Sam Rainer's Blog, page 8

Why Your Church Needs More (Often) Announcements in Worship

Most of us have entered the twilight zone of worship announcements at some point. A person approaches you with awkward determination three minutes before the start of a worship service. A piece of paper unfolds multiple times.

If there was a way to collect all these scraps of paper, we pastors could create an epic coffee table book of some of the oddest things people want to share with a congregation.

In a previous church, I had to kill the death announcements. Historically, the church began wor...

The One Thing that Solves Most Church Problems (Only 1% of Churches Actually Do This)

Church health will not improve until ongoing evangelism returns.

A recent Church Answers poll found that only 1% of churches have an ongoing evangelism effort. This finding corroborated a more extensive longitudinal study we’ve been conducting since 1996, in which the lowest church health score across denominations is in the category of evangelism.

The trend is alarming, and it is getting worse. We are seeing it across denominational lines and in non-denominational churches.

The figure below is ...

Dispelling Four Common (and Unhelpful) Myths about Neighborhood Churches

“There’s a church on every corner in that community!”

I’ve heard this comment many times over the years. In most cases, the tone indicates a level of disdain. It’s understandable. Church buildings seem to be everywhere, while God’s mission seems to be nowhere. But I don’t believe we need to give up on these churches. God hasn’t.

When I see a church on three acres buried in a dense neighborhood, I don’t think “landlocked and limited potential.” I see opportunity. Who else is better situated to re...

How to Recover from a Toxic Church and Bounce Back Even Better

When the church causes hurt, it pollutes God’s calling and creates a toxicity that works against the gospel.

The goal is to minimize church hurt and maximize church unity. Here is reality. Something will happen in almost every church because ministry includes people. In some cases, the pastor is the cause of the hurt. In other cases, the people of the church hurt the pastor. Pastors can be responsible for church hurt, but this article focuses on how pastors should respond when experiencing a tox...

The Megachurch Movement Is Fading. What’s Next?

Once a church reaches two thousand in weekly attendance, its sheer size becomes a self-generating attraction. Massive facilities, a sprawling campus, and numerous attendees give these large congregations more prominence than other churches. Megachurches receive more media attention than smaller churches. Their physical campuses can dominate their surrounding community. Megachurch pastors tend to have charisma, and their churches can offer a wide variety of programs appealing to a broad base of p...

Why Every Single Word in the Bible Matters for You Today

All of Scripture is for every part of our lives.

Every single word in the Bible is powerful, purposeful, and prescient. Understanding the Bible as a whole is worth your whole effort. Every word in the Bible matters because every minute of your day matters. In Luke’s gospel, we learn that God counts the hairs on our heads (Luke 12:7). God is always involved in every area of your life. Since He always knows every hair on your head, God must actively count each one.

The lesson is simple: God is alw...

It’s Time to Release Churches from the Myth of Infinite Expansion

Every church has limiting factors. No church grows exponentially every year. Infinite expansion isn’t possible. Even the largest churches stay at the top of the list for only about twenty years. Each generation has its own group of biggest congregations or fastest-growing congregations. Compare any lists of the largest churches from the 1970s, 1980s, 1990s, or 2000s and you’ll find different churches leading the way. By virtue of their size, big churches are constantly shifting. Indeed, some of ...

Behind the Decline: Unraveling the Forgotten Reasons of Fading Neighborhood Churches

No doubt you’ve heard the phrase, “There goes the neighborhood.” Historically, it has been associated with ethnic minorities moving into white neighborhoods. I don’t believe most people use the phrase today in such a way. However, during the civil rights movement and the following decades, many white neighborhood churches changed locations, often moving to the growing suburbs where fewer minorities lived.

For the congregations that stayed, the fracturing of the neighborhood also meant the fractu...

The Neighborhood Church Returns: Making the Comeback a Reality

Neighborhood churches tend to be small or midsize and well-established. For years, we have dismissed the potential for a significant move of God in these churches. I believe they are primed for a comeback. They are numerous, and they are located in the heart of places with lots of people.

I believe in this comeback so much that I wrote a book about it. The Surprising Return of the Neighborhood Church just released! If you lead or attend a neighborhood church or want to know more about this poten...

The New Golden Handcuffs for Pastors (It’s Mortgage Rates)

The real estate market is encouraging some pastors to stay put. For now.

Rising interest rates produce a “golden handcuff” effect on the housing market. Golden handcuffs refer to a set of financial incentives that employers use to encourage certain employees to remain with a company. These incentives are typically tied to some conditions that make it financially unattractive for the employee to leave the company before a specified date.

Many pastors locked in low-interest rates on their homes. R...