giving away a house<\/a> to a family. The requirement for being considered for the big giveaway is to attend one of the worship services on Easter weekend. I have to say, in all of my church growth and church health experiences, this giveaway exceeds anything I’ve seen.<\/p>\nThe Motive<\/b><\/p>\n
Though few churches will make such elaborate and expensive moves as giving away a house, many churches will invest much time and money to get people to attend their churches on Easter weekend. The motive stated is typically noble: get them in a worship service to hear the gospel.<\/p>\n
There is also the expectation that many of the people attending on Easter are among those who typically attend twice a year, Christmas and Easter. Since they attend so infrequently, it is presumed that many, if not most, of the CEO Christians are not actually Christians at all. They thus present good opportunities to present the gospel.<\/p>\n
The Reality<\/b><\/p>\n
But, according to our research in earlier years, that may not be the case. We actually found that most who attend on Easter are fairly regular attendees. They just happened all to come together on the same day. On Easter, those who attend one, two, or three Sundays a month join those who attend nearly every Sunday. In reality then, the CEO Christian is likely more myth than reality.<\/p>\n
In fact, if there is a given day where more unchurched non-Christians are likely to attend church, it would be on Christmas eve. Some churches do make special efforts to reach people with the gospel on that day; still most churches have no strategic plans to do so.<\/p>\n
The Need<\/b><\/p>\n
The obvious need is for a higher commitment among the members of our congregations. In most of our churches, we accept as normative that members attend infrequently. We usually don’t think twice about that member whose commitment is limited to attending only twice a month.<\/p>\n
Most of the congregations in America have become low expectation churches. They expect little of their members, so they get little commitment. Even matters as basic as worship attendance become optional in the minds of many members. The church has dumbed down what it means to be a part of the local expression of the body of Christ.<\/p>\n
So, in reality, we really don’t have CEO Christians. Easter is primarily a reunion of the COO (Comes Only Occasionally) Christians. It is the one day that most of the low commitment members believe they should attend. But the need is for churches to start expecting more of their members. The need is for membership to really have meaning and purpose.<\/p>\n
The need is for congregations across America to take seriously what it means to be a disciple of Jesus Christ.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"This Easter will likely be the highest attended day this year for churches across America. Such has been the norm for a few decades. Indeed many churches will go all out to attract people to attend their churches on Easter Sunday. It is understandable that church leaders put much effort to bring people to church…","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"publish_to_discourse":"","publish_post_category":"","wpdc_auto_publish_overridden":"","wpdc_topic_tags":"","wpdc_pin_topic":"","wpdc_pin_until":"","discourse_post_id":"","discourse_permalink":"","wpdc_publishing_response":"","wpdc_publishing_error":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[1,184,175,186,180,176],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-696335","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-church-answers","category-discipleship","category-grow","category-health-and-metrics","category-outreach-and-evangelism","category-revitalize"],"acf":[],"yoast_head":"\n
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