The Unstuck Church Podcast

Engagement—It's the buzz word we hear church leaders discussing across the country. What does it really mean and how do you know if you're hitting a mark? Truth be told, we find many pastors are confused about engagement. How do we increase it? Why do people show up, come back, plug in or leave? Recently, Tony, Amy and Sean hosted a live webinar for church leaders on the topic of engagement. In th...

It's one of the big responsibilities every pastor has—the planning process for message series. Few pastors tell us they have a great process. Often, there's no plan at all, or the plan only goes a few months out and lacks an aspect that brings focus to the big picture. While it may work for the lead pastor's writing rhythm, it rarely serves the rest of the team well. In this episode, Tony and Amy...

It can feel like a losing battle. You want to help new guests feel welcome and decide to return , but how do you even identify them? T he most common strategies don't work very well anymore. Many churches don't have an intentional plan to identify, welcome and follow up with their new guests. And, i f they do have a plan, it's often too cumbersome for a new guest to engage. In this episode, Tony,...

The good news is that things have gotten better.  A few decades ago, churches weren't talking about design or brand or project management or technology. The bad news? Many churches are doing those things now, but overall our outcomes are not better. Many churches are still in decline, and all this cool stuff we're creating is not putting the mission and vision in action or within reach.  In this e...

Church growth vs. spiritual growth. Churches often operate like the two are mutually exclusive.  The truth is, Jesus charged us both with reaching new people and helping them learn to be more like Him. We find unstuck churches are effective on both sides of the equation. In this episode, Tony and Amy share 3 reasons why churches are struggling to help people grow spiritually, and some practical ne...

167 hours per week. That's how much time people spend doing all the things that don't happen at a weekend church service. If you're interested in redeeming all that time to help people take next steps in their relationship with Christ, there's one particular strategy we'd encourage you to employ. And very few churches are trying it. This episode is all about  podcasting . A few reasons to look at...

Tension. Your multisite church has some frustration bubbling below the surface if you hear team members asking questions like... Who do I (really) report to? Who made that decision? Why didn't they ask me about that? Why can't we do that? We find there are 3 areas every multisite church must clarify to reduce tensions in the multisite matrix. In this episode, Tony and Amy dig deep into all of them...

One church. Multiple Locations. It's the mantra of the multisite movement. But in our experience? Few are truly one unified church meeting in multiple locations. Instead, what we find is that many multisite churches are connected through one leadership structure, but beyond that, they are splintered in their ministry strategy. They are really multiple churches trying to operate as one church. In t...

More leaders. Every pastor we talk to is hoping to find more of them. But how well are you multiplying the ones you have? Multiplication is the element of small groups strategy churches tend to leave out. But  if you're developing leaders through small groups, that's discipleship that leads to multiplication. You can eventually send them out to start new groups or let them take over existing ones....

What if your church's back-door problem is actually a front-door problem? That's the question Connexus Church in Barrie, ON (yep, Carey Nieuwhof's church) found itself wrestling with several years ago.  In a post-Christian culture like Canada's, it couldn't been disheartening: Realizing that even though they'd been designing the ministry strategy to reach people outside the church they still weren...

There are some things a senior pastor just can't delegate. Leaders are often told they're trying to do too much—and it's usually true. But if you succeed at empowering and developing other leaders, where does that leave you? What are the things  only the senior pastor can and should do ? In this episode series, Tony and Amy dig deeper into  the most popular topic of all time on this podcast : the...

There are some things a senior pastor just can't delegate. Leaders are often told they're trying to do too much—and it's usually true. But if you succeed at empowering and developing other leaders, where does that leave you? What are the things  only the senior pastor can and should do ? In this episode series, Tony and Amy dig deeper into  the most popular topic of all time on this podcast : the...

There are some things a senior pastor just can't delegate. Leaders are often told they're trying to do too much—and it's usually true. But if you succeed at empowering and developing other leaders, where does that leave you? What are the things  only the senior pastor can and should do ? In this episode series, Tony and Amy dig deeper into  the most popular topic of all time on this podcast : the...

There are some things a senior pastor just can't delegate. Leaders are often told they're trying to do too much—and it's usually true. But if you succeed at empowering and developing other leaders, where does that leave you? What are the things only the senior pastor can and should do ? In this episode series, Tony and Amy dig deeper into the most popular topic of all time on this podcast : the ro...

Tim Celek and Andrew Brownback have a rare shared experience: They've successfully navigated the passing of the baton from founding pastor of a thriving, growing church to successor who will lead that church for a new generation. Tim had only recently closed the door on his 40s, when he—with that visionary knack for forward-thinking—started a conversation with his board about succession planning....

It's all interim work. The sooner you can get your mind around that one point, the sooner you can be freed up to start thinking about what happens next . In a recent study, Barna Research found that half of the senior pastors in America are 55 or older, and that the number of pastors older than 65 has tripled in the last 25 years. This week, Tony sits down with William Vanderbloemen for a frank co...

What does "engagement" really mean? We hear that word buzzing among church leaders, but it's kind of a loose term. You could define engagement however you want. We recently partnered up with Blackbaud to survey church leaders across the country and find out more about how church leaders are actually defining and measuring engagement In this episode, Tony and Amy shared a few of the findings that j...

It's a dance. One church leads, the other has to follow. The data is telling us more than 40% of all multisite campuses today are the result of a church merger or the acquisition of a church building. How do you ensure a successful outcome? Jim Tomberlin joins Tony Morgan in this third episode in our multisite series to explain what you need to know about church mergers and how you can leverage th...

90%. That's the success rate surveys are showing churches are having with launching multisite campuses. Five years after launch, they're still up and running. What's more—57% of multisite churches are planning to launch another campus in the next 12 months.  Tony Morgan and Jim Tomberlin  recently announced  that our two ministries—MultiSite Solutions and The Unstuck Group—are coming together. In...

Why is Tony so passionate about getting churches to track more numbers? Really it's just about being a good steward of the resources God has given us. Stories are important, but the numbers confirm the stories. And... the numbers serve as warning signs that your church is getting stuck. In this episode, Tony and Amy share how tracking metrics related to the Front/Back Door, Leadership, Engagement...

Inwardly-focused churches don't grow.  And every church is at risk of becoming inwardly-focused. It's the natural tendency over time if intentional steps aren't taken to address the warning signs when they flash. In this episode, Tony and Amy discuss what it really means to think like a missionary in your own community, and how making that mindset shift will cause your team to view all of your chu...

The goal is to equip people to become more like Christ. So why do many churches spend so much time just keeping people busy? None of us start out intending to lead over-programmed, complex churches, but most of us find ourselves there. This topic of "programs vs. a discipleship path"  has gotten a ton of attention in our articles over the years. How do churches really make disciples? What do you d...

They sound simple, but implementing these communications best practices means big operational changes for most churches. Churches tend to be reactive instead of proactive in their communication—and that's one reason why churches we're guiding through the Unstuck Process almost always self-identify communication as a "core issue" that's getting them stuck. In this episode, Tony shares the top 3 mis...

Tony Morgan and Jim Tomberlin recently announced that our two ministries—MultiSite Solutions and The Unstuck Group—are coming together!   J im was one of the pioneers of the multisite movement back in the early 1990s and has been helping churches effectively transition from being one church to being one church in multiple locations ever since. In this episode, Jim joins Tony on the show to discuss...

Staffing issues get churches stuck. We see it all the time.  We recently took a look at all of the Staffing & Structure assessments The Unstuck Group completed in the last year. We were looking for themes or trends, and boy, did we find some. In this episode, Tony and Amy share the remaining most common staffing pain points we uncovered in our analysis. They share some indicators these issues are...