From the Office of the Pastor


I ran into an unexpected fortune during last February’s South-central Korean Ministers’ Retreat in Dallas. During my days as a student in theological seminary, I concentrated on reading and studying materials pertaining to philosophical and systematic theology; therefore, I was new to the field of practical theology and, as a consequence, had harbored some skepticism and incredulity regarding “quantitative church development.” With this pretext, I came upon the “natural church development” in Dallas. (I would like to take this opportunity to thank Reverend Kyu-Chin Ahn for introducing and systematically taking me through this valuable theory.)  

Today, many pastors talk of evangelism—for some, evangelism is a life-long wish, while for others, it even comes up as a wish in their dreams. We often find our attention shifting onto rumors about how a new, fledgling church grew rapidly, or how a pastor developed a theological concept to win over new members into a congregation. Just as Reverend Yong Do Lee stated, “good and evil both serve as mentors;” hence, keeping our minds open will allow us to broaden our perspectives, learn outside of the notional boundaries that we establish for ourselves, and ultimately benefit as result of our newfound knowledge. However, sometimes I resign myself to the fact that seminar-chasing—in order to listen to a lecture delivered by so-called “successful” preachers who evangelized a small church of few dozen members into a church of thousands—may be a futile, fruitless endeavor.

Like the phrase “wherever you go, maintain your independence,” we, as individuals, must never forget our individuality. I cannot become someone else; I, Reverend Heung-Gyu Kim, am an individual with my own perspectives and thoughts on ministerial philosophy. Whenever I pray in the morning to God, I often ponder what unique gift and talent I have that can allow me to effectively lead this ministry in a healthy, refreshing manner.  

Because of this desire, when I heard something about the “natural church development,” my attention focused on the subject. Upon returning home, I obtained two books to study in depth: Natural Church Development by Christian A. Schwarz, and Implementation Guide to Natural Church Development, co-authored by Schwarz and Christoph Schalk. After reading these two books, just as I initially felt—and excited—at the retreat, I had a firm belief that natural church development can play a key role in a church rebirth, renewal, and progress.  

The theory of natural church development is based on the premise that developing the quality characteristics of a healthy church—specific qualities that distinguish a church from others—will make a church grow on its own. Schwarz, in his book, stated that the secret to church development is “qualitative maturity,” the ingredient that may often be lacking in “mega” churches of today. Quantitative growth does not necessarily promote qualitative maturity; however, the latter can ensure the former. It is true that many pastors wish to achieve growth first and foremost when leading a ministry; hence, sprawling buildings are built, efficient workers are hired, and plans are put into practice in order to compete with other churches—based on a business-like mentality and approach in leading a ministry. The trait of modern churches is to first obtain growth, then seek maturity as a congregation. Schwarz offers a novel, and opposite, concept that becoming “mature” church will ensure growth.  

In his work, Schwarz critically compares three paradigms from start to finish. The first, the “technocratic paradigm,” concentrates on artificial methods, programs, management, and systems in seeking ways of growth. Just as inserting coins in a vending machine will result in dispensation of soda cans, this paradigm suggests that systematically adopting successful methods used in one successful church to another will yield great results. The second, the “spiritualistic paradigm,” theorizes that prayer and Holy Spirit will automatically ensure the growth of a church.

 People who harbor this thought are conservative fundamentalists; they view that artificial methods—as created by humans—designed for church growth cannot coexist with Christian orthodox belief. The two paradigms are direct opposites of each other, where those with technocratic paradigm viewpoints criticize spiritual paradigm as irrational, irresponsible, and parochial, while spiritual paradigm criticizes the former as excessively secular and non-religious.  

Schwarz asserts that there are inherent problems with both paradigms, and suggests the third alternative: a natural—or biotic—church development. The natural/biotic church development is a theory based on rediscovering the law of life in order to have the sole organism of God—the church—grow naturally all by itself. Humans cannot tamper with growth potential inherent in all organisms to hasten growth; the only thing that they can do to promote growth is minimizing the environmental resistance to growth. Likewise, we cannot artificially promote church growth; rather, we must work on reducing the element that can hinder church growth, both from within and outside of a church. Schwarz asserts that his natural church development theory is God’s theomatism, based on the fact that if a congregation does all it is supposed to do in order to promote growth, God will ensure that growth takes place.

Just as Paul confessed in the First Book of Corinthians, chapter 3, verse 6, “I planted, Apollo watered, but God gave the increase,” man’s efforts at sowing, watering, and cultivating can have an effect on growth and harvest; however, the fundamental growth and fruits of harvest lie within God’s hands. Therefore, according to Schwarz, “there is really nothing we can do about church development, and yet we ought to do something.”  

The impressive fact surrounding the basis of Schwarz’s theory is that the theory is based on an empirical research, obtained through some 4.2 million opinion surveys, translated in 18 different languages, administered in all five continents of this world, in some 32 countries and covering some 1,000 churches. Schwarz further points out that observation of nature, as created by God, studying of nature and the Bible contributed to the construction of the natural church development theory. Another reason why I support this theory is that unlike Peter Wagner’s classical church growth theory, which stresses quantitative growth and practical goal achievement, the natural church development theory rests on the universal principles that can be implemented in any church.  

Then what are the quality characteristics of healthy churches that grow and develop on their own? We, as the St. Luke Church, must focus on these characteristics. Schwarz contends that a mature and healthy church may well be guaranteed to grow; and yet, large church that grew and developed in a short period of time may not be mature and healthy. However, having higher quality index will ensure growth and development, and Schwarz lays out the following eight quality characteristics that separate healthy churches from the rest.  

First, leaders of growing churches concentrate on cultivating and empowering other Christians for ministry. Rather than utilizing lay leaders as mere helpers to achieve some goal or vision, the leaders of growing churches assist these lay leaders in discovering and developing their gifts to become better Christian leaders. Schwarz calls this effort the “empowering leadership.”

Second, in growing churches, the members of the congregation serve the church according to individual gifts and abilities. Rather than serving the church in areas that one is not familiar with, volunteers and workers in a growing church serve willingly and happily in fields they are intimately familiar with. Schwarz calls this “gift-oriented ministry.”  

Third, there must be a strong flame of spirituality within the hearts of pastors and lay members alike. Regardless of what individual creed or doctrinal preference may be, all members of the ministry must be able to share a true relationship with Christ. Schwarz calls this characteristic the “passionate spirituality,” and interestingly points out that most legalistic and dogmatic churches tend to show lower index for this characteristic.  

Fourth, the church must have a functional structure that allows it to function as a living entity. Each group and organization within a church must perform their functions in order to achieve a multiplicative, synergistic effect for overall church work and effort. For example, if the time for worship service does not suit majority of the congregation, if leaders do not serve the congregation, or if leaders are overly authoritative, there must be some organizational overhaul to correct these deficiencies.  

Fifth, there must be “inspirational worship service.” Regardless of where the focus of the service may rest, the worship service of a healthy church must instill, for those in attendance, the presence of the Holy Spirit within their hearts. Depending on how the service is programmed, and how the pastor leads the service, attending worship service can be an enjoyable and enlightening experience.  

Sixth, the work of holistic small group must get completed efficiently. The word “holistic” means the membership of small groups is not limited to Bible study or social gathering; rather, the membership into a group has profound effects on everyday-lives of the members as genuine Christians. Schwarz stresses that this characteristic, of forming as many holistic small groups as possible, is the most important of the eight quality characteristics of a growing church. As churches grow and develop, the need for holistic small groups become much more acute.  

Seventh, the church must have a “need-oriented evangelism.” Personal relationships between member of congregation (believers) and non-believers must take place in order to address the needs of the non-believers and ultimately convert them to Christianity. Mission work must concentrate on addressing the needs of the target group for conversion.  

Eighth, there must be a surfeit of “loving relationship” within the congregation. Each member of the congregation must feel loved and loving; there must be contagious laughter and communion in the church. An interesting statistic is that this characteristic has the lowest index for large churches—those with 1,000 or more members in their congregation.  

Schwarz grades each of these characteristics on a scale of 100, and a score of 65 or above indicates success in that category. I would like to conduct an opinion survey in the future to gauge our church’s quality characteristic index. The key point of natural church development theory is that qualitative maturity plays a key role in development and growth of a church. Concentrating on increasing the index of each of these eight characteristics will inevitably result in growth and maturation of a church.  

The task of uniformly improving each of the eight characteristics, Schwarz suggests, can be best achieved by “minimum strategy.” Minimum strategy entails developing the weakest characteristics to be on par with other characteristics. Schwarz gives “water barrel parable” as an example: If a water barrel is made up of eight planks of wood, the water will always flow out over the shortest plank, regardless of how high the other planks may be. Although our church may boast high indices for other seven characteristics, if our functional structure is dysfunctional, not only will God’s grace flow out of our church; we will not be able to grow as a church. To focus on our weakest characteristic, we must maximize the use of our strongest characteristic.  

Schwarz’s eight characteristics are truly important. “Leadership,” “ministry,” “spirituality,” “structures,” “worship service,” “small groups,” “evangelism,” and “relationships” are all characteristics that have an important bearing on our ministry field; adjective characteristics such as “empowering,” “gift-oriented,” “passionate,” “functional,” “inspirational,” “holistic,” “need-oriented,” and “loving” are all related to the principles of life. We need to concentrate on the characteristics that have a bearing on principles of life.  

There are much more materials in Schwarz’s book that I would like to go over with you, but we will save those for a later time. I would like to close out this article by stressing, once again, the importance of the eight quality characteristics that Schwarz lays out in his book. Our task is to improve upon our weakest characteristic by maximizing the strengths of our strongest characteristic.

Schwarz introduces and concludes his book with an image of people who are pulling, with great efforts, a wagon with square wheels as its propulsion. Although they are exerting maximum efforts, the fact that the wheels are square is making it nearly impossible for these people to effectively pull the wagon. If only they knew to attach the round wheels to the wagon, which are sitting atop the wagon! Schwarz’s point is that God has empowered us with all the tools to make our church grow naturally and automatically; by holding onto our secular beliefs and desires as well as our technocratic methods, not only will we experience difficulties as Christians, our church will likewise not grow.

Round wheels atop a wagon! These wheels represent the eight quality characteristics of a healthy church that Schwarz deduced through years of detailed research and information gathering. We, as St. Luke UMC, must concentrate on all eight characteristics to increase our indices above 65 for each of the characteristics. From now on, my ministerial focus will be on improving these eight characteristics for our church. Your help is absolutely needed in achieving this goal!


Schwarz describes the church that has an index of 65 or greater for each of his eight characteristics as such:  

There is a church in which the leadership is committed heart and soul to church growth; in which nearly every Christian is using his or her gifts to edify the church; in which most members are living our the faith with power and contagious enthusiasm; in which church structures are evaluated on whether they serve the growth of the church or not; in which worship services are a high point of the week for the majority of the congregation; in which the loving and healing power of Christian fellowship can be experienced in small groups; in which nearly all Christians, according to their gifts, help to fulfill the Great Commission; in which the love of Christ permeates almost all church activities.” (Natural Church Development, p. 40.)