GROW your CHURCH. Growing Your Church Today. Laura Click & Stanford Smith

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1 GROW your CHURCH 5 Powerful IDEAS to start Growing Your Church Today Laura Click & Stanford Smith

2 INTRODUCTION As a pastor or leader, you want to see your church grow. You have a deep desire to see your members grow in their faith and you want to connect more people to Christ. The question is - how do you get started? You know that standing on the corner with a bullhorn or knocking on doors isn t the way to do it. But, you might be struggling to come up with some ideas that actually work. That s why you re reading this book. And, we want to help. In this book, we re giving you five simple and effective ways to help you jumpstart your church growth. There are no silver bullets or magic wands inside. You must roll up your sleeves and get to work if you want to make an impact for your church. However, this book will help you channel your time and resources on a few proven ideas instead of wasting time searching for the next big thing. IDEABOOK GROW YOUR CHURCH 2

3 How to Make the Most of this Book To make the most of this book, we recommend doing a few key things: Pray. Before diving into this book, spend a few minutes in prayer. Ask God to guide and lead you as you determine the best way to implement these ideas for your church. Make an appointment with yourself. Set aside at least 30 minutes on your calendar for the next five days to work on the ideas in the book. You might need more than that, but start small to ensure it happens. Do the work. You can read the book quickly. What takes time is putting these ideas into action. Don t just read it and move on. Use the appointments on your calendar to map out how to implement these ideas. If you follow these steps, you ll be on the right track to making these ideas work for your church. We can t wait to see how you use these ideas to impact the Kingdom of God! We re cheering for you! Your friends, Laura Click & Stan Smith IDEABOOK GROW YOUR CHURCH 3

4 IDEAONE Create a Compelling Vision. Does your church have a vision for where you want to be in the next year? Five years? Ten years? If not, now is the time to create one. Churches without a vision for where they want to go will have a difficult time stimulating growth with their congregation. A compelling vision can help your congregation get excited about the work you are doing for the kingdom of God. After all, without a crystal clear idea about where you want to go, it will be hard to get your church to follow you there. Remember, Jesus cast a vision for his disciples. You need to do the same for your church. So, what is your audacious, God-sized vision for your church? Allow yourself to dream. Close your eyes and envision the most amazing church you can possibly imagine. What would that look like? Here are a few more questions to help you think through this: Where would you like your church to be in five to ten years? What kind of church do you want to build and lead? Who do you serve? Who are you reaching? What kind of impact are you creating in your community? What impact are you making on the kingdom of God? What kind of leaders and volunteers are you creating? How are you discipling your members? Taking the time to map out the vision for your church might be the most powerful thing you can do to impact the growth of your church. Taking 30 minutes to brainstorm your vision would be a worthy investment of your time. IDEABOOK GROW YOUR CHURCH 4

5 IDEATWO focus on discipleship. Although most church members understand the importance of discipleship, they feel uncomfortable with doing it themselves. We know that Jesus urged us to Go and make disciples of all nations. But, the idea of actually doing it? It can feel daunting and incredibly uncomfortable. However, that mindset can be detrimental to church growth. That s why it s important to build a church culture that s focused on discipleship. In order for that to happen, you must take the mystery and stigma out of discipleship. It doesn t mean standing on the corner with a megaphone and handing out tracts. It starts with conversation and investing in people. Most people know how to do that. It s just a matter of giving your members the courage to do it with a Gospel mindset. How do you do that? Start by talking about it in your sermons. Maybe you can even create a sermon series focused on discipleship and use that as a vehicle for starting conversations about it in Sunday School and small groups. You can even take it one step further by hosting a bible study or training class about discipleship. The bottom line is this - give your members the tools they need to feel more comfortable talking about their faith and discipling others. Unless your church members adopt a discipleship mindset, it will be difficult for your church to grow and reach more people for the Kingdom of God. IDEABOOK GROW YOUR CHURCH 5

6 IDEATHREE Narrow your target audience. The biggest reason churches don t grow is because they try to reach everyone. Although we want to see every person come to know Christ, casting a wide net is not a strong church growth strategy. Why? Because when you try to attract everyone, you will attract no one. Think about it - the kind of church that would be attractive to an 18-yearold college student may look very different to a 68-year-old empty nester. That s not to say you can t have both of those in your church. But, the way you serve and reach those two people will look very different. And as a result, you end up with a wide array of church programs to cater to everyone. And your outreach efforts are fragmented because you re trying to attract everyone under the sun. That s why it pays to start with a narrowly defined audience. When you know exactly who you are trying to reach, you can create messaging, serving opportunities and outreach activities that are more attractive to this audience. Not only is a more focused approach far more effective, but it s also easier for your congregation to implement. This prevents you from spreading your resources too thin. How do you narrow down your audience? Here are a few ideas: Neighborhoods - Can you focus your outreach around a particular neighborhood? A good idea would be to consider the neighborhood where your church is located. Needs - Is there a need that your community faces that your church wants to address? Maybe it s homelessness, drug addiction, single parents or joblessness. (You can get more ideas about this in IdeaBook Church). Demographics - Think about your members and community - is there a certain demographic group that would be easy for you to reach? Maybe you re located next to a an assisted living facility, so it would make sense to target that audience. IDEABOOK GROW YOUR CHURCH 6

7 IDEAFOUR trim your programs. Many churches struggle with burnout. Pastors, church leaders, volunteers and members can easily get stressed and overwhelmed - especially in church plants or smaller churches where there s little opportunity for people to take a break from serving. It might seem counterintuitive, but cutting back your programs might be just the thing you need to do to grow. Remember the parable about the vine and branches? Jesus says that the Father cuts off every branch in me that bears no fruit, while every branch that does bear fruit prunes so it will be even more fruitful. Sometimes, in order to be more fruitful, we have to be willing to cut away the things that don t work. Once you have created a vision and a defined target audience, this becomes easier to do. Ask yourself - which programs and ministries will help us reach our target audience and help us achieve our vision? When you look at your programs through that lens, it becomes easier to see where you can prune your efforts back. IDEABOOK GROW YOUR CHURCH 7

8 IDEAFIVE take your church to the people. Far too many churches approach growth with the build it and they will come mindset. They simply hope someone new will wander in on Sunday because they have a sign out front with worship times. As I m sure you can guess, this approach doesn t work. It takes a lot for a disconnected, unchurched person to show up in a sanctuary on Sunday. After all, visiting a new church can be intimidating - even for regular church goers. The barriers for a disconnected person to show up at a sanctuary on Sunday are even greater. That s why you need to take the church to the people instead of waiting for them to come to you on Sunday. Here are a few ways you can do this: Take your church services to your target audience. What if you took your church service to a park once a month? Or, what would happen if your church holds a service at the homeless camp, women s shelter or assisted living center? Don t wait for people to come to you. Bring your worship service to your target audience instead. Dramatically serve your audience. One of the best ways to show the love of Jesus is to serve people first. How can you serve your target audience? Can you cook them meals? Offer free babysitting? Wash their cars? Serve first and see if that doesn t open all sorts of doors for conversations about your faith. Create community. People crave connection. They are desperate for it. How can you create a place where your target audience can feel safe, loved and accepted? It s not about preaching to people. It s about loving them. Maybe it s a movie night or a potluck supper at the community center. Find a way you can help people in your community connect. IDEABOOK GROW YOUR CHURCH 8

9 WHERE DO YOU GO FROM HERE? As we said at the beginning of the book, the most important thing you can do is START. There s no way to know if these ideas will work for your church unless you actually implement them. We hope and pray that you do just that. Get more bright ideas for your church These ideas are a great starting point to help you jumpstart your church growth efforts, but maybe you are looking for more ideas and a way to build an entire growth strategy, we ve got another resource to help you. IdeaBook Church provides you with a foundational strategy that has been used to help fuel the growth of businesses, non-profits and faith-based organizations just like yours. In addition to seven strategic principles for church growth, IdeaBook Church also includes 21 additional breakthrough ideas you can start implementing today. To learn more about IdeaBook Church and to purchase your copy, please visit ideabook.flybluekite.com/church. IDEABOOK GROW YOUR CHURCH 9

KINGDOM COME ONE YEAR PLAN

KINGDOM COME ONE YEAR PLAN We put this together to empower you to succeed when you launch Kingdom Come Discipleship at your church. We encourage you to print this out and fill in the blanks together with