In times gone by, Pastors would start conversations with other pastors by asking “How are your nickels and noses?” It was a way of asking how is your church doing, how is your church health? The nickels, of course, referred to the offerings. How is the financial health of the church? The noses referred to people. They were asking how is your attendance, how many do you have in Sunday School or Connection Groups? How are your nickels and noses? Most of the time they would not be that straight forward. They might word it a little more delicately. Reality is that attendance and offerings are indicators of health but not the only indicators.
Over the past 6 years JIBC has been blessed with over 90 baptisms. What a blessing to “average” 15 baptisms a year for the past 6 years. Our last baptism had 7 adults, 3 teens and 4 children. That is a good indicator of health.
Our offerings have grown from $707,474 in 2021 to $1,041,615 in 2025. That means we gave more to missions than ever before. JIBC underwrites the Hispanic Church, Luz Y Verdad and the Slavic Church, Zion. Spiritual health is seen in the increase of our weekly tithes and offerings but also in the many missions we support. We are blessed to be a blessing.
Our attendance has been around 200 in worship services every week. This past Sunday we had 267 in worship. That includes 29 we had in Children’s Worship. I must admit it is very encouraging to see the attendance numbers go up. But more encouraging is the number we see going out…out into the community as volunteers at places like James Island Outreach, VBS, Awanas, etc. Spiritual Health is better seen in how many we send than how many we seat! But let’s keep working on both of them.
There are a lot of other ways to measure church health. Some might be a little harder to track. How many hugs are given out each week? How much laughter do we hear in the building? How many meals are shared? How many eat at JIBC on Wednesday nights and how many meals are sent out to the sick, the homebound and the local fire stations? How many people were invited to JIBC this past year? These would all be indicators of church health. What would you list as an indicator of church health? I would be interested in knowing.
See you Sunday, good Lord willing!
Pastor Tom
