Why Some Churches Choose to Die

I was recently meeting with about a dozen members of a church that was on the precipice of closing. During their perceived "good old days," the average worship attendance was in the 40s and 50s. Now the church attendance was in the teens. The church was on metaphorical life support.

I shared with them some items of urgency that might give them some glimmer of hope. So I was surprised when one of the members asked me a question that seemed to come from nowhere: "Will we have to sing from screens instead of hymnals?" she asked with a tinge of anger.

never responded directly to the question. It was too late. The few members were of one mind about an issue so peripheral I had never anticipated it. I left saddened.

It is my life and ministry passion to help churches, particularly struggling churches, to revitalize. One of the greatest needs of churches today is to choose to live and to thrive.

Unfortunately, many congregations are choosing to die. For certain, they are not calling a business meeting and making a motion to die. Their choices are more subtle and, often, more incremental. But the end result is the same.

So what are churches doing specifically that leads to their demise? Here are five of the more common choices.

I was in a dying church recently. The congregational average attendance was 425 seven years ago. Today it is 185. I could find no one in the church who thought the trends were bad. They were in a state of delusion and denial.

Church membership has become self-serving. The church is more like a country club than the body of Christ. People are "paying dues" to get what they want in the church. It's all about their preferences and desires.

It's the fault of culture. All the new churches in town are to blame. If someone wants to come to our church, they know where we are. People just don't want to come to church anymore. Excuses and more excuses. I have never been in a community that is nearly fully churched. There are many people to reach. Excuses preclude obedience.

If we could take the energy of church critics and antagonists into reaching people with the gospel, our churches would become evangelistic forces. Unfortunately in many churches, members expend most of their energies criticizing leadership and others, and fighting over trivial issues.

Almost ten years ago, a couple of men who live near me asked to visit with me in my home. They wanted me to consider visiting their church. One of the men told me their church was one of the few in the area defending the faith. I asked him what he meant by that. He explained that the faith was one particular Bible translation and traditional hymns. I wasn't sure what happened to the bodily resurrection and substitutionary atonement. The church died within seven years.

Most churches have choices to live or die. We use the word "revitalize" because it means to live again. I hope you will join me in this passion to see unhealthy churches become healthy, to see churches choose to live.

As one way of being a part of this movement of revitalization, I have teamed up with Revitalized Churches in Florida to offer the best resources we can to help in this cause. They are once again offering the resource that has helped hundreds of churches move toward revitalization.

Our modern society with the lifestyles brought by its technological advances doesn’t go well with Christianity.

Then said Jesus unto his disciples, If any man will come after me, let him deny himself, and take up his cross, and follow me.
For whosoever will save his life shall lose it: and whosoever will lose his life for my sake shall find it. (Matthew 16:24-25)

He that loveth his life shall lose it; and he that hateth his life in this world shall keep it unto life eternal. (John 12:25)

Love not the world, neither the things that are in the world. If any man love the world, the love of the Father is not in him.
For all that is in the world, the lust of the flesh, and the lust of the eyes, and the pride of life, is not of the Father, but is of the world.
And the world passeth away, and the lust thereof: but he that doeth the will of God abideth for ever. (1 John 2:15-17)

I went to a wonderful church with wonderful people. The preacher was great and gave a wonderful 20 minute message. I assume the music was good, my wife liked it but I’m no judge of music. The church wasn’t dying by attendance was stagnant and they only saw a handful of people come to Christ in a year.

We moved to a new city. We started attending a local church and things were the same, lots of music, a short but good message but no growth.

This summer we started going to a new church. Less singing but the preacher gets a good hour to preach and you can hear the bible pages humming in the congregation during his message. I don’t think he is a better speaker that the previous two preachers but there is meat in every message. The congregation give him time to deeply dive into the Word and it’s amazing. I’ve seen more people come to Christ in the last 4 months than I’ve seen over the course of my life! They’ve expanded to 4 services, with standing room only.

The Church is not dead, many congregations are starving for lack of the meat of the Word, but God is still moving.

I went to a wonderful church with wonderful people. The preacher was great . . .

You can stop right there. When one preacher occupies 80% of the people's attention, no matter what the assembly is for, the never-improving lack of individual spiritual discernment causes the death of the church. It ages and dies when (or before) the central leader ages and dies. A local assembly never dies when there is a superabundance of spiritually trained disciplers relying on coequal fellowship in the Gospel and not on the oratory of a man.

This summer we started going to a new church. Less singing but the preacher gets a good hour to preach and you can hear the bible pages humming in the congregation during his message.

Same problem, just a different stage of it, like an early phase in the course of a fatal infection. This group is simply in its early stages of death as an assembly, and they--like you--are not discerning enough to see it.

The marked principle of life in the true culture of Christness and reproduction of the living assembly is that each one walking in The Spirit teaches one or few (11 or less) other(s), a spiritually mature Christian recruiting new disciples, and teaching the immature ones through direct, frequent, and intimate regular personal fellowship. The contact of discipler and trainee does not consist mainly, and especially not only, in the Sunday meeting.

The death culture is that of one seminary-indoctrinated specialist teaching the many constituents, of whom very few ever grow into responsible spiritual maturity, discernment, and church government by a plurality of elders. The trouble is that the corpus of practice infused at the seminary level is almost always a derivative of the past to perpetuate the past, not directed creatively toward addressing existing or future needs.

Probably the greatest factor stifling spiritual growth is denominationalism, a supposed catholicity extending across and above local churches, towering over them, and dictating their operation, of which the model is the Roman/Byzantine paradigm, with its knock-offs of reformed, lutheran, anglican, "orthodox," etc. With this form, so-called "evangelism" has come to rest on the "social gospel" and allegiance to it by family tradition (=infant baptism) and cultural allegiance to the particular sect of religious practice.

The best example for the vital local autonomous conclave of Christians is the New Testament model typified these days by the "Plymouth" brethren, but whose power of making disciples is being encroached by elevating Bible-schoolism or seminarianism that elevates itself over and above the personalized Paul/Timothy mentorship model of spiritual growth.

The independent baptist model is in between, fluorishing but hampered when the focus of decision-making and "feeding of the flock" falls on the local pastor as the principal elder-teacher upon whom too much of the shepherding is expected. The definition of, and distinctive of "One pastor" is so limiting that usually the one appointed/ordained to it can stand no development of equally authoritative maturity in other individuals among the congregants. Here the focus tends to shift from "the Plan" (evangelism by personal contact and example) to "the Man" (attracting constituents by preaching style alone).

Of course, correct Biblical doctrine (true orthodoxy) is the key necessity for spiritual union and fellowship among local, autonomous assemblies of Christians; and today there is a wild tumlt of neo-non-orthodoxy claiming the inventiveness of people influenced by the world and its age of "information." But information is not wisdom, and the influence of orthodoxy is becoming less and less, as prophesied by The Savior Himself:

"And many false prophets shall rise, and shall deceive many.
And because iniquity shall abound, the love of many shall wax cold.
But he that shall endure unto the end, the same shall be saved" (Mt. 24:11-13 AV).

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