How Should We Think About Church Numbers?

For many Christians, a church’s success is a matter of simple mathematics. The more people, the better. If attendance and giving numbers are going up, God must be pleased. And if those numbers are going down, well…you get the picture.

I wish I could say that I’ve never played the numbers game myself, but I can’t, because I have, and I do. However, over the years I’ve tried to give some sustained theological reflection to this issue, since I don’t believe it’s as simple of a matter as many Christians seem to believe that it is. This post is my attempt to summarize the most significant conclusions I have come to concerning this issue, in light of what I see in the Bible. I hope sharing these conclusions here will be profitable to you in some way as well.

Here they are:

1.     Church numbers are not spiritually irrelevant. 

I admire those good and well-intentioned Christians who encourage the church to not care at all about numbers. There is a part of me that wishes I could be more like them. However, I am not convinced that God would have us care nothing about the number of people being evangelized and cared for and instructed in and through our churches. In fact, it seems that if we truly care about seeing the Gospel spread to as many people as possible, and if we care about the souls of people, and if we care about teaching people how to live as obedient disciples of Jesus, then we must give some attention to our numbers – because our numbers represent the people we are ministering to and serving.

This is why I believe, for example, that when we read of Jesus in Mark chapter 6 feeding a great multitude of people; we are not simply told that he fed a great multitude. We are instead told that he had fed some “five thousand men (not including women and children)”. That is, Jesus and/or the disciples counted the people. And why did they do so? Because they were market-savvy, pragmatic, church growth gurus who cared nothing for the truth or a faithful method of ministry and everything for results? No. They counted the people because Jesus saw that multitude as a large group of “sheep without a shepherd” (Mark 6:34). At least five thousand sheep, to be specific.

This is also why, for example, that when NT church was born in Acts chapter 2 at Pentecost, we are not just told that a bunch of people got saved. Rather, we are told that “about three thousand” (Acts 2:41) people came to Christ under the Spirit-empowered preaching of the Apostle Peter. The numbers there in Acts 2 are significant because of what they represent. Luke describes them very specifically. “And there were added that day about three thousand souls.” The number is significant because souls are significant.

There are other places we could look, but you get the idea. The number of people being reached and discipled through our churches is not irrelevant, because people and their souls are not irrelevant.

At the same time…

2.    Church numbers are not easy to interpret. 

That is, the numbers game is not a matter of simple mathematics. This is where I think a lot of Christians would do well to stop and evaluate how they think about the issue. Many assume that if a church is growing numerically, then it is a sign of God’s blessing; a sign that the church is doing something right. However, the question of whether a church is growing numerically is by no means the only important question to ask about a church.

Churches that experience great numerical growth need to ask a number of questions to interpret that growth properly. For starters, are they growing because they have gone soft on the Gospel? Are they growing because they are refusing to confront serious issues in their attendees? Are they growing because they’re constantly preaching to the choir and going soft to the prospective member? Are they growing because they are obsessed with numbers and are willing to give people whatever they want simply to get them to walk through the door on a Sunday morning?

In other words, why are people coming? Are they coming because they are getting the truth, or because they are being affirmed in their sin? Are they coming because they are being brought under conviction through the straightforward and clear preaching of the God’s Word or because they are being entertained? Surely, if it is the latter, the numerical growth of that church is not a sign of God’s blessing.

In fact, the Bible warns churches of a trend that is said will increase as the return of Christ draws increasingly near. The Apostle Paul talks about it in 2 Timothy 4 when he writes to Timothy his young pastoral delegate over the church at Ephesus: “For the time is coming when people will not endure sound teaching, but having itching ears they will accumulate for themselves teachers to suit their own passions, and will turn away from listening to the truth and wander off into myths” (2 Timothy 4:2-4). Therefore, it would seem that there is a common kind of numerical growth that occurs, not as a sign of God’s blessing, but as an indication of spiritual compromise.

Now, my point in saying these things is not to say that all numerical growth is bad (remember point #1) or that all numerical decline is good (see the following points).  Rather, it is to say that numerical growth is not easy to interpret.  A lot of people assume without any serious thought that if a church is growing, God must be very happy with that church. I am simply arguing that this assumption is wrong and leads to shaky, misleading conclusions.

I’ll try to break this point down further in the next two points. 

3.    Bigger is not necessarily better. 

This clearly follows from the previous point, but I’d like to expand upon it a bit here. Here’s how we know when numerical growth is not necessarily a good thing; when bigger is not necessarily better: 

Bigger is not better when people are leaving their otherwise faithful churches to join yours simply because they like your church better. Bigger is not better when you are stealing sheep from other churches, and encouraging them to leave their churches without any reason other than they like your church better.

Bigger is also not better if there is not a team of qualified pastors in your church who are able, equipped, and available to care for the souls of everyone coming to your church. If the growth of a church has clearly exceeded the ability of the pastors to care for the flock, it is not a good thing. It is a significant problem.

Bigger is also not better if the growth is due to a professional model of ministry that relieves the saints of the responsibility to do ministry themselves, and makes it “easier” for them to be a Christian than Jesus says it is. If people are coming to our churches because they find it easy to be self-centered, lazy, and do nothing but consume services in them, it is not God’s affirmation of our ministries.

And as I said before, bigger is not better if the growth is due to a church’s compromise on the hard truths of Scripture. If the bad news that must precede the Good News is never being preached in our churches; if the Law of God is never proclaimed to people to show them God’s holiness and their sinfulness; if people are never confronted in sin and called to turn from it; you can be certain that your growth is not a healthy kind of growth. 

As I see it in Scripture; there are two kinds of numerical growth that a church should desire. The first is growth by way of genuine conversions, where unbelievers hear the Gospel and are brought under the authority of the Word of God by the Holy Spirit, who causes them to be born again, grants them faith in Christ alone for the forgiveness of their sins and right standing with God. The best kind of numerical growth occurs in a church when these converted people are then instructed to go into the waters of baptism to publicly identify with Christ in his death and resurrection, and are then joyfully added as members of Christ’s universal and local church. This is the best kind of numerical growth any church can experience.

But a second kind of growth that I think the church is right to pursue, is the kind of growth that occurs as they seek to gather up Christians who are not in healthy church situations or who have found themselves looking for a new church for good reason. Churches should be on the lookout for Christ’s sheep who are lacking a biblically faithful church to call home.

Beyond that, I can’t really think of a kind of numerical growth that Scripture would lead us to care about. Am I wrong? 

So then, bigger is not necessarily better.  Yet, at the same time…

4.    Smaller is not necessarily better either. 

Some Christians take great pride in being a part of a small church, feeling that they are part of a rare and faithful remnant. And while faithfulness to Christ is certainly rare in our fallen world; I’m not so sure it’s quite as rare as this remnant might think.

Instead, the smallness of a church could very well indicate a number of spiritually troubling things. It could indicate that the church doesn’t really care for souls outside of their gathering or is apathetic about evangelism. It could mean that they are unloving, or that they preach weird doctrines, or that they are dominated by an ultra quirky leader who elevates his preferences to the level of first-level doctrine. The smallness of a church could mean that it is not focused on obeying Christ by heeding the Great Commission, or that certain people in the church are afraid of losing their influence in the church, or that their facilities are unnecessarily uninviting, or that they do not place a priority upon excellence in their ministries.

Furthermore, the smallness of a church could also reveal that the church is not actively dealing with conflict in a biblical and peace-making kind of way. It could mean that they’re comfortable with divisions and strife, and don’t really care when people leave due to a conflict. The smallness of a church could indicate that the church isn’t really that concerned about being a healthy church, and is more cultish in nature – whether practically or theologically.

So, while bigger is not necessarily better; smallness should not be seen as a badge of honor either. We need to be clear about that too.

However…

5.    Smaller is not necessarily worse. 

Smaller is not a sign of God’s displeasure with a church if that church is seeking to grow through practices clearly assigned to them in Scripture; biblical corporate worship, serious Christ-centered preaching and teaching, discipleship, courageous personal evangelism, and loving church discipline, to name the more important activities of a church. If a church is focusing hard on being faithful regarding the depth of her ministry and sincerely seeking to trust God with the breadth of her ministry, it is not a bad thing. Far from it; it is a sign that the Spirit of God is truly at work in that church.

Furthermore, smaller is not necessarily worse if the lack of growth is giving time and opportunity to the pastoral team to adequately care for the souls who are already in the church. Sometimes a lack of growth in a church enables the pastors of the church to better care for the saints who are already a part of it, as well as to prepare for any growth that God may grant to the church in the future by raising up other leaders.

But beyond these things, there is simply no guarantee in the Bible that if a church is faithful to its God-given mission that God is going to grant large measures of tangible fruit to that church. In fact, faithfulness in ministry may mean meager numbers for a church, as it did with many of the OT prophets, for example.  “Indeed,” the Apostle Paul says, “all who live a godly life in Christ Jesus will be persecuted.” Not surprisingly, these words echo the words of Jesus, who told His followers, “In the world you will have tribulation” (John 16:33). These things are guaranteed to faithful churches. Explosive numbers are not.

And so, smaller may not necessarily be worse.  It may just be evidence that the Word is true.    

6.    Supernatural growth in the church is supernaturally produced. 

Far beyond numerical growth, the Scriptures would lead us to care most about true spiritual growth.  And spiritual growth is supernatural growth. It is only produced by the Spirit of God. What kind of growth am I talking about? 

Well, let’s first consider a kind of growth that sees a person brought from spiritual death to spiritual life. This is the “growth” of conversion, which is a lot less like growth and far more like a resurrection.   We should be praying and working to see this kind of “growth” take place, confident that we can not bring it about ourselves.

Beyond that, we should desire the kind of growth whereby Christians are transformed increasingly into the likeness of Christ. The kind of growth that takes place as a Christian regularly encounters the glory of Christ in His Word and is changed increasingly by the Holy Spirit as a result of those encounters, making that sinner more and more like His Savior; more loving toward one another; more concerned about the state of lost souls; more gracious in their dealings with other people. 

The growth of a church is about so much more than a growing number of people sitting in chairs or pews. It is about lives being changed through encounters with the living Christ that are blessed by the power of the Holy Spirit.

And “this [kind of growth] comes from the Lord who is the Spirit” (2 Corinthians 3:18). There are no shortcuts to it. The only way to see this kind of growth is to plant and water with and according to the Word of God, trusting that God will do what only God can do: “give the growth” (1 Corinthians 3:6, 7).  And that growth may or may not have any drastic affect upon a church’s numbers. 

7.    The true success of a church is about far more than numbers.   

While giving attention to various tangible metrics may be helpful to a church that is seeking to honestly evaluate the success of its ministry; those tangible metrics are not everything. True success is ultimately measured by whether a church has sought to be faithful to the Lord Jesus and truly obedient to His Word as they have gone about life and ministry as a church. 

Does your church seek to give glory to God as our Creator and Redeemer in Christ in its worship services? Does your church seek Spirit-produced Christ-likeness by giving prayerful attention to the Word of God in private and as a gathered body? Does your church seek to build unity around the glorious reality of God’s grace in Christ as revealed in the Gospel? Does it seek to be a place of loving, truthful companionship and partnership in Gospel ministry? Does it seek to spread the Gospel as far as the Lord would allow? Is the church a place where holiness is promoted and sin is confronted in love?

If a church can answer “yes” to these kinds of questions (not as if they’ve done these things perfectly; but in the sense that they’re doing them sincerely), that church is a success, no matter the numbers.