Introduction:
A. Happy New Year! Let’s begin this morning with a few quotes for the New Year.
1. “Be always at war with your vices, at peace with your neighbors, and let each new year find you a better man,” Benjamin Franklin.
2. “One resolution I have made, and try always to keep, is this: To rise above the little things,” John Burroughs.
3. “Cheers to a new year and another chance for us to get it right,” Oprah Winfrey
B. Looking back over the years I have noticed that I have a pattern of beginning the New Year with a sermon or two about our mission as a church family.
1. Here are a few of the sermon titles from lessons I have done in January over the years.
a. “The Church Everyone Wants to Join”
b. “The Church in Crisis”
c. “What is Our Business”
d. “Devoted to the Fellowship”
e. “A Faithful Church”
2. So, in staying with that tradition, I would like to begin the new year with a sermon series concerning what it means to be a healthy, growing church family.
C. This congregation began in the late 1930s in the city of Syracuse, and moved here to Liverpool in the mid 1960s.
1. Although our past history is important, what we do and who we are in the present is what will determine what the future brings, or even if we have a future as a congregation.
2. Some have said, and I think they are right, that every congregation is only one generation away from extinction.
3. Although we are a strong, vibrant congregation today, that is no guarantee that we will be the same 20 or 30 years from now.
D. What are our goals and dreams for this congregation?
1. What are our principles, convictions and values?
2. What are our methods and processes for carrying out our principles in helping us achieve our goals?
3. These are very important questions, which must be continually evaluated against Scripture and communicated to the body so that we can be of one mind and purpose.
4. I helped us explore some of those questions in the sermon series last Fall called “UR Church – Be the church of Christ.”
5. In that series, I attempted to clarify our biblical approach to being just Christians who are members of the church that Jesus built.
6. Now, I want us to build on that foundation and work toward being a healthy and growing church as God wants us to be.
7. Ultimately, I believe that healthy churches will be growing churches…just like a healthy plant will be a growing plant.
E. I thank God that we have been growing both spiritually and numerically in the last couple of years.
1. We must be careful that we don’t give too much attention to our numbers, because numbers are only one criteria for evaluating where we are.
2. There are other important ways to measure the health of our church family.
3. Therefore, what I would like us to do today and in some future lessons in this series is to think together about what it means to be a healthy church.
4. I want for us to explore what God says about who we should be and how we should go about God’s business?
5. To get started, I would like to consider a few myths people often have about growth and about growing churches.
I. Myth #1: The only thing growing churches care about is numbers.
A. The truth is, a church won’t grow for very long if numbers are all they care about.
1. The key is not focusing on growing the number of people in attendance at our services, but growing in our ability to assimilate people into the family of God.
2. Healthy and lasting church growth is multidimensional.
3. I’m going to suggest that we need to focus on five facets of spiritual work that will lead to our growth as a healthy church.
4. Here they are:
a. We need to grow warmer through fellowship.
b. We need to grow deeper through discipleship.
c. We need to grow stronger through worship.
d. We need to grow broader through ministry.
e. We need to grow larger through evangelism.
5. If we will grow in all of these ways, then we will be a healthy church and we will grow because we are healthy.
B. In our text from Acts 2:42-47, we notice that these five facets of growth are described in the experience of the Jerusalem church (read the passage again).
1. Look at what the first Christians were up to: they studied, they fellowshipped, they worshiped, they ministered to each other and they evangelized.
2. And look at the wonderful result: “And the Lord added to their number daily those who were being saved.” (vs. 47)
3. So we see that God added the growth as the church did its part and focused on the right things.
C. Let me repeat what a said earlier: I believe that church growth is the natural result of church health.
1. To be a healthy church our message and mission must be biblical and must be balanced.
2. Each of these five purposes must be in equilibrium with the others for health to occur.
3. That kind of balance does not occur naturally, we must continually monitor how we are doing and correct any imbalance.
4. It is human nature to overemphasize the aspect of the church and mission that we feel most passionate about or that meets our needs. You might be all in on fellowship, but not on discipleship or evangelism.
5. But we must work at giving equal attention to each of these elements of church health if we are going to be healthy and therefore grow.
II. Myth #2: To grow you must choose between quality and quantity.
A. What do people mean when they say that? How do they define quality and quantity?
1. Typically, quantity refers to the number of Christians a church is developing and quality refers to the kind of Christians they are developing.
2. Sadly, it can be the case that a church family is neither developing quantity nor quality with regard to people – no growth spiritually or numerically – we don’t want that!
3. Also, we certainly do not want to bring a lot of people to faith in Christ, if we are not also going to help them grow in Christ.
a. I’ve illustrated this in sermons before, saying that it would be alike a husband and wife having 15 or 20 children only to neglect them – what good is that?
b. Like the old woman who lived in a shoe – she had so many children she didn’t know what to do.
B. So, how can one measure the quality of Christians a church is developing? Here are some good tests:
1. Are the people in the church being genuinely transformed into the likeness of Christ?
2. Are the people growing in their knowledge and use of the Bible?
3. Are they using their talents in service and ministry?
4. Are they sharing their faith regularly with others?
5. These are just a few ways to measure the quality a church is developing in its people.
C. But, when it comes right down to it, every church should want to grow in quality and quantity.
1. When you go fishing, do you want quality or quantity?
2. I want both. I want to catch the biggest fish I can, and I want to catch as many as I can.
3. Here at Wetzel Road, we should desire to reach as many people for Christ as possible as well as desire to help those people become as spiritually mature as possible.
4. As long as there are lost people in this world, then we must care about quantity as well as quality.
III. Myth #3: To grow you must compromise the message and the mission of the church.
A. Certainly there are examples of churches that have grown large with faulty theology, shallow commitment, and worldly gimmicks, but that doesn’t have to be the case.
1. Jesus’ ministry attracted enormous crowds. Why? Because He was good news.
2. The Gospel of Jesus still is good news, and it has attractive power when clearly presented.
3. Jesus said, “When I am lifted up from the earth, I will draw all men to myself” (Jn. 12:32).
4. A Christ-like church preaching a Christ-like message will have the same drawing effect.
5. And so Jesus drew large crowds yet He never compromised the truth.
a. He preached it hard and straight.
b. Just look at the Sermon on the Mount, it contains some very difficult teaching.
6. Jesus never watered down the message. Jesus said, “If anyone would come after me, he must deny himself and take up his cross daily and follow me.” (Lk 9:23)
B. Something that we must not be confused about is this: There is a big difference between what is expected of unbelieving attenders and what is expected of believing church members.
1. These are two very different groups.
2. We should not expect unbelievers to act like believers until they are believers, right?
a. We should not expect visitors to our church to act like members of our congregation.
b. We should expect very little from the seeker who is investigating the claims of Christ.
c. We should say, as Jesus did in his first encounter with the disciples, “Come and see!”
d. Come check out the claims and teachings of Christ.
e. Come check us out. Check to see if we are following the Scriptures as a church of Christ should.
3. On the other hand, we should expect and require major commitment from Christians who want to be a part of our fellowship, God’s family.
a. We should expect them to maintain a godly lifestyle, be involved in spiritual disciplines, follow the leadership, engage in fellowship, serve in ministry, share their faith, and give financially.
b. If a member of the congregation is not living up to these commitments, something should be done about it by the church family, both for the good of the individual and for the good of the church family as a whole.
4. We cannot grow as individuals or as a church by expecting less of each other than God expects of us.
5. I believe that challenging people to the kind of commitment God requires will actually attract people rather than repel them.
6. Many unbelievers are fed up and bored with what the world offers.
a. They are looking for something greater than themselves.
b. They are looking for something challenging and adventurous.
c. They are looking for something worth giving their lives to.
7. Jesus and His church are worthy of the commitment of our lives. Amen!!
8. We will be a healthy church as we hold each other to the commitment that Jesus calls for.
C. Another challenge we face under this point is the challenge of being contemporary without compromising.
1. Bruce and Marshall Shelley have described this tension as “our ambidextrous calling.”
2. On the one hand, we are obligated to remain faithful to the unchanging Word of God. On the other hand, we must minister in an ever-changing world.
3. Unwilling to live with this tension, some have retreated to one of two extremes.
a. Some churches fearing worldly infection, have retreated in isolation from today’s culture.
b. At the opposite extreme, there are churches, fearing irrelevance, foolishly imitate the latest fad and fashion of the world.
4. Is there a way to minister to our culture without compromising the Word? I believe there is and we must continue to do so.
5. Ultimately, the message must never change, but the methods for communicating the message must change to some degree with each new generation..
IV. Finally, Myth #4: If you are dedicated enough, your church will grow.
A. In most cases, when churches are not growing, the problem is not a lack of dedication in the leadership or membership.
1. Hundreds and thousands of ministers, church leaders and members are working faithfully with great effort, but there is little or no evidence of spiritual or numerical growth.
2. It is an insult to say that their problem is a lack of dedication.
3. It takes more than dedication to lead a church to growth.
B. In addition to dedication, it takes skill.
1. Ecclesiastes 10:10 says, “If the ax is dull and its edge unsharpened, more strength is needed, but skill will bring success.”
2. If you have wood to chop, you will have a much easier time of it if you sharpen your ax and cut with some skill.
3. The point is: work smarter, not harder.
4. We need to take time to learn the skills we need in ministry. We’re never wasting time when we are sharpening our ax.
5. Another aspect of this is that there is skill involved in doing the right things the right way.
6. The key to church health and growth is not just doing more things, but doing more of the right things the right way.
7. If a method or activity does not work, then doing more of it is not going to make it work.
8. That’s why I mentioned, a few minutes ago, the need for balance in our ministry focus and experience.
9. Paul called himself an expert builder of churches. In 1 Cor. 3:10 he wrote, “By the grace God has given me, I laid a foundation as an expert builder.”
10. We too must learn to use the right tools in building and growing our church family.
C. But, most importantly, in addition to dedication, and skill, we must depend on God.
1. All our plans, programs and procedures are worthless without God’s blessing and empowerment.
2. Church growth is a partnership between God and God’s people.
3. Churches grow by the power of God through the skilled effort of God’s people.
4. We cannot do it without God and , God could do it without us, but He has decided not to do it without us!
5. Paul illustrated this partnership between God and man when he wrote, “I planted the seed, Apollos watered it, but God made it grow…we are God’ fellow workers…” (1 Cor. 3:6,9)
6. We must avoid two extremes when it comes to this principle.
a. One extreme is to assume all responsibility for the health and growth of the church.
b. The other extreme is to relinquish all responsibility for it.
c. We must see it as a partnership – like Paul spoke about in Colossians 1:29, “To this end I labor, struggling with all His energy, which so powerfully works in me.”
Conclusion:
A. Let’s review what we have talked about.
1. First, if the church is healthy, then it will grow – both spiritually and numerically.
a. It is not a question of quality or quantity. We must work toward both.
b. We must not and will not compromise the message and mission of the church in the process.
2. Second, we will grow not by sheer determination and dedication, but through God-given skill and God-given empowerment.
a. We must sharpen our ax and swing it with God’s strength!
B. Let me finish up with this challenge. Let’s dedicate ourselves to become a healthy, mature, growing church. One that…
…turns seekers into saints.
…turns the hurting into helpers.
…turns consumers into contributors.
…turns members into ministers.
…turns an audience into an army.
C. I know that God will be pleased by that! Amen!!
