would recommend the latter. When we try to take care of it, it leads to dysfunction and codependence. It leads to pain, heaped upon imperfection. Just like alcoholic families, congregations exhibit the dysfunction and codependence of a family with addictions. Vestry meetings are filled with plays for control and manipulations. Nobody feels free. Everybody feels miserable. It is a living hell.

            But evangelism and witnessing in our communities is freeing. It is fun. Prayerfully finding how exactly God wants you and your brethren in the congregation to witness is finding out who you are in Christ, who you are by nature, who you were born to be! It doesn’t require doing “what works” – for somebody else, for some other congregation in town. Keeping up with the Joneses is boring. Rather, prayerfully seeking God’s will allows you to do what it is that God is working in you! – Indeed, that which is well-pleasing in His sight.