When to Walk Away from a Dead Church

When to walk away from a dead church.

“When the horse is dead...dismount.”

This has to be one of the most difficult questions for any pastor to answer. This question assumes, first of all that you are already serving at a dead church and have taken the time to carefully evaluate its condition. It’s difficult to walk away from a dead church and not feel a great sense of personal loss and failure. Moreover, there is also a nagging hope within you that the long prayed for revival is just around the corner. Perhaps, you argue with yourself, if I give it just one more try.

I’ve talked with many pastors who have gone through this cycle of surrender-to-leave/renewed hope/disappointment/surrender-to-leave. I believe you must be very careful when you see this pattern developing in your ministry. This world is littered with former pastors who now sale insurance or work in no brainer jobs because they fought the fight too hard and too long. Before you begin to work with a stalled or dying church, establish in your own mind what conditions will demand your resignation and departure. Write them down and keep them in your personal file. Share these conditions with your wife and your accountability group. Most importantly, pray and ask God to protect you from the sin of pride (which makes you think you can “save” this church) and to make you sensitive to His leading throughout your ministry.

If you are candidating for a church, the “condition of the church” will obviously be one of your great concerns. The physically dead church is in most cases easy to spot; the spiritually dead church takes greater discernment. Statistical trends are a good place to begin, but they can’t tell you the whole picture. Pointed questions during your visit to the church will shed more light, but most congregations are on their best behavior for visiting pastoral candidates. How can you be certain you are not accepting a call to a dead church? In a word, you can’t. We live in a fallen world, and as long as we walk with feet of clay we will make mistakes. You can investigate the church carefully, sense God’s leading in the call, receive positive reinforcement from your friends and family, and still end up the pastor of a dead church. The key, as mentioned above, is to recognize the signs and move on.

** Where does the will of God play into this? Does God turn His back on a spiritually dead church? Where does revival enter in? What’s the difference between a dead church and a dying church?