Church with narrow focus won't help parishioners grow in faith

By their very nature, big churches minister to people with widely varying spiritual, intellectual and emotional needs. If Bill Hybels, senior pastor of the 20,000-member Willow Creek Community Church in South Barrington, didn't already have a hunch that this is so, he now knows for certain.

The unofficial guru of the "seeker-friendly" model for churches, Hybels saw his congregation grow from 125 people to over 20,000.

But now, through a survey commissioned by the Willow Creek Church, Hybels has found out that many of his members aren't showing the expected spiritual maturity, and some have left the church for other places of worship. Hybels faults the model and his own leadership.

As quoted in a story on chicagotribune.com, Hybels says, "There were some unpleasant surprises we had to face. If people are not feeling supported by the church, they don't grow in faith."

Greg Hawkins, the church's executive pastor, commented, "So much of our messaging is a one-size-fits-all framework. That ignores the reality that everyone's relationship with Christ is unique."

One reason why people feel like they're not being ministered to is that most mega-churches focus on a narrow strategy for attracting people.

Rick Warren, pastor of Saddleback Church in California and best-selling author of "The Purpose-Driven Life" and "The Purpose-Driven Church," preaches that churches should focus their energies on one goal.

The problem with this strategy is that as believers grow, they need a different kind of emphasis in their lives, and the church with a narrow focus isn't equipped to provide it.

Another reason believers stagnate is that while large churches have the resources to provide a wide variety of ministries and to do them well, it also is much easier for a person to get lost in a large church than in a small one. My wife and I experienced this soon after I retired.

We were looking for a church as parishioners, and one church of about 1,500 members really caught our attention. The worship services were great, and the first Sunday there we signed the visitor card in the hymnal rack, expecting a promised contact from the pastoral staff.

After three Sundays of signing visitor cards and getting no response -- no letter or phone call -- we just quit signing the cards. We kept on attending because we liked the worship, but we also were quite sure that after attending for five years we could decide to leave and no one would know we were gone. Finally, we initiated the contact ourselves, but I wondered how many people less persistent than us had fallen through the cracks.

Roman Catholic congregations are large, with a tradition that you join the church in whose parish you live. But as more Catholics feel the freedom to explore other parishes, it appears that the ones that offer the more stimulating preaching, more interesting music, better education programs, and better opportunities for small-group Bible study grow faster than those who don't.

Willow Creek is offering to conduct surveys at other congregations, and according to the story, more than 1500 churches from 14 denominations (including Roman Catholic) have applied.

Obviously, there is a need out there!