So here you have it, 10 Ways to Insult and Disrespect Churchgoers:

1. Imply I’m Stupid : So far I’ve kept from writing about the foolishness of church signs. However, there is one local example I want to share. “Pastor Ken Doesn’t Use Big Words Like Mayonnaise So I Can Understand“. Everyone I’ve mentioned this sign to, both Christian and pagan, found it insulting. Dear pastors, just a tidbit of advice; insulting people’s intelligence is a very poor evangelism technique. Unless of course your goal is an ignorant congregation with a shallow theology, who doesn’t understand words like propitiation or Christology or mayonnaise. In which case, nevermind.
2. Demean Singlehood : I know, single Christian church-going men are a rare breed. Being a relatively young one, who intends to marry, have a whole soccer team of kids and a wife unburdened by a job means surely somewhere there is an endangered species poster with my picture on it. When I tell you I’m single, please stop saying things like “oh I’m sorry to hear that” or “we’ll have to change that.” Please, search the Word on singlehood, listen to what Paul Matthies has to say and stop trying to be Chuck Woolery.
3. Slander Other Churches : It really does amaze me how often a pastor I just met will name and completely slander another church. If you spoke to me out of love and laid out scripturally your concerns, I’d be eager to hear you out. However, it always seems to be the bigger, more contemporary church you rail against. That or just any and every church outside of your denomination. It’s bad leadership, it’s divisive, and you come across petty & angry.
4. Disrespect My Boundaries : Let me set the scene for a moment; I’m a first-time visitor, I’m a guy, I have 20 other things I could be doing. What this means to you; I don’t really know any of you, so I’m a bit suspicious of all of you, a solid hand-shake is the only necessary and acceptable form of greeting, any reason to not be here is reason enough. This ludicrous forced meet and greet thing that churches have decided is necessary, isn’t. In fact it’s awkward and annoying. Additionally, if at any point you tell me to hug someone or hold someone’s hand, I’m probably leaving and never coming back.
5. Attack Our City : I love my city. God chose for me to be here. Unless He says otherwise, I have no plans to go anywhere. In fact I already have a burial plot here. By the way, it’s your city too. It should be out of love for this city and its residents that your heart breaks and gets you out of bed in the morning. If you hate it, its residents, and its culture as much as you say, you are in the wrong place at the wrong time. Seriously man, you missed a turn somewhere.
6. Belittle My Depravity : I’m a mess. But more than that I’m depraved. In fact I’m so depraved I don’t even know how depraved I am, because in my depravity I think I’m doing okay on my own apart from God. So when you’re talking to me about how to get my life right, it would be great if you didn’t morph into Tony Robbins, give me 5 easy steps to a better life and tell me I just need to try harder. I’m pretty sure the whole point is that no matter how hard I try, I can’t make it happen on my own. So take my sin seriously, tell me about Jesus and what it means to be alive in Him. Because that would be awesome.
7. Try and Guilt Me : Say it with me…”God loves a cheerful giver.” If every week you have to “lay down the law” and use compulsion to fill the coffers or the volunteer sign-up sheet, there are deeper issues at play. Tell me about Godly finances, I really want to know; but not when you are doing a building campaign and need to work me over. Please teach me about true Christian community and doing for one another. Just not when you feel under pressure and have to buckshot it to the whole room hoping you’ll bag a new volunteer.
8. Pretend You’re Perfect : Not only am I a mess, but you’re also a mess. Yes you are. SERIOUSLY, you are. One of the most needed characteristics of a pastor is transparency and humility. I’m not saying share everything, but if you are more concerned with people knowing you sin, than setting the example of how you’re broken by sin or your story of continual repentance, than you’re too fearful for anyone’s good. If nothing else, do it for your wife. She is probably being crushed under the expectation of perfection that is presented from the pulpit. She’ll thank you and your congregation will be better off.
9. Lie To Me Some More : Yes, this was on the first list, but it’s worth revisiting because it’s so prevalent. I continue to discover instances where pastors are simply lying to me about their church. Honestly I think they are lying to themselves as well. Perhaps they really do think their church is outward-focused. Maybe they are blind to the discontinuity of teaching something counter to their own statement of faith. Do they not think when they tell me their weekend attendance is 100 and I show up and it’s 30, that I won’t notice? I know, it’s tough out there guys. But lying to newcomers is definitely high on the list of ways to not grow a church.
10. Steer Me Towards Hell : I’ve saved the worst for last; two words, “False Teaching.” This isn’t the typical doctrinal disputes I’m talking about, but freaky counter-biblical stuff. Things like how someone in one part of a room can receive healing, but not someone on the other side, because the first guy was standing in the angel portal that gave him a healing connection to heaven. Oh it gets worse…Did you know it’s called the “second coming” because ever since Jesus ascended he has been traveling from Heaven, on the other side of the universe, through space “coming” towards Earth? Those are extremes, but frequently I’ve heard how it’s all about me. Oh, the name of Jesus is tossed about occasionally, but no, it’s all about me. It’s about me having an easy suburban life, singing erotic love songs to Jesus, and staying as far away as I can from non-christians cause they’re worldy. Unless they’re in Africa; they’re too poor to be worldy. Otherwise, it’s all me…me, me, me. So..teaching me a false gospel..worst..insult..ever.

Drop a comment and let me know what you think.

Regrettably, I think at different times I’ve been guilty of every single item on this list. Are you holding back community?

Here’s the first five…

1. Keep Conversations Short
2. Always sit in your “assigned” seat
3. Avoid New People
4. Come in Late
5. Leave immediately after the service (or early)

See the rest of the list and Adam’s commentary at 10 Ways to Avoid Building Community Within the Church .

1. Pursue me : Being pursued by a church can be either helpful or scary. The helpful form is for a church to be responsive and to make a genuine effort to connect. The scary form of pursuit is when it turns into stalking. Churches will spend thousands of dollars to send a missionary around the world or for a local marketing campaign, but don’t return an email from a seeker or follow-up with an attender who’s absent from activities. If someone shows interest in Christ and the church, go after them. If someone is already part of your church, don’t let them fall to the wayside.
2. Take me out to eat : An excellent idea if I ever heard one. Both pastors I met with in the last week offered to buy me lunch. I took one of them up on it. A good conversation over the breaking of bread is a lost art. At minimum in my last church anyone that requested info we’d offer to take out for coffee.
3. Ask about my story and show genuine interest : The few pastors I’ve met recently have done a pretty decent job of wanting to know my story, at least as it related to my church background. What was missing was a genuine interest in my whole story, not just the part that applied to their context.
4. Find out how I’m really doing and pray for me : “I’m good” is the most frequent lie out of people’s mouths, especially on Sundays. Search your heart; do you really care how someone is doing? Are you prepared if instead of “things are good” someone says “my life is falling apart”? Don’t let me get away with “I’m fine”. If I share a prayer need, pray for me right then and there. Ask me to do the same for you.
5. Show interest in my hobbies : Knowing how someone chooses to spend their free time can be immensely useful. Is their hobby something others in the church share that would allow for connections to develop? People tend to exercise skills in hobbies they may not otherwise get to use. Those skills can likely also benefit the church.  You don’t know if you don’t ask.
6. Help me get involved and see that I do : As someone who started volunteering at age 11, I frequently lament to my friends the difficulty in getting involved. Most churches or non-profits I’ve contacted, who are begging for volunteers, absolutely drop the ball on getting me connected. Having managed volunteers in a couple different organizations, this is indeed a continuing struggle. People do want to make a difference, make it easy for them to do so.
7. Seek my input : After I attended church on Sunday the pastor took me out for lunch and asked me to tell him everything I’d change about his church if I had a year to recreate it into an outward-focused church. Now I’m not suggesting you ask that question of all your visitors. It was a bold and humble step for this man who is working hard to revitalize a small waning church. However, you can provide a culture where people in the church are comfortable providing input on how church is “done” and how the city is being reached. If you do so, I assure you that you’ll reap positive results.
8. Invite me to hang out with your friends : This suggestion by Andy stood out to me above all others. One of the many buzzwords in the church is “relationship”. One of the most lacking things in churches today is relationship. Life is best lived in community and one cannot be sharpened or sharpen another in isolation. Don’t just send someone off to a connection class, invite them into your life.
9. Tell me your story and how God transforms : As much as I love to share my story and testimony, I also want to hear yours. Knowing how God has transformed your life gives me hope about how he can transform mine. It is very easy to insulate oneself in leadership from sharing. But having a two-way dialog is the difference between friendship and counseling.
10. When I’m sick, check up on me : Most people I hang out with (guys 20-35) aren’t going to take you up on an offer of assistance if they are sick. Still I call just to make sure they are alive and see if they need anything. Being sick is no fun and it’s even worse when no one seems to care. Just whatever you do, don’t offer assistance that you aren’t sincerely and happily willing to provide.

All of these together boil down to one simple message: Show That You Care.

So if your church’s goal is to make it painfully difficult to be discovered by new people, here are 10 real ways I’ve experienced that churches keep from being discovered:

1. Don’t have a website : This is the information age, even 107 year old women have blogs, but not your church. No church website, no blog, no flickr account, and don’t podcast your sermons. Knowledge is power and providing me easy access to information about your church might empower me to learn more or even visit. So even if you must have a website, make sure it is poorly designed, lacking in information, hard to navigate, out of date and doesn’t have an rss feed to make things even remotely easy for me.
2. Be completely inactive in the community : If you’re not doing anything in the community then no one will talk about your church. That makes it a lot harder for me to accidentally find out anything useful. So don’t serve the community or partner with other churches or non-profits. In fact it’s really just best if you stay completely inward-focused and don’t do anything missional in your city.
3. Don’t answer your phone : Regardless of what time I call (weekday, weekend, morning, afternoon, evening) don’t answer the phone and don’t have an answering machine or voice mail for me to leave a message or prayer request. If you do have voice mail, don’t include your website address, service times or directions to your church on your message, and don’t ever answer the phone on Sunday mornings. That way when I’m lost en route to service, I’ll have no choice but to drive around aimlessly until I give up and go home.
4. Allow misinformation : Sometimes you just can’t prevent denominations or directories from listing information about your church. When contact information changes, don’t tell them about the update. You can save time by providing them incorrect information initially and for added confusion make sure each directory lists different information about your church, all of it wrong.
5. Lack clear signage : Even if I’m determined to visit your church, you have several on site options to discourage me. The first is to play hide and seek. Is your church in a nondescript building or on a street with several other churches? Have absolutely no signage; none, whatsoever. Except maybe on the mailbox, where you abbreviate things beyond comprehension. If you run a Christian school, put up a 10′ x 14′ sign just for it, so I’ll be led to believe the building is only a school.
6. Have insufficient parking/seating : Other discouraging on-site options are lack of adequate parking and seating. Does your church seat 200? Only have 30 parking spaces. Been running at capacity for weeks or months? Don’t start another service, so that there will be standing room only. Have visitors’ parking? Put it in the corner of the lot away from the entrance. Have adequate parking? Don’t stripe the lot or have parking attendants; chaos is best. Have adequate seating? Make it as uncomfortable as possible.
7. Ignore Visitors : Despite your best efforts I have found and attended your church. In fact, I even filled out a visitor’s card requesting more information. Don’t acknowledge my visit in any way. Don’t call me, don’t send me a thank you card, don’t answer any of my questions or give me any information about how to become involved or learn more about Jesus. Also don’t have any literature available to provide visitors and don’t train your volunteers to be courteous or helpful in anyway.
8. Respond half-heartedly to inquiries : If responding to information requests at all, do so extremely slowly and only partially. Wait 1 week or more to return emails or phone calls and if I ask several questions, don’t answer them all. Instead just tell me I should come to a service to find out more. That saves you a couple minutes of response time and makes you look very busy and important. Whatever you do, do not start a dialogue with me.
9. Be evasive about your beliefs : When I ask a direct question about the church’s beliefs, ignore the question or act like you don’t understand and then start telling me about your denomination or church programs. For “What We Believe”, only include the Nicene Creed on your website or literature. If I’m adamant about wanting positional clarity, instead tell me about the love of Jesus and how Christianity isn’t about division. For those times you do answer my questions, act offended that I would even ask, then try and make me feel stupid or sinful for questioning you.
10. Lie to me : When all else fails, simply lie to me about your church. You might just get a few weeks of attendance out of me before I learn the truth. Are you denominationally affiliated? Don’t mention it ever and talk about how independent you are when I find out. Being on mission is important to me, so make it sound like all 500 of your members are actively involved in serving the city, even though you don’t give a single cent to local missions and never talk about it from the pulpit, because you actually hate the city and it’s sinful people. Lastly, spend a lot of time telling me how you are distinctive from other churches, even though you’re not.

There are certainly other ways to keep me from discovering your church, but these have proven quite effective over recent weeks. I assure you, that if you implement these 10 things, you will manage to keep just about everyone from finding or connecting with your church.

Do you know of other ways that churches keep people at bay? Share it in the comments.

Update 03/20/07: See a follow-up response @ “10 Ways to Draw Me to Your Church“.

I know, change can be quite scary. In the church, it is can even be downright divisive. There are an astonishing number of church splits that come about not because of the preservation of Biblical truth, but rather because someone dared change a much-beloved and all-to-ineffective tradition.

As part of a church planting team, I’m not faced with the choking weight of decades of organizational tradition. However, many newcomers bring “tradition baggage” with them. These are the notions of how church should be done because that’s how their old church did it, even if the Bible doesn’t say it. So while I try to be sensitive to this, my main concern is helping to lay a solid and biblical foundation for this new church. Unfortunately, as with any new thing, we don’t always (if rarely) get it right on the first go.

Accessing the Need for Change

So how do I know when to advocate for change? There are four questions I ask:

1. Foundation: Are we structured and developing in a way that supports God’s vision for this church, that is sustainable, and scalable?
2. Function: Are we modeling appropriate Biblical roles and actions (through servant leadership), building a culture of discipleship (Great Commission) and fulfilling our call to servanthood?
3. Flavor: Are we using techniques and language that are understandable, relatable and relevant to those God has called us to reach and partner with?
4. Fruit: Are we witnessing positive life change, a deepening of community, an increase in discipleship, the fruit of obedience and healthy church growth?

These four questions are applied to any and every aspect of our developing church and if the answer is ever no, then change must be prayerfully considered. The hard part is knowing what to change, when and how. This takes a lot of discernment, prayer, fasting, good counsel, more prayer and often lots of trial and error.

Exception 1: No Reflex Change

I’ve come to realize that change isn’t always necessary despite appearances. There have been seasons where things felt stagnant, no one seemed to be connecting, growth was nonexistent. Over the last year we have indeed experienced periods where the visible fruit did not meet our expectations, but through prayer and discernment our eyes were opened to the fruit being born in other ways. For example, there was strengthening in our core group, even when public gatherings felt anemic. That’s why I said earlier that “change must be considered”, rather than automatically enacted. Also change takes time to bear results. I still struggle to wait patiently for God-driven change to bear fruit. But I know, if God has guided a change to take place, it will bear fruit. Sometimes however, that fruit is simply the wisdom of a lesson learned.

Exception 2: Change for Challenge

While we are told to “be content in all things” we are never told to expect comfort. In fact the opposite is true. Sometimes the answer can be yes to all four “F” questions, and yet, something is amiss; comfort has set in. Whereas the world seeks comfort in almost all things, as a Christ-follower I am skeptical of it. Comfort breeds complacency, which breeds traditionalism, which breeds religion, which breeds legalism, which…well you get the idea. I’m not talking about change for the sake of change, but rather “change for the sake of challenge”. This is the riskiest and scariest type of change and often the most profound and fruitful. Sometimes it’s necessary to “mix things up” for no other reason than to defend against complacency. The best advise I have to offer on this is to look past the big picture and really evaluate in detail where change may in fact be needed. Being able to show people specific areas needing change is always preferable over changing when no one thinks it’s needed. But if you really find the need to change for challenge, pray, fast, fast, pray, fast, pray and then have someone try and talk you out of it.