My Mantras: Think Trends, not Weeks

*Previously I have written about a mental soundtrack that I have used for years. Since I have a variety of mantras I use, this may be its own series on the blog. TBD :-).

In ministry, it is very easy to get excited, or depressed about a singular week.

This week the offering was high/lowThis week everyone who calls this church home was here – attendance was great!This week a BUNCH of people were gone – attendance was terrible!This week all the music, tech, check-in, children’s, etc went wonderfully!This week it’s like there were demons in the sound system, the guitarist broke three strings during the first song, the lead vocalist had a cold, and 3/4ths of our volunteers called out at the last minute from serving in the children’s ministry!

If you have ever been involved in church leadership, any of these conversations might feel familiar. That is why with our church leaders there is a mantra I repeat over and over when it comes to numbers, statistics, etc – Think trends, not weeks.

Granted, if you are in a field where these emotions can fluctuate day-to-day perhaps for you this would be – Think trends, not days. Or maybe in your leadership capacity, the monthly metrics are the ones that get the most focus. For you, this might be – Think trends, not months. Regardless of specifics, the point is the same. I want to focus on the overall trends rather than the isolated incidents. Don’t get me wrong, we can certainly learn from one-off highs or lows. Yet the majority of our focus should not be on the overall upward/downward trends, rather than those outliers.

In ministry, this means not getting too absorbed in what happened on any particular Sunday. There will be weeks when it feels like everyone is sick, traveling, etc, and in those weeks it can be easy to look out at an empty room and feel massively discouraged. However when we step back and look at the overall trends – say attendance patterns year to date or attendance patterns year-on-year – that offers a more honest picture of how things are going.

So yes – celebrate those big Sundays! Celebrate the days when there is a full room, the music is great and everyone walks out energized.

Similarly – learn from those days when people are not present and every piece of technology has decided to go on strike.

Yet do not get too caught up and focused on either extreme. Both are going to happen, and often both are beyond your control. Instead, look over the long-haul to examine trends, not weeks.