300

No not the movie, which honestly I didn't think was all that great. I know that might hurt my "manhood" a little with some of you guys but it just didn't do it for me.

300 is the number that I have been reading about as the ideal size for a church. Big enough to enjoy some of the benefits of a large church like energy and the feeling of being part of something bigger than yourself but small enough to retain intimacy and a family feel. This size is especially appealing to young adults and emerging generations. This is a move away from the mega-churches and mega sanctuaries.

So when a church hits somewhere around 300 they just plant another church instead of growing bigger in one place.

Personally, I like this model. I think it is where the church is going in the future. What do you think?

It also begs the question of what is the ideal size for a youth ministry. I have led two high school groups of over 100 students and one that was over 200 and I feel like the ideal size for a bigger group is around 100-150. After that you lose something. I am not sure BIG youth groups work. I have seen really large churches high school groups where they had like 400-500 students coming but the church had 20,000 people in it. I think you reach a number with a large group that becomes ineffective.

Now I know the "big numbers" people out there will say "Why wouldn't you want to have 500 students?" To them I say I am not saying we shouldn't reach 500 it is just don't expect to do it in the "one-youth group" model. Those days are gone. I am not sure discipleship really can work in a youth group that big and usually you can't find enough adult leaders to support it.

Maybe after you get to 150 or so you should plant another youth group? Just some thoughts.

Chime in!

**Sorry for the long delay between posts, just been real busy!

Comments

[Tony LaMarca]

another reason the multi-site church model is having such success. I think sometimes in the mega churches, you will find small "churches" within them that all sit together for their main service but get together outside of the weekend (and I don't mean small groups). good insights mark, and it was great to see you at the wedding this past weekend.

[Alexander Wilhelmsen]

I will take on this issue soon enough, but I will say that I think that there's a lot of ways to look at it.

My personal background is that I believe that my first church was not a megachurch, but it was a decent sized one (I would hope so, because it was 150 years old when I was 4). My second church where I was for 12 years, was around 500 people, if I remember right, and was housed in an office building. Eventually it got its own building around 1994, and it's tripled in size and probably has a member roll in the 1,500 - 2,000 range with attendance around 1100. It wasn't the same over time.

My third church, where I was for about 5 years, grew to around 2,000 members and has grown over that, I believe, and like my second church, has added buildings recently and over time.

My church of the last year has regular attendance around 250-300, and it might be because I know the presence of larger churches that I see resources, and I also see your point.

This might get touchy, but who knows. My point was to establish the fact that I've seen, as a congregant and ardent member of my churches as much as I could be for my age (as a member primarily of youth and creative ministries and those in combination doing a lot of stuff).

There is a pretty big difference from what I can tell from a "everyone knows almost everyone" to a resources and how resources are handled standpoint. Granted this is between the two or three churches I've gone to, but it feeds the argument. What's better?

I've heard of congregations under 100, but wow... unless it grows or those people are on fire... yikes...

As for youth groups, I was a part of yours, which you were in charge of the high school of a Youth Ministry in two parts (where I served in one and then both for a time), before moving on to my present situation where a grade of the old group could match up in number or outnumber the combined 6th-12th grade group I'm a part of now.

Some of it I think is size, some of it I think is how you handle it.

Stay tuned for my further thoughts.

[Alexander Wilhelmsen]

I think a great sustainable number is around 500 and 1,000 is the largest I'd go, if you have the right people on board and the growth is gradual enough. As I'm with a church that has 300 people as right now, I think it's a shade on the smaller side of what I think would be a church that's not too big, but not quite too small.

Then again, a very dedicated 300 people is a very good thing.

The issue with a church this small is that you have enough people to house in one building and that's really all you can support. That along with four total staff members, two full time (the Senior Pastor and Worship & Arts Director), two part time (Ministry/Administrative Assistant and Children's Minister) and the rest are volunteers. Very dedicated volunteers (which is quite beneficial, I think), which keeps us in check, which is good and bad.

I think if you gave us 500 in support, you have two buildings and six regulars (or five regulars and two part timers) on staff (Pastor, Worship and Arts, Youth/Students, Elementary/Children's, Administrative Assistant, and the sixth spot is Adult/Missions Ministries with or without a secondary Administrative person who is focused on the Students Ministies (Children through College/Young Adult). It seems like you get a full person for around 100 people and a part timer for about every 50... well, I think that's normal based on what little I know. About 240 man hours total per week, divide it as you wish.

If you have a Day School, consider that group separate from the main staff for this purpose.

You also have enough money to have more resources, but not so much that you can go crazy with what you have.

Youth Ministry wise, it's very funny when you worked with students at a church that can host its own mission week and pull in 150, and overall 200-300 youth between the ministries to having 20-30 total max, with all but a few involved in the creative ministries (possibly just as many as the larger group had leaving out puppets... how does that work?).

I'd say it'd be cool to have a combined youth ministry around 50 students strong with a top number around 100. What's cool about a group the size we are is that we know all of the students and most of the parents (well, atleast one per family) as each seems to have siblings involved and the parents get involved as well.

What's awesome is that we're fortunate to have a decent sized Cantata choir; a small, but dedicated drama team; three regular teams for the three services (one each per service), and just about everything is manageable.

I think that we're fortunate to have the dedicated people that we have and I think we make a good impact in the community, but I think that that little extra could help with the little more that we could do.

Overall, if you do it right, you can make any number work out. The problem is when you have too many people and some people who are very talented get lost in the shuffle and never really get a chance to show their stuff. This problem is worse when the leader(s) have their favorites that they always go to and that hurts a person, or atleast holds them back.

While it's not about a person getting granduer for themselves, I believe that if someone has a talent that they can share (even if it's good, not great) that they should get an opportunity to share it. The church has gifted people and people love to use their gifts. The problem is when gifted people get stuck doing the dirty work, even if they're blessed with the demeanor that they are more than willing to do that.

I do think larger churches do have a place and a responsibility, but a larger church should never look down at a smaller church that may be more effective than them. A church, regardless of size, should look beyond their walls to team up with others that are reasonably like minded to work with them in some projects (and that doesn't necessarily mean worship together if you're talking about "Oil" and "Water," i.e. you may not put a Pentacostal or T.J. Jakes in a Catholic Church, or cast out spirits in a United Methodist Church, but if a local church is leading a Community Food Pantry, many churches should donate food, people, and other resources to make it happen).

A larger church has a role as the more resourced due to its numbers, and maybe they could use those resources to have a church within their church from time to time. In a way, I'm a part of two "churches," a true church, and a young adult church (which is a ministry within a larger church, not my own, oddly enough they're of similar size). The latter also has activities and volunteers of its own, not unlike a regular church does. The "3rd" is kind of a church due to its size. Maybe you can have a larger church, but within it you have "small churches" that make up the larger one with their own leader (which is sort of like a multi-site church has, but in this case at one place) just a thought.

It's funny how bigger churches (thank goodness), look to smaller ones to be more effective, and really I hope so. I also hope that they'd be willing to help bolster good but, due to size, suffering churches to build them up.

On a church of 20,000, yikes. How are they structured? How are the student ministries structured? Wow.

I remember being a part of a middle school that had 125 total students and that dropped to around 100 when I was in 8th grade. Just about everyone knew everyone. Not too long after the private school folded due to cost. Unfortunately some churches can go this way, if they are too small or too unbalanced (as my home church has young people and a few older ones as well).

In a youth ministry, if you have 20-30 people, you really know everyone, but around 50, you can still know who everyone is and you probably have a good core group at that point (I think I was in a group of around 20-30 in sixth, but it got larger). Not everyone's going to make it, and if you have a decent amount of siblings, this serves the purpose to keep the number of parents you have to know manageable. When you get over 100 and I think it gets interesting.

While I've never been a youth professional, nor am I the most outgoing person, I know that there's only so many people you can invest in effectively over time and overall keep in line.

Churches can be islands with their own unique character, sure, as long as they make sure that they have good boats that are willing to travel and good relationships with the other islands to work together.

[Alexander Wilhelmsen]

One thing I will make note of is that the summer interns you can have is limited if you're smaller, so that's where you hope your community is willing to give a little more or you have a community larger than 300.

As I noted, I feel lucky to be in a smaller church, but I also think it has its limitations where we're just a little short of where we'd love to be.