The Intimate Little Flock

Hi Brother,

I also am a fan of smaller churches. The Church then gets the chance to function as an actual family. Just as if your family had 3000 people vs 100, you can't devote as much time to each person in a 3000:1 setting versus a 100:1 setting. As such the relationships with people are not as developed.

In my second year of college I got Saved. I went to a local IFB church of 250-300 people at the top of a ridge over in Jackson County, NC, deep in Appalachia. Those folks showed me such love and kindness that I'll never forget. One time I couldn't go home for Thanksgiving. A local widow and her daughter invited me to their family's thanksgiving in a double wide on the side of a hill. I'll never forget that. Them folks had hardly any money, the cars were rust buckets, but they let me share in their food. It was literally the parable of the poor woman with the 2 coins. Because of the small size of that Church I was able to develop a relationship with the Pastor, and many of the congregants. It WAS a family. I doubt I could have had as close of a relationship with 3000 people. Heck, I probably wouldn't recognize some of the people outside the Church if it was that big.

I was married in the Missionary Baptist Church that I go to when visiting kinfolks up in the High Country in Ashe County. That Church has only 17 people in it, but the relationships built there will last a lifetime. First time I went there was Pastor appreciation day and those folks let me share a meal with them even though they hardly knowed me. Had it been a Church of 3000 people, none of the congregants would ever remember me, and you wouldn't be able to have events like that potluck.

My current Church in the Piedmont has 100 people in it, and the small size lets me stay in the loop with how everyone is doing, who needs help, who is looking for something, who needs prayer requests, etc, just like a family does. I couldn't do that in a Church of 3000. I mean, heck, I could pray for Cousin XYZ in a big Church, but I wouldn't know who I was praying about.

So yes, I think small Churches lead to better relationships, and because of that lead to more Christ-likeness.

 

Saint Francis instructed his people who walked the streets to always seek out small churches where you’d be a pilgrim and a stranger.

 

The closest I ever came to that Glen is a Sunday Alcholics Anom meeting in a delapodated building of an old monistary ... meeting run by a few iron workers and the Abbott, himself an alcoholic (we called him the drunk monk... lovingly of course). Funny but I find that kind of spirituality at the cancer treatment center. At both places they are treating the sick, the broken. That is when you are truly humbled. That’s my communion.