Fishers of Men

What defines success in ministry? I have been thinking about success and what it usually means:

1. rise in attendance

2. rise in giving

3. rise in baptisms

4. rise in program participation

5. rise in building funds.

Pastors and elders can butt heads on issues of what success means in a church, and usually do. People working outside of a church setting are expected to perform in their jobs by bringing in a rise in numbers, be it sales, orders, customers... that is how their performance is judged.

Then you come into this thing called the church and you have another element that is a bit harder to gage. The spiritual realm. How do you gage success in a church? You certainly can't go by numbers alone. On the other hand, you certainly can't let a church decline into nothing and call it faithfulness. Where is a balance? How can you gage success in a church?

At Shiloh we are gaging success in one word: Movement. We have a process that we want each believer to walk through. Come | Grow | Serve. 

Come is seen with weekends at Shiloh, the worship services. We believe that when Jesus is lifted up, He will draw people to himself. We We want people to COME to Jesus, and our main vehicle is our Weekend worship service.

Grow is seen in our teaching venues. We offer "classes" or short term Bible studies that get people to look at where they are in their faith and take another step. We have a class going on now about the spiritual disciplines and how to practically use them in your life to make space for God to fill.

Serve is seen in Ministry teams that you can get involved in. Kids ministry, youth ministry, Audio Visual, Worship Service etc... We want our people to serve Jesus by serving others.

Come | Grow | Serve. Obviously Weekends are not the ONLY place that someone could Come to Jesus, it is just where we are going to funnel our resources for that purpose. Grow can happen outside of a Bible study, but the studies are going to be our main channel for that purpose. Serve can happen outside of a ministry team, and we hope it does, but our main focus is going to be those three channels.

So how do we define success at Shiloh? Movement. Let me show you how it works:

  Weekend attendance 550

   Study Attendance 3

+Serve Participation 0

_________________=

Shiloh Failing as a church

there is no movement in getting people to deepen their relationship with Christ. they just show up for the service and leave. I did my God thing for the week.

  Weekend Attendance 550

   Study Attendance 45

+Serve Participation 35

___________________=

Shiloh is getting more successful in moving people toward maturity in their faith.

So now, everything that we do as a church has to point to or enhance this movement process.

So, someone wants to start a polka dance training seminar held in our gym. We will ask, them a question, how does this enhance or promote our vision of getting people to Come to Christ, Grow in Christ, and Serve Christ at Shiloh? If it is not an entry point to our venues or a stepping stone in between our venues, it cannot work at Shiloh. 

Does that mean that Polka Dance Seminars are bad... Yes, but that is because it is Polka. When we turn down a ministry, or ask a ministry to change it is not because it is inherently bad, it is just sucking resources from the Main Vision at Shiloh.

This is all part of the transition that our church is in the middle of. I am very excited to see where god takes us in the next few years with our leadership and vision of the church.