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By the numbers

Tom Rehling

Disney World has an entire department committed to tracking and predicting attendance, usage, and consumption. For each day of the year, they are able to predict, within one or two percent, how many people will enter the four theme parks, which attractions will have the longest lines at various times of the day, and how many sodas, hamburgers, hot dogs and French fries each restaurant and street vendor will sell. Paying attention to the numbers is a part of what has made Disney an enchanting experience for so many people.

I often hear people suggesting that churches should not be concerned about numbers. “The church should be focused on quality not quantity.” “The church is about spiritual matters not numbers.” “Numbers are for people on ego trips.” Consequently, many churches have not paid much attention to the numbers, and the church has suffered.
Numbers are as important to the church as they are to Disney World. The fourth book of the Bible is “Numbers.” We know how many seats we have in the sanctuary, how many dollars we need to balance the budget, how many pies we need for the potluck and we have an official number of church members. Numbers help us know what to expect and how to plan.

When we pay attention to the numbers they tell us how we are doing and where we are headed. I am convinced that the most important indicator of church health and growth is average weekly worship attendance (AWWA). Worship is the central weekly gathering and celebration of the congregation. If you pay careful attention to the ebb and flow of worship attendance, you will learn much about the health, vitality, and life style of the congregation as well as the worship attendees.

The collective AWWA for the churches of the Rocky Mountain Conference UCC is very alarming! In the past 10 years, we have experienced a 19% decline in membership (from 21,000 to 17,000) and a 37% decline in AWWA (from 9,070 to 5,705). We need to reverse this trend while we still have the strength and the resources to do it. It won’t be quick or easy, but another decade of similar decline would be devastating. It would force many of our churches to close their doors and the voice of the United Church of Christ to be silenced in the Rocky Mountain Conference.

I am asking the Board of Directors to declare increasing AWWA as the top priority of the Rocky Mountain Conference for the next decade and to commit the energy and resources of the Conference to making it happen.

I am asking every minister and congregation to do whatever is necessary to increase AWWA by 5% per year for the next 10 years. This means that a church with an AWWA of 40 in 2005 needs to increase it to 42 in 2006, and an AWWA of 100 needs to increase to 105. If every congregation will commit to 5% growth per year for 10 years, we will have a 63% increase in AWWA by 2016 and be at our highest AWWA since 1990.

I believe we can do this. Will you join with me in making a solemn commitment to increasing AWWA for the next decade? For God’s sake, let us work together to broaden our base for mission and ministry.

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