The DOH Effect

I'm doing a lot of administrative work today, preparing a new directory and working on a minister's report for the next board meeting. And I've spent a lot of time dissecting attendance reports, counseling notes, etc. looking at who is attending church and how often they're here.

Of the reasons that people miss church, most reasons fall under the umbrella of the DOH Effect (pronounced like Homer Simpson's annoyed grunt, D'oh!). Hundreds of needs and activities get prioritized over going to church, leading a family to miss church at the Drop Of a Hat.

Often heard drops of a hat include:

"Our kids needed to be in three different peewee football leagues and a Sunday morning popsicle-stick-art show." DOH!

"I had a really busy Saturday and needed to sleep in." DOH!

"My best friend didn't save me a seat and when I arrived fifteen minutes late she totally didn't even say hi to me and I think her kids are only pretending to like my kids and so I didn't even have the energy to deal with it." DOH!

"The Chiefs were playing at Noon." DOH!

"My alarm didn't go off." DOH!

A guy I used to know always said that the easiest thing in the world to do was to talk yourself out of going to church. That's the truth. By my count, as much as 2/5 of our active membership misses church multiple times each month. Some of those absences are totally legitimate. But many of them are unnecessary.

So does it matter some folks miss every other week? Yes. Church is one of those things that has a cumulative effect. One individual service may or may not do anything for you. But the total impact of week after week of forming relationships, building trust, serving people's needs, and hearing God's Word is immeasurably valuable.

[Update: I wrote more over at the church's blog.]