In 2006, I became a small church advocate. At that time, no one was addressing the needs of the small church. I became a pastor in 1997 and I pastored several churches that had less than 100 people attending our morning worship service. I went to the annual SBC convention and other conferences during each year. In each venue, the training provided was for larger churches. "How to develop your staff" wasn't helpful to me. I was the only staff in the church! Many topics like this were addressed in breakout sessions in the conferences and SBC convention. Where was the training I was longing for that would be applicable to my position as the pastor of a single staff church?
In 2006, I began to bring this issue to light by writing about it on my blog. In those days, blogs were popular. Facebook and Twitter were in their infancy so blogs were the main method of communicating.
In 2008, I ran for the Presidency of the Southern Baptist Convention. I had no thoughts of winning. My purpose for entering into the fray of SBC politics was to highlight the small church issues. In addition, I held a small church conference at my church that included speakers such as Alvin Reid (SEBTS), Brad Waggoner (LIFEWAY), Greg Lawson (SEBTS), Tom Eliff (IMB), Dick Church (NAMB), Christ Schofield (NC BAPTIST), Kevin Bussey (CHURCH PLANTER), C. B. Scott (SMALL CHURCH PASTOR), Chris Hauser (SMALL CHURCH PASTOR), Micah Fries (SMALL CHURCH PASTOR), and David MacEachern (SMALL CHURCH PASTOR).
Today, there are many resources available for the small church pastor. A lot of focuses of church growth and that is a good thing, but much of it deals with the different culture in a small church as opposed to larger churches.
A few years ago, a small church pastor was elected as President of the SBC pastor's conference. The result was that the speakers for the following year were all church pastors instead of celebrity pastors which has been the norm for this event.
I am thankful that many have taken up the small church mantle. More than 80% of all churches in the Southern Baptist Convention have less than 200 people attending services each Sunday. I believe it's vitally important that we continue to support this majority of the Southern Baptist Convention in practical ways.