Six Ways Not to Score a Win for Church

Last post I introduced six lessons learned by Jeff Lethco of Northside Baptist Church in Greenwood, SC.  One important lesson was ”Before you start keeping score, make sure you have the right scoreboard.”

Andy Stanley’s book, 7 Practices of Effective Ministry helped Northside examine this with Stanley’s first practice, “Clarify the Win.”

“What is a win for the church?”  Whatever it is,  it’s certainly harder than counting field goals.  But that doesn’t stop churches from trying to play a “numbers” game. 

We want to win, so we report on how many and how much, because those are the only quantitative things we can put on a plaque or bulletin.  The only problem is

that Jesus never defined a win in terms of the many and much.  John 2:23-24–The miracles gathered crowds, but crowds weren’t what Jesus was after.

So, there are six areas, Jeff said, that we wrongly try to score in order to decide a win.  We wrongfully think a win is based on…

1. Bodies–how many we average.
2. Baptisms–how many we dunk.
3. Barometric Pressure–how stormy or calm the church atmosphere is.
4. Busyness–programs, meetings, events.
5. Buildings–bigger means better.
6. Budgets–more means we’ve arrived.

I had someone to say to me, “I just want this place to be filled.”  I agree…it would be nice to have more, but if we aren’t really healthy at an average of 55, what makes you think we’re going to get healthier when we reach 255?

This is a hard lesson to learn.  And I am still asking the question…What is a win?