The Illusion of Health

Welcome to 2011! We are excited to begin sharing some of the "illusions" that churches and other organizations non-profits face every day. If you missed the intro to this year, please feel free to check it out at http://cmi-blog.blogspot.com/.

At the beginning of a new year, many people make resolutions to exercise and to pay more attention to their health. So, we have decided to begin the year by discussing the "illusion of health".

A number of weeks ago, I had a conversation with someone working through a situation involving their aging parent. This parent had had a serious stroke losing 20-30% of their brain function, now experiencing difficulty in hearing, some sight impairment and reduced "perception" or problem solving abilities. After a week of being in the hospital, with all of the tests associated with something this serious, the parent was released under the condition that they were to have 24 hour care. As time went on, it was interesting to talk to the care-giver as their parent, persistently, tried to convince them that they were fine and could be at home, on their own... that there was nothing wrong with them.

Since we have been working in the area of stewardship development for over 20 years, we set out early in 2010 to try to determine which churches were struggling in the area of giving. We started to look at the receipted giving of churches (mainly) over a 5 year period, based on amounts declared to Revenue Canada - since every charitable organization in Canada is required to file a T3010 form annually.

Stay with me for a moment... we are aware that finance is only one measure of church health. However, our logic behind this particular assessment was that, if a church's participating members are more engaged in the vision of the church, over time, they will give more to see that vision accomplished. In addition, we reasoned that if a church is reaching more people for Christ, then the church would be growing and, with more people attending, more people would be discipled, and overall giving would increase, as more people became engaged with the cause of Christ. And so, the cycle would continue.

With this in mind, we tested our assumptions. We conducted research into over 3,000 churches spread over 12 different denominations/associates and some 22 districts or dioceses, with two significant findings. First, we found that even through poor economic times, there are some churches that actually grew financially - even exponentially - while others continue to experience decline. Secondly, we found that 60-70% of all churches had stopped growing...regardless of their denominational affiliation.

But most striking was the response we received as we started to contact churches that appeared to be in the biggest season of decline. A few responded right away, recognizing they needed help, and they have moved forward in 2010. Some asked for more information, but did nothing with it. However, the most shocking response we received from several churches was that "We are fine but certain that everyone else needs help!"

After looking at this information and taking time to reflect on 2010, I wonder if many churches today are like this aging parent - unaware of what is really happening to them, convinced that they are fine (or at least as healthy as everyone else is) and not in need of any help.

This all begs a couple of questions: What DOES a healthy church look like? Does it make sense to spend more & more money to reach & serve fewer and fewer people? Exactly when is a church at its best? How do you as a church leader, assess your own church's health?

Remember, when an organization or organism is healthy, it grows naturally.