It’s easy for small churches to feel overshadowed by megachurches. The media emphasize large churches, and rarely do news reports, magazine articles, or documentaries acknowledge the essential nature, or even the existence, of small churches.
Why? Because the media like exceptions. They deal with the unusual, with what’s creating a splash, not necessarily with what’s most important. They cover celebrities, not the everyday workers who produce our essential food and shelter. They cover accidents and crises, not the daily transactions that make our economy possible.
Yet, although they don’t make a media splash, small churches, like small businesses, are vital to our national well-being. They make several unique, vital contributions.
I grew up in a small church in Nashville, Tennessee, where my father was pastor-not “servant leader.” He was just plain Brother Smith, on call twenty-four hours a day, searching for sinners and serving saints, with most of the members neither noteworthy saints nor conspicuous sinners. There was no paid staff, and most of his sermons he prepared at home.
Much of my adult church experience has been in large churches. However, recently-perhaps due to a reverse reaction to the media’s emphasis on megachurches and neglect of the small church, my wife and I have been visiting small churches.
Before offering some reflections on the unique contributions of the small church, let me describe some of the things we experienced.
What I Saw
Mary Alice and I visited a church we had passed several times. It turned out to be a noisy little Baptist church, and most of the members carried big, well-worn King James Bibles. The minute we stepped in the door I knew we were “back home.” There was joy in the place.
With no choir loft, the audience was the choir, and the singing was led by a young man with an electric guitar.
The kids were full participants. A group of them came up front to sing “I’ve Been Redeemed,” and they even included a verse they had written themselves (“You can’t get to heaven on a taco shell, ’cause in heaven there ain’t no Taco Bell”). Everybody laughed with them.
In front of us sat a young father. From his build and muscular forearms, he looked like a carpenter. His 3-year-old daughter sat in his lap during the entire sermon and his 6-year-old son leaned against him, thumbing through his father’s big black Bible. This church wasn’t big enough to offer a separate children’s church program, but that wasn’t a disadvantage for this young family.
What a start to give his kids, I thought. They’re learning that two important things in their father’s life are his Lord and his kids.
Worshiping there I was reminded of the best seller, All I Ever Needed to Know I Learned in Kindergarten. Spiritually, sometimes we need to get back and relearn our earliest lessons.
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Another church we visited was in a tiny suburban town. We arrived early and had a chance to watch the crowd assemble. Eventually, 58 people came, most of whom were older. The young pastor was a soft-spoken man with a non-professional smile, which told me he liked what he was doing.
At first I was distracted by six or seven kids in the right-front corner who couldn’t keep still. I wondered if we would be able to worship with that noise.
Then came the surprise. The pastor announced, “Fellowship Time!” and all those young people started running throughout the room hugging the old people. The room filled with laughter and greetings. Even some of the adults hugged each other.
I watched a 30-year-old woman hug an elderly round-shouldered woman, her hair twisted in a bun held by turquoise combs lined with rhinestones. I remembered reading that what many older people miss most as they grow older is tactile contact; people stop touching them. Seeing the enjoyment in her face, I could easily believe that one reason the older woman came to church each week was to get that hug.
While shaking hands before the service, the pastor had been in a white sport shirt. For the service, he put on a simple black robe and an inexpensive cross on a chain around his neck. I was delighted to see that he didn’t make any change other than that. He was still the same friendly “you know who I am” person. He wasn’t role playing. He didn’t change his tone of voice. He was the same person they would see all week.
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In another small church, I was impressed that the service wasn’t held for the members but by them.
At the door stood a rugged older man who passed out the bulletin, shook hands with the men, and hugged the women as they came in.
Chatting with him I found he lived alone in a small trailer across the bay and came by ferry to the service. He had relatives in Minnesota and California, but after ten years in that church, he said, “This is my home.” He not only had found community; he was also creating it.
The sermon wasn’t particularly original. The young preacher mostly combined a series of thoughts and excerpts from sermons he had read. Fortunately, what he selected both appealed and applied to his audience. He was a humble man. He didn’t try to become the voice of God, but I could see he was sincerely a man of God.
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In another service, the pastor announced that the husband of Aunt Molly had died. They had been praying for him for weeks, he said, and now they would pray for Aunt Molly. They did, and then he asked if there were any other situations that should be remembered in prayer. A young boy, about five years old, spoke up and said, “My dog died last Thursday.”
There was an embarrassed silence. The pastor thanked the young man and the service went ahead. I wished we would have stopped and prayed immediately for him, for in the mind of that youngster, what worse could have happened that week?
But as it was, I was impressed that the young boy knew that when you have a deep hurt, you bring it to church and ask your friends to pray with you. Where else besides a small congregation can a young boy feel free to speak up in that way?
I saw small churches take advantage of their informal atmosphere. The gathering is not so choreographed that interruptions are out of place.
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Just one more: in a little church near a famous summer music camp, we were surprised to find at the Sunday service a renowned professor of violin giving a word of testimony, after which he played an old hymn without any embellishment whatsoever. As he played, I noticed others saying the words.
Then, just to show the beauty of the music and the magnificence of the instrument, he played a variation of the same hymn. Then he closed by holding his violin and bow with bowed head. It was a moment to remember.
What I Learned
After these and other experiences in small churches, I tried to distill my reflections.
I can’t say that I heard any world-shaking sermons in these churches. Then again, most of the pastors were not evaluated for their great sermons but for their great compassion. As Warren Wiersbe recently told a group of pastors, “Don’t be afraid that your people listen to TV preachers; those preachers can only talk to your people; they can’t minister to them.”
Pastoring the small church requires some unique skills, different but no less vital than the skills necessary to pastor a large congregation. Both large and small churches require the same dedication and energy.
In the small church, pastors can spend more time in ministry and less in management. For many people, they’re more likely to mature spiritually in a congregation where the individual is more important than the growth of the institution. So often we confuse “doing church work” and “doing the work of the church.” Immature Christians can easily do church work but only mature ones with the presence of the Spirit can do the work of the church.
While the large church may have more excitement, it does not necessarily have more vitality.
I was reminded that the prayers of a small group are just as effective before God as those of a large group. Scripture talks about “a righteous man” (singular) having power in prayer and “where two or three are met together,” Christ promises his presence.
Too often we’re tempted to think of God as a politician who listens to a large group of his constituents but might not regard the concerns of only a few. Nowhere does God instruct us to get the maximum number of people praying in order to influence him.
The successful small churches I visited did not try to imitate large churches or apologize for being small. The small church won’t be as dynamic as the large one, but it can be just as joyful and much more intimate.
The major purposes of our Lord can be accomplished in small groups as well as large. A soul can go to heaven as well from a small church as from a large one. As we look back at history, we find most of our forefathers worshiped in small congregations, often with irregular preaching and with few of the programs that we consider standard today.
One last observation, a purely personal opinion: As I’ve observed a great many ministers, it seems the pastors of large churches are more vulnerable to burnout due to the multiplicity of activities, the complicating problems of multiple staff, and the increasing demands on the budget. Pastors of small churches are more prone to discouragement.
John Maxwell, the energetic and effective pastor of Skyline Wesleyan Church in California, is keenly interested in the vitality of pastors of small churches. Recently he invited me to speak to a gathering of pastors and laymen, mainly from churches of 50 to 250 members. It’s not easy pastoring a church that size, and if we are wired into the world’s definition of success, it’s hard to do much bragging. These brothers and sisters are working hard in the vineyard without the recognition they deserve.
I couldn’t help but notice, however, that these individuals, from many denominations, were vitally interested in doing God’s work and eventually hearing him say, “Well done.”
If I had any suggestion to make to both groups, it would be: Stay involved with personal ministry, and stick to your calling rather than your profession. If we only see our human activities, it’s easy to become disillusioned, discouraged, and burned out. When we see the power of God work, whether it’s in a small situation or a large one, then we know the power and feel the joy.
Copyright © 1991 by the author or Christianity Today/Leadership Journal. Click here for reprint information on Leadership Journal.
