The remaining thirty members of Mossy Flat Baptist Church* sat in shock as they listened to the report from their new interim pastor. The past year had been a nightmare. Yet, the church had been relatively healthy before everything fell apart. They had relocated to a growing community, were reaching new families, and were slowly retiring their $600,000 debt.
The trouble began when a baseball player at the high school complained to his parents about the violent temper of the coach. This coach was well loved in the community. He was a deacon at Mossy Flat, and his wife was the church treasurer. The church was quick to defend their leader, and their loyalty blinded them to the growing evidence of physical abuse mounting against the coach.
Slowly, the church began to lose many families who had children in the athletic programs at the high school. Other families followed as they grew weary of the distraction and began to realize that the church had positioned itself firmly against anyone in the community who doubted the character of this respected member. Then, it was Palm Sunday when phones began to buzz across the sanctuary, alerting people to a shared video that appeared to show the enraged coach and his wife in a physical altercation with another couple outside of a sports bar in another town.
Eventually, several other former players stepped forward with accusations of harshness and abuse. However, the coach and his wife refused to vacate their positions in the church. The church attempted to remove the couple, but family members and close friends who had not been active in the church for a decade showed up for the business meeting and swayed the vote in the coach’s favor. The following Sunday, the pastor resigned. Two weeks later, the coach’s family left town during the night.
The remaining church members were already broken and confused when they showed up for the meeting with the interim pastor, but none of them were prepared for the news they were about to receive. An audit of the church’s finances showed that it had missed its past three mortgage payments, and most of its reserves were mysteriously missing. Their most optimistic estimation of the situation gave the church four months before the money ran out.
Things may seem hopeless for Mossy Flat, but there is a revitalization option for the church—adoption. A church adoption is a partnership between a healthy church and a declining church with potential for growth because it matches its community but lacks the ability and resources needed to turn the church around. In an adoption, the healthier church agrees to incorporate the declining church into its ministry for a season until the declining church is healthy enough to operate on its own again. The adopting church provides volunteers, leadership, health, a fresh perspective, and a strategic plan.
In the case of Mossy Flat, the adopting church sent a seasoned pastor with a heart for shepherding the hurting and a vision for discipleship and evangelism. Several families volunteered to serve as missionaries to the Mossy Flat community and strategically became a part of a new leadership team at the church. The church’s identity, reputation, and name were recreated as they returned to health. The adopting church’s vibrant and strong culture was slowly transfused into Mossy Flat, and the former culture slowly faded. Mossy Flat was becoming a new church with a new identity and purpose in the community. The older members were not proud of their past but were grateful for God’s mercy and amazed at the beauty God had raised from their ashes.
Adoption is a powerful way to breathe life back into a declining church. If you think your church would benefit from church revitalization, I would love to hear your story and discuss potential options with you. If your church is healthy, there is a great need for churches of all sizes to embrace our local mission field by becoming a partner with a declining church. For more information about church revitalization in the BMBA, please email me at joshc@bmbaonline.org.
*Mossy Flat Baptist Church and its story is fictional.