How to Evaluate your Sunday School's Effectiveness

Written by Keith Wilkinson

Planning can make a big difference in how effective your Sunday School program is. But where do you start? How can your church plan its Bible Teaching-Reaching Ministry? One proven method of effective planning is SWOT - evaluating your ministry in regards to its strengths, weaknesses, opportunities, and threats.

STRENGTHS
Begin with strengths. Starting with identifying strengths is as old as the writings of Paul. He began his letters to the churches by listing their strengths. To the Ephesians he spoke of their faith in Jesus and their love for all the saints (see Eph. 1:15).

Beginning with strengths helps the planning team identify accomplishments and qualities that make their Sunday School effective. Ask the team what has gone well. What have been the results? What are the positives about your Sunday School? What do people like about coming to Sunday School?

Asking questions about strengths starts the planning process on a positive track. You'll note good things to celebrate! Perhaps new people have joined. Perhaps a new teacher has begun service. Perhaps a new class has been started. Perhaps a class has accomplished a ministry or missions project to meet needs in the community.

WEAKNESSES
The next step in the SWOTs process is to identify weaknesses. While many areas of your Sunday School are great, some areas likely are not going so well. By listing each of the tasks of Sunday School - reach, teach, care, fellowship, witness, and worship - you can approach your evaluation in a balanced way.

What weaknesses do you see related to each task? Perhaps you are doing well with fellowship and teaching, but you are weak in outreach and witnessing. Perhaps some people do not connect small-group Bible study with the worship experience of your church. Perhaps people in need in your community do not sense that your church cares for them. By identifying weaknesses, you can take corrective actions.

OPPORTUNITIES
What opportunities beckon your Sunday School? What opportunities do you have to provide life-changing Bible study, witnessing, and caring ministries to the people in your community? Begin by asking questions such as these:

• How many people live in your community? (That question may require some research ahead of time.)
• Who are the people of your community?
• What are their ages or generational groupings?
• What are the cultural or ethnic groupings?
• What are the marital groupings?
• Are there singles?
• Is the population growing, stable, or declining?

Does your Sunday School enrollment reflect the demographics of your community? Finding significant differences may be a signal to consider developing new ministries to reach the people who live in the community. Do you have an opportunity to start new Bible study units? New classes may be started in the current organization or beyond the church building. Sunday School growth comes from starting new units.

Listing opportunities is the dreaming part of planning. Don't set limits on the creative imagination of the planners. Think of all the opportunities before the Sunday School. Out of those opportunities may come some of our best plans!

THREATS
The final step in the SWOTs process deals with threats. Lead your planning team to consider all the threats that might keep your Sunday School from realizing its potential. Threats come in three dimensions.

Some threats are simply frustrations. A frustration occurs when something bothers you. People get frustrated when things don't go well. Teachers may face frustrations in teaching. Identify those frustrations. Children's teachers may face frustration when children do not attend regularly. They may feel their teaching is ineffective. Another teacher may be frustrated because she has had little training to teach or to use Bible study curriculum materials effectively. Such frustrations become real threats to effective Sunday School work.

Another type of threat may be in the form of barriers people face. A barrier represents anything that blocks you from accomplishing your goals. One barrier may be poor communication. People may not know about your Sunday School or what Bible study is. Other barriers may be limited space or classes that won't consider starting new classes. Whatever the barrier, it represents a threat to accomplishing your dreams.

Some threats may be difficult challenges. These opportunities require unusual effort. If your largest prospect group consists of single adults, then your challenge becomes providing an effective single adult ministry. Do you have a teacher who can relate to single adults? Do you have a few singles to start a class? How will you contact single adults? Will you respond to their needs and concerns? If you are reluctant to take on these challenges, they become a threat to your progress.

Following Through
Each step in the process calls for follow-through actions...

• With strengths you can rejoice and celebrate!
• With weaknesses you identify areas for improvement.
• With opportunities you plan new and exciting ministries.
• With threats you identify frustrations, barriers, and challenges so that you can take action to overcome them. When you encounter roadblocks, you can decide if they will stop you, if you can remove them, or if you can go around them.

Keith Wilkinson is retired State Sunday School Director of the Baptist General Convention of Oklahoma.

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