From house churches to mega churches, almost all churches steal sheep.
For some groups, this is the primary method of numerical growth: “Oh, you don’t like your church? You should come to mine!” Studies have shown that over 80% of church growth in the United States is nothing more than people transferring from one church to another. One church’s growth is often another church’s decline.
But is transfer growth all bad? Is sheep stealing always wrong? I’m not so sure. Here are some of my thoughts on the subject. Add yours in the comment section below.
1. Sheep stealing shouldn’t be your goal.
Reaching unchurched people should be the goal. I agree with Ed Stetzer when he says, “Many churches in North America have ‘called the righteous’ with better teaching and more programs. Advertising claims of ‘programs for the whole family,’ ‘quality Bible teaching,’ and ‘full-featured choirs’ seem designed to attract members from other churches. But Jesus claimed that he had come to call outcasts rather than the righteous. Like Jesus, the planter must seek the unchurched” (Planting Missional Churches, 43).
2. Jesus and Paul were the original sheep stealers.
Both of these men spent every Sabbath in the local synagogue teaching. I am not sure that either Jesus or Paul intended Jewish people to leave the synagogue, but many of them did leave—or were kicked out—after believing the message and Jesus or Paul preached. These people who left often became followers of Jesus or formed churches in their local communities. So make of it what you will, but Jesus and Paul stole sheep.
3. Beware! Some sheep are actually wolves!
While initially an influx of people into your church from another church seems like a blessing, it often turns into a curse, especially if they left in anger or as a result of a major disagreement with the pastor or elders of the previous church. It will generally not take long for this group to also find fault with you and your church, and start to cause problems in your congregation as well.
This is not always true of people who come from other churches, but if they frequently speak negatively about the former church or pastor, or if they arrive saying they want to help you and your church move in the direction God wants, these are good indications that you will face problems from these people down the road.
4. Many sheep need to hear and understand the Gospel.
However, there are many people in churches who do not understand or believe the Gospel. In fact, since Christianity is the “American religion” it could be argued that many people go to church for reasons other than that they are followers of Jesus Christ. Sometimes the only way church people hear and believe the Gospel is by leaving their current church.
In such cases, a church that soundly teaches the Gospel is not sheep stealing, but is engaging in the evangelism of church people. Of course, the big problem here is that one church’s Gospel is another church’s heresy. Just look at the debates between Catholics and Protestants, Calvinists and Arminians, or Lordship Salvation and Free Grace. In the battles between such groups, it is often the people in the pews who lose out the most. They become hurt, confused, bitter, and disillusioned. Therefore, a church must always be careful to disagree with others in a way that is gracious and tactful.
5. Sheep go where the grass is greenest.
Christianity today is woefully ignorant of Scripture. If there are sheep in another pasture who are starved and thirsty, and they see green grass and cool water across the street, who can complain if they go? Christians, whether they realize it or not, long to hear the Word of God faithfully and accurately taught. If your group offers such nourishment, Christians from other churches will start coming. Are you going to turn them away and tell them to go back to their parched pastures and withered grass? Probably not. As one pastor said, “We don’t steal sheep. We just grow the grass.”
Even here, however, we must be careful. Just because people are coming to your church does mean you offering green grass. And just because people leave your church to go across town does not mean you were not offering it. There are lots of places today that appear to be offering green grass, but on closer inspection, only have Astroturf. How to know which you are providing is difficult to discern.
6. Conclusion: Cross-breeding is healthy.
Ultimately, I think that when people move around from church to church, we can see it not so much as a bad thing, but as a good thing, even when they leave our church and go somewhere else. Christians need to be challenged in different ways, taught different ideas, and see church done in different ways. Such cross-breeding of ideas and methods helps develop unity within the church. No church should be so arrogant as to think that they can provide the total and complete package for what believers needs to fully grow and develop as followers of Jesus Christ.
So when people come to your church from another church, welcome them with an open hand, knowing that they bring some blessings and some baggage. And when people leave your church to go to another church across town, thank them for what they contributed to the church while they were there, and trust God to lead them to the next step He has for them.
Only in this way can we focus on caring for the people in our fellowship right now, rather than worrying about who left or how to attract others. After all, we’re all in this together—at least, I think we are—and each of us have a role to play in building one another up as the Body of Christ.
I sometimes challenge the people of my church to go visit other churches just so that they can see that “our way” is not the only way. Thankfully, most of them return after their visit to another church… ha ha!
I always wanted to tell the people in my church to do this, but never had the courage. I was afraid they would (1) not come back, or (2) would come back with a bunch of ideas that they wanted to change about the church.
Has that happened much in your situation?
For many years my wife and I kept track of everyone in the churches we attended. We especially tried to get to know new people, and follow up on (contact) people who had left. Based on what people told us, very few left one church and moved to another because they were angry or because of a major disagreement with the leadership of the old church. We have heard the situation characterized as such by church leaders, but in most of those cases they were guessing and had never talked to the people about it and never really knew the people. I could give dozens of examples.
I have observed that most of us find it difficult to love people without having an agenda attached. I hope to write a post on this later as a follow-up to the “Getting To Know Our Neighbors” series on GraceGround, and will probably title it “Learning To Love Without an Agenda”. Churches almost always have an agenda that includes counting attendance, wanting people to give money to help pay the bills and wanting people to have a job, such as teaching Sunday School.
Usually churches will claim that their purpose is to help people find Jesus and then mature as Christians, or something like that. If that is really the case, then would not Church A be happy when someone discovered that church B was a better fit for them and was better helping them grow in Christ? – Usually the leadership (behind closed doors) is concerned because “attendance is dropping, giving is decreasing and we don’t have enough people to teach the kids”. I’ve been there and heard the discussions, so this is not secondhand info.
As you said “Ultimately, I think that when people move around from church to church, we can see it not so much as a bad thing, but as a good thing, even when they leave our church and go somewhere else.” Then there is also the issue of all of the people in our communities who are not moving from church A to church B, but instead have no interest in either church or Jesus. Instead of desperately trying to hold to what they have, perhaps churches might try to figure out why so many people are not interested.
Ah, well, my church makes disciples so much better than that church down the street. And besides, they have some heretical ideas. And did you know that the Pastor’s daughter got pregnant out of wedlock? At least, that’s what I heard. But I do know for a fact that the pastor and his wife are going through some marriage problems. I saw them arguing at the supermarket. Nobody should go to that church. I think the devil is at work there because it certainly can’t be Jesus. I’m going to call up those people who left our church and warn them.
I disagree that Jesus and Paul were the original sheep stealers. Jesus established the New Covenant and Paul was an Apostle given charge to preach the Gospel. Those going to the synogogues were obviously not saved since they still trusted in the Old Covenant and their works to save them. So they were not sheep yet, but goats. So it is perfectly acceptable to convert those of other faiths such as Judaism, Mormonism, the Jehovah’s Witnesses and the like. They are not saved and therefore are not sheep. They are still the devil’s children and going to hell. So their conversion does not constitute “sheep stealing”. Additionally, I do agree that if believer’s at a given church are not effectively being taught the Word of God, and they believe they need a more effective teacher to better learn the Bible, it is their right to seek one. That’s not sheep stealing either. Sheep can move on, basically firing the pastor who is not doing his job. But many people who attend church, but are at best only suspect believers, seem to move on from the churches that do preach the Word in favor of a less convicting enviroment. I base this on my experience as a pastor for the past decade. For instance, if they are shacked up with someone and not married, living in fornication, they stick around only until their particular sin is addressed in a sermon. Then out they go to fake it somewhere else instead of repenting. So in conclusion, those moving from one church to another are not always looking for the Word of God, but a compromised church they can feel more comfortable in. Nowadays, they seem to be the majority.
I am a Quaker. I went through many churches before I came to understand that I was a Quaker. I think all Christian churches should keep this topic, as well as any other petty topic alive and well so I don’t have to be concerned about congregational shrinkage. You guys send them to us by driving them out of your churches with this kind of thinking. There are very few Quakers who have been Quakers for life. A vast majority of us came from other churches where we tried our best and eventually got worn out and had to leave. Almost every “new” Quaker I have talked to considers themselves a “religious refugee”.
So please keep arguing and sniping about this stuff. There are lots of extra chairs where I worship.