The Unstuck Church Podcast

Churches decorate, plan and hold extra services—but are we really connecting with the people who only come to church during the most wonderful time of the year? Our culture still embraces Christmas. Easter? Not so much. Church leaders can leverage this holiday better than any other to generate momentum for reaching people outside the church. In this replay of a popular episode, Tony and Amy review...

It's possible to grow a church that is  not  healthy. It's also possible for healthy churches to get stuck. But we think the win is for there to be both  health and growth  in a church. When that happens, we get to celebrate as churches continue to fulfill the Great Commission and make more disciples. In the second part of this episode series, Tony and Amy unpack the next 5 things on a list we bra...

It's possible to grow a church that is  not  healthy. It's also possible for healthy churches to get stuck. But we think the win is for there to be both  health and growth  in a church. When that happens, we get to celebrate as churches continue to fulfill the Great Commission and make more disciples. In this episode, Tony and Amy unpack the first 5 things on a list we brainstormed of 10 things we...

Many people are more familiar with what the church is against than what the Church is for . Jeff Henderson's new book  Know What You're FOR: A Growth Strategy for Work, An Even Better Strategy for Life  is all about shifts organizations can make to be  for their communities. In this episode, Jeff joins Tony for a conversation about practical ideas leaders can implement to reframe how their churche...

We've found many church staff teams operate in one of two extremes:  They get along with each other but struggle to execute plans... or they are impressively productive but unhealthy and dysfunctional. The undercurrent is often that we church leaders can get so busy "doing" ministry that we never think about how we "do" team. It's the Sunday's always coming syndrome. But the truth is, a church's k...

Churches drift towards an insider-focus over time—more attention is given to discipleship of Christ followers than to effective outreach and evangelism. How do you fight that tendency? We've noted four steps that help churches open their "front door" wider. All four are critical—but we've found most churches only have strategies and structure to engage one or two of them. In this four-part series,...

Churches drift towards an insider-focus over time—more attention is given to discipleship of Christ followers than to effective outreach and evangelism. How do you fight that tendency? We've noted four steps that help churches open their "front door" wider. All four are critical—but we've found most churches only have strategies and structure to engage one or two of them. In this four-part series,...

Churches drift towards an insider-focus over time—more attention is given to discipleship of Christ followers than to effective outreach and evangelism. How do you fight that tendency? We've noted four steps that help churches open their "front door" wider. All four are critical—but we've found most churches only have strategies and structure to engage one or two of them. In this four-part series,...

Churches drift towards an insider-focus over time—more attention is given to discipleship of Christ followers than to effective outreach and evangelism. How do you fight that tendency? We've noted four steps that help churches open their "front door" wider. All four are critical— but we've found most churches only have strategies and structure to engage one or two of them. In this four-part series...

You had more questions about church engagement—so we are  taking this week to answer them. We recently hosted a webinar on the topic of ​increasing church engagement​, and as part of the event, we fielded questions from people who tuned in. We weren't able to get through all of the questions live, so in this episode, we're digging a bit deeper. We saw some themes in the questions that came in. Par...

Bus ministry, cassette tape messages, door-to-door evangelism... all ministry strategies have a lifespan. Is multisite nearing its end? Recently, some high profile multisite churches made the decision to un -multisite. For a variety of reasons, their ministry strategy has shifted from "one church in many locations" to "multiple independent churches," some even boldly downsizing to one location. Do...

What's the "win" for your church's social media activity?  If you don't know, at best you'll waste time and resources, and at worst you'll do damage to your brand and the potential you have to engage people outside your church. Social media platforms play a big role in the success of an inbound marketing strategy, and it seems like most churches are struggling to use them well.  (Not sure what "in...

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...