Possible Impossibilities

February 26, 2018

It took the near-implosion of the church to teach me how little I really know about growing a congregation. I had been doing everything the pundits recommended, and the people responded accordingly, with attendance growing in ten years from around 120 to nearly 300. Then, in the space of six months, it all collapsed. I went from being in the know to being in the stew. It took another ten years to dig out of the hole we were in.

When I was asked to take on another pastoral assignment, my first thoughts were how to bring this congregation back from the hole in which they had found themselves through no fault of their own. I had fallen back into my old patterns of thinking I would be able to figure things out and fix whatever had gone wrong. What I hadn’t counted on was how little I still know, and how much church growth is a matter of God’s grace.

Today as I sat in the church office working on Sunday’s sermon, the volunteers for Willow Mission were busy meeting the people, providing food and clothing, and care. They treated each client with dignity and respect, as they do every Monday. I left the office to see if I could connect with a family that came for awhile last fall, but was unsuccessful. I’m finding myself up against an entirely different way of thinking. Life in the city is different than in a small village. Here, I can knock on a door and be confident that if the residents are home, someone will answer. In the city, I am as likely to remain standing on the front porch even if I hear voices and feet shuffling inside. It is humbling to realize again that when it comes to growing a church, I know nothing.

The almost oppressive air of poverty hangs over everything, and although we are doing our best, it doesn’t even scratch the surface of people’s need. There is good, too. I am driven to prayer more than ever before. Humanly speaking, we face impossibilities every day, and so I cling to the angel’s word to Mary: “With God, nothing shall be impossible.” (Luke 1:37). If the Scriptures be not true, we have nothing to offer; but if they are in truth, the Word of God, we have nothing to fear.