5 Ways to Keep Growing AFTER Easter

Bob FranquizChurch

Many churches are going to experience an attendance bump on Easter. But what about the week after Easter or the week after that? Many churches will go back to being stuck. There’s several things that churches need to do to keep growing after Easter. Here’s 5 that you can start doing today… 1. Keep growing yourself – growing churches are led by growing leaders. Period. 2. Improve your systems – your current systems are giving you your current results. Improve your systems and you’ll improve your results. 3. Develop new leaders – You can’t build a 20-story house on a 10-story foundation. In the same way, you can’t keep adding … Read More

If George Costanza were a Pastor, he would…

Bob FranquizChurch

Remember the classic Seinfeld episode where George decides to do the opposite of his natural instincts and everything works out well for him? That’s how church leaders should be sometimes. They should do the opposite of what the average church is going. The average church is… – Not growing – Now seeing people saved – Not baptizing new believers In short, the average church is, stuck! Here’s the leadership lesson: if your church is stuck, you have to do different things than what got you stuck in the first place. My church was stuck for over a year early in … Read More

Your 2012 Easter Checklist

Bob FranquizChurch

Easter is 17 days away. Now is the time to make the final preparations so you’re ready for the biggest Sunday of the year. So here’s 10 areas you need to have ready if you want to reach a lot of people this Easter: 1. Direct Mail What’s you direct mail plan? (Please tell me it’s not just blasting a few zip codes. Be more strategic and you’ll see much better results) 2. Mobilizing your congregation Have you equipped your church with the tools they need to invite friends? Encourage them that this is the easiest Sunday of the year … Read More

What Pastors can Learn from Plumbers

Bob FranquizChurch

I’ve learned a ton about plumbing in the last 2 weeks. I have been without a kitchen because of a leaky pipe. Here’s what I’ve learned about the plumbing arts… If you have a leaky pipe, you have to pump twice the water through the pipe to get 1/2 the amount H2O when you open your faucet. Here’s how this relates to church leadership and outreach… Your church can spend lots of money on outreach and fill your seats on Easter. However, if you don’t have a good follow up system and newcomers and new believers, they will slip out … Read More

3 Important Facts about those who will attend your Easter Services

Bob FranquizChurch

Churches who are serious about outreach see huge crowds on Easter. But while we focus on strategies for getting crowds in the doors (which I’m all for), there’s another element that I want to focus on. I want to talk about what’s happening internally to those who will attend your services on Easter. There are 3 things happening in them when they sit in your seats… #1 – They Know They Need God in Their Lives – Long before you give your invitation sharing about people’s need for God, He has already been at work in people’s lives. Our goal … Read More

Lessons from a Preaching Nightmare

Bob FranquizChurch

It was December of 2000. I was a younger preacher, 3 months into planting my church. It was our first Christmas Eve service and I put in about 35 hours prepping a 30 minute holiday message. So the day came and I preached my heart out. When the end of the message came, I gave an invitation for people to invite Jesus into their lives. Crickets. I clarified the Gospel more. Created more urgency and recast the net and invited people to raise their hands if they wanted to come to know Jesus. More.crickets. There’s an old preacher saying: if … Read More

Where’s the other half of your Church?

Bob FranquizChurch

Sometimes when people hear the story of Calvary, they get the wrong idea. When they hear that in the 1st 18 months of planting Calvary we didn’t reach one person who was far from God. But in the last 18 months, we’ve seen over 1,000 first time decisions and more than 2,500 rededicate their lives to Christ in that time.” Here’s the problem with my story. It’s only 1/2 the story. We are just as committed to discipling the people we reached as we were to reach them in the first place. Some churches are totally committed to outreach and … Read More

VCR Churches in a Blu-Ray World

Bob FranquizChurch

I spoke at a conference last week and I was asked a really interesting question by a Pastor who attended my session. He asked, “Bob, if you could go back to when you planted your church, what would you do differently?” While time travel is only possible on Star Trek, I immediately responded. I said, “In the 1st 18 months at Calvary we didn’t reach one person who was far from God. We only reached Christians. In the last 18 months, we’ve seen over 1,000 first time decisions and more than 2,500 rededicate their lives to Christ in that time.” … Read More