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Conventional wisdom may say “change the name, start fresh.” Today, we explain why that often is bad advice.
Today’s Listener Question:
FROM KYLE
In a replanting situation, should we rebrand the church and change the name?
Episode Highlights:
- When you change the name of a church, it typically gets changed to something generic and nondescript.
- Quick fixes may change the results, but they typically don’t change the heart of the people in your church.
- There aren’t any easy pathways to church replanting.
- Changing a church’s name shouldn’t be the first thing you run to in a replant.
- Christ will never give up on us. What Christ has started in us, He will finish.
- It takes a lot of work to reclaim with a community the name of a dying or dead church.
- Want to change the perception of your church in the community? Serve the community with abandon.
The five reasons you might not want to change a name are:
- Conventional wisdom is not always wise.
- The unchurched community is not easily fooled.
- Shutting the church down in does not ensure a good restart.
- A better approach is to reclaim the name.
- The remaining members need to gain a new heart toward the community and one another.
Resources mentioned in this episode include:
- ChurchReplanters.com
- ChurchAnswers.com
- Replanter Assessment
- Find more resources at the Revitalize & Replant page at ThomRainer.com
Revitalize & Replant is sponsored by the North American Mission Board and ChurchReplanters.com. More than 10% of churches in North America are at risk of closing and the North American Mission Board is committed to reversing this trend by decreasing the death rate of existing churches while simultaneously increasing the birth rate of new churches. To learn more about what it means to become a replanting pastor or to explore resources for replanting and revitalization in your own church, visit ChurchReplanters.com.Submit Your Question:
Do you have a question about church revitalization or replanting for us to use on the podcast? Visit the podcast page to submit your question. If we use it on the show, you’ll get a copy of Autopsy of a Deceased Church and Reclaiming Glory.
The church that I pastor changed its name several years before I began here. They had been Kennebec Mennonite Church for 25+ years, but they found that nobody in Maine knew what a Mennonite was and confused them with Amish and Mormon churches. So, when they moved to another facility in another town, they also changed the church’s name to Faith Christian Church and it seemed to help a lot. They lost a few people who didn’t like de-emphasizing their Mennonite roots, but it’s really been a win for the church in the long run. That said, I think rehabing your reputation is a harder but more rewarding work than just re-branding to sound trendy.
As an aside, the church I grew up in changed its name by accident. They put the word REJOICE! in huge letters on their sign and as a result, people began to refer to them as Rejoice Church. It stuck and it sounded a lot better and more succinct than First Free Will Baptist Church of Owasso.
I am in a similar situation and would like your advice. We are a plant church that is a little over a year old. We are healthy and everyone is on board with our vision. We have an opportunity to merge with a dying community church. This church does not have a great reputation in it’s community. In this situation, what do you suggest we do about the name? Keep the one from the traditional church that has been there over 100 years without a great reputation, remove their name completely and go with our name, or come up with a new name all together that incorporates both of the previous names?
Not Mark but a few things I pick up from your description:
1. Your plant is going well and growing; the current church is dying and unhealthy.
2. You have a good reputation; the dying church does not.
Sometimes the hardest thing to do is to let a congregation die with dignity. Often, at least in my denomination, churches get to the place where the right response is “last person lock the doors when you leave.” Churches die for any number of reasons and, since you are growing and thriving, there is no need to be coupled with the memory of the “bad” church. In your case, because you are just starting to create a “brand name” (I don’t like the term but it’s what we have) it would be better not to mess with your name.
I would recommend prayerful contemplation for your answer.
The above notes are not the same mentioned in the episode.
What about changing a name with denominational baggage to better reach people in a region in which denominations no longer have currency? What about changing the name to better reflect the community worshipping in that place?
Case in point, we are a historic Baptist church in rural New England, but we function as a community church. All the growing churches in our state have nondenominational names, and I think there is good reason for that–they are better at understanding the culture in which we live.
In my view, a name like “Such-and-such Community Church” or some other nondenominational name will be far better at reaching our community. Please advise. Thanks!
Matt-we faced a similar situation with our church. Our church is in a predominantly progressive, liberal and unchurched community for whom the denominational name “Baptist” is viewed negatively. During the public celebration and dedication of our community soccer practice field the number one question we were asked was: “What kind of baptist are you?”
Those asking had heard of Westboro Baptist and wondered if we held to their doctrine and views. Our city had recently passed an ordinance against the Westboro style of protesting so the was a wide awareness of that church and its practices.
Part of our name was connected to a street in an older subdivision which no one really knew-it wasn’t the name of the subdivision but a street in the subdivision-and it was a very affluent one at that–none of our members/congregants lived in that area. When we asked if anyone knew why it was part of our name only one remembered why it was part of our name.
We did a couple of things: 1) we surveyed the community to find out if they had ever heard of our church 2) what they knew about it 3) what the name brought to their mind.
We shared the results with our church family and then proposed a name change. Someone from our congregation suggested the name that we have now adopted.
One think you may want to consider is operating under a DBA (doing business as) with the new name. In our case, changing our name via a DBA was much easier than establishing a new church and closing down the existing one.
Praying for you as you lead.
Is changing the name or ‘rebranding’ so that the local culture can better accept the church really necessary? OR, is it just ‘scratching itching ears’?
I better like the idea that the church (no matter the name) has to have a change of heart towards the surrounding cultural community. Meet them where they live instead of demanding they attend services. Serve their unmet needs with abandon and the heart and mind of Jesus Christ. Then, the surrounding community will see the church has been renewed, refreshed, and revived.
We are First Baptist Church of Red Bank, located in New Jersey. Through an unscientific survey we have found that the perception of “Baptists” in our area, is not good. Baptists are thought of as judgmental, rigid, older, etc. We are thinking of changing our name to something like Riverside Community Church, which places a distance between the negatives and the reality of our church. Would this be more of an exception to your overall thinking? Just wondering.
In the mid-80s I planted a church in a very small rural community and it grew to about 70 members. Years later I returned to that congregation in a part time capacity. Clearly not much had changed in my 20 year absence!
I noticed, now, that many people visited for a service or two and then disappeared. Clearly a totally different sort of service was needed to reach them. The existing congregation wasn’t prepared to change very much.
We started a second service with a totally different style … at a different venue. This broke away from the (fairly tired) image of the ‘mother church’. The two congregations were clearly linked as both were called Hoedspruit Community Church, but we advertised the original as “Church in the Village” and the new as “Church in the Canyon”. Soon that also reached about 70 members.
The result, two groups who met for special services, shared the costs and the ministry / mission activities and no-one felt that they had ‘lost out’ or had to ‘accommodate’ traditions that they weren’t really comfortable with. And double the number of people in the community were reached.
I’ve been in ministry for 7 years the person I had in place to get 501c(3) did not do so, all paperwork sadly is gone. I’m I allowed to relaunch my ministry under a different name and start 501c (3) over?