I am a Sunday School teacher at the church that I attend...Yes good old fashion 10:30am B.Y.O.B. (Bring your own Bible) Sunday School. On a good Sunday I will have three people (not including my wife in attendance. The age group that I teach are in their 20's an anomaly, nay a disturbance in the force in this generation that two twenty (something) year olds are attending Sunday School. Frankly, I thank God for those two men.
I have thought over the last couple of years of ministry their about growing the class - growing the church. But how do I market a Sunday School class that would seem out-dated and dull to most of my peers? Forgive my futility, but I do not think it will happen. There is too much competition. The average church now has all the bells and whistles, power-points, sermon openers and a rocking praise team; why would someone want to get up an hour early to come hear sound Biblical teaching? That is ridiculous.
Now that I am off of my soapbox: The Bible teaches that (spiritual) growth is a process that begins with death. Take the seed for example, it is a seed at first, it goes in the ground and then it dies to become something else. A plant. The plant then has to push through all kinds of dirt to get to the sunlight in order for it to mature. This process can take days or even weeks.
Christian leaders need to understand that we should never gauge growth by numbers. Numbers feed our ego and make us feel like we are doing a good job and when they are down, so are we. Jesus changed the world and started a movement with 11 committed people (plus the 70 but he didn't hang out with them much). The kingdom of God is like a seed that grows, do not have disdain for small beginnings because a Redwood tree starts from a tiny seed.
Growth should never be gauged numerically - but intrinsically. Jesus had twelve disciples, but one did not grow - I wonder if it was because he skipped Sunday School?
i feel this post. at the same time, this is something that way too many people in ministry i know struggle with. they feel that God will give them greater numbers if they are doing what they are supposed to be doing. it's just mixed up into the mindset. when i read the Bible, though, i see that while God "doing stuff" draws crowds, He is generally very "whatever" about them. at the same time, he gets very excited over small numbers of people that have a deep commitment. the 70 were cool and all, but he wanted 12 to commit, out of those 12, he picked a super-ultra-hardcore 3.
ReplyDeletewe really should pay more attention to this kind of thing.
oh, the other thing that i want to point out is that growth has two sides: that which is *gradual* and that which is *exponential*.
ReplyDeleteas you said, a seed is put into the ground, splits open, and becomes a shoot that pushes up out of the ground and continues to deepen its roots for a while, then grows taller and becomes that redwood you were mentioning. those trees can take up to 50 years to grow into the trees we admire. that is the gradual part.
however, there comes a time for that tree - which was once a seed - to produce its own seeds. it does so, on time, every year, without fail. it is a rare plant that only produces one seed. most plants produce hundreds of seeds. once that tree is established, it can reproduce itself hundreds of times a year over many years, creating thousands of trees (THAT IT HAS NO OVERSIGHT OR CONTROL OVER, but that is another topic). that part is exponential.
the long and the short of it is this: there is such a thing as accelerated growth, but nature handles that on its own without the trees help and tree is content to just grow, take root, and produce whatever seeds it can produce.
what does that say about what we should be doing? hm....
Thanks for your comments omochan, very insightful and thought provoking. I am reminded of Jesus' words in Matthew 7:18, "A good tree cannot bear bad fruit, and a bad tree cannot bear good fruit." As followers of Christ we are known and recognized by the fruit that we bare. The fruit has the seed that continues forever..deep stuff.
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