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Home > Blog > The Biggest Challenges in Churches

The Biggest Challenges in Churches

By New Churches Team

Every church faces challenges. Some of those are common to every church in America; some are unique based on your church’s location, culture, and congregation. No matter what your challenges are, you can overcome them by continuing to run the ball and create a culture that engages your members.

Growing Small Groups and Reaching Families

Common to most every church in America are the challenges of growing small groups and reaching families through children’s ministry.

At the beginning of a church plant, you need to focus on small groups. You should be spending time raising up leaders and coaching them. There will come a point, however, when you can no longer lead all the small group leaders. This is often the breaking point because it seems easy to lead them, but take a step back and find someone who can help you coach and lead. Keep a ratio of one coach to every three to four small group leaders.

Kids ministry is also an area that constantly needs attention. You will always need more volunteers. Don’t grow weary of that process. This is a common struggle, but be encouraged to just keep pushing forward. Providing excellence in your kids ministry will keep families in your church. This is worth the effort.

Facilities as a Growth Barrier

The goal for all of our churches is to bring more people to Christ. That goal, for most of us, will also increase the number of people attending the church. This often leads to space issues within the church’s physical location. If your church is smaller and has less than 100 seats, adding a service may not help. Instead, you need to focus on finding a new space. If you have a slightly larger space, your next step is likely adding more services. If you are stuck in your space, no matter the size, be creative about ways to overcome the growth barrier. Always be on the lookout for a better space.

What’s most important in facing growth barriers head on is your leadership pipeline. Always be developing leaders who develop leaders so that as you add services you already have leaders in place for a new service. Double your volunteer numbers. Add a teacher to every kids class, so that when you add a second service you can then split those teachers between the services. Once you do that, add another volunteer to each class so that they are again multiplying for future growth. Do this throughout all volunteer areas in your church.

Adapted from the New Churches Q&A Podcast Episode 413: Growing Small Groups and Overcoming Barriers. Click here to listen to more to church planting, multisite, and multiplication tips.

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By Ed Stetzer: People in your church are going to be nervous. They’re going to say, “Now, wait a second. If we send people out, won’t our church decline?” Statistically, the most likely scenario is that it won’t. Jeff Farmer (researcher and professor at New Orleans Baptist Theological Seminary) did a comparison study of 75 churches and found that churches who planted, when controlling for other factors of similar size and passion, actually grew. When you send people out to plant, others will show up and step into leadership roles.

When I planted a church in Erie, Pennsylvania, we decided to start two daughter churches. We said we were going to have twins, so we planted two daughter churches on one day with residents. For six months, these residents were on staff where they walked with us and we trained them. We then gave them a three-month transition period where they had a fishing license to anybody in our church. We blessed and encouraged them to approach anyone in the church with a challenge to come and plant with them. At that point, we were running 350–400 in attendance, so when they got about 50–75 people to go with them, it hurt. It was a lot more than we expected.

One whole worship team and a drummer—we had two worship teams—got a vision for church planting and decided to leave. This meant we now had no drummers in our church when they would leave. We said to our church during one of the preview services, “Listen. We’re so excited about what’s happened and how you have rallied around these church plants we’re sending out. But did you notice there’s no drummer today? We had to use a track.”

After the service, one of the members came up to me and said, “You know, I could be the drummer.”

And I said, “That’s awesome, man. But have you ever been a drummer before?”

He said, “Yeah, yeah. I used to tour professionally as a drummer.”

“What?” I was shocked because our previous drummer struggled. I mean we had a drummer all these years and he was painfully bad, but at least we had a drummer. And now this guy, who was a professional drummer, who had played for a couple different famous bands, comes up to me and tells me this?

“Are you serious?” I asked him, “Why have you never said anything?”

“Well, you know, I just wanted the guy to have a shot who was up there.”

“Dude, you’re killing me.”

This is what happened throughout the church. After we sent out people, others began stepping up to the challenge and taking on leadership responsibilities. So, cast a vision for this and allow God to send people to fill the void!

This was an excerpt from the book that I wrote with Daniel Im, 1000 Churches: How Past Movements Did It—And How Your Church Can, Too. You can learn more and download it for free here.

By Ed Stetzer: It is important to remember that ‘missiology’ is not a thing. It is things.

Some people say, “We just have to think missiologically.” But, they need to know that a missiology of a tribal people group in Papau New Guinea is very different than a missiology of Chicago’s Lincoln Park neighborhood.

As such, when we think missiologically, there is not one right way to plant a church, so it is worth looking at how churches are planted.

Let’s face it: sometimes, there is arrogance among church planters. Not you, but some of the others!

Often, this is just part of the entrepreneurial spirit that often accompanies people who start new things. Many times, new projects are started in order to ‘do right’ what previous starters ‘did wrong’.

In fact, you will find that frustration coupled with attempts to rebuild a broken structure often erupt into a drive to build something completely new. Building something new is good. But it isn’t good to plant a church for the wrong reasons, or to plant a church to show the world how it should be done right.

Today, church plants are everywhere, and cover a multitude of expressions and tracks. Let me share just two and talk a bit about the history that created the second.

Track 1: From a Home Bible Study Onward

Before the 1980s, people primarily planted churches along one track. You would start a home Bible study with a few people. It would grow for months, and then when you hit maybe 16-24 people, or a core of four or five families, you would move into the chapel stage.

This would include more traditional church elements. Then, whenever you had enough families to be self-supporting, and put people in place for leadership or church officers (depending on your denominational affiliation), you moved into the mission stage. You develop various ministries and outreach opportunities, and eventually you become an established church.

This is the way most churches where planted and what most groups taught.

Track 2: The Launch Model

Then, a conversation began in the late 1980s and early 1990s (which was greatly impacted by conversations at Fuller Theological Seminary) that would result in a major shift in church planting practices. Bob Logan developed a toolkit for church planters that was widely used (and is still on Amazon!). Kevin Mannoia wrote an interesting and helpful book about the history and development of this new phase of planting titled Church Planting – The Next Generation.

What grew out of the Fuller conversation was new and included varied ways to do something that already had a multitude of expressions for thousands of years around the world. Because we know that there is really nothing new under the sun, what happened was a revisiting of old ideas. Things that work in some areas, don’t work as well in others. Things that worked at certain times, don’t necessarily work well every time.

Missiology that marks your area and time is not necessarily the same missiology that should be engaged across the state or in 20 years.

One of the primary tracks that emerged from those conversations in the late 1980s to early 1990s was the launch model. The expression over the last 20 years looks something like this:

It begins with a team that has been built by a planter who went through an assessment and evaluation process. That planter often goes through some sort of church planter boot camp. The planter has been immersed in resources and understands the process. The person usually has some sort of financial support package that will diminish over time as the work becomes self-supporting.

The team meets regularly to prepare for the launch spiritually, emotionally, and strategically. Leading up to the launch, the team gets things in place. They secure a free or rented space and engage in a mass introduction to the people in their community or region through mailings, advertisements, social media, and other forms of technology.

This leads to a time where there may be a soft launch, practice services, and ultimately a launch service, which may have anywhere from several dozen to several hundred attendees. Because it is larger, it connects people to a larger group. To the guests, it looks like a church that is well established because the team and program work fairly smoothly and there are many people.

Is There a Preferred Way?

Each track takes dedication. Many people far from Jesus have been reached by both. Churches have both succeeded and failed in both models. There are other models as well. The key to all of this is listening to the voice of God, working for proper contextualizing in each context, and working within a framework you believe in.

However, we are now seeing a reengagmenet of the non-launch model. Sometimes it’s called different things, like missional incarnational. But, it is similar to what planters did 50 years ago—planting by relationship rather than launch.

Both matter. Both are being used today. But, the choice of which appoach should be shaped by the context.

In other words, the ‘how’ of church planting is, in many ways, determined by the who, when, and where of culture.

By Ed Stetzer: There is a big difference between talking with someone and talking about someone. Yet Christian organizations, churches, and families are full of people talking behind each other’s backs. When conflicts arise—and they will—as leaders we frequently skirt around the necessity of dealing directly with each other.

We may develop unhealthy patterns of response when we want to avoid conflict: we retreat into prayer to the neglect of communications, we work out ways to avoid the person, or we get as many people in the office as possible on our side. If we are observers of the conflict, we often ignore the situation as much as possible.

But it doesn’t help to close our mouths. And for those in leadership positions in the church, this is simply not an option.

Jesus called the peacemakers blessed. And he said that they would be called “sons of God.”

Courage to Step into the Uncomfortable Places

Yes. Communication is hard. And those who solve conflict deserve some praise. But since the process of conflict solving is painful, we often don’t receive much credit—at least in the middle of the process.

So, if you want to help people, you need to lean into the pain and help people to communicate with each other.

Recently, I was on a conference call with some guys who are wanting to launch an alliance. During the call, we kept talking on and on. Finally, I said, “Guys, I think you two need to sit down because you’re both hemming and hawing around this central question.” I defined the central issue and asked, “Are you on the same page of this? Do you agree to this basic fundamental issue?”

The answer was no. So I told them that before another conversation took place, they would need to work out that fundamental difference.

Leadership requires a commitment to solving conflict. Note that I do not say ‘ability,’ but instead ‘commitment.’ To be honest, most people can become conflict solvers if they are willing to endure some pain. A lot of leadership is being the person willing to lean into pain. When I meet with a staff member who I might need to redirect, I recognize that it could be a painful situation.

But I do it. Preferably as soon as possible so the situation doesn’t fester. I’ll say, “Listen, I just want you to know this is not working for these three reasons and we need to address it and be fine.” People typically respond, “Okay. This was helpful.” Then they continue with a better sense of clarity.

It takes courage to step into a conflict situation. In the movie We Bought a Zoo, Matt Damon reflects on the worthwhile challenges of life. He says to his son, “You just need 15 seconds of bold, audacious courage.”

And that’s what it takes. When you take that first step, it’s amazing what can happen as a result. In the Midwest, South, and much of Asia, there is a lot of conflict avoidance going on. It’s important to know your culture and audience, but after you have done that, as leaders it’s important to quickly address any conflict we see. Sometimes, it may take a few minutes before we say, “Listen, I think we’re maybe kind of walking around this.” Other times, we feel more freedom to jump right in with, “It seems like we are tiptoeing on eggshells. But we are all friends here. So let’s just break the egg.”

I want to offer four simple steps for dealing with conflict as leaders:

One, always build rapport.

A leader constantly listens. He or she builds rapport through respect, engagement in the worker’s world, and encouragement. You can’t walk into a conflict without good rapport. Some call this an “emotional bank account.” You need to keep your account full with people on your staff.

Two, set the agenda aside for a bit.

Sometimes, we are so hurried to get something done that we push through the agenda in the meeting even though people are clearly at opposite ends of the issue. Quite likely, the project on our agenda won’t get done with any quality if we finish the meeting with conflict hanging overhead. So sometimes we just need to spend time tending to the relationship before we dive in. Then, we can raise the issue directly.

Three, take the bold step.

Make sure you single out the people you are talking to so that nobody is confused where the action needs to happen. Don’t generalize. If you don’t tell others who you are addressing, you will be inviting people to take sides as a group. And that is always harder to deal with.

Four, don’t back down even if it takes a couple of minutes.

Sometimes, people are entrenched and can’t immediately admit that there is a problem. So the room may go silent or someone will try to deflect the issue. Be persistent. Think about it like a sliver in your hand. Sometimes, you need to work it a bit to get it out. And it is painful. But worth it when you are done.

No one likes conflict resolution. At our core, we all have a desire for harmony. Sometimes, however, the only way to get to harmony is through a few bumps in the road.

By Shelley G. Trebesch: Two to four years into a church plant? How do you know the church is making a difference? Courageous enough to seriously ask?

How do we know our ministries, whether preaching, outreach, serving the poor, children’s programs, or life groups, make a difference? Measuring impact tends to be elusive and often downright avoided, especially in Christian circles. However, I offer a fun and insightful method for discerning impact called the Most Significant Change (MSC).[1]

MSC is a qualitative, monitoring and evaluation methodology centered around asking people the question “What is the most significant change that has taken place as a result of …” and then asking them to tell a story that illustrates the change. MSC allows respondents to share freely and results in many stories exemplifying personal, relational, and/or leadership changes in people’s journey with God, family, workplace, community, and so on. Indeed, the range of life-change themes for effective programs can be vast and unexpectedly surprising.

This process works best in an interview setting where the interviewer asks two questions then captures a story.

1. What have been the three most important benefits of ________to you?
2. What has been the most significant change in your life (or your colleagues’ lives or your family member’s lives) as a result of this _____ ?
3. Please share a story that illustrates this change in your life (or your colleagues’ lives or your family member’s lives).

To conduct an evaluation, select a team of people who will interview and collect stories. For a small program, endeavor to collect stories from all participants. For a larger program or church, collect at least 10 percent of participants’ stories. Make sure the stories are told in personal ways, using pronouns such as “I” and “we.” Either take notes while listening, record the conversation, or have the person write the story.

Once the team collects the stories, have members read the stories individually and select the most important stories to them. Then, gather as a team and read the selected stories out loud. As a team, make a list of the emerging themes and how often they occur—repeated themes demonstrate significance. Select stories that represent the most themes i.e. the most significant themes. I find it helpful to use a spreadsheet to correlate how many stories have the same or differing themes. For example, if five out of ten persons reveal in their story that they practice reconciliation as a result of conflict management training, that theme occurs in 50 percent of the stories.

Different sets of eyes may notice new themes, potentially because of their relative importance to another team. Send the above, along with the list of themes, to the leadership team. The leadership team then reads the stories and captures the themes they see. A third group, say program directors, may capture other themes. Then create a spreadsheet that shows the three teams’ (columns) and their selected themes from highest (occurs in more individual stories) to lowest percentages and observe what can be learned from the three columns. What is important to whom?

In my experience with MSC, individual stories often reflect multiple themes that are important markers of the change process. This allows a church to understand their change theory—what activities, programs, practices, etc. actually instigate change?

Although MSC is a qualitative technique, given a sufficient number of stories, it is possible to conduct some quantitative analysis. For example, the percentages of the most common themes, as well as differences in themes that emerge in different contexts or as the result of different participant characteristics. One may notice the frequency and difference of themes amongst men and women or age categories or ethnicities or marital status, etc. This analysis enables leaders to plumb the depths of what activates change for certain groups, as they compare the themes to elements of the program.

Give it a try and discover the impact of your church!

[1] See mande.co.uk for a guide to MSC. Wikipedia also has a reasonable summary of the methodology at wikipedia.org.