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image credit CreationSwap user Ales Cerin

Our church will never grow.

Those were the words I heard over the phone from a pastor. “Because of the town where we’re at, and with it being pretty rural, our church isn’t ever really going to grow.”

It felt like the punchline to a joke that wasn’t funny. I unintentionally let an awkward silence hang over the airways while I caught my breath, hoping he’d fill the silence with, “Oh, you know I’m kidding.” He didn’t.

We were in the middle of a conversation about small groups, and how small groups can be a growth engine for your church as they help connect people into life-giving, discipleship-making relationships. I was trying to help him see how small groups can be an environment for people not just inside of the church building to connect and grow, but for those still on the outside. A chance for skeptics to “kick the tires,” if you will, not in an argumentative you-better-convince-me-intellectually kind of way, but in a way where they see the church in action. Where they watch love. Watch grace. Watch forgiveness. Watch confession. Watch growth.

Small groups are the Church. Alive. (Tweet that)

Small groups are ideal environments to invite your friends.

But he wasn’t buying it. And I couldn’t believe what I was hearing.

Our church will never grow.

Basically I was being told, “Evangelism won’t work for us. The Great Commission (Matthew 28:19-20) is for everyone else. Because of where we live, we’re off the hook. Jesus couldn’t have meant us when he commanded us them to make disciples of all nations. No way. No how.” (Tweet that)

If you get to the point where you feel like the Gospel isn’t

  • powerful enough
  • big enough
  • life-changing enough
  • culture-shaping enough
  • hope-giving enough 
  • marriage-saving enough
  • addiction-breaking enough (Tweet that)
  • grace-infusing enough
  • slate-cleaning enough

to shape your community and grow your congregation, get out of the ministry. (Tweet that) Do something else. Anything else. The Gospel is too important to waste. Too powerful to keep confined to a small box.

Pastors, your community needs you. (Tweet that) It needs you to believe that there’s hope in the Gospel. There’s healing to be found in surrender. That marriages can be reconciled. That change is possible.

The Gospel is not small.