Common Size, Uncommon Impact

Thousands of small churches across the United States are changing the spiritual landscape around them in extraordinary ways. They’re thriving right where they’re at—not with grandiose numbers, but with servant hearts. Hear frontline stories from pastors of small churches throughout the country and learn what it takes to thrive in a small church.

by Shawn McMullen & Mary Elizabeth Hopkins

BIGGER ISN’T ALWAYS BETTER: “Everything we do in our culture is super-sized. We have mindlessly bought into the concept that bigger means better, and in fact, it doesn’t,” says Shawn McMullen. As preaching minister of Milan, Ind.’s 100-attendee Church of Christ, he proves that big things can come from small churches.

“So, what are you running these days?”

It’s the question all church leaders hear—and dread—usually at conferences or seminars, anywhere a bunch of Type A personalities have gathered to talk about ministry and their churches. Unfortunately, in our American church culture, the measurement of how successful you are as a person and as a pastor seems to rely on your answer to the question—that one telling number we define ourselves by.

I still remember a pastor I met five years ago. He had brought me in to lead an evangelistic meeting for a small church in his small Midwestern town. While I was there, I spent several days as a guest in the pastor’s home. In the late afternoons, he and I would sit on the family’s front porch and invariably people strolling by would stop to talk, often expressing their appreciation to the pastor for his counsel or encouragement. One morning, we walked into a nearby diner for breakfast and this personable preacher stopped at every table (I’m not exaggerating!) to talk and laugh with someone he knew.

This man and his family were making a profound impact on the people in their small community. But when the days’ meetings were over and we sat on that same porch in the quiet of the evening, the preacher’s gregarious voice grew soft and subdued as he talked about the discouragement he felt in his ministry. Many of his seminary classmates had gone on to serve much larger congregations. By comparison, he felt as if he’d failed. I sensed a similar feeling of inferiority among some members of his congregation.

This pastor and his church, for lack of a better phrase, suffered from low ministry self-esteem. In their thinking, because they weren’t big, they weren’t successful—or effective—or healthy.

And he’s not alone. I often hear  friends from Bible College and fellow ministers say, “I just don’t feel like I’ve accomplished anything.” We’ve come to think the phrase “small church” inherently means defective or insufficient.

But as a pastor of a small church in Milan, Ind., I know this to be untrue. We run 100 people on a “good” Sunday, and I know we’ll never be a huge church. Milan has a population of 1,800, and that’s not going to change much. One day, I came to the conclusion that it’s OK. God is happy with us. He is pleased that this small church in this small community is being the salt and the light, all numbers—attendees, resources, programs, acres—aside. And when that occurred to me, I knew other small churches needed to hear this, as well.

According to Barna Research Group (barna.org), the average church in America has only 89 attendees. That doesn’t sound like much, but I’ve seen how 89 people, including my preacher friend and his family, can change the spiritual landscape around them. They loved the people in their church and community, and in return, the church and community loved them. Good things were happening in that Midwestern church and town.

All small churches are unique, so developing a one-size-fits-all solution to thriving is nearly impossible. In his book Effective Small Churches in the Twenty-First Century (Abingdon), Carl Dudley writes that the effectiveness of a small church does not lie in numbers—although yes, they can sometimes be important—but rather in the human relationships of those who attend.

“The challenge is always dependent upon people’s commitment to the church,” he says.

And here’s the good news: Many smaller churches across America are committed and thriving. They’re in the center of God’s will, making a difference in people’s lives. They may not be receiving a flood of new residents into their communities. They may not be welcoming scores of new visitors to their services. But for these congregations, it’s not about attendance. It’s about making good use of what they have. It’s about taking their hill—their community, no matter how small—for Christ.

In my 30 years as a pastor, I’ve learned specific principles for thriving in a small church that are outlined below. And over the next few pages, you’ll hear about and meet some small churches—Valley Open Bible Fellowship in Big Lake, Alaska; Hope Christian Church in inner-city Indianapolis; and Whipple Creek Community Church in Vancouver, Wash.—that are taking their own hill right where they are, not with grandiose attendance numbers, but with servant hearts.

Principle 1: Pray, pray and pray again.

Prayer is the most crucial—and easiest—step. It’s biblical, affordable and doable for any church.

At my church, we have special prayer sessions when we come together and just pray for our church, our ministry and outreach to the community. We ask God to bring us the people that will help us. We ask Him to help us with our unity, spirit and focus.

The size of your prayer group is irrelevant. Just make sure you meet regularly to ask great things of God and expect great things from Him. As pastors, we cannot underestimate the power of prayer to change lives—and churches.

Principle 2: Find a niche.

For Valley Open Bible Fellowship in Big Lake, Alaska, its niche is food. The church knows that many of its area’s 3,000 households are living without the basics—electricity, running water and food. So, every week, the church of 40 to 50 regular attendees provides a full-course meal from its 9- by-10-foot kitchen for some 60 unchurched people.

“We have a team of people that loves to cook. Another team collects food from local food banks and delivers it to the church,” says Pastor Ed Blocker. “We’ve found a way that we can meet our area’s needs. Our main focus as a church is just to be able to sit there and share a meal with them.”

Rather than tackling a number of projects that may deplete your resources and strain your budget, look for one thing your church can do well, and do it. Does your community lack a vibrant Christian youth group? Find parents and single adults in your church who are passionate about helping kids, and get behind them to develop the most dynamic youth group in town. If no one in your community is reaching out to people with special needs and their families, assume that responsibility.

Often, small churches can reach a segment of the community that would otherwise go untouched. Kathy, a member of my church, worked in a home for men with special needs. One Sunday, she invited Orla, a resident, to come with her to church. A couple in our congregation then volunteered to begin a Sunday school class for Orla, and today five men from the group home worship with us regularly. We’re the only church in town to provide such a ministry.

As one niche ministry takes off, don’t be afraid to start another. But keep your focus and concentrate on doing a few things well.

Principle 3: Plug people in.

Every church, regardless of size, has gifted people in its midst. Identifying their gifts and challenging them to use their abilities for Kingdom purposes takes time and work, but the results are worth the effort. In The Indispensable Guide for Smaller Churches (Pilgrim Press), author David Ray lists 30 unique characteristics of smaller churches, one being “Lay people are more important than the pastor.”  If work is to get done in many smaller churches, he says, it all depends on volunteers.

Take the example of  Whipple Creek Community Church in Vancouver, Wash. The 90-member church puts on a monthly production called “Electric Avenue,” with drama, music and games for its local families, emphasizing a specific virtue or moral.

But this only happens because the church capitalizes on its members’ talents, says Pastor Brett Aljets. Whipple Creek’s artists paint and design the backdrops, actors perform or help direct the production dramas, and vocalists sing and write lyrics. 

The production is attracting not only the area’s unchurched, but also more willing volunteers. “We want to do drama well in order to attract drama people, and do music well to attract music people. Excellence attracts excellence,” says Aljets. 

Pay attention to what the people in your church say about their professions, hobbies, recreation and other interests. Then use that information to help you identify their gifts and strengths. Help them get plugged into ministries that match their gifts and passions and give them the tools they need to do their work well. Encourage and honor them often—from the pulpit, in front of others in the church, in personal conversation and in your church publications. Smaller churches may not be in the position to hire additional staff members, but they can use their volunteers to great advantage.

Principle 4: Celebrate your victories.

Effective smaller churches celebrate every victory they achieve. If you want to elevate the excitement, enthusiasm and sense of purpose in your church, acknowledge your accomplishments. Did you end the year in the black? Celebrate. Did you decide to support a new missionary? Celebrate. Did someone come to Christ? You get the idea.

In Indianapolis, 225-member Hope Christian Church offers GED courses for its inner-city community where many lack full-time jobs. For each course graduate, the church hosts a graduation ceremony with all the fanfare of a high school graduation. The celebrations give the church volunteers and those they’ve helped tangible reasons to be thankful together. Friends and family feel appreciated for the contributions they made to help graduates, and the graduates feel loved and more inspired to help others in the future.

Some smaller churches assume they have little to celebrate. I believe that’s a matter of your perspective. Anything done for God is a big thing—and it should be celebrated. Celebrations generate enthusiasm. It has been said, “People love to go to church where people love to go to church.”

Since 1999, Shawn McMullen has served as preaching minister of Church of Christ in Milan, Ind., which averages about 100 weekly attendees. In editing Unleashing the Potential of the Smaller Church (Standard), McMullen heard from multiple pastors of small churches that are thriving.

Writing for Outreach magazine for the first time, Mary Elizabeth Hopkins spent time speaking with small church pastors to hear how they’re changing their communities. The Austin, Texas, writer reveals the churches’ humble self-sacrifice in the following three profiles.

ROOM AT THE TABLE

In the beginning. Valley Open Bible Church in Big Lake, Alaska, began as a home group in 1997. When the pastor and associate pastor died in a tragic head-on collision in 2003, Pastor Ed Blocker, 46, and his family moved to Big Lake to build community, even though residents want quite the opposite.

Asian pork noodles, cashew chicken and Napa cabbage sound like items on the menu of a trendy Asian café. But in the tiny sanctuary of Valley Open Bible Fellowship in Big Lake, Alaska, 60 unchurched townspeople dine on the cuisine—for free—with cake for dessert.

The church of nearly 50 attendees has found a way to reach the area’s many “get-off-the-gridders,” those adamant about escaping their pasts by avoiding contact with others.

Most of the nearly 3,000 local documented households, along with the “invisible” ones, languish. Throughout the area, one- or two-room cabins, old mobile homes and even camp trailers or motor homes molder through the  minus 40-degree winters. Many in Big Lake lack running water or indoor toilets. Some rely on generators for power.

Although construction company owners, oil rig workers or highly paid commuters from Anchorage own exceptional homes on Johnson Lake, the rest, mostly seasonal and retail workers, go without even necessities.

So Valley Open Bible Fellowship provides a free and unique menu every Wednesday evening. All meals emerge from a 9- by 10-foot kitchen, just large enough for a stove, small cabinet and refrigerator on one side, and a three-compartment sink and dishwasher on the other. Visitors dine on portable tables in the sanctuary of the 40- by 50-foot wood church, which has a partial second floor for office space.

Sitting across from people at the dinners, just chatting, has brought people to Christ and the church.

“Evangelism and outreach are the primary thrusts of the dinners,” Pastor Ed Blocker says. But it takes commitment from members like Andrea Thistle.

“Anti-hunger issues are dear to my heart, and I like to cook with a servant’s heart,” Thistle says. Every week, she shuttles in her Subaru Forester to the Food Bank of Alaska, an hour’s drive away in Anchorage, to pick up food. And because of her grant-writing prowess, the Alaska Food Coalition funded new coffee mugs, silverware, bowls, etc. A $200 monthly donation from the Lion’s Club and a partnership with Food Bank of Alaska also help make the full-course meals possible for the church.

Thistle devises the menus ahead of time or while shopping at the food bank. Dinners range from broiled salmon and halibut, pasta in white sauce with French bread, Shepherd’s Pie or soup, to a Mexican night with enchilada pie, tacos, refried beans and green salad. Followed always, of course, by dessert. 

In March, the 9-year-old church of young to middle-aged families and a few retirees put forth even more effort to feed the area’s children during spring break. Many children would go hungry without the free meals received through the school’s low-income lunch program.

So, through sandwich boards on the main highways and fliers at grocery stores and the post office, Valley Open Bible told its community it would help. More than 45 families came to the church all week for lunch. And in thanks, the Big Lake Chamber of Commerce awarded the church a plaque for its outstanding community service.

Because of its success, the church plans to provide another spring break lunch program next year, and hopes this summer to add brunches a few days every week, with free lunches during its Vacation Bible School.

The ministry is neither extravagant, nor unheard of. But with a lot of commitment and a little food, Valley Open Bible is filling the hearts and stomachs of its neighbors.

Modern-Day Samaria

In 2000, fresh from serving as an associate pastor in the suburbs, Jeanne Huiett loaded up her trunk with donated groceries. She called the police department to find out the toughest neighborhood in Indianapolis, drove there and parked in front of the most dilapidated house. As she began unloading the groceries onto the front porch, two women and nine children emerged. Stunned by the generosity, they became the first members of Hope Christian Church.

Two years ago, 45-year-old J.L. walked out his door thinking that day would be his last. An alcoholic and drug abuser who’d hit rock bottom, he intended to commit suicide. Wandering aimlessly through inner-city Indianapolis, he threw up a silent prayer of desperation and minutes later, found himself near the two warehouses of Hope Christian Church where he learned of an upcoming Bible study. That Monday, J.L. checked out the study. Five days later, he responded to an altar call during the church’s worship.

Clean and sober ever since, J.L. says God led him to the church.

“I was a liar, a thief, a taker,” he says. “I understand you don’t earn your way into heaven, but I used to be an electrician, so I can give back that way.” And he does. Now, with a job, a home and an AA sponsor, J.L. volunteers to help the church with its electrical needs. He also helps teach Hope Christian’s recovery classes, sharing how God has transformed his life.

Since its launch six years ago, the church of 225 is filled with volunteers like J.L.; its warehouses provide a safe haven of practical help and spiritual hope for thousands of inner-city residents in transition from a nearby prison, foster homes, drug addiction or crime.

“We decided to go to ‘Samaria,’ ” says Pastor Jeanne Huiett of her congregation’s presence in a city where 80% of the population is unchurched.

Hope Christian knew that many people in the area couldn’t read or do math, let alone secure a full-time job. So, since early 2005, in partnership with Literacy Plus, a local organization providing job skills training, the church has hosted a one-on-one GED prep course in its fellowship hall. Currently, 35 people participate in the course.

And much like the pomp of a high school ceremony, the church honors its graduating class. Clad in cap and gown, graduates receive diplomas as Hope Christian’s worship band plays. Following the ceremony, volunteers serve a celebratory dinner for friends and family.

And through the church’s “University of Hope” in the church warehouse, students learn trades in classes focusing on sanitizing hospital equipment, welding, barbering and using computers.

“We take people out of poverty, share Christ with them and try to help them get employed,” Huiett says. “We want to see a healed, whole, happy, healthy person.”

To that end, Hope Christian provides free meals for the homeless every Sunday, and has also started two homes for older children just released from the foster care system, as well as one for pregnant teenagers. After basic needs are met, the church shares God’s hope.

But Huiett and church volunteers don’t mince words when it comes to offering the Gospel to crack addicts, former Satan worshippers, gun-carrying thugs and recently released inmates on parole. They exhort newcomers with a simple message: “All have sinned and come short of the glory of God. You get to choose where you spend eternity. God loves you. Will it be darkness or light?” Then they explain how to get right and stay right with God, which is what Karen, a former crack addict, is trying to do.

Three months ago, Karen was baptized on Easter Sunday. Her formerly abusive husband, also rehabbing and volunteering at the church, used to be a very angry person. He credits the church for helping him learn to control his anger. Now, they both attend regularly, and Karen calls Hope Christian Church a place of “biblical rehab.”

Avenue of Virtues

Brett Aljets, a banker-turned-minister, moved his family four years ago from South Dakota to Vancouver, Wash., as part of a church plant. With only 20 people, they researched the best ways to reach the community. In 2001, Aljets attended a conference at the 17,000-member North Point Community Church in Alpharetta, Ga., whose children’s ministry inspired him.

Fog rises from a machine near a painted backdrop of a tree house, and a musical depiction of a dream sequence unfolds. Singers, actors and dancers from Whipple Creek Community Church (whipplecreek.com) bring to life a 45-minute program complete with costumes, set and music in a Vancouver, Wash., mall one Saturday night in January.

Many shoppers and passersby are curious: “What’s going on?” they ask. “Are you looking for donations?”

Just the opposite. Instead, Pastor Brett Aljets and his crew are giving away “hope,” the virtue of the month, as part of Electric Avenue. The Nickelodeon/Disney-esque program of drama, music and games focuses on a different virtue—obedience, conviction, love—the first Saturday night of each month. The program had become so popular in the area that the mall asked the 140-member Whipple Creek to host an Electric Avenue there.

Usually, it’s held at Alki Middle School, where Whipple Creek meets for worship. In the three years since Electric Avenue began, the program has become a place where kids, like 8-year-old David, introduce their parents to church. A friend had invited David to Electric Avenue for the first time. He returned the next month, this time with his mom, Rhonda Nosler. She’s now a Whipple Creek member, and David regularly sings for Electric Avenue.

“I think when I first heard about it, I assumed it was all adults,” Nosler says. “We were amazed at the level of participation by all members of the church.”

And that’s the beauty of it—many of Whipple Creek’s 90 adults and 50 children are involved in Electric Avenue. The church’s administrative assistant, Teri Trimble, took a one-day creativity seminar and now designs and paints the portable backdrops. Fourteen-year-old Brennan Jung regularly participates in the dramas and hopes to go to acting school. And Aljets’ wife, Merrily, puts her college background of English, music and drama to use by helping direct the productions.

All this is done to attract the 90% of the area’s population who don’t go to church. The growing community of 160,000 near Portland, Ore., is trendier than much of the country—politically and socially progressive. The area’s rapid growth has resulted in a moratorium on building construction to allow time for developing streets and sewers, Aljets says.

But unfortunately, in this hopping, church-wary economy, people tend to keep to themselves. “These upward, mobile families have two busy parents working full time and trying to run their kids to all these sports and extracurricular activities,” Aljets explains. So, the church pondered how it could help: What do parents want?

“Most parents want to teach virtues, but they don’t know how,” Aljets says. So he and his portable church offer spiritual anchors to help parents build relationships with each other. Aljets hopes, of course, that ultimately they’ll come to Christ. But first he hopes that they come back on Sundays when he revisits the virtue of the month in his messages, and Sunday school classes build lessons around that virtue.

“We don’t focus on the growth. We’re just content with wherever God has us,” Aljets says. Although the money and manpower Electric Avenue requires is tough to pull off at times, Aljets figures if they do it with excellence, they’ll attract excellence. “We just try to max out our resources and think outside the box.”

--Outreach magazine, "Features," July/August 2006

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