Small Churches have Problems

If we fail to understand and examine the underlying causes then the problem will manifest itself in other areas and so we will end up spending all our time “putting out the fires” rather than preventing the fires from starting.


I’ve been to a number of the smaller of churches, and visited the largest of churches. There is indeed a sharp distinction between the two and for good reason. 
By using the word “grow,” I do not mean in numbers for numbers’ sake. I do not subscribe to the fallacy that bigness is good and small churches are failures. What I mean by “grow” is reaching people with the gospel of Jesus Christ. 
       Problems arise in any and every church.  The fact that the church is composed of fallen people seeking to serve a fallen world where Satan and his cohorts are seeking to destroy the church means that we will encounter all types of difficulties and challenges. Anytime there is even a minor decrease in attendance or giving we feel pressure to respond quickly and decisively to the perceived problems least we lose more people and suffer greater financial shortfalls. Within the small church, problems are exponentially felt because of the rippling effect that it has within the small church and the impact even the loss of one or two families can have upon the whole congregation. 
    For example, there may be some conflicts arise over the style of worship that the church is having.  At first glance, it may appear that the problem relates to music and personal tastes regarding style.  However, when examined more closely, it may be that the real issue is low morale because the church is not attracting new people.  As a result, disagreements arise because people have different ideas on how the style of music may contribute or hinder the outreach of the church.  Just addressing the issue of music may ease the tension regarding the choice of music, but soon tensions will rise in another area (such as the style of preaching by the pastor) as people continue to struggle with identifying possible reasons new people are not coming to church. When the church is struggling with problems, one of the questions that the board should examine is whether or not there are underlying problems that need to be addressed as well.