What size church do you pastor and how many years have you been in the ministry?

I'm 35, we average between 80-90 in worship, i'm the only full time staff member, we also have a part time worship leader and a part time secretary. This is my 2nd church, i've been here 2 years...served at my previous church as Assoc Pastor and Interim Pastor for about a year and a half.

 

I served for two years as an interim for a rural congregation that had been pastorless for ten years. Twelve adults and four children.
When I finished in December they were down to 6 adults (One died and two left the same time I did).
In a word, "Sardis". They wanted to live in the past.

 

I am not a pastor, but I can speak for my church.

Our attendence runs 70-100.

Our pastor has been here for 20 years. He was pastor of another church for just a few years before coming to our church.

This is our 2nd pastor, our first was here also about 20 years.

 

I have been in ministry for 10 years. My church runs between 85-105 in Sunday AM worship.

 

I've been student pastor here 6 years. (been in ministry since 1987) We have four FT ministers on our staff.
Our church has around 700 on Sunday morning. Our student worship service has about 150 in attendance each week.

 

I've been in the ministry for 3 years, and the church where I pastor runs between 85 and 100 on a given Sunday.

 

I have been a Moderator/Pastor for the last 25 years I have been an ordaind minister for 33 years and the church I am at now I have been there for 17 years and our attendance is 85-100 on Sunday. We call our Pastors Moderators. I have an Assistant also who has been with me for 17 years.

Oh forgot, I am 67 years old

 

big 40 years old.
started as youth director in 2000
surrendered to pastoral ministry in 2002
first pastorate began in Oct 2004. 8 members in attendance thefirst Sunday there.

currently averaging 31, 18 months later. God is so very good and gracious to a sinner like me.

 

I am now retired from the pastorate, but will answer in terms of where my church was when I left it a little less than two years ago. First, I have been in ministry 42+ years.

I found that no one answer suffices for "what size church". The one I served, at the time of my retirement, had ca. 850 names on the roll, but of these, ca. 150 had no addresses and may be deceased. We did not purge because every now and again a name would pop up somewhere (obituaries, for example!) and we needed to respond.

Our average worship attendance was 200-235. But the most telling statistic I have is that we know, because we took attendance every Sunday via cards turned in to the ushers, that we served between 550 and 600 persons, members and attenders. That does not count first-time visitors or others there for incidental reasons (e.g., people visiting family members). I liked to point out that we were larger than we looked on a given Sunday morning ... so many of our people travel frequently.

 

Starting a new church, since I'm "retired" at 67.
Around 50-70 attenders. Been ordained 36 years.

 

I am 55, have been in ministry for 25 years, 12 of which as Senior Pastor. Our church averages 150 with 4 part time staff people.

 

25 years old and have been a pastor for 7 months. The church I currently am at has around 25 members, averaging 30 in attendance..

 

Rhet,

I read about what happened in ABP. Sad, really. I don't know which side you fell on, but I was greatly disappointed to see your seminary put itself in the middle of the debate. (At least that's how the article read.)

How can the pastor stay now and effectively lead?