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December 13, 2019 6 Comments

One Key Reason Many Churches Are Fighting Attendance Declines (Update)

Podcast Episode #597

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We hear more and more about attendance frequency becoming a pain point for many churches. After over a decade of having this conversation, Thom and Sam discuss the one key reason many churches are still fighting attendance declines.

Highlights:

    • Revisiting the Concept of Attendance Frequency
    • The Priority/Expectations Factor
    • The Weekend Worker Demographic
    • The Focus on Us Instead of Them
    • Groups, groups, groups

Other highlights:

    • For the church to exist it must gather.
    • One of three people in the U.S. workforce is unable to attend a Sunday morning service due to a work conflict.
    • The gig and entrepreneurial economy are having an impact on church attendance.
    • Personal preferences always kill priorities. 
    • Group involvement can have a huge impact on church frequency.
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Comments

  1. Gabriel Agbeboaye says

    December 13, 2019 at 4:11 pm

    I’m presently facing this problem of low attendance frequency. I need help of how to tackle it.
    Rev. Gabriel Agbeboaye.

    Reply
  2. Meg I. says

    December 14, 2019 at 2:00 am

    This is great and we are seeing this at our church. The sad thing, besides this sporadic attendance of “church members,” we have a leadership body who has not wanted to hear this. For the past 5 years I have tried to bring this up in our staff meetings, but I just receive stares. This is such a millennial issue with entitlement mentality. Now, this entitlement mentality is in some young pastors that fit this demographic. They at least come each Sunday but can not be counted on in other “body life’ ways.

    Reply
  3. Brandon says

    December 14, 2019 at 10:44 am

    I know this isn’t related to the article, but I would like to ask for a few more details in the highlights. I like quickly browsing your information and find it very helpful and insightful, but I don’t care to grab my earbuds and take the time to listen to the full recording. I ask this in a humble fashion and realize that you can’t make everyone happy, but if this is a common feeling among your followers, please consider adding a little more. Thank you for all you do.

    Reply
  4. Chris C says

    December 14, 2019 at 12:21 pm

    Brandon, I agree totally! Podcasts are ‘nice’ but a podcast essentially asks folks to give up (in this case…22 mins) of valuable time. Possibly while on the clock or on one’s personal or family time. If the only intent is to reach people on their ‘drive time’, then, well, the benefit of the information is lost to a much wider market. Reading is much faster and also eliminates the intro and banter time that wastes everyone’s time. The podcast should be in addition to the article rather than in lieu of an article. It’s value added, but otherwise less value overall when intended to stand alone. I’m certain, it’s much less investment of time and resources to write and post an article than to invest in two people’s time, sound equipment etc.

    Just because technology enables an activity, doesn’t always mean it is best. It may expand one’s pool of potential listeners but at the same time may result in more folks not listening…

    Your mileage may vary….

    Reply
  5. Rebecca Jefferson says

    December 14, 2019 at 12:28 pm

    Brandon and Chris –

    I work with both podcasters and blog writers. I wish I had the opportunity to work with Thom, but I don’t. I am amazed at the amount of content Thom produces, both written and audio. I met him at a conference and asked him if anyone wrote his content for him. He told me he wrote it all himself.

    Thom is producing a wealth of content for free. I appreciate your sentiments, but you are asking him to produce annotated podcasts in addition to all of his written content and audio content. From my perspective, few people provide the abundance of free content as Thom does. We could always asks for tweaks and additions. I am just grateful for what he does.

    Reply
  6. steve housewright says

    December 15, 2019 at 2:42 pm

    I have a non profit for youth that is set up in a church during the work week (Mon-Fri) This church also allows other non profits to utilize their building during the week as well. The volume of people utilizing these non profits is very high (lot of young families and children) yet the church, pastor and the Sunday congregation never seem to want to be involved or take an interest in these young families that come week after week, year after year through the doors of their church. Literally hundreds of people. Their Sunday congregation is down to about 20 or 25 people on a good Sunday, primarily older people with no children. There is a very clear dividing line between the Sunday crowd and those that utilize the church during the week.
    If churches take no interest in the needs of young families during the week, why do they expect their attendance to be healthy and grow on Sundays? It seems many non profits supported by foundations are much more interested in helping communities in a constructive & dignified way than churches.

    Reply

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