Church Extension in the news

For more information on developments in the settlement of the Church Extension fiasco, check out this news article in the Indianapolis Business Journal: "Directors dangling $5M deal".

 

Blogging

It's been awhile (over two weeks to be truthful!) since I've posted to this blog. I've wanted to on several occasions, but life has been tugging at me from a number of directions for the past few weeks and blogging had to be set aside for a bit. I hope by next week to share some recent thoughts and reflections that have been coming my way.

 

Talking about blogging, be sure to check out the growing "blogrolls", listed on my main page. I am a strong proponent of blogging, and therefore I want to maintain the most exhaustive list possible of

Church of God blogs, bloggers, feeds, and podcasts. Be sure to check these out, as you may find a few that would be worth subscribing to.

 

Hopefully you are "subscribing" to CHOGBlog and not just visiting the main web page to read my posts. Blogging is much more than a forum for individuals to rant, but the technology behind it allows readers to more effectively keep up with a number of blogs, thereby increasing interaction and exchange. If you are not already using a feed reader to automatically retrieve blogs and other feeds I urge you to find one that works well for you. There are three major types: Browser-integrated (e.g. Firefox with the Sage Extension), Stand-alone program (e.g. RSS Bandit), and Web-based (e.g. Bloglines, Newsgator, Google, or even My Yahoo!). I personally find web-based readers to be the most effective since they are not limited to any one computer.

 

Let's keep dialog alive within the Church of God. Blogs can be one of the most significant ways for us to learn from others and to engage in healthy discussions that ultimately will strengthen us all as we strive to carry out God's mission.

 

More Yearbook reflections

Last week I pointed out the shifting geographic trends that are apparent from studying the 2006 Church of God Yearbook. Since then, I have also been reflecting on the type of data collected and published in our annual.

 

My question is: How can we better quantify church effectiveness than by just "AM attendance"?

 

I touched on this issue a few months back ("How do we meaure success?"), but I want to approach it from a slightly different angle this time. Certainly, measuring congregational size has become an unhealthy preoccupation today, as the explicit and implict assumption is that the bigger the church, the better the church. That's not a necessarily true relationship.

 

But, apart from using size to compare churches, even using AM attendance itself is a problem. Certainly, measuring the number of people present at our Sunday service(s) provides a tangible reference point, but I believe it is an increasingly meaningless indicator of true church life and activity. Why have we settled for attendance at our weekly gathering of celebration and preaching as the best way to evaluate our life? Obviously, counting warm bodies on Sunday mornings is easy, and other things are more difficult to quantify. For example, up until a few years ago a "membership" number was also included in the Yearbook, but since we don't have a consistent method to determine measurement within our theology and polity, it is a fairly useless statistic.

 

Perhaps the whole practice of "measuring" is the problem. Shouldn't we be more concerned about being "faithful" than trying to quantify our activities? Sure, I understand the argument that measurements are a valuable tool to help us objectively assess our effectiveness. That is true to point. Maybe it is what we are measuring that needs to change.

 

While this will hardly satisfy those obsessed with the need for accurate statistical data, I would be more interested to measure some of the following congregational markers:

 

1. Number of people actively involved in cell-groups, as this is probably a better indicator of church life.

2. Number of people we are touching in our community through our intentional contacts and service projects.

3. Number of baptisms.

 

This is my start for a list. I'd love to hear from those of you reading this blog. How can we best measure congregational life, activity, and effectiveness?

 

Geographic shifts

I received my copy of the 2006 Yearbook of the Church of Godtoday.

 

As usual I made sure that my name and congregation were listed (and correctly). Once my fears were relieved I spent a few minutes glancing at various sections, looking up old friends, etc.

 

One of the most interesting observations I made was on the North American Summary (pp. 368f). For the first time ever, California has surpassed Indiana in "AM Attendance" for the number two spot (Ohio still has a commanding lead), although Indiana still has 19 more congregations than California. 

 

While I don't want to get hung up on church statistics, something significant is happening here. While the midwest is still the geographic hub of our movement in North America (36% of AM attendance is centered in the five states of OH, IN, MI, KY, and IL), there is a trend of growth in states on the fringes. For example, above average growth is occuring in California, Washington, and Florida, whereas the five "hub" states showed virtually no cumulative growth, with three of the five actually declining from the previous year's statistics. There are other apparent differences too. California, for instance, has roughly half the total Sunday evening and Sunday School attendances of Indiana, but over twice the number listed as "Saved". What is most interesting is that the west coast in particular is known as highly secularized and less religious.

 

One shouldn't draw too many conclusions from these statistics, as these numbers only provide a snapshot (and not a comprehensive one) of what is really happening. But, they certainly illustrate some interesting trends and provide material for further reflection.

 

Church on the roll?

Happy New Year!

 

I couldn't resist on this one ...

 

First Church of God in Pendleton, Oregon has come up with a unique fundraiser: Selling toilet paper!

 

Read the article in the East Oregonian newspaper.