I got a text from a friend yesterday who’s a church planter. The one sentence text, actually 2 words (plus an exclamation point), was to let me know that they had a high water mark in attendance. Earlier in the week I was in an online conversation with fellow Bakke classmates and we were talking about success in the context of urban settings. I know this topic is heavily debated and highly subjective … but what is success?
Here’s what I’ve learned so far … pastors / planters of growing or big churches will never say it is about numbers for fear of being looked at as prideful. Pastors / planters of small, struggling, or plateaued churches will never say out loud it is numbers but inwardly and secretly what they long for most is numeric growth. What is success? Is it quantifiable?
Even for me in “my industry” success is 100% purely about numbers. The more churches we see planted then the more successful I look. I am judged or validated by the number of churches I can manufacture. Then if I plant an insane amount then all of the sudden I have more “street cred” and who knows … maybe I’ll write a book or start making the conference circuits. What’s funny is that I don’t even plant ANY churches myself, but if I can talk enough guys into planting then that makes me look good.
So what is success? Here’s the bottom line … WE’VE ALREADY DEFINED IT. As much as you argue with me it isn’t … we’ve defined success as attendance and dollars. How do I know? Ok Mr. Pastor / Planter … tell me otherwise. I get texts, emails, and phone calls from planters when they have a surge in attendance. In our reporting systems in our denomination what do they ask? How many people were in your worship service? How many came to Sunday School / Small Groups? How much money did you take it this month?
For me, there’s an annual “book of reports” that goes out to our entire state. In that it breaks down how many churches were planted association by association. At these annual meetings I’ll get people commenting on how many churches we planted. I live in the same tension as planters and pastors do.
Success in business comes down to how many products you’ve sold and how much money you make. We’ve blindly taken that definition and attempted to translate it into the church. And the funny thing is that it doesn’t matter what kind of church you’re planting … seeker, emerging, house, hybrid … you’re still judged by the same definition. So where does that leave us? If this is how we’ll be judged then seminary is a complete waste of time. We should be focusing on getting MBA’s instead. Why not? If we’re judged in the same way as Fortune 500 companies then what the heck good is it to know Greek or eschatology?
If there is another definition of success I’d like know … I mean we’ll lie to each other and say it’s about making disciples … but even then so it comes down to HOW MANY disciples we’re making and we’re back in the same trap.
