The issue at hand is an element of focus.

4 Life,

Josh Reading
LifeCity Church, Civic and Tuggeranong

I do think that Jesus once in a while looked at the huge crowds following him and decided “I need to prune out the fakers” every once in a while.

I think the concern from some in the small church movement is whether we’re making disciples or filling seats. They may be wrong, but they’re intentions are far better than we give them credit for.

If it is small groups that make transformation possible at the deepest level, then meet in small groups. Why waste time, money, energy, and resources on putting on a good weekend service if the best that can be hoped for is getting people into a small group?

I think I’ll take a contrary viewpoint to just about everyone who has commented and say the church DOES exist for us. The church is a place for us to get and to give, to exist with one another in a community and meet the needs of fellow believers.

I grew up in a congregation of about 300 and we were the closest knit group of people. “Church” was everyday - delivering meals, hospital visits, witnessing through works, etc. You could count on the members of the church in ways I’ve seldom seen elsewhere.

But I think its a trade off of sorts. On the one hand, a larger church allows you to do more (i.e. financially) but you invariably attract people who just show up for the donuts. On the broad scale, do these half-hearted christians do the message of Christ a disservice by giving a witness that does not accurately reflect Christ?

I had a youth leader who told us his prayer was to have the smallest youth group by the end of the summer. Not that he wanted people to leave, but that he desired a group that were complete disciples of Christ. A quality > quantity sort of arrangement. I don’t know if thats the right way to view church, but its certainly the opposite of the collective views from these posts.

So now a “would you rather” question…
Would you rather have 12 disciples who would die for you, or 1000 followers who didn’t know your last name?

Okay, just kidding there…

Actually, I think it has to do a lot with your view on worship. If you’re viewing worship as a “lifestyle,” then you’re running as fast as you can to make sure your church is growing.

The problem is, most of us aren’t looking at worship through that lens. We tend to think of it as a “diet from sin.” We live our “real lives” all week long and then come to church on Sunday morning, where we confess to God, experience closeness with Christ, hang out with our friends who are living life just like us, and walk out the door to our “real life.” We let God wash off the sin for an hour or so and then we spend the next 6 days and 23 hours binging on whatever makes us feel good.

If that’s how you view worship, then you don’t want your church to grow because it messes up the environment you’re comfortable in and it forces you to change what you know. Because people will always DO what they KNOW. If you don’t know how to worship as a lifestyle, there is no way it will happen.

You will find things to criticize and tear down, instead of ways to encourage and build.

Let’s redefine our definition of “worship” and then we will see our churches grow.

Sorry I didn’t make it to Baltimore. Prayed for you several times on Monday. Hope to see you again soon. Keep leading well, you are making a difference.

Jeff, I think I’ve done some writing on the questions you’re asking about on the blog. You might search multi-site. Sorry I can’t spend the time answering them in detail. I”m walking into meetings now.