Challenges church growth poses

Most of us pray that our churches will grow, we long for it.  We'd love to see more and more people coming to faith in Jesus from our community, families and friends and then joining with us in our church family.  But is loving the idea the same as loving the reality.

We were looking yesterday at Acts 6v1-7 where we see the early church which has grown explosively from 120 to well over 5,000 facing the challenges growth brings.  It is a fascinating and helpful passage for our churches.  It helps us think about potential issues growth might bring and ways to plan for and resolve them.  Because growth brings dangers.  Acts 4-6 shows us the church under threat, in Acts 4 it is the threat of persecution as they are ordered by the Sanhedrin not to teach about Jesus any more.  Then in Acts 5v1-11 it is the threat of internal corruption as Ananias and Sapphire fake a work of the Spirit, and try to counterfeit grace.  Then in Acts 5 we see the threat of escalating persecution as the Apostles are arrested, divinely released and then rearrested and tried, and told not to teach anymore before being flogged and released.  Now in each case the Apostles and the church are not cowed or distracted from preaching the gospel or gathering together.

Then as chapter 6 opens we see a new threat to the church, in many ways perhaps the most dangerous because it is unexpected.  This threat has its genesis in the growth of the church.  As the church grows it gathers those who now follow Jesus from different cultures, and a simple oversight - the badly managed distribution of food by the overstretched apostles - leads to grumbling which threatens to turn difference into division.  The other danger that growth brings for the church is distraction for the Apostles from serving by preaching the word to serving by mercy ministry.  Growth brings pressures, it has with it dangers as well as potential benefits.  But this danger posed by growth also presents an opportunity to plan and re-imagine church so that growth continues.

God through Luke records for us their Spirit inspired way of resolving these pressure points brought about by growth.  The Apostles acknowledge the danger of difference becoming division and resolve that they mustn't be distracted.  The solution is re-imagine church and to appoint others to serve via mercy ministry whilst they focus on preaching and prayer.  Why?  Not because one is more important that the other, both must go hand in hand.  But because preaching the gospel of grace fuels the church.  It is the good news of Jesus taught and grace grasped that sees people won to follow Jesus and join the growing church.  It is the good news of Jesus taught and applied to believers that leads to unity despite difference and prevents those differences widening into division.  And it is the good news of Jesus taught and the growing awareness of God's amazingly gracious and generous love for us as needy people that fuels love and results in practical service of those in need.

What's the result?  A church growing in maturity expressed in unity and service of others at cost to self, and others seeing this gospel fuelled community in action and hearing the gospel which has created this amazing community and responding to the call to follow Jesus and becoming disciples in numbers.

It is so helpful as we aim to be churches taking the gospel of Jesus to a needy world to be aware of the challenges growth will pose.  To ask where are we facing these challenges?  And to reaffirm our commitment to prayerfully teaching the gospel, to be looking to multiply ministers so we can serve others well and care as the gospel calls us to.

The tragedy of watching life on a loop

Sometimes it feels as if life is merely a repeating series of cycles, but then I guess if you've read Ecclesiastes you'd expect that to be the case.  One of the great frustrations is watching people repeat the mistakes of others without recognising that they are doing so.

I guess the area where this most commonly happens is in a gradual drift.  First of all you begin missing a few things because of work commitments or family things.  Soon with a promotion or change of hours you find you "can't" make home group.  Then something happens and you miss a few Sundays.  But when people raise concerns you reassure them that you are fine, that your personal relationship with God is strong.  But as the pattern continues and you drift out to the fringe of church, increasingly giving up serving others or investing in your church family, you gradually begin to feel not part of things and your heart begins to cool towards God.

The tragedy is not just that this happens but that the bible so often warns us against it.  In the parable of the Sower we see one seed that grows up and looks good initially before getting choked by the cares and worries of this life.  Or we read in Timothy of Demas who has deserted the work of the gospel because he loved this world.  Or we read the book of Hebrews, a whole book inspired by the Spirit filled author, addressing this issue of gradual drift and the dangers inherent in it.  And yet whenever I have spoken as pastor to someone about this issue they conclude that that isn't them, that somehow they are immune from that danger.  But all the while I am speaking to them I am aware of that danger in me, that any of us can find our devotion to Jesus choked and challenged and ultimately overturned.

Watching this process happening and all your warnings being ignored is painful and frustrating.  You know what is coming but feel powerless to stop it, and you pray God would warm their heart before it is too late, as they ignore the loving outstretched arms of the church family towards them.

It's partly a result of our over individualised culture.  Maybe the church is partially to blame too as we teach people about their 'personal relationship with God' when we should be emphasising our corporate relationship with God.  Believers need each other.  The moment we start to think we don't need our church family and that they don't need us we have laid the theological foundation for drifting and spiritual shipwreck.