Missional Church Scorecard

In case you don't know it, churches have scorecards. They aren't called scorecards, they go by names like - Annual Statistical Report. But no matter what we call them, they are still scorecards because they serve to measure how well we are doing.

Church scorecards traditionally have kept tally of things like attendance, membership, giving, and frequency of meetings. In other words, how many and how much? Scorecards are still needed in missional churches. But the scorecards must change if a church is to become more effective at reaching beyond the walls of the sanctuary, educational wing and family life center.

Reggie McNeal, the author of "Missional Renaissance: Changing the Scorecard for the Church", proposes that we "expand the bandwith" of what we measure in order to determine our success as missional churches.

Instead of asking how many people showed up for an event, he suggests asking such questions as:

* How many better marriages do we have in our church today than a year ago?

* How much money did we give away last year? How much did we invest in our community?

* How many members are prayer partners with a public school teacher?

* How many people have figured out a way to show love for their neighbor instead of just coming to support our stuff?

To quote McNeil: "In a missional world, it’s about the size of your vision and impacting your community. A church with 33 people in the inner city that’s about making an impact is making a bigger difference than a big old honking suburban church with 3,000 people who are as busy as can be running the cruise ship."

So is your church more like a lifeboat that goes out into the stormy seas to rescue drowning people or a cruise ship that seeks to keep the passengers on board entertained?