Our lifegroup leaders and I are reading a book together called “Sticky Church,” by Larry Osborne. In it, he talks about the need for “closing the back door” of the church. Many churches have a wide-open front door where all are welcome, but many of those same churches also have a wide-open back door, where people leave the church and their relationships with other christians. I thought this was a great excerpt:
To be structured for spiritual growth, a church (whether front-door, or back-door focused) must have some sort of method in place to consistently connect people to both significant relationships and the Bible.In a very small church, that might be nothing more than the weekly worship gathering. But in any church of more than eighty to ninety people, it takes a PLAN or it won’t happen.Front-door churches that fail to structure for spiritual growth risk becoming merely a birthing center, the telltale mark of which is a back door fueled by maturity migration- a steady flow of people who complain, “I got started here, but I can’t grow here.”Back-door churches that fail to structure for spiritual growth will end up with programs and ministries that keep people from leaving but do nothing to help them grow or reach out to those who need Jesus.To combat that, the simplest and best tool I’ve ever seen for connecting people to one another and engaging them with the Bible for the long haul is a sermon-based small group. It offers a format that fits the way we spiritually grow, while providing a framework for a healthy and sticky church. Nothing compares.
We’ve been looking at this “sermon-based” model of lifegroup for a while… Some of our groups are even doing it already. I’ve got to admit, I always looked at these groups and thought “those only happen in churches with narcissistic pastors. They just like to glorify themselves!” BUT, as I’ve been reading this book, my mind has really been changed, and we are looking into implementing this church-wide pretty soon. What do you think? Email me and let me know!
Sticky Church, by Larry Osborne is available at Amazon.com.