The Church Answers Podcast
Lessons from Church Autopsies, Part 1: Dealing with Denial
Welcome to the Church Answers podcast presented by Chaney & Associates. Chaney & Associates are the accounting firm for the church. Now get ready for fast-paced insights on key issues affecting the local church today. We release three episodes each week, so make sure you've seen or heard them all. And now, here is the CEO of Church Answers, Tom Rayner. We're talking about autopsies, really not the most pleasant thing to talk about. And of course, I'm not talking about autopsies of individuals. I'm talking about autopsies of churches. And that's still not the most pleasant thing to talk about, because you're talking about churches, at least from an organizational point of view that don't exist. Now, I get it. I get it. The church is the people and not the building. I've heard that so many times. I get it. But local churches do close. And we're going to talk about the why on this in just a moment. I think it'll be fascinating. Even if you've read my book, there's been out for quite a while, called Autopsy of a Deceased Church. I think these insights really updated compression insights since we wrote the book will help. So we've decided to put this in a three-part series because again and again, people keep saying, "Hey, is there going to be another book on autopsy?" Well, not really. I don't think there will be. But for now, that little book serves its purpose, and we'll be adding information to it. Well, as we go into autopsy, let me share with you an organization that is really alive. Just the opposite of that. Chaney and Associates, we call them the accounting firm for the church. Hear me well, church leaders. If you haven't found a place to put all of your bookkeeping, to put all of your accounting, or maybe you're not satisfied with one you have, Chaney and Associates is our number one recommendation. Just as simple as that. They are our number one recommendation. They're serving over 1,100 churches. They have cloud-based software. They can serve you from anywhere. Great organization. Well worth the funds that you pay to have someone else do it. You'll end up saving money in the mid and long term. That's chaneyassociates.com, or you can get the link in the show notes. Okay, between 8,000 and 12,000 churches are closing annually in the United States. Okay, you asked, Tom, how do you know, and why is there a range of 4,000 churches, which if you use 8,000 as the base is a 50% range, or if you use 12,000 as the base, it's a 33% range. That's a big range. Well, first of all, we don't know. Just like we don't know exactly how many churches exist in the United States or anywhere for that matter. We estimate 375,000 Protestant churches in the United States. But likewise, if we don't know all the churches exist, we probably are not going to be precise in knowing all the churches that cease to exist. And so we don't know for certain. We can do samplings. We can look at denominational records and we can get some type of insight and idea. But the bottom line is we do not know. Here's some things we feel very comfortable asserting. One, there are a lot of them that close every year. Two, since the pandemic, that pace of closure has accelerated. The pain points have been exacerbated. And so we know that this is a very real issue. I hardly go anywhere or do anything related to church answers where I don't hear the comment. Man, I read all types of deceased church and it sounds just like my church. I'm fearful for my church. Well, that was the purpose. The purpose of the book was not to bemoan the death of churches that have already gone before us. I guess I'd be a way of saying it. But to say, here's what happened to these churches and don't let it happen to your church. How did I do the book? It was very simple. It was case study base. I interviewed church members and pastors who were once in churches that no longer exist. That's very simple. And I did a lot of them. Again, I did not do a statistical sampling. But when you do that many case studies, you begin to see a pattern that develops. So that's what I did and my research team helped me as well. But the reality of it is I did as many as anybody else on the team because I wanted to listen to each of these stories. And so what we will do in the next three podcasts, all three are dropping this week. So you're able to go from this part one to two and three and you'll be able to listen all of it. But I think it's good that we put these in bite size nuggets so that we can look at different issues specifically. So right now we're dealing with the issue of denial, the issue of denial. And this is something that was true in every single church case where the church no longer existed. Let me say that again, denial was the number one factor in every church that did not exist. In other words, whenever in interviewed someone, they would typically say, I just didn't see it. I didn't see it coming. I was in some of them actually use the phrase. I was in denial. They stated that sentence. And so we know that this was one of the main issues. So I'm going to take the first of the three episodes on autopsy, all available this week. I'm going to take the first of three episodes and I'm going to just highlight some of the issues of denial. One of the issues is this matters of faith can be challenging to release. What do I mean by that? Well, many of these members said that some of the things that they would not let go of, they perceived to be central to their faith. Let me give an example. Somebody talked about a particular room in the church that was to them sacrosanct. It was a bride's room or parlor or something like that. It had a singular purpose and couldn't be used for anything else. Well, that's one of the characteristics of these dying churches. They had these rooms that were protected. From the perspective of some of the members at the time the church was still open, that room was a sacred room. That room was a matter of faith for them. Now you might laugh at it, Ralph. Sure. But it was. It really was. Just like stained glass, windows can be a place of that. But you hold on to it because you perceive it to be part of your faith. The room or any other issue can be challenging to release. Now the reality of it, the issues of which I speak were not central matter to faith. They were perceived to be matters of faith. And in all these churches that died, they were clinging to something that almost became a core doctrine for them, if you will, even though it was not a doctrine at all. So one of the characteristics of these churches that were in denial is they were holding on to things that they perceived central to their faith. And they held on to that and they would just not let it go. A second thing is incremental decline. It can be the most challenging decline because it is not the decline that you can see on a regular basis. Let me give you an example. I was born and raised. I'm thinking of a Clarence Carter song. I was born and raised down in Alabama. I'm on a farm by way back up in the woods. I was so ragged folks used to call me patches, but that's okay. Papa done the best he could. I'm going to stop singing. Okay, so I'm reminded of where I was raised in Alabama. And sometimes it would be years before I would return to my hometown, especially after my parents died. And I really had no connection in the little town. And I have vivid memories of going there because then I was CEO of lifeway when I went there last time and they wanted to do some video shoots of me in the streets of this town just talking shows in the storekeepers looking at what was going on. They didn't know. But here's what I remember. I remember walking into one of the local merchants after looking at the town and looking at the pervasive and startling decline. Of the town. I mean, some stores were boarded. The place was run down. It just startled me to see it because that was not my memory. Well, when I went into the local merchant, I said, what's happened to this town? He said, what do you mean? I said, the decline. And they said very seriously. We don't say the decline. Same point with churches. With church members, particularly. It can be numerical decline. It can be physical facility decline. It can be spiritual decline. But because they're there on a regular basis is incremental to them and they don't see it as those who might come from the outside to look in. One of the reasons you should have a church health checkup on a regular basis. You're interested in that you can you can just contact us info at church answers.com. So you're interested in a church health checkup or church consultation. That's another story, but incremental decline can be the most challenging issue. The final thing I want to say is this on the denial issue. Inward movement is natural. What an inward movement, meaning taking care of our own needs. Looking after the me, myself and I in the church dealing with preferences rather than being sacrificial and looking outside the church. Inward movement is a natural phenomenon with a church outward movement reaching people beyond the walls of the church is supernatural. And more people will naturally gravitate toward the natural than the supernatural because the supernatural puts you into a world that you are maybe not visiting that often. It puts you into a place of faith. It puts you into a place that you say, wow, I really have to trust God here. So typically churches will will move inwardly. Typically they will not move outwardly and they move toward the natural way instead of the supernatural way. And so they can be in denial just simply saying we're doing what we're supposed to do. Well, those are three reasons or maybe a way to say there's three ways churches have denial. And these are churches that are no longer existing because we've interviewed the members and the pastors who were once in those now deceased churches. Well, we're going to cover some other issues. That's just one of them. The issue of denial. The second one is toxins. Wow. What is a toxin in the church? Well, that's where we're going to go. When we go to the next podcast, as we continue to deal with lessons from church autopsies, this is the church answers podcast. My name is Tom Rainer. And we are going through autopsies of a deceased church. And we're able to do it because Chaney and Associates, our sponsor is paying the way and they are incredibly the accounting firm for the church. Stay tuned for the next podcast as we look at the failure to deal with toxins. See you there. You have been listening to the church answers podcast presented by Chaney and Associates. Chaney and Associates are the accounting firm for the church. You need to focus on ministry. Chaney will focus on finances. Also, please subscribe and give a review to the church answers podcast on YouTube and on your favorite podcasting app. (upbeat music) (upbeat music)