As I begin this series of post on Assimilation, I am doing this to help churches understand the challenge and importance of connecting better with members and guests to better fulfill the Great Commission. It would be important to start by defining what we mean by assimilation. A simple definition of assimilation is: Moving members toward greater involvement and contribution to the church. The two fold objective is increase involvement and contribution in the church.
It goes without saying too much here, that the last two years have been difficult for the church. Now that the church is somewhat post-COVID it is increasingly imperative that the church close its back doors in order to keep people from leaving and create an intentional strategy to better involve members and guest in the life cycle of the church. The overarching goal of the church is to help members to look more and more like Christ, we call that Discipleship. to which the Great Commission tells us to Go and make disciples of all nations, teaching them to obey all that has been instructed. So the natural challenge in a post pandemic church is re-engageing with members and guest to fulfill the church' responsibility.
The reason assimilation is important is because this is often the first steps in the bigger picture of discipleship. The Bridge Goal is to help members get more involved and help members in attending more frequently. I'll illustrate it this way. Let's say you are the pastor of a church with 400 members. If those members attend 4 times a month you have 400 in attendance. But consider if those same 400 members only attend twice a month your typical worship service looks more like 200 in attendance. The same is true if your 400 members attend one time a month your weekly average will be 100 people. Many pastors will joke and say "we would have a full house if everyone came on the same Sunday." Thats true perhaps, but we want to see more than just attendance increase. the goal of assimilation is to see greater involvement and contribution in the church.
How much more could the church do for the Kingdom of God if all of our members were more involved and contributed in our churches? I believe that churches that do not have a strong assimilation process will be missing out on what the church can do for the Kingdom of Christ. Over the next several posts I'm going to share several tips that can increase a church's attendance that will engage members better and help guests take a next step with the church.