Nearly 20 years ago, I was invited to meet with a group of pastors for an all-day meeting at a mountain cabin. I felt privileged to be included and was looking forward to our time with great anticipation … until the group leader asked this question:
“How did Easter go at your church?”
One by one, the pastors talked about the number of people who came out for Easter services. We didn’t hear much about the biblical passages the pastors used, or the music that was sung, or the way the Spirit moved.
No, every pastor present talked about the number of people who showed up for Easter services.
All except one, that is. Out of the dozen or so men gathered around a table, nobody asked me how many people showed up for our Easter service – and I didn’t volunteer the number.
I’ve never told anyone – until now. It was 70.
Years later, I’d be the pastor of a church that had ten times that amount on Easter Sunday, but so what?
While numbers at a church do tell a story, they never tell the whole story.
Why are evangelical Christians so obsessed with numbers?
For starters, numbers are a way to measure a church’s progress. If your church had 225 people in attendance a year ago, and you have 270 today, you’re reaching more people for Jesus. And on the surface, that’s good.
Conversely, if you have 270 today, but 183 a year from now, that doesn’t look so great.
Ten years ago, Dr. Archibald Hart told our “Pastor’s Personal Life” class at Fuller Seminary that the church growth movement was dead. That was a surprising statement to hear coming from a Fuller leader because the church growth movement originated there. Dr. Hart told our class that the emphasis now was on church health, not church growth.
And that seems like a healthier emphasis to me. The New Testament epistles never mention specific attendance numbers. Paul doesn’t commend the church at Philippi for growing 23% in the past year. John doesn’t applaud his readers for growing their church from 100 to 150 over the previous six months. And in Revelation 2-3, when Jesus addresses the seven churches of Asia Minor, He never once mentions numbers. The emphasis of the New Testament is on spiritual qualities like faith, hope, and love. (Read the first few verses of Paul’s epistles and notice how many times he mentions those terms.)
The biblical implication is that a healthy church is doing its job and will have some impact on the surrounding culture.
Thank God, we sometimes hear people say, “That’s a really loving church” or “Those people exercise great faith.” But it’s easier to measure cold hard numbers than spiritual intangibles, isn’t it?
Next, numbers are a way to measure a pastor’s worth. Is this a good line for a major league baseball outfielder (.227, 3, 14)? No, it’s not. It means his batting average is .227, he’s only hit 3 home runs, and he’s knocked in a mere 14 runs. He may be a great outfielder with speed, but unless he can raise his offensive stats, he won’t be in the majors very long.
In our day, pastors are often measured by a single line as well, like this one: (17, 847, 23). This pastor has 17 staff members, an average weekly attendance of 847, and an average weekly offering of $23,000. In some areas, those are fantastic numbers. In others, they’re average.
The pastor could be a godly man and a great husband and father. He could be a phenomenal preacher and raise the dead with his prayers. Doesn’t matter. In the Christian world, those statistics summarize his worth. Every pastor knows this, and most find they cannot fight the system. So every week, they live and die by their stats.
When summer hits, the numbers go down, especially in more affluent communities. Sometime during the fall, they go back up. In December, the numbers trend downward as people stay home due to illness or travel for the holidays. In the spring, the numbers rise again because people feel better and are not traveling.
You can track a pastor’s moods by the seasons.
Pastors are aware they cannot fully control these numbers, but that doesn’t keep them from trying. On Monday mornings, they are eager to know “how many we had yesterday” and “what the offering was.” If the attendance and offering were above average, the pastor feels good. But if the attendance and offering are poor for a few weeks in a row, the pastor wonders if his tenure in that church is over.
I fought the “numbers game” for years, believing they are just one way to measure a pastor’s worth, but not the only way – but evangelicals continue to live and die by them. Every year, denominations request various numbers from their churches. They don’t ask who got saved – they want to know how many were baptized (it’s more easily quantifiable). They don’t ask if God did any miracles – they want to know how much the church gave to missions.
If you want to know how a particular pastor or church is doing, you just open up the denominational annual and look. It’s all there on one line in black and white. And for many, those numbers define that pastor’s true worth.
In addition, numbers are a way to gain credibility with the culture. If I’m telling a co-worker about Jesus, and I attend a church of 50 people, I might feel embarrassed to invite her to my church. But if I attend a church of 5,000, I feel a sense of pride. Poor stats seem to reflect poorly on the gospel, while large ones seem to give it more weight.
This is one reason why large churches are growing and smaller churches are shrinking.
For years, I assumed that everybody in the churches I pastored viewed numbers the way I did. If we had a poor Sunday statistically, I believed it was a frontal lobe issue for others as well.
But it wasn’t. People didn’t come to pad the stats.
Instead, they came to meet God. They came to learn Scripture. They came to fellowship with friends.
In fact, their value systems were often more spiritually-oriented than those of their pastor!
I’ll have more to say about the “numbers game” next time.
How do you feel about church statistics?
I used to work for the Canadian government in statistics at the Canadian Grain Commission! Every day, we knew the exact amount of every type of grain that was in every grain elevator and every train box car or ship in the country. Numbers are just part of life. The Gospels even recorded the number of people that Jesus fed! Would it have been such a great miracle had He only fed 50 instead of 5,000?! It sure would not have been as interesting a story!! I agree that numbers should not be the only measure of a church’s success, however. When a church is healthy though, it is likely that numbers will be higher. New life-new believers provide energy and enthusiasm. People are naturally attracted to that. It is disheartening to see numbers drop and to be judged by that in a denomination or community. Where we are presently serving on staff, the emphasis is on what is happening in the lives of people much more than on numbers. It is great to see fruit for ministry efforts! That is refreshing! A drop in numbers at times is not as noticeable in a large church with more than one service and that is somewhat psychologically pleasing. I like that! If a church is really small and one family is absent, it can be a real downer and cause others to stay away. As Ross preached yesterday…we really do need ONE another…numbers again!!
Numbers, unfortunately, are being used more than ever in the political world too, especially in the US. I see many parallels with the church and politics. From the news, polls and peoples’ comments, one would think that the only thing that truly matters these days is the economy and the huge numbers of the debt. The US is much more than that and should not be judged solely on the deficit. Nor should the president. The country has done so much on the world scene, has opened its heart and wallet to many people around the world and is full of warm and wonderful, loving people. It has had presidents and has a president who sincerely love their country but are at the mercy of other politicians, the people and the numbers. So too, pastors and churches are often sadly and tragically judged mainly on numbers. Wonderful, sincere people working hard alongside the pastor and staff, serving the Lord, worshiping Him faithfully and even winning people to Jesus are still often blamed and criticized if the offering or attendance is down. They cannot carry burdens alone or make unilateral decisions. They are at the mercy of people who often aren’t as committed or who refuse to change – often the unofficial voices of the church. The only numbers though that truly count ultimately are the number of people we will take to Heaven with us. A small church may only have one new believer in a year. But God counts every one as precious and the Word tells us that there is great rejoicing in Heaven! It would be great to live in a perfect world. Since sin entered, that is not possible. Praise God we have a perfect Heaven to look forward to…where we’ll rejoice with untold MILLIONS……numbers….
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Yes, Bev, I know the reality of how numbers are used, and agree with your assessment. But I also know how numbers can be manipulated, even in churches. A famous church in America once had reached a certain level of attendance. Years later, their attendance had shrunk significantly, but they still reported high numbers to the public to foster the image they were still relevant. Unfortunately, in many Christian circles, if you produce numbers, you are allowed to get away with murder in your personal and family life. I believe that doing the will of God makes one successful in His eyes even if the culture doesn’t notice. Otherwise, Jeremiah and John the Baptist were really colossal failures.
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I always looked forward to your preaching… It didnt matter how many attended, i was there to hear His word, and to worship. I knew when i saw you on sunday, I breathed a sigh of relief…I knew I didnt have to get up and preach. lol
Thanks you for your service, whether you were told or not told, you were appreciated.
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Thank you, Sara! There’s something special about Sunday, isn’t there? Kim and I go to church sometimes late on Saturday afternoon, and even though we enjoy it, we do miss going to church and serving on Sundays. Hopefully we’ll be able to do that in the days ahead. Thanks for reading and for commenting!
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Numbers, numbers, every morning the question everyone wants answered is “how were sales yesterday?” When Wendy’s franchisees meet they also talk about the number of stores they own, not how profitable they are. My bosses used to talk about owning 15 or 20 Wendy’s restaurants. That was 10 years ago. Ever since the “chili finger” incident, the downturn in the economy and getting a little older the number of restaurants seems to matter less than the health of each one.
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In business, sometimes numbers are both the only thing and every thing. But in church ministry, numbers are only a part of the story. Charles Spurgeon was walking to church at age 16 when a snowstorm diverted him into a small chapel where a layman was preaching. The congregation was small, but that’s the day Spurgeon received Christ. Was church successful that day? Absolutely! I’m not sure what the equivalent of conversion is at Wendy’s – upgrading from one hamburger to a full meal? – but statistics only measure surface matters. More tomorrow!
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keep them coming, enjoy reading your log!
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Thanks a bunch, Sara! You won’t believe all the stuff that’s been floating through my head all these years …
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The owners love it when people “get fries with that” but for me it’s all about making a difference, even an ever so small difference, in a person’s day. I always tell our managers to remind their employees that our customers are people with lives. Who know what may have happened to them that day-maybe they found out a loved one is ill, maybe their spouse wants a divorce, maybe they are facing a possible layoff at work. Whatever it is, at the very least if they come to Wendy’s we can provide good food at a fair price and, most importantly, a smile and a sincere “thank you” even if the customer is not feeling very friendly themselves.
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And that’s how church should be as well. The focus should be on loving God and serving people well. Do those things, and the numbers will take care of themselves. But when people get anxious – especially pastors – they start doing things to generate better numbers, and then people can easily feel manipulated. Keep on serving!
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