The two churches were nothing alike. First Baptist was a county seat church. It had a history of influence in the city and among Baptists of the state. The church met in an old brick building that had not aged gracefully. Neither had the community around it. A kind description would be to call it a community in “transition.” The truth is, it was in decline.
Suburban Church (not its real name) had once been an open country church. From atop the rolling hill on which the building sat, one could see the fields and woods in all directions. No longer. Now from that hilltop, one saw new homes springing up on two- or three-acre plots. Convenience stores and small shopping areas seemed to dot every intersection as the nearby city edged ever closer.
Few similarities
About the only thing these two churches had in common, besides the Baptist name, was that both called pastors at about the same time. That was more than 20 years ago. These years later, they still share little in common except being in geographical proximity.
Growth at First Baptist has been slow. According to the state convention annual, the church never baptized more than 60 people any year since the pastor came. The average was more like 40–50. Not all of those stayed. Average Sunday School attendance crept up but at least the graph was always upward.
First Baptist did minister to its community. It was one of the first to start a Mother’s Day Out program. That expanded to a full child-care program. The church provided facilities for community events and organizations. That involvement helped the church maintain its influence and leadership in the city.
The church was one of the first local congregations to begin airing its worship services on cable television. The public access channel did not reach anywhere near the audience of a commercial station but it reached people not touched by the church any other way.
First Baptist kept people driving into the city to worship and serve there.
That helped provide the financial resources to build a much needed sanctuary complete with a marvelous set of stained glass windows. Some people complained about the price of the windows but after they saw the finished products, the windows became a point of pride for the congregation.
Today, First Baptist is a strong, stable congregation still providing leadership to the city and to Baptists of the state. Members of the church serve in city and county government. They are business and professional leaders. They serve on Baptist boards. The pastor is still there and during that time the church has been among the leaders in Cooperative Program giving.
The church never led the state in baptisms, never won Eagle Awards for Sunday School growth, but the church continues to baptize about 50 people a year. Sunday School continues its upward trend though slowly. In 20-plus years, average attendance has doubled. Still, First Baptist is not a mega-church. It may never be. Sometimes other pastors wonder out loud why the church “never took off.” Others wonder how the church continued to grow at all given its downtown location.
Soon after the arrival of the new pastor at Suburban Church, people in the area began talking about what was going on at the church. It was all positive.
People began joining Suburban Church and it was not long before Suburban overtook First Baptist in attendance. Suburban’s pastor had been a salesman before going into the ministry and he used all the skills learned there to grow the church.
Making a difference
Within five years Suburban was honored for leading the state in baptisms. For five straight years, the church baptized more than 100 people. Once baptisms topped 300 everybody knew Suburban was the next mega-church.
Attendance at worship services meant new buildings. The rustic country church building gave way to a new worship complex that reflected the changing nature of the area. The pastor was widely sought as speaker for Baptist events. National Baptist leaders spoke at the church. It was a good time for Suburban.
The church made some difficult choices. To pay for the buildings, it cut back Cooperative Program gifts. One year, the church gave less than $1,000 out of a budget of more than $1 million. And while worship attendance was high, Sunday School figures did not reflect the growth. Year after year, the convention annual reported average Sunday School attendance at just more than 300.
Suburban’s pastor began looking for another church.
When he resigned, attendance plummeted. The budget fell and the church had trouble paying the building debt. The fragile financial condition caused others to leave. Suburban weathered the storm but at a huge price. All of the staff was dismissed and a bivocational pastor led the church for about two years. That is all the church could afford.
Today, it is better. The church has a full-time pastor and a full-time minister of music. It still meets atop the rolling hill on which the building has sat for generations.
But not all of the hilltop belongs to the church any longer. Some of the land and buildings had to be sold to commercial interests to pay the debts. The size of the church is only a little more than when this story began.
Pastors who know what happened at Suburban still sit around and wonder how it all happened and why.
Could First Baptist have done better? Could Suburban have done better? Should they have done better?
Leadership styles and congregational choices can be debated until our Lord returns without any definitive answers. Each has strengths. Each has weaknesses.
But there is no escaping that one’s evaluation of the two situations is different when viewed throughout a 20-plus year history rather than a momentary slice of time.
Perhaps all of us should learn the value of taking a longer perspective about decisions made by a church or by an individual rather than basing our judgments on impressions.
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