How do we grow a church?

There have been countless books, seminars, conferences, and programs that have attempted to answer this question. It would probably not be hyperbolic to say that billions of hours (and dollars) have been invested in efforts to tell churches how to grow. It would be arrogant to flippantly brush all that aside as worthless. I am sure many of those books and conferences have valuable and helpless insights.

Nevertheless, the only correct answer to this question is a confession: we can’t!

God is the one who makes the Church grow. When we read of the growth of the early church in the book of Acts, growth did not come about through strategies or programs. The growth did not occur because the church was healthy – it often wasn’t. The growth was not due to the eloquent preaching of the apostles or their gifted leadership. No, the growth occurred because “The Lord added daily to the community of those who were being saved” (Acts 2:47 CEB, emphasis mine).

Paul picks up this same line of thought in his first letter to the Corinthians: “Neither the one who plants nor the one who waters is anything, but the only one who is anything is God who makes it grow” (1 Corinthians 3:7 CEB).

Like gardeners, pastors and church leaders can work to help create the conditions for growth. We can till the soil, plant the seeds, pull the weeds – but we have no ability to bring the rain or ensure that the seeds take root and grow to produce a crop. We can pray, preach the Word, administer the sacraments, and love God and neighbor, but only God can grow the church.

Part of the problem with the 20th and 21st Century western focus on “Church growth” is that it turns the church into an idol. The church growth movement sought to model the work of the church after the work of corporations. When this happens, the church becomes a human institution rather than a God breathed creation. Businesses grow through strategies that do not account or leave room for the working of the Spirit.

Stanley Hauerwas puts it this way: “The problem with so much of the church growth literature is that many of the strategies offered are based on atheism. These are techniques which work irrespective of whether people are deeply formed in faith in God’s work through the resurrection of Jesus of Nazareth.”¹

If how we function and strategize as a church can make sense without the work of God, then we are not a church but a business.

Biblically, the church is created and sustained by God (not ourselves). The work of the church is not to grow the church. The work of the church is to be faithful to the God who called and formed us. Yes, at times this faithfulness will bear the fruit of growth. But not always.

To return to the gardening metaphor: there are times when the work necessary is that of decline. Gardeners must prune and cut off unhealthy growth. They must pull weeds, trim branches, and throw away rotten fruit. If a gardener accepted everything growing in their garden, it would become a jungle.

There are times and seasons when God’s work in the church looks like things being stripped away. How many times in Jesus’ ministry did the crowds diminish?

The fact is that not everything that grows is healthy. Cancer and weeds and unhealthy churches can and do grow. Sometimes a church will grow because it has watered down the message and told people what they want to hear. Sometimes a church grows because it offers much but asks very little. Sometimes a church will grow because people are entertained: it’s a free concert every week along with an interesting TED Talk. There are lots of reasons why a church would grow: not all of them are because of the movement of the Holy Spirit.

Church growth and church decline tell us little about the spiritual health of a church. Churches can and do grow because the Spirit is adding to the community of those who are being saved. Churches can and do grow because people are being entertained. Churches can and do decline because the message of the gospel is hard. Churches can and do decline because the community is unhealthy and lacks Christian character. But the numbers alone cannot tell the story.

Local churches need to turn away from the golden calf of church growth. Church growth is God’s job. Our job is to be faithful. Our role is to pray, proclaim the Word, share in the sacraments, love our neighbors, point to Jesus in our words and actions, and then wait for growth in God’s good timing.

1. Hauerwas, Stanley, and William H Willimon. 1996. Where Resident Aliens Live : Exercises for Christian Practice. Nashville: Abingdon Press. Pg. 89 ↩︎