187: When Your Church Feels Like It’s Dying: What to Do (and What’s Still True)

If your church is shrinking, struggling, or just doesn’t look like it used to—it can feel like failure. But what if it’s not?

In this episode, we talk honestly about fear, change, and what actually makes a church vibrant (hint: it’s not numbers). Because while buildings close, callings don’t—and Jesus isn’t panicking.

You’ll hear:

1. Why panic isn’t a strategy—and what to focus on instead
2. How to grieve well without getting stuck in it
3. What to do when the youth group disappears (or never existed)
4. What influence looks like when you have no title or team

Let’s shift from fear to purpose—and start showing up like it still matters.

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Transcript

Laurie Graham: 0:01

Hey, welcome to the small church ministry podcast, where we help volunteers and ministry leaders experience less stress, more joy and greater impact as we share strategies that actually do work in smaller churches. I'm your host. Laurie Graham, let's dive in. You. Laurie, hey friend, welcome back to the small church ministry podcast, where we don't measure health by how many people are in the room, but by how we love the ones who are. I'm Laurie, and today we're kicking off a short series that I've been dying to record, because honestly, some of the stuff I see in Facebook comments and at church conferences, like workshops and things, it makes me Twitch a little, not in a judgmental way, but in this is doing real damage, and we need to talk about it way. So for the next few episodes, I'm taking some comments and questions and even quiet concerns that I keep hearing in small church spaces, the ones that maybe get whispered in hallways or thrown around online like they are facts, the ones that stir up shame and pressure or fear and today's comment, what we're going to talk about is, what if your church is shrinking or even dies. If you feel like your church is dying, is that always a crisis to fix? What are we doing wrong? Or could there be another way to see it? So stick with me. This is going to be an honest, hopeful and yes, maybe a little bit toe steppy, but only with love, and you might walk away feeling a little bit lighter. So let's dive in. So real talk. Someone on our Facebook community recently named this phrase, kind of called this out, and I'm putting in quotes here, a tsunami of death, as in, if your church doesn't do this, that's the sign that is a tsunami of death, your church will die game over. Now this was in the context of youth ministry, like, if your church doesn't have a vibrant youth program, that is the tsunami of death. And around this comment were facts and statistics and things like this. And please listen, I just want to be clear, that kind of thinking isn't this person's fault. She didn't invent it. That narrative was taught somewhere in a workshop, that narrative is echoed in books and preached from stages by people claiming to be experts. It's presented like a universal truth. If you don't have a good children's program, if you don't have a growing youth program, your church is going to die. Have you heard this? Have you been scared of this? Are you in a place where you've seen this even play out. But here's the thing, it is not true, that idea is no more true than things like this. You have to go to college to be successful. We've all seen exceptions more and more every day. How about this fact that's not a fact bigger churches are always healthier. Have you heard that it's presented like a universal truth, but it is not a universal truth. No more than saying if you don't have a nursery, you're not a good church, you're not a growing church, you're not a vibrant church, just because something is loud and repeated or even published. It just doesn't make it true. Here's the grace. If you've ever felt that panic, you are not crazy. You were handed a script. We were taught something. But here's the deal, you don't have to keep reading it. I don't have to keep reading that same script. In fact, we can rewrite that script, as I kind of alluded to, this tsunami of death type of thought is not just about youth groups. People worry that their church is dying for a variety of reasons. There aren't enough young families. Our numbers aren't growing. Giving is down. A big donor left. There is no nursery. We're living off our savings or off like a big contribution, an endowment. Maybe you can't find a pastor, or you've been looking for a pastor for two years. You're in a rural area. It's an aging area, or a quiet area. But here's the truth, fear is not a strategy. I'll say it again. Fear is not a strategy. And just because your church doesn't look like someone else's idea of success, it doesn't. Mean, it's failing, and yes, we want to reach the next generation in church that matters. My first position in churches was all about children's ministry and youth ministry. I love the younger generations. It's important, but let's not idolize a packed youth group or a full nursery as the only signs of life. Small churches can be vibrant, purposeful and deeply alive, even if they don't fit the current modern view of a successful church. I'm going to say it again. Small churches can be vibrant, purposeful and deeply alive, even if they don't fit the mold of whatever that script is or that picture is of this is what an alive church looks like. We've got to throw it out. So keep listening. We're going to talk. We're going to walk through what's happening, why it might be happening, why it might not even be something to be fixed. And we're going to grab on to embrace hope throughout, because everything that I say, everything that I share, everything that I'm learning, is based on the truth of what I've experienced, what other people experience, what Jesus modeled. We're not just pulling out some toxic positivity or trying to flip a script on something that is truly awful. But here's the edgy question, what if shrinking isn't always a crisis to fix? What if shrinking or getting smaller or watching your numbers go down? What if it's not a crisis to fix? What if it is a season to honor, no, I also want to say right now, we're going to talk about grief, we're going to talk about sadness, we're going to talk about loss. In a minute. I am not at all trying to minimize any pain that you or others might be feeling around their church. Okay, around your church season. But I just want to talk about a different perspective. What if it's really a season to honor? Let's talk forest fires. At first glance, they look like total destruction, but underneath the soil gets richer. It's not like things just regrow. It actually gets better. Some seeds only sprout when exposed to intense heat. Did you know that fire actually can make space for new life that wouldn't have come otherwise? Sometimes what looks like loss and is actual loss is actually clearing the way. Sometimes the death of something or the loss of something, please hear this isn't a punishment, it's a reset. So let me give you another analogy. I'm at a time in my life right now where my littles are all grown up. My kids are currently 2523 and 21 and sometimes when I have memory floods or when I look at pictures, I feel this intense loss of what was, of when they were sweet and they sat on my laps, they're still sweet, but they don't sit on my lap anymore of when I could brush hair, or when we would fill up tubs in the backyard with water and pretend we had a swimming pool, like I have these memories, and it is so much loss. It's sad, but where they are now launching their lives is such a different place. And if I didn't have that loss, I wouldn't have this now, which is deeper connection, deeper conversation, relationships I never knew I would have with these little ones. So it's okay to say this hurts. It's okay to grieve what used to be, but not everything that ends is failure. And please hear this, not everything that's smaller is sick, it's totally true. Not everything that ends is failure, and not everything that's smaller is sick. Because here's the bigger picture, even when a local church closes or loses families or, you know, shrinks down to just a handful of faithful people, that is not the death of your calling. The church isn't a building the church. Church isn't a head count. The church isn't a budget. You are the church. I am the church. Our friend who sits across from us is the church, and you, I'm just going to tell you right now, you are not being cleared out of the way. Even if you feel like your church might be dying, you are not being cleared out of the way. We are called to influence. We are called to be a light each, ever, each and every one of us as individuals, we make up the church. I think sometimes we put the local church are not just the building, because I get that it's not just the building, but we put this local institution up on a pedestal. But maybe this isn't the ending. Maybe this is a shift. Maybe it's your shift. Maybe this is your personal invitation to live differently, to lead with less pressure and more presence, to pour into what matters with the people who are still here now. If you're listening right now and your church is growing good for you, that's awesome. God is at work. If you are listening right now and your church is shrinking, I'm gonna say it again, good for you. It may not feel as good, but God is still at work. If you are listening right now and your church is not at a place where you fear these things. Would you please just keep listening so that you can be an encouragement to many? Many people around the planet who are in this place, especially post covid. I know we're years out, but people are still talking about it. It had a big impact on many, many churches all over the world. So we've got to talk about this. What might God do be doing if your church is shrinking? Because surely, my God did not stop working. Jesus is not failing here. What if it's a shift and not a death? Your purpose, your personal purpose, as an influence, as a light of Christ, has not disappeared just because the crowd did. If you are still here, if you are still breathing, if you are still willing, not only is there still good work to do, but God is still here with you. It's not just about what we do, it's about who we are and who is holding us now. This might be a time to kind of pause or shift or re evaluate. It might be a time to get creative. It might be a time to pour into the people who are still here. Maybe that's the purpose meeting needs that others might miss. But I just want to encourage everyone present myself included, whether you're dealing with shifts in your life, in your church, in your own personhood, can we stop chasing the way it used to be, and start asking, What could this become? What could this become? Hope isn't lost, it's just shifting form. And I don't say that as a funny, fuzzy meme or as a hopeful, toxic positivity shift. I say that because of the God that I follow, because of where my hope is, because of God's consistency, because of his word, because of the people that I see around me who are still loving no matter what, no matter what's happening in the economy, no matter what's happening in politics, no matter what's happening in education, I still see people around me who are loving well, who aren't thrown by whatever Wave has just happened, but that deep peace that God is still on the throne didn't shift, and it certainly isn't shifting because less people are coming into your church. Hope isn't lost. It's just shifting when we stop panicking about numbers and start embracing where God is at work. We absolutely find life in places where we had stopped looking. I just have that image of the forest fire in my head. There was recently a fire along a tray. Where I walk, the amount of life that is popping up, the amount of things I am seeing that I did not see before, that were there before, so different every time I walk there. Okay, let's keep going. I want to also just make permission for this. I kind of hinted at this toward the beginning. I do believe it's really important to give some space for grieving. We can grieve a loss and still move forward. We're not ignoring the fact that we could say, I miss when our church was full. I am tired of trying to do all these different ministry areas where people have left this isn't what I imagined. We can grieve loss and still move forward. It's the same thing I do with my kids. I can grieve the memories I had when they were two, four and six. I can grieve the memories the loss of that time, because I will never have that again, and I can still move forward and love what is happening now. This is not weakness to grieve. It's honesty, and God calls us to honesty. So let's also not gloss over things and say, Oh, well, God's at work. You know, Laurie said on the podcast, you know, this is all good. God's doing something good. I'm also saying grief is okay. In fact, it is good and it is healthy. We don't get over emotions. We move through them. We grow through them. We get to heal and grow and re imagine purpose and keep loving people without tying our hope to the survival of our building, our church, being able to pay our pastor. I know this is hard, and we get to grieve that, and we should, but we can grieve what was and still be part of what is next. Do you know people who grieve so hard that they don't move on to what's next that things are moving on around them? There's beautiful things bubbling up, and I could be talking about a work thing, a family thing, a church thing, whatever. Sometimes we get stuck in our grief and we actually miss what's next. Grief is not the end of the story. Okay, let's take a deep breath. Let's do a little pivot here, from panic to purpose, okay, from spiraling to steady? How about just from that great feeling of loss to just some curiosity, from what would we ever do? What will we do to what can I do right here, right now, now, you might not be able to grow the budget. You might not be able to find a full time pastor, a part time pastor, or you might not be able to, just like, refill the nursery. But you are not powerless. You still have influence. And in small churches, the people who care, the people who show up, they shape everything, everything. So instead of scrambling to try to save what you feel like you're losing, let's start asking these questions, I'm going to give you three questions, who is in front of me right now that I can love Well, who's in front of me that I can love well. Second question, what real needs do I see? Okay, now, this is a tricky question, because we want to see the needs for a nursery or for young families or for outreach, or for whatever we used to do it was good ministry, but I want you to think about what real needs do you see right now? Okay, so first question is, who's in front of me right now that I can love well. Second question is, what real needs do I see? Okay. Third question is, Where is God already at work, and how can I join him there? Where is God already at work, and how can I join him there? Now this is where we bump up against something that is talked about as truth. That is a lie. We have been told, often in many places, from experts in books, from the pulpit all over the place, that if your church was growing, if God was at work, your church would be. Growing. We've been taught that that if God is at work, your church would be increasing in number. Okay, that is not true. Okay. It can be true. But what is more true is that God is always at work. God is always at work. So where is he? At work? In your midst, in your heart, okay? And how can I join him? I'm going to give a couple practical examples, and then just move on. These might fit you. They might not. This is where we get curious and get creative about your specific culture. What is around you? Maybe it's starting a once a month meal for caregivers, people in your community or in your church who are caregivers. They are exhausted. Okay? Another idea, hosting a community grief group, okay, there is always, there are always people around us who are grieving, who are not being met. That's just statistical. Another idea, maybe it's mentoring one student instead of building a youth program from scratch. Maybe it's one student moving into mentorship or tutoring. Maybe it's shifting the energy get this one from getting people back to blessing whoever shows up. Yes, I realize these may be your core people. These may be your your six, your faithful 12, your 20, the people holding up the church who are exhausted and maybe it's time to look at each other instead of trying to work to get people back. How about we serve the people who are always serving, which includes you. This is where it becomes a community thing, a mutual blessing, encouragement, but shifting, and maybe just maybe, this isn't a season of decline. You're seeing numbers decline, but maybe that's not what's going to define this season. Maybe this season is a season of deep personal growth for you, for whoever is there, maybe God is inviting you into a deeper understanding of the church, of yourself, of him, of how he works in deeper community. Your willingness to pay attention to where God is already at work is huge. Do churches do not need to look traditional to be transformational. If our goal was to keep the church running like it always has, which seems to often be people's goal, we are missing something. The goal should be to make the church matter in the lives of people right now. So just another breather, just to step back and be honest here, resting when things feel uncertain or scary or depressing or sad, it doesn't always feel holy. Sometimes taking a breather or resting or stepping back can feel irresponsible. Okay, now I just want to name that, because when you feel like everything's falling around you and you've been the responsible one holding it all up, I'm that person too. So everything in my gut is like, I gotta fix this, I gotta fix this. I gotta fix this. What can I do? Sometimes it feels irresponsible, but what if it's not? What if this is the stretch of faith? What if this is the reset? What if this is the renewal? What if this is the stepping back far enough for long enough that we can actually see what God is doing? Over the last several years, I have learned in very hard and devastating ways that healing, personal healing, is a lot of work. Whether you have been through church, hurt, relational hurt, trauma from work. You know the violent layoffs that happen, meanness in your. Church, in your neighborhood, in your school, bullying as a child, when we actually start to work through some of these things, it feels irresponsible because it's deep internal work. Do you know that when we have outside pressures, like stresses that we actually need more rest, that rest is work, that our body is like regenerating, renewing with extra sleep. How often do we allow that with ourselves? So when things feel uncertain or scary and you just want to work, you want to fix it. You want to do things. Can we step back and see that our internal work of rest, of renewal, of reflection, even if the pews feel empty, programs are fading, momentum seems to be missing. That deep work isn't passive. It's actually real practical and it's also really powerful. We're not taught this. We don't see it modeled very much. It's not what's being preached out in so many places, as though it's our power or our responsibility to hold up the church, as if we don't do enough, the church is going to die. That's not biblical. Who holds up the church? Who holds the church together. Who grows the church? It's Jesus, it's God. The church is not going to die because we didn't do enough. That is not biblical. Okay, so let me just get a little practical again, because I know if you're like me, you're like, Okay, what do I do? What do I do? What do I do? What do I do? Okay, so here's a few things that that I encourage you to do, and I also really want to encourage you if you're in a place where your church is feels like it's dying, or you have that fear of paying your pastor or losing your building, or, you know, finding young families, I really want to encourage you to share this episode and talk about it. Okay, don't just say, hey friend, would you listen to this? Hey, so and so, would you listen to this? Say, would you please listen to this? And I want to talk about it because we were created to live and learn in community. It's part of the beauty of everything we do at small church, ministry, with our Facebook community, with our conferences, our live conferences, with our network, our membership community. It's learning together. The growth doesn't come in reading something or hearing something. Okay, that's not where we grow. We do grow in applying it, and we apply it much better with much more wisdom and much more depth and much more breath, even when we're doing it in community. So share this episode if you're in a tough place, in a church, maybe play this episode for Sunday school one Sunday and then talk about it. What's resonating with you? Where do you want to push back? Where do you want to come into some calm and some peace? What phrases? What statements, what words have I said that made you go, huh? Okay, so what does this look like, practically? Let me get to a couple things. One thing I would say is pause the fixing, not forever, but long enough to not just ask, but reflect and discuss and communicate about God, what are you doing that I might be missing? What are you doing that we might be missing? And this is why you need community around you. We all don't have the same perspectives. We're all not seeing the same thing, the same people, the same ministry opportunities. Pause the fixing long enough to ask, God, what are you doing that we might be missing? Okay, a second thing I want to encourage you to do, name. What is heavy, name it and make space for it. Praying God, this feels like failure is more honest and more healing than faking optimism. This is not a time to pull yourself up by your bootstraps and just keep pushing in. This is a time to name what's heavy and allow others around you to do it too. This is not a time of whining or griping. That's not what we're talking about. We're talking about grief. We're. Talking about naming what's heavy so we can move forward. Okay, both and are so important. Okay, another thing I want to suggest is that you shift the scorecard. Okay, like where you're keeping score. Shift it away from numbers. Who's coming? Okay, shift it. What else could we be tracking? What else could we be measuring in the season? Maybe it's faithfulness, maybe it's relationships, maybe it's a depth in asking questions. Maybe it's healing. There are a lot of things we can track for pros progress other than numbers. Just shift the scorecard. There's tons of things we could keep track of. There's tons of things we could measure. Shift the scorecard, start looking at something other than numbers. Another thing I'm going to mention suggest that you practically lean into is to listen for invitation. The word invitation is so important. It's not pressure, it's not obligation, it's invitation. It's a nudge. What small nudge keeps resurfacing, where you could serve, where you could help someone. Not every gap is yours to fill. And I think that's one of the patterns we get into That's so wrong, is we see a gap and we fill it if we have the ability, if we have the capacity, even when we don't, if we have the talent, we see a gap, and we move into that some of these gaps might be yours to notice. Some might be gaps for you to pray about. Some might be gaps for you to bring up to other people, but pay attention to the nudges, the invitations, the ones that keep resurfacing, not the obligation, but the invitation. And the last thing I'm going to say practically that, I hope you take me up on this, but rest like it matters, not like it's necessary, not like it's a necessary evil, because your eyes are closing on their own. Rest like it matters because it does. I think of the times when we saw Jesus sleeping that were recorded, right? He slept a whole lot more than were recorded. But which time is popping to your mind right now, when Jesus napped during an unexpected time, Let's even say a turbulent time. Do you remember in the middle of the storm, Jesus slept on a boat while everybody around him was panicking. And a lot of times, I've heard this story, you know, many times growing up in the church, that the disciples were worried and anxious. And if they weren't worried and anxious, they would have napped like Jesus. They could have slept, because if we feel peace in a storm, then, of course, we could sleep. What if part of the reason Jesus was sleeping is because it mattered, because it was necessary, because it's a part of healing, because it's a part of regeneration, because it's a part of renewal, because it is needed for our strength. It's not just that Jesus napped in the storm because he didn't care about the storm, because I believe Jesus deeply cared about the storm. What if we rest like it matters? What would change? Sleep is an epidemic today. All over our culture, people aren't sleeping enough. What if we the church led, led the way to rest like it matters. How is this episode hitting you? I know it's not my norm. It's not our normal. Rah, rah, let's do these things. But it is vital. It is important. And if you remember at the beginning of the episode, one of the reasons I'm popping into some questions, struggles, challenges that get listed online, where people have all these answers and all these reasons and all these truths that aren't truths. Part of the reason I'm doing this little mini series is because these kind of things, how we process them, what we teach about them. Some of it is doing real damage. Church, and we need to talk about it, because if you think that you need a youth group, or your church is going to die, or if you don't get that pastor in the pulpit, that your church is going to die, and we are all losing hope because of this, we've got to hang on to the truth that your church might not be dying. God might be doing something very new. The shift may be for your church, and it may be for you. We can grieve what we are losing, even if it's a season many churches go down in size and regrow. We can grieve a season and still move forward. What we don't want to get stuck in is believing in a tsunami of death, because that is not biblical. If your church is shrinking, or maybe it's close to closing, maybe it did close, and you are still carrying the burden or the guilt of that like you could have or should have done something different. I just want to say you're not failing. If your church is shrinking, if it's close to closing, you are not crazy for grieving. You are also not without influence. You are not powerless. You also have not lost your calling. The church is actually not fragile. Have you ever thought about that? The church is not fragile? Jesus is not panicking. Your calling has not disappeared, and I mean it your personal calling, because here's the real talk, you are the church. I am the church. We are the church, not the building, not the attendance, not the programs, not the local hub, as long as we are breathing, our church isn't dead, because we carry the culture. The culture is contagious. Do you know what else is contagious? Fear is contagious. Discouragement also contagious. However, so is hope. Hope is contagious. And no, I'm not talking about toxic positivity. This isn't about pretending everything is fine. We can grieve the loss and still have real hope, the kind that gets uncovered, even in the midst of loss, not hope that gets pasted on or frosted over. That's not what I'm saying. It's the kind of hope that says Jesus holds the church together, not my effort, not yours, not our youth programs, not that longed for full nursery young families coming in. Jesus never said, without a children's ministry, your church will die. Jesus never said, Without young families, your church will die. Do you know what he did say? He said, few will follow. He said, he said this, this is the truth few will follow. And it wasn't a hopeless statement, few will follow. And yet, what happens when few are following? We panic. What? What? So let's stop trying to prop up a version of church that Jesus never promised, with full pews, booming programs. That's not what the church is at its core. Please hear me, it's not a bad thing. God works in that. Yes, 100% there's beauty in that. But this is not a version of the Church that Jesus promised. So let's stop confusing numbers with life, with Christian life, with an alive church. Instead, let's ask Jesus, where are you? Already at work. Watch for it. Sometimes we gotta rest. We gotta get still. We gotta back up and then go there. Go join him. And let's bring our whole selves, your worth, your influence as an individual follower of Jesus, your mission. It is not tied to the size of our sanctuary. It's not. Now, when I talk about your individual mission, we are part of the church, but that's you and me, and I'm way over here in Tucson, Arizona. I don't know where you are, and do you know we're part of the same church? This is community, but your influence, your mission, your purpose. It's not tied to the size of your sanctuary. Victory. It's tied to how we show up, with grounded hope, with relational integrity, with everyday leadership, right where we are, right where we are. So thanks for listening, friend. If this hits close to home, share it with somebody who's carrying the weight of a shrinking church with you, and if you want more practical support made for your reality, maybe there's no title, no team, no time. Come hang out with us at small church ministry.com our links are in the show notes. I'm Laurie. This is the small church ministry podcast where we not only believe it, but we know the truth of it, that small isn't less, it's just different. All right, we'll see you next week. Talk to you soon, until then, be light you.