May 13th

Prioritizing “Growing and Nurturing Healthy Congregations”

This is the ninth in a series of reflections from Executive Minister Michael Pahl on our new MCM Vision & Mission Statement, approved at our 2026 Gathering.

In a previous reflection, I talked about the language of “flourishing” as a description of what we want for our congregations and for our regional church. That language, I noted, echoes Jesus’ words in John 15, were he describes his followers as the branches of a vine—God’s vine, Jesus himself—bearing the fruit of love as we abide in him.

This is what’s behind the second of our discerned missional priorities as Mennonite Church Manitoba: “Grow and nurture healthy congregations centered on Jesus Christ in which diverse people can belong and be loved.”

But what actually makes for a healthy congregation?

There are many good and useful resources out there for describing and assessing congregational health and guiding congregations toward greater health. Natural Church Development. Flourishing Congregations Institute. Cyclical Full Circle. LifePlan. And others, especially books. Lots of books.

These resources, in various ways, all describe a congregation as being healthy in three dimensions: its internal ministry, its outward ministry, and its organizational structure and ethos.

Internal ministry includes things like corporate worship, faith formation, hospitality, and mutual care. A healthy church gathers together regularly to worship God, and this worship is meaningful, thoughtful, prayerful, and hopeful. A healthy church both encourages and provides opportunities for ongoing faith formation for all ages, where people can grow in knowledge, faith, and love in the way of Jesus—and where some are formed as leaders within the church. A healthy church practices hospitality among its members, whether congregationally (e.g. church potlucks) or in households. And a healthy church facilitates practical and spiritual care for one another, both pastoral care and care among congregants.

Outward ministry refers to the various ways congregations engage with others beyond their church. A healthy church bears witness in the world to the good news of Jesus and the reign of God through words and actions. A healthy church engages in acts of service within their local community, as well as partnering with or supporting mission efforts beyond their community—regionally, nationally, even globally. A healthy church develops relationships with other churches for shared worship, faith formation, hospitality, mutual support, and more—being part of a wider conference is especially important for this.

Outward ministry refers to the various ways congregations engage with others beyond their church. A healthy church bears witness in the world to the good news of Jesus and the reign of God through words and actions. A healthy church engages in acts of service within their local community, as well as partnering with or supporting mission efforts beyond their community—regionally, nationally, even globally. A healthy church develops relationships with other churches for shared worship, faith formation, hospitality, mutual support, and more—being part of a wider conference is especially important for this.

This internal and outward ministry is the practical fruit of love that comes from being connected to each other and ultimately to Christ, abiding in God’s love in Christ—it’s the fruit that grows from a healthy vine. But, as I noted in that previous reflection, a vine needs a trellis if it wants to be as fruitful as possible—a church needs good organization in order to support its internal and outward ministries.

This organization includes things like clearly outlined decision-making processes, designated roles (leadership and otherwise) with intentional paths for onboarding, specific yet flexible foundational and guiding documents which describe this structure, and positive leader-follower and member-member dynamics. A healthy church pays attention to all of these organizational aspects and reviews them regularly.

Very few churches are healthy in all these ways, all the time. Taking care of our individual health in all its dimensions is an ongoing, never-finished process, and this is true also of our health as congregations.

But if we do attend carefully and prayerfully to these three dimensions of congregational health—internal ministry, outward ministry, and organizational structure and ethos—we will more faithfully abide in Christ, our true vine, and thus more abundantly bear the fruit of love for God, each other, and the world. May it be so.