Is the Church a business?

I was talking with a friend of mine the other day, and he asked, “How is the church business going?” It sounds odd to place the words “church” and “business” together in the same sentence, doesn’t it? At first, I was taken aback, almost offended, that he would equate the two. I mean, the Church is God’s sacred bride, for whom Christ died! The church’s foundation is Christ, the chief cornerstone. The Church is a body of people, spanning thousands of years, not a building.

As I began to think about it a little more, though, I saw some similarities.

Businesses are out to sell their product…churches are out to “sell” a product (Jesus)
Businesses are mindful of their consumers and are trying to market their product in a way that is relevant to the consumer…churches are mindful of the consumer (the congregation), and are trying to keep their product (Jesus, God, Bible) relevant (the church has been around since ~30AD…don’t we believe that the Bible is relevant for today??)
Businesses want to come up with products that are useful and keep people coming back for more…churches want to “feed” people from Scripture, help them to grow spiritually, and have them come back the next week. In fact, both die out if people never come back.
Businesses want to grow to the point that they can open up more stores and spread ultimately throughout the country and the world…the Church’s goal, via Christ, is to make disciples of all nations, spreading the gospel to the whole world (Matthew 28:19-20; Acts 1:8)

I don’t want to take this illustration too far. Ultimately, the Church is not a business. The Church is the worldwide community of the redeemed people of God. We are established, fed, matured, sustained, and loved by God. To say that the Church is simply a business would sell it far short of its beauty.

But comparing the two is intriguing, isn’t it? I know that there are many more, but these are just the few that came to mind. If you’ve got some more, feel free to leave a comment.

jmt

I’ll dispute your second parallel between business and Church: the congregation is not a set of customers. The congregation is the church. And you know that site-obsession (calling the meeting house a church) peeves me. My pedantry aside, I was reading the recent TIME article on Rick Warren this morning, and his service to his community and the world certainly shows there is some practicality to applying business/organizational skills to Christianty. But we must let the Bible critique and set the agenda for our methods…
business man

Grace seems to be doing a great job getting business done. Jesus was about his father’s business. Kingdom business is a big deal. There are profits, losses, gains, counting of costs, and the like. Grace has been successful in attracting people to the storefront.
ToddR

As someone who used to work "behind the scenes" with a church, I can say that this is one of the most precarious balancing acts a church has to play.

From an administrative standpoint, a church most certainly does have to function like a business. Almost every church (I say "almost" because I'm sure there are exceptions out there somewhere) has overhead expenses to deal with, including payroll, printing, utilities, etc. If a church fails to properly manage the administrative elements (or if you prefer a "Christianese" term, to be a good steward), then it will never have the resources it needs to expand its ministry at best, and it may fail to meet its own overhead needs at worst.
ToddR

As far as the term "customers" goes, I have to take a moment to disagree with JMT. The church is not just made up of the congregation any more than it is simply a facility; a church is the entire organization, including the congregation, the volunteers and lay-leaders, and the paid staff. A church is indeed a service industry; it provides spiritual services to its community. Anyone who is familiar with customer service theory knows that every organization has 2 sets of customers – external and internal. In a church, the external customers are the people the church is seeking to reach. This includes the congregation, here defined as the people who attend services, but do not serve as volunteers. Your internal customers the staff and volunteers. Providing good customer service to one of these two groups and not the other will lead to a failure of the organization. This brings me to the other side of the scale in this delicate balancing act.
ToddR

The church is also a family. Any decisions that affect a church's "customers" must be made like a family. You wouldn't come home one day and announce that the entire family is moving across the country for a new job because you've decided that it's the best thing for everyone involved. No, instead you would sit down with the family and discuss the potential move, and come to a decision together. This can be really tricky in a church setting, especially when dealing with your volunteer base; on one hand, volunteers are like staff, but on the other hand they're also like external customers.
ToddR

The last church I was involved with almost failed because the pastor, elders, and staff made decisions too much like a business intead of like a family. I had been a volunteer ministry leader for eight years, spending 25 + hours a week leading this particular ministry. The worship minister and the programming director one day decided that they no longer wanted my ministry team to be as prominent in the church services, so they essentially "fired" me from my volunteer position with no notice whatsoever. This style of decision making continued, and the church's volunteer pool almost completely dried up. The resulting chain reaction caused the congregation to dry up as well to a point where the church almost went under.

I guess what I'm saying is that yes, a church is a business… but it HAS to be more than just a business. And yes, a church is a family… but it HAS to be more than just a family.

Is the Church a business?

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