Support for Smaller Churches Ready to Grow

What will your church be like in 5 years? How about 10 years?

It’s a question all churches need to think through.

For many smaller churches, the context for asking this question is either of numerical stagnation, numerical decline, recognising the church has an aging congregation that is not being replaced, or simply that the church is struggling to reach its local community.  

Maybe as a church you recognise one of those scenarios and feel it is time to reach out for support and advice.

Thanks to some gospel-hearted churches who have been willing to release their pastors for a number of hours each month, we have brought together a geographically dispersed team of experienced pastors who all have a heart to support smaller churches in their part of the country.

The team is made up of pastors from both smaller and larger churches, all with a heart to follow the pattern of a healthy church as revealed in scripture, but in a twenty-first-century, culturally relevant context.

There are five ways in which we can help.

Listen

For many church leaders, loneliness is the biggest battle they face: faithfully serving but feeling isolated, or maybe having to juggle secular employment with leading the church.  

We would love to listen to your story and learn where the church is at today. It is also helpful hear about the community in which the church serves and vision of the church for the next few years.

We see this as foundational to being able to offer help to churches and their leadership teams. 

Encourage

Ministry has many challenges – and, sadly, at times discouragements – which I suspect you know all too well.

We want to encourage you in the role God has called you to serve him in and to be able to fulfil that calling with joy in your heart through all circumstances. 

Think

We want to help you think through afresh what a biblically healthy church could look like in your particular context, and for the church to identify areas where it needs to consider making some changes.

This invariably involves looking at leadership, church culture, or outreach into the community.

We want to help you think through how your church could move in the areas identified towards being the church it could be, to better meet the opportunities you have been given. 

Challenge

We want to gently challenge you where appropriate. This may be challenge in areas where church culture or personal preference are taking precedence over gospel opportunities – so that you can seize them in more culturally relevant ways. 

Support

It is our desire to support churches not to just be an attractive church but also a missional church, remembering the importance of equipping members to serve where they spend most of their time (their daily lives).

We want to support church leadership teams to bring about any necessary changes required to achieve this.