A Final Word on the Beauty Of the Small Church

The small church is a place of beauty in the Kingdom of God. I have tried to convey in these pages some of the beauty I see in small churches. Perhaps you see beauty in other aspects of the small church that I have overlooked. I encourage you to gaze upon that which Christ is building (Matt. 16:18) and cherish it. Whether your church has fifty or five hundred, it is a beautiful wonder to behold.


Finally, I wish to encourage pastors of small churches to finish what God has called you to do. God's people are not to be viewed as a "stepping stone" or a "training ground" as you scale the denominational ladder. God's people are precious to Him. He protects them and loves them and saves them. This includes God's people at the place where you pastor.


If you think you can come into a church and spark unprecedented growth in two or three years, you're kidding yourself. God grows His church in His own time through His ways. We must be patient and faithful in believing that God will do great miracles in our churches. I'm not talking about the "parting of the Red Sea" sort of miracles. I'm talking about the greatest miracle that God ever does: the changing of the human heart.


When God calls you to pastor a church, He is usually not calling you to a one or two year of service. We should view the call of God to a place of service as a lifetime call until God so clearly calls us to another place that we cannot deny it.


A difficult place of service in God's Kingdom is no reason for one to leave. Perhaps we can all learn a great deal about staying in one place even in the face of harsh resistance from the example of Charles Simeon.


The following is an excerpt from a biographical profile of Charles Simeon by John Piper.

Simeon was about to leave the university to live in his father's home. Simeon had often walked by the church, he tells us, and said to himself, "How should I rejoice if God were to give me that church, that I might preach the Gospel there and be a herald for Him in the University" (Moule, 37). His dream came true when Bishop Yorke appointed him "curate-in-charge" (being only ordained a deacon at the time). His wealthy father had nudged the Bishop and the pastor at St. Edwards, where Simeon preached that summer, gave him an endorsement. He preached his first sermon there November 10, 1782.

But the parishioners did not want Simeon. They wanted the assistant curate Mr. Hammond. Simeon was willing to step out, but then the Bishop told him that even if he did decline the appointment he would not appoint Hammond. So Simeon stayed – for fifty-four years! And gradually – very gradually – overcame the opposition.

The first thing the congregation did in rebellion against Simeon was to refuse to let him be the Sunday afternoon lecturer. This was in their charge. It was like a second Sunday service. For five years they assigned the lecture to Mr. Hammond. Then when he left, instead of turning it over to their pastor of five years they gave it to another independent man for seven more years! Finally, in 1794, Simeon was chosen lecturer. Imagine serving for 12 years a church who were so resistant to your leadership they would not let you preach Sunday evenings, but hired as assistant to keep you out.

Simeon tried to start a later Sunday evening service and many townspeople came. But the churchwardens locked the doors while the people stood waiting in the street. Once Simeon had the doors opened by a locksmith, but when it happened again he pulled back and dropped the service.

The second thing the church did was to lock the pew doors on Sunday mornings. The pewholders refused to come and refused to let others sit in their personal pews. Simeon set up seats in the aisles and nooks and corners at his own expense. But the churchwardens took them out and threw them in the churchyard. When he tried to visit from house to house, hardly a door would open to him. This situation lasted at least ten years. The records show that in 1792 Simeon got a legal decision that the pewholders could not lock their pews and stay away indefinitely. But he didn't use it. He let his steady, relentless ministry of the word and prayer and community witness gradually overcome the resistance.

But I mustn't give the impression that all the troubles were over after the first 12 years. After years of peace, in 1812 (after he had been there 30 years!) there were again opponents in the congregation making the waters rough. He wrote to a friend, "I used to sail in the Pacific; I am now learning to navigate the Red Sea that is full of shoals and rocks." Who of us would not have immediately concluded at age 53, after thirty years in one church that an upsurge of opposition is a sure sign to move on? But again he endured patiently and in 1816 he writes that peace had come and the church is better attended than ever.

Stable leadership is the key to growth in any church. small or large. Let us take courage from the example of Charles Simeon. May we also make sure of our call to a particular place of service before we undertake to pastor any of God's people.