Last week saw the completion of the political party conference season and I was struck by a similarity between these conferences and the church in the UK.

In the 1950s, political parties were boasting over 4 million members between them and their conferences were very well attended, exciting events.

Today membership of political parties isn’t even an eighth of what it use to be. Only 1% of eligible voters place themselves on any party roster. Conference attendance has followed a similar decline.

These statistics are very similar to the decline in church attendance that has been well documented over the last 60 years. When I ask church leaders how many students are in the various churches of their city, they can only usually account for as little as 1%.

A huge amount has been written about why this already but I want to make a simple observation. People today are less likely to be a member of any kind of club. Whether it be political, religious or social - people are less inclined to define themselves by being ‘a member’.

In the world of students, this is even more prevalent and presents the church with a multitude of challenges. How do we encourage students to join? How do we retain existing students? How do we help students to feel part of the church?

I believe the answer does not lie in solving each of these conundrums. Rather, let’s embrace the death of the ‘church club’ which you are either part of or not, and welcome a church that unashamedly points all people to Jesus. A church that engages with the difficult conversations and that would prefer to spend its time with its non-members, with the poor and vulnerable.

When I read the stories of Jesus, I don’t find him being concerned with losing followers and he certainly didn’t start a club - we did. So let’s follow his example, stop worrying about numbers and start spending time with people who haven’t met this Jesus bloke yet.