I was their church consultant in 2003. The church’s peak attendance was 750 in 1975. By the time I got there the attendance had fallen to an average of 83. The large sanctuary seemed to swallow the relatively small crowd on Sunday morning.
The reality was that most of the members did not want me there. They were not about to pay a consultant to tell them what was wrong with their church. Only when a benevolent member offered to foot my entire bill did the congregation grudgingly agree to retain me.
I worked with the church for three weeks. The problems were obvious; the solutions were difficult.
On my last day, the benefactor walked me to my rental car. “What do you think, Thom?” he asked. He could see the uncertainty in my expression, so he clarified. “How long can our church survive?” I paused for a moment, and then offered the bad news. “I believe the church will close its doors in five years.”
I was wrong. The church closed just a few weeks ago. Like many dying churches, it held on to life tenaciously. This church lasted ten years after my terminal diagnosis.
My friend from the church called to tell me the news. I took no pleasure in discovering that not only was my diagnosis correct, I had mostly gotten right all the signs of the impending death of the church. Together my friend and I reviewed the past ten years. I think we were able to piece together a fairly accurate autopsy. Here are eleven things I learned.
- The church refused to look like the community. The community began a transition toward a lower socioeconomic class thirty years ago, but the church members had no desire to reach the new residents. The congregation thus became an island of middle-class members in a sea of lower-class residents.
- The church had no community-focused ministries. This part of the autopsy may seem to be stating the obvious, but I wanted to be certain. My friend affirmed my suspicions. There was no attempt to reach the community.
- Members became more focused on memorials. Do not hear my statement as a criticism of memorials. Indeed, I recently funded a memorial in memory of my late grandson. The memorials at the church were chairs, tables, rooms, and other places where a neat plaque could be placed. The point is that the memorials became an obsession at the church. More and more emphasis was placed on the past.
- The percentage of the budget for members’ needs kept increasing. At the church’s death, the percentage was over 98 percent.
- There were no evangelistic emphases. When a church loses its passion to reach the lost, the congregation begins to die.
- The members had more and more arguments about what they wanted. As the church continued to decline toward death, the inward focus of the members turned caustic. Arguments were more frequent; business meetings became more acrimonious.
- With few exceptions, pastoral tenure grew shorter and shorter. The church had seven pastors in its final ten years. The last three pastors were bi-vocational. All of the seven pastors left discouraged.
- The church rarely prayed together. In its last eight years, the only time of corporate prayer was a three-minute period in the Sunday worship service. Prayers were always limited to members, their friends and families, and their physical needs.
- The church had no clarity as to why it existed. There was no vision, no mission, and no purpose.
- The members idolized another era. All of the active members were over the age of 67 the last six years of the church. And they all remembered fondly, to the point of idolatry, was the era of the 1970s. They saw their future to be returning to the past.
- The facilities continued to deteriorate. It wasn’t really a financial issue. Instead, the members failed to see the continuous deterioration of the church building. Simple stated, they no longer had “outsider eyes.”
Though this story is bleak and discouraging, we must learn from such examples. As many as 100,000 churches in America could be dying. Their time is short, perhaps less than ten years.
What do you think of the autopsy on this church? What can we do to reverse these trends?
Posted on April 24, 2013
With nearly 40 years of ministry experience, Thom Rainer has spent a lifetime committed to the growth and health of local churches across North America.
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473 Comments
I’m curious–what church was this in Thom Rainer’s story? It would be very interesting to know the name of the now deceased church, then google the name, and find out more. Such as, for example, do the former members now regret their mistakes?
What church was this, Thom?
Thom:
I am a 26 year old minister who is called to preach and pastor and have been in the ministry for 4 years. The church I am serving at is going through a change and says they want me as their pastor. (I am currently serving in other areas). The church averages around 30. We currently have 56 chairs out that we can’t fill. They say they want to grow, but there is unresolved conflict that has been building over the years and I believe it is hindering the growth of the church. I am going to be using this article in a sermon this week and it may very well be the last sermon I preach here, but it also may be just the beginning. The most recent pastor left in January and he left discouraged and I have been preaching ever since. I am asking for prayer for myself and the decisions to be made but also for the hearts of the people in the church. I have a vision for our church to start reaching the community, but I don’t believe we are ready. I’m just not sure where to go from here. Any advice would be appreciated.
Dr. Rainer,
I just just bought and read the new Autopsy book in one sitting. Very insightful stuff. I admit I bought the book because my own scenario at the church I pastor made me desperate to find some answers.
As a pastor of a small, rural church, I’ve seen the “We’ve never done it that way” animal rear its ugly head far too often. The amazing thing I’ve found is that most church members seem to know that it’s a problem – in a vacuum. But when situations come up that they care about, no matter how small, wisdom seems to fly out the window. Often as not, it ends up being someone you thought had a little more wisdom than they display.
I appreciate your insights on this topic, and with your permission, may attempt to incorporate some of these principles going forward (giving you due credit, of course!).
My prayer request is this: it often seems hopeless. Tradition for tradition’s sake produces the single hardest and most illogical obstacle I’ve faced as I attempt to lead God’s people. My prayer is that we pastors have the wisdom when to speak and when to let things go, and in all things, rely on God’s grace. Right now, I’ll admit, I’m not sure which way is up.
Thanks for your faithfulness.
Ben- Thank you. I am praying for you right now.
Such short sightedness by some of you to ignore real numbers and statistics regarding population growth and church membership.
Really tired of all the blame being placed on the older members.
Really tired of all the answers revolving around needing children.
Between 2012 and 2020 the population of those over 50 will have increased by 76%, while the population of those under 50 will have increased by 1%.
Clearly, a church must meet the needs and reach out to ALL ages with the same gusto. To do anything less is tell that group of people being ignored that they are not worth the effort and have no value.
Any church should be excited to gain members with a potential of being there for 30 years, right? If you answered yes, then you need to be certain you are not ignoring the over 50 population, 40% of which is unchurched.
When Christ said to “love your neighbor” he didn’t stop there, he continued saying, “as yourself”. A church must be healthy itself or it won’t be able to love their neighbor. We must care for and feed ourselves or we’ll be in no condition to care for and feed our neighbors. It’s not an either/or situation, but a both/and situation.
When a church doesn’t “vote to live”, they’ve turned completely inward, but turning completely outward ignoring the health of members is also not voting to live. IMHO
I’m music director at a dying congregation. This past Sunday I glanced over people in the pews and it dawned on me that I saw mostly white hair (or no hair…). I say ‘congregation’ because it is the Traditional Worship campus of a thriving multi-campus church, having grown about a thousand members in the last five months and becoming one of Methodism’s largest churches in the US. All this growth has taken place at the Contemporary worship campuses, where the leadership puts all the attention and energy. Traditional worship is seriously neglected. Any suggestions, Mr. Rainer?
Our denomination began in the late 1800’s. In the 1970 and 80’s attendances peaked, the Sunday school hour was often more attended than worship hour. Numbers in the churches were high. Sadly today most of those churches have an attendance of under 50. I have looked over the records of these churches and because they have kept good records across the boards, I have discovered their past and present practices in ministry have changed. Their sad because of the present low numbers. The outstanding difference is, they just don’t do what they used to do. If we’re not getting results it’s our own fault, Gods provision is still promised if we’ll engage in the Great Commission.
I am staring dead in the face at some of these issues right now. I have also been studying on the Jerusalem Factor. A book that was written by Dr. David Wood. It is very simple. Look at the first church. They started with twelve, added and multiplied to 120, then multiplied greatly within 3 years until they had won over half of Jerusalem to Christ. Our issue is that we have tried to come up with ideas to grow or reach people on our own. Studying these things has led me to realize that one of our biggest problems, is Jesus laid out the method and commanded we follow. We MUST get back to that.
I am staring dead in the face at some of these issues right now. I have also been studying on the Jerusalem Factor. A book that was written by Dr. David Wood. It is very simple. Look at the first church. They started with twelve, added and multiplied to 120, then multiplied greatly within 3 years until they had won over have of Jerusalem to Christ. Our issue is that we have tried to come up with ideas to grow or reach people on our own. Studying these things has led me to realize that one of our biggest problems, is Jesus laid out the method and commanded we follow. We MUST get back to that.