Good Question: Merging Churches

With most of the churches around Buckeye losing people during the economic downturn, shouldn’t we just combine some of the churches to make a bigger one?

Let me ask a question back – why would they build a brand new McDonalds on Watson when we have a perfectly good McD’s in the Wal-Mart a quarter mile away?  Or, why didn’t the struggling Hawaiian BBQ next to Chipotle simply merge with the now out of business, Ben’s Bagels?  The answers – each has a unique and distinct purpose and style of business that appeals to certain people.  They also have unique goals and a leadership team committed to the success of those goals.  In ministry it goes beyond goals to calling, but similar to businesses, we see a need for what we are offering and we see many prospective “customers” in our community.  The more restaurants and businesses the more variety and the more services that are offered to our community.  The more Bible teaching church options (styles, sizes, personalities) the more opportunity there is to reach a larger segment of the Buckeye population.

The truth is that churches, like many of the individuals and businesses in the far west valley, are working their tail ends off to survive.  Like some of the businesses, some of the churches may not survive beyond the next couple of years.  Yet, even if they all make it, Buckeye is underserved when it comes to evangelical churches.  In the “Bible Belt” you’d expect to see around 50 Christian churches in a town our size, with some of those churches being mega churches.  In Buckeye we have less than half that many and they all are small churches and many of them are unable or unwilling to actively reach out with the Gospel.  So, we are severely under-churched as it is and Buckeye is still one of the fastest growing towns in the Country!  

When a place like Buckeye is underserved it is the local unchurched and non-Christian population that is most affected.  Committed Christians will drive all the way into Phoenix if they have to, to find a good church (and many currently do,) but unbelievers who are drawn into church through personal invitations and the convenience of close proximity to a neighborhood or community church will not make this commute.  Knowing this need and the reality that Buckeye continues to add population, we know that we need more Bible teaching, Gospel preaching healthy churches not less and the need is urgent.

The temptation for some Buckeye churches might be to hope that a better economy and a big wave of new growth will show up soon and propel us once again into a pattern of numeric and revenue growth and until then we'll hunker down and simply exist.  Along with the hunker down mentality comes the idea of churches merging (which would mean fewer churches serving a growing population.)  I try to eradicate this notion from the Christian community in Buckeye any time the topic comes up.  I’m preaching the fact that we need more churches and more leaders/pastors! 

The only way that I would advocate two churches merging would be from a position of strength not weakness or desperation.  However, the only time this topic comes up is when people are feeling desperate.  This topic was the center of a talk I had with Pastor Miguel some months ago.  The Buckeye Spanish congregations like most churches in Buckeye have been feeling the impact of the declining economy and an exodus of attendees.  The knee jerk response is to say we should just combine churches.  The reality is that all three Spanish congregations in old town Buckeye were being led by called Pastors with congregations loyal to them and the style of their church.  Pastor Miguel likes our style of being a casual church, but that’s pretty radical for the Spanish culture and many won’t attend a church where the pastor isn’t dressed in a suit.  Likewise Miguel can reach some who the other churches aren’t reaching for various reasons.  

So, our challenge isn't to figure out how to merely survive or to consider merging with other church plants.  Our challenge is to reinvent ourselves for a different and evolving community.  People are leaving Buckeye in droves, but people are buying those foreclosed/short-sell houses. Often, it's a different kind of person from the Yuppies who were coming from Phoenix, from California and from the mid-west, looking for instant equity and the promised entertainment/retail that was supposedly right around the corner.  The new people coming to our community have a realistic view of their community and the deficiencies of the education system and the lack of development. These new people are open to God and to church (all the studies show that people are the most open to church when they have just moved to a new place) and we need to reach them!