Church Growth

Reinvigorating the Aging Congregation

Reinvigorating the Aging Church I doubt the current wisdom of rescuing dying churches by merging them into larger, stronger congregations. In my opinion, church leaders who propose this solution overlook or have forgotten how change, innovation, and growth occurred among these churches in years gone by. In the past, these churches “hung on” until a

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Roadmap to Church Revitalization

The journey to church revitalization is a roadmap. It is not a recipe. When you follow a good recipe, you put together the correct amounts of flour, sugar, milk, butter, oil, baking powder and eggs, put it in the oven and “presto!” out comes a cake. Every time, guaranteed. Not so with church revitalization. When

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Yes, pastors must focus on church growth

I love Rich Birch. He’s an independent, out of the box, creative thinker. I love people who challenge prevailing wisdom and push the limits — not rebelling for the sake of being a rebel, but someone who looks for better ways to accomplish the mission. His recent post, Should You Even Bother Worrying About Church

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2 Reasons Pastors Give Up

Over the past five years, my colleagues and I have noticed a disturbing trend in plateaued and declining churches. Many of them are staffed by: pastors who have given up. pastors without hope. pastors convinced revitalization efforts are futile. pastors who ignore offers of help. I don’t have hard numbers because to date we haven’t

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A Tale of Two Barns –A Tale of Two Churches

Dr. Gordon E. Penfold Co-founder of Turnaround Pastors, Inc.   The Two Barns   “It was the best of times and it was the worst of times . . ..” So begins Charles Dickens’,  A Tale of Two Cities.  I would like to parallel that truth with two barns and two churches. The analogy will

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1 Helpful Tool for Church Revitalization

You got to know who’s out there! Since this is my blog post, I get to define a couple of key terms. That’s one of the benefits of writing; you get to be sovereign in your own little world, even if no one else is in it! In the world my colleagues and I inhabit,

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Relationships: 1 Key to Church Turnaround Leadership

It’s a stark fact most pastors wish they could avoid. The person most responsible for leading a dying church into life and growth sits in the chair behind the desk in the office that says “Pastor” on the door. The problem is that most pastors have no idea how to do it. The problem is

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