Is your Twitter hype actually stat porn?

I had coffee recently with a great church planter who planted 2 ½ years ago in one of the most unchurched cities in the country. Almost no one in his congregation came from another church, so the 250 or so people who come every weekend are almost all recent converts. In my eyes he is knocking it out of the park. But he is battling discouragement because he’s not seeing the results he sees on Twitter and Facebook every Monday morning. You know what I'm talking about, we've all done it:

“We baptized 200 people this weekend!”

“We broke every attendance record yesterday!!”

“We had to literally stack people like cordwood in the fourth service!!!”

“This weekend we had more people in church then live in our entire state!!!!” 

This church planter is seeing amazing life change, but he doesn't have the stat porn he sees online. And he’s not alone. I know a lot of church planters and pastors who are being crushed by the comparison monster that feeds on social media. The reality is that no one is trying to discourage others, we’re all just super excited about what is happening in our own church and we want to share it with the world. But I think there are a couple of issues we should think through before we hit social wave next week.

What would Paul have Twittered?

Would Paul have focused on attendance and baptism numbers, or would his tweets have looked more like this:

“Got stoned after church yesterday. A little sore this morning. Its worth it for the Gospel”

“Worship was so rockin’ last night a jailer and his family came to Christ. I feel like I’ve been set free!”

“I think the unknown god illustration was golden, a couple of the Athenians dropped by the house last night. I really think they're listening.”

Seriously, I think we should really filter some of our exuberance through the lens of the first church planters. Paul never really commented on numbers other than to say he was glad he hadn’t really baptized very many people. He celebrated changed lives new growth, but he didn’t spend much time on weekend attendance.

It not a competition

Here’s what I think God’s church dashboard looks like:

1. The aggregate total of all believers. I don’t think he’s all that impressed with whose chairs they sit in on Sunday.
2. The number of new believers added to the Kingdom.
3. The progress believers are making toward becoming more like Christ. Things like not smoking crack for a month or beating back the pride monster are tough to quantify or twitter about, but I think that’s what God is paying attention to.

And your numbers have no correlation with anyone else’s numbers. What happens in Charlotte, Atlanta or Oklahoma City has nothing to do with what happens in Seattle, Boston or Denver. We all have unique callings to unique ministries and God is doing something different where you are. We’re on the same team and we all get credit for the wins. So remind yourself every Monday morning that God is up to something different at your church, so you don't need to worry about whether it matches up with the big(ger) guys.

Think before you Tweet

All of us, me included, need to think about what impact our next tweet will have on the people who read it. Will it spur them on to good works? Will it encourage them to not be weary in well doing? Or will it take the wind out of their sails and make them think about giving up?

Does the world need to know our stats? Or would it the Kingdom be better served to hear about the life change, challenge and rewards of ministry and leave the stats to staff meetings?

So the bottom line is

1. Let's stop being so sensitive, no one is competing with us
2. Let's stop being so arrogant, no one is impressed with us
3. Let's "win one more for Jesus"

 

Comments

[Paul]

An excellent word! Thank you.

[Jonny]

This one will sting a bit for some (myself included), but it's all about what we're measuring. As Mike Breen would say, are we measuring attendance and tithes or the number of people who are truly being discipled?

That's a much harder measurement to make because it requires a shift in focus to the behind the scenes stuff that's happening on a daily basis and not just the weekend experience. Thanks for writing this

[Derwin L. Gray]

Bravo!

This will impact how I tweet.

Derwin

[Walt Tanner]

Thank You. Great post. As a pastor of a 3 year old plant in SC I too sometime can allow social media to steal my joy. I celebrate with those who tweet wins, but it also is like a shot to the gut because our wins look different and aren't so easy to tweet in 140 characters.

[myabnormallife]

Awesome! See a lot of stat porn recently. Great advice.

[Dean Reynolds]

As pastor of a 4 yr old plant in a smaller SC town I enjoy reading what God is doing in other places. The numbers that Elevation, Newspring and others put up cause my heart to rejoice that God's Spirit is being poured out in great measure. But, I must confess too that there are those times when those numbers do discourage. I appreciate your words of wisdom here.

[Carlos Griego]

Good post. I appreciate how you don't just go at the pastors who are excited about their churches, but you also call us church planters who don't see that type of growth to watch our own heart.

I would say though that the book of Acts, maybe the premier church planting book, is filled with numbers and celebrations, so it is not totally foreign to the early church.

I could see Luke tweeting "5000 were added to the church yesterday!"

I think when we realize it is God's work, and that those pastor's are celebrating God's work, not theirs (we must hope all things, not be cynical of their "hype") we can rejoice too.

Just my 2 cents.

[DJChuang]

Bravo! Good thoughts about stats, and how stories matter much more than stats. And, I'd think it be much more amazing to see evangelism happen in cities and areas with majority unchurched rather than yet another church doing well in the Bible belt.

[Ianmdent.wordpress.com]

Yep. I see it every Monday morning too and as others have said, it sometimes can be discouraging. Our numbers are growing every week, but I want to see growth in people's lives. That is Kingdom growth. In our 600 square mile county with 50,000 people, we have over 130 churches. What "works" in urban Atlanta may not even be understood where I am even though we're in the same state.

In most cases, I don't believe anyone tweeting those stats intends to hurt, demoralize, or discourage anyone. The question we have to focus on is, "Am I doing what God has called me to do to the best of my ability?" If the answer is yes, let God take care of the results. It's one of the hardest things I face each day.

[Ryan Loche]

Great reminder to not get caught up in the metrics and reach out to the people that God puts in our path every week!