Carey Nieuwhof's breakout was entitled Breaking The 200 Barrier.
- You need to structure bigger to grow bigger.
- 90% of all churches can’t get past the 200 barrier.
- The reasons churches don’t grow are quite surprising.
- The structure that you have right now is perfectly designed to sustain the church you are at.
- Most churches behave like a mom-and-pop operation. You structure where everything is within your reach.
- A really charismatic leader can break these rules but you cannot sustain growth breaking these rules.
- You need to structure around pastoral care.
- My first church had 6 people in it. I could do all the pastoral care by myself.
- Small groups are a very good way of scaling pastoral care.
- 98% of pastoral care is having someone who cares. It does not have to be you.
- You need to structure care into the DNA of your church.
- Pastoral care is the #1 killer of churches.
- Staff that do everything vs. staff that lead leaders.
- Do hire people to do. Hire people to lead.
- You know they can lead when they take a vacation and the ministry runs better.
- Get comfortable doing what God called you to do. Not what other people think God called you to do.
- Bigger vision requires better structure.
- If I do all the pastoral care we’ll never grow beyond 200 people.
- When “No” becomes your default it makes people very grateful when they get a “Yes”. They also respect your time more.
- The governance issue will kill you 500 to 600 in attendance.
- If you spend $0.42 on children’s ministry you’ll never have a good children’s ministry.
- The mission has moved home.
- Volunteers can accomplish more than we think.
- You tend to be too staff heavy when you’re not good in volunteer development.
- Every leader has a number on his back. Some people are just going to lead churches of 50. Some are more organizational.
- People who are in all the details can’t scale beyond 200.
- The question is not, “Will they develop leaders?” The question is, “Are they developing leaders?”
- It now takes 2600 to make 1300 on the weekends. You need a bigger reach.
- My goal is not to get people in the building. My goal is to get people to engage in the mission.
- It’s not getting people to church to engage. It’s engaged people who attend.
- If you’re the only person thinking about your church on a Wednesday, you’ve got an engagement issue.
- When you have engaged people, you see your attendance surge.
- I’m only good at communicating, inspiring people and raising money.
- I manage self-managed people really well.
- If someone can do something 50-80% as well as you can do it, hand it off and do what you do well.
- When you add a 2nd service the rule has always been you automatically grow by 20% because you give people more options.
- Multi-site as a growth strategy, you need to be careful with that. I live in a country where 95% of the people won’t be in church this Sunday.
- I would not add another location if you’re not growing. I would not add another location if you’re not at two or three services. I would not add another location if you don’t have momentum. Adding another location will take away momentum, not add it, if you don’t have it.
- Great communication used to buy you more than you have today. Anybody can hear anybody. You’re now competing with every pastor in the world.
- Good preaching will not grow your church. Bad preaching will kill your church.
- Church culture – Is what you what worth exporting?
- At 200-500 the Board knows exactly what’s going on. They develop bad micro-management habits.
- Congregational leadership is a permanent lid on the growth of a church.
- You cannot run any successful organization on a vote. The congregation needs to trust the leadership.
- As elders, we only meet six to eight times a year.
- Move the kids to the service you want people to attend.
- If you get bigger you have to do less. You can’t duplicate complexity. You can only duplicate simplicity.
- We only do a few things well. If we keep doing more, it gets increasingly complex.
- For every 100 in worship, you should have 1 FTE. If portable or multi-site, it needs to be a little higher.
