Bad Lessons run off more people than good outreach programs can bring in. You will literally kill your church visiting if all you ever visit is Chronic Absentees. If you’re not enrolled in Sunday School, you ain’t got no class! Enrollment is the most important statistic in the church.

These were just a few of the snappy little sayings by Andy Anderson.   Everyone needs a class, but If you’re not enrolled in Sunday School, you ain’t got no class! It is so powerful to hear someone share how a class of people ministered to them in their time of need and brought them to Jesus.  In September of 2006, I arrived at my classroom to find a message from the pastor on the marker board: Pray for Beth Smith.  I had no clue that Beth was sick. On Saturday, I had chaperoned the High School Band to a Band Contest and we returned at 2:00 in the morning. Both of Beth’s daughters were in the band.  When they arrived home, Beth had responded to them.  Beth’s husband, Chuck, was accompanying a terminally ill boy on a Elk hunt as a part of an organization like Make a Wish.  The next morning Beth was very lethargic and was rushed to the hospital.  The majority of the members of Sunday School class spent that day and Monday morning with Chuck, Jordan and Jessica at the hospital.  Beth never came out of the diabetic coma that she was in and died on Monday afternoon.  During the next few days, our class took the lead and ministered to the family and continued to do so to this day.  That experience led me to the conclusion: That my desire is that every Tennessean would have a Sunday School class like mine to minister to them in a time of need.

Andy is shouting from the grave: If you’re not enrolled in Sunday School, you ain’t got no class! Sunday School leader do you understand the importance of enrolling people in Sunday School?  In my opinion, every church member should be a member of a Sunday School class. After someone has been won the easiest and most efficient way to assimilate them is a Sunday School class.  In fact, Thom Rainer’s, President of LifeWay Christian Resources,  research indicates that if we get someone connected to a Sunday School class or small group that 85% of these people will still be connected to your church 5 years later, compared with only 15% of those who only attend worship.  Join me in believing that every person needs a class.

As a young minister of education, Andy convinced me that enrollment is more important than baptisms, church membership, and attendance.  He would declare, “Enrollment is the most important statistic in the church.” In fact, I agree with my friend Bob Mayfield who says, enrollment is the forgotten factor in evangelism today. Churches are dropping people from the rolls instead of adding people to the roll.  When your enrollment increases, your attendance increases. When you enroll lost people, your baptisms increase.  When your enrollment increases, your offerings increase. When your enrollment increases, your membership increases.  A pastor from West TN recently took the Power Up Your Sunday School Challenge and his church enrolled 41 new members in 7 weeks and the attendance grew from 80 to 120.

Daniel Edmonds, the State Sunday School Director in Alabama, has a great definition for enrollment. He says that enrollment is a covenant making, attendance increasing, relationship building, evangelistic opportunity.   Everyone needs a class that will enter a covenant to pray for them, to love them, to minister to them, to challenge them in their spiritual journey. But if they’re not enrolled in Sunday School, they ain’t got no class.
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Mark Miller, State Sunday School Director, Tennessee Baptist Convention