One Size Fits All

Something I read.

We can look at the different churches and we see similarities with our own. For most people in the parish community church is irrelevant, people politely or otherwise push church aside, for those involved in church it's frustrating, prayer is diheartening and outreach wasn't working or there just isn't any. Does it sound familiar?

Statistics also paint a drepressing picture. Back in 1979 about 12 per cent of the entire population could be found in church on a Sunday. By 2005 this had plummeted to 6.3 per cent*. According to the Daily Telegraph around 10 churches in the UK close every week. If these trends continue, by 2004 there will be just 2 per cent of the population attending church on a Sunday - half the number attend mosque on a Friday - and the average age of the church member will be 64.

It's not all disastrous news, by any means. It's merely discouraging an inconvinient truth.

I believe there is hope and we have the answers in our churches.

Usually we would look to different programmes or initiatives to be more effective, we look for the one size fits all, the latest tried and tested technique. We think if we find the right gifted people, the new powerful initiative, then things will move forward.

This kind of thinking falls short, our church is awash with evangelistic gift and potential

* Dr Peter Brierley (ed) Pulling out of the Nosedive and Religious Trends No6 2007

It's true.....