Image: Susanne Nilsson | Flickr

Are you a small church pastor? Me too.

Have you ever felt like that’s not enough? Me too.

Today I have good news for both of us.

Your church is big enough.

Right now. Today. At its current size.

Your church is big enough to do what Jesus is calling you to do, and to be who he's calling you to be.

Your church is big enough to minister the healing grace of Jesus to its members. And you have enough members to take that healing grace to your community in an overflow of joy, hope and healing.

Quit Waiting – Start Doing

I know what some of you are thinking about the title of this post – because I used to think it, too. If we tell pastors their church is big enough, aren't we encouraging them to settle? Aren't we giving in to apathy?

Quite the opposite. The premise of this post is not about settling, it's about doing. Now. If you pastor a small church, you don't need to wait until your church is big to start doing great ministry.

I’m not anti church growth. I’m very pro church growth. Jesus said he would build his church, and I always want to be on Jesus’ side.

In fact, I wrote about the truth on the opposite side of this coin just a couple months ago in Never Settle for a Small Church (No Matter How Big It Is).

Every church is called to worship, disciple, fellowship, minister and evangelize with all our heart, soul, mind and strength. And leave the results in Jesus’ hands.

No matter what size your church is, you can do those things. All of them. And you can do them well.

Jesus is better at growing his church than we are. If we'll do our part of making disciples and equipping the saints, Jesus will do his part of growing the church.

But when we think our church needs to be bigger, we often miss out on doing the great things Jesus has for our church right here, right now.

Isn’t Bigger Better?

We’ve had a 40-50 year love affair with growing bigger churches in much of the western church world. Actually, we’ve had a love affair with the idea that bigger is better.

I’ve been to a lot of church ministry conferences. Great events put on by helpful people about how to do church ministry better.

I go because it’s good to strive to be better in everything we do. But the not-always-so-subtle message behind many of those seminars and conferences is that your church isn’t big enough.