The 80/20 Rule (Pareto Principle) states that 20% of the people in an organization will produce 80% of the work and production. If you’ve experienced the frustration of this reality, you undoubtedly dislike this rule. Unfortunately, most of us have found it to be painfully true in almost all of the organizations we’re associated with, whether professional, social, or religious. It is particularly frustrating when you see it played out in churches –– true to the rule’s percentages.
Jesus obviously anticipated that throughout the growth of His Church, this sort of problem would exist. As evidenced by His words recorded at Luke 10:2... Jesus said to them, “The harvest is plentiful, but the laborers are few. Therefore pray earnestly to the Lord of the harvest to send out laborers into his harvest.” ESV (Also Matthew 9:37-38; John 4:35) Notice He doesn’t say “believers” are “few”, just that those who really get engaged in the work and mission of the church, the harvesting of souls, would be few in number. Notice too... the urgency implied in his message. By using the metaphor of “a harvest” Jesus implies an urgent work that requires immediate attention. When a harvest is ready, you can’t wait, you have to move quickly and decisively to bring in the crops.
Maybe therein lies the problem in our churches. Perhaps we have failed to communicate the sense of urgency in what we are attempting to accomplish. “Urgency” tends to require visualization of a pending disaster to motivate some people. For example, if a building is on fire we know that rescue efforts have to move quickly or people could possibly die. Firefighters are motivated and aggressive in rescuing people and using their equipment and skills to put out fires before loss of life and property. Perhaps in our churches, people are not fully realizing the consequences of inaction, and even if they have some sense of the consequence, they are convinced that someone else will deal with it.
Christians... we have a raging fire that demands our total unencumbered attention. It’s the work of harvesting souls, bringing people to Christ... it’s God’s command to urgent action... the Great Commission. People are dying minute by minute without friends, without hope, without help, without belief, without care. Just as surely as that fireman sees a child in a second story window of a burning structure, we are witnessing people who are in imminent danger of an eternal destiny apart from hope and apart from God. Can you imagine a firefighter who would stand outside that burning house and say, "I am safe and comfortable right here. I’ll just watch. One of the other firemen will get in there and help those people." Most of our churched members are thinking to themselves, "That's the preacher’s job, the elder’s job, a missionaries job, not mine."
Here’s a question to ponder: What if the 80/20 rule were reversed? What if 80% of the people produced, not 20% of the work that needs to be done, but 100%? Okay, maybe given the lesson of history,that's a naive assumption. So, let's reduce those expectations just a bit. If the 20% are producing 80%, then what if we could get 40% to accomplish 100%? What if 50% got involved? If the 20% can do so many good things, then what if we could just get half of the people in our churches passionately motivated to participate in the work and mission of God? No doubt the results would astound us!
Maybe your church is a small one. If you’re one of the leaders, you may be frustrated that only five, six or seven folks show any desire or ability to help move things forward. No matter what you try, what you do, how your encourage and motivate, you just can’t get more people to participate. You don’t have to be a small church to experience the 80/20 Rule... larger and even mega churches experience the same problem.
I know this next statement is going to sound very odd, and it should not be viewed as an excuse for the majority to shirk their responsibility for the Great Commission. If you’re a frustrated small church leader... you should consider yourself fortunate that you have that many willing servants, five, six or seven souls ready, willing and able to work for the interests of God’s mission.
Fortunately for us, God rarely needs more than a few to get the ball rolling and keep it moving. Remember... Jesus changed the whole world with twelve disciples, plus Paul.
Christianity in terms of active participation, has always been a minority movement. Jesus occasionally attracted multitudes, but his transformative work was achieved through a small group of disciples who influenced many.
So, if you’re one of those leaders who is frustrated by a lack of participation... maybe this “idea” is a new way of seeing your situation. Don’t be frustrated, build around those who have stepped up to do the work of the church. Remember, through your preaching truth, shepherding and counseling efforts you’re planting seeds that may very well grow over time to inspire wider and deeper levels of participation and engagement.
We should be exceedingly thankful to God that we don’t have to wait until 60%, or 80% or 90% of regular members decide to get involved. God can work through something as seemingly small and insignificant as a mustard seed to grow His Kingdom. Jesus saw the "crowds" who assembled to hear His messages and recognized the extreme urgency of the situation.
He didn’t wait until a large “army of believers” could be assembled, over months and years, to carry out the work of spreading the gospel. He “launched the mission” with something akin to a “mustard seed,” a small group of men filled with the Spirit. They in-turn, inspired and passionate for Christ and His Kingdom, responded to a continuously evolving vision of not only what needed to be done, but what it would take to get it done. They went out and did it... one, two or three to the entire known world of their day!
There’s a “mustard seed” in every congregation of God’s Church. It’s small but it can do great things. Of course, more “workers in the harvest” are always welcome.
