{"id":2426,"date":"2011-09-24T09:19:10","date_gmt":"2011-09-24T13:19:10","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/blog.fbclafayette.org\/?p=2426"},"modified":"2014-07-21T10:16:04","modified_gmt":"2014-07-21T14:16:04","slug":"a-rough-decade-for-congregations","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blogs.faithlafayette.org\/church\/a-rough-decade-for-congregations\/","title":{"rendered":"Learning From the “Rough Decade” for American Churches"},"content":{"rendered":"

This week CNN posted\u00a0a blog post about the demise of churches<\/a> and synagogues over past ten years. They based their article on a study recently released by David Roozen of\u00a0the Hartford Institute for Religion Research.\u00a0 Three trends especially stood out.<\/p>\n

    \n
  1. Church attendance in America is declining.<\/strong>\u00a0 The median weekend worship attendance dropped from 130 to 108 in the past ten years.\u00a0 Researchers found that 1 in 4 congregations has fewer than 50 in attendance on Sundays and just less than half have under 100.\u00a0 Megachurches, congregations with 2000 or more members, make up less than half of one per cent of all churches today.\u00a0 Roozen said, “no single category or kind of congregation was exempt from the decadal downsizing of worship attendance.”<\/li>\n

  2. Jesus promised to build His church.\u00a0 There is no reason that growing churches cannot be built when God’s people are passionate about the task God has given us to do.<\/strong><\/p>\n<\/div>Church giving is declining<\/strong> as well. In 2000, 31% of survey participants reported excellent financial health.\u00a0 In 2010 that number fell to 14%.\u00a0 In discussing the recession, Roozen explained that it, “affected nearly every kind of congregation equally–large and small; north, south, east, and west; financially healthy or struggling before the recession.”<\/li>\n

  3. Churches bucking current trends are innovative in worship and electronic communication.<\/strong>\u00a0 People\u00a0told surveyors that congregations that were characterized by “high spiritual vitality” were those that were innovative or contemporary.\u00a0 On the other hand, only 17% of churches that were described as\u00a0neither innovative or contemporary were rated as possessing high spiritual vitality.<\/li>\n<\/ol>\n

    Take-aways for church families<\/h2>\n
      \n
    1. Embrace changes in methodology\u00a0while striving to preserve and promote sound doctrine.<\/strong>\u00a0 Our culture is changing at a dramatic pace.\u00a0 God’s people simply must be prepared to make whatever changes are necessary to minister Scripture effectively using methods that connect with those we are trying to reach.\u00a0 “We’ve never done it that way before” is a recipe for decline and failure.<\/li>\n
    2. Do not assume that a church will automatically grow.<\/strong>\u00a0 Some men and women seem to believe that success in the past means guaranteed success in the future regardless of the choices they make today.\u00a0 That is simply untrue.\u00a0 The natural tendency of the church is decline and ineffectiveness.\u00a0 God’s people must do everything we can to passionately pursue the mission the Lord has given us.<\/li>\n
    3. Praise the Lord for men and women who are faithful with their finances.<\/strong>\u00a0 We talk very little about finances at Faith, but by God’s grace, our giving has increased 5% this year in the midst of very challenging times economically in our country.\u00a0 We should always thank the Lord for His blessing and provision of generous men and women.<\/li>\n<\/ol>\n

      The bottom line<\/h2>\n

      Jesus promised to build His church.\u00a0 There is no reason that growing churches cannot be built when God’s people are passionate about the task God has given us to do.\u00a0 Let’s allow this recent survey to cause us to be thankful for what has happened at Faith in the last decade and to redouble our efforts to avoid the slide into apathy and decline.\u00a0 The eternal destiny of those around us depends on it.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

      This week CNN posted\u00a0a blog post about the demise of churches and synagogues over past ten years. They based their article on a study recently released by David Roozen of\u00a0the Hartford Institute for Religion Research.\u00a0 Three trends especially stood out. Church attendance in America is declining.\u00a0 The median weekend worship attendance dropped from 130 to… read more<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":15,"featured_media":2453,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[94],"tags":[4462,4463,4282,4465,4467,4466,4464],"yoast_head":"\nLearning From the "Rough Decade" for American Churches - Faith Church Blog<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/blogs.faithlafayette.org\/church\/a-rough-decade-for-congregations\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Learning From the "Rough Decade" for American Churches - Faith Church Blog\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"This week CNN posted\u00a0a blog post about the demise of churches and synagogues over past ten years. 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