Comments on: Why Churches Stop Growing

By: c

Mon, 02 Jun 2014 05:20:22 +0000

Shepherds Church is known in UBF as the El Camino (Los Angeles II) chapter. The director of Shepherds Church was originally part of Los Angeles (Downey) UBF. He separated and began his own ministry. After sometime he rejoined UBF officially, but I think they are still using the name Shepherds Church when referring to themselves outside of the UBF conversation and reporting. Someone please correct if I am wrong about this.

By: BK

BK — Sun, 01 Jun 2014 21:35:40 +0000

By the way, Isaac Kim's blog is a good way to keep up with news at ubf :) Isaac Kim's report about the 2014 staff meeting

By: BK

BK — Sun, 01 Jun 2014 21:23:29 +0000

One of the things churches especially seem to want to do is re-brand themselves, as businesses might do when failing. So... anyone know what this "Shepherds Church" thing is all about? This seems to a California chapter of ubf? Clearly this is a ubf outpost, but why the "Shepherds Church" name? [Note this is not Shepherd's church, which would imply the church belongs to Jesus. The church is called Shepherds Church without the apostrophe, denoting a group of shepherds gathered.] Are some ubf chapters going rogue and renaming themselves?

By: Brian Karcher

Brian Karcher — Sat, 09 Nov 2013 17:03:35 +0000

So I'm really glad to be part of a company who understands more than a lot of churches about this topic. I learned more here at this company in 6 months (and was treated better) than 24 years in ubf. RIP UBF.

By: Brian Karcher

Brian Karcher — Sat, 09 Nov 2013 16:58:34 +0000

Thanks for sharing Ben. This is a “must understand” topic in my observation. I think equally important to understand would be the meaning of “growing”.

How do we tell if a group or church is growing or dying? I would contend growth has little to do with increase or decrease in numbers. Numbers and stats follow, and tell the story of the past, but numbers do not lead. If we are led by numerical tracking, we are being led by the past to ignore the present and be unprepared for the future.

One characteristic then of a dying church or group would be an obsession with making decisions based on numbers. As you mentioned: “Good future leaders need a humble and honest view of the past. The problem is that our idealized memories of the past often look better than the harsh realities of the present.”

I think we should look for the marks of the one, holy, catholic, apostolic church and identify whether we see the fruits of the Holy Spirit among the group. How open and transparent are they? How do they handle authority? How much do they honor reality around them? How well do they understand their core values? How connected are they to other groups? I think those are some of the questions to ask when determining health of an organization.