About Nickels and Noses

"Counting nickels and noses" is sometimes church leadership speak on church attendance and offering.

I read in I Chronicles 21:1, "Satan rose up against Israel and incited David to take a census of Israel." Some theologians and preachers will speak of this as an issue of the pride of David, King of Israel. You see, Joab, David's commanding officer, tries to talk him out of it, but David does it anyway and it leads to the death of 70,000 soldiers! What a severe penalty! In the context of the story you almost think it has little to do with David's pride and more to do with David's security. It seems he wants to know that he has a large and powerful enough army to deal with any threats against the nation of Israel. In the spiritual realm, God has been consistently emphacising Israel's need to rely upon Him and not theirselves. Even so, we have recorded for us approximate numbers of conversions in the book of Acts where the Spirit is working and drawing people to Jesus.

Sometimes, in the church it seems like we in church leadership get caught up in either one of these two things as well. Either we feel like we need to know how many people are attending so we can justify an expense such as adding a staff member or building a larger sanctuary, or at times we just want to know how large the gathering of believers is so we can record this and chart church growth. Are we more like the book of Acts doing these things or do we sometimes come closer to David and the other kings of Israel that were seeking to find some type of security that would come from knowing those numbers rather than knowing the Lord? Some might be offended that I even bring this up at all. However, is it possible when we make a big deal about attendance, that Satan could be rising up against the Church?