Rapid Increase in Alternative Forms of The Church Are Changing the Religious Landscape
October 24, 2005
(Ventura, CA) – For a rapidly growing number of Americans, a local church is no longer the place to go as their primary religious meeting place. A new study by The Barna Group shows that new forms of religious experience and expression are growing in popularity, drawing millions of people closer to God but farther from involvement in a congregational church. New ways of experiencing and expressing faith, such as through house churches, marketplace ministries, and cyberchurches, are becoming the norm for millions of people.
The Growth of New Models
For most of the past century, the local congregational church was the go-to place for people interested in experiencing God and being part of a community of faith. The United States has more than 300,000 Protestant congregations and some 20,000 Catholic parishes that have been the primary gathering place for Americans. During the past decades, about two-thirds of the nation’s adults have been attached to one of those congregations, with roughly 40% of adults showing up for religious services and programs in any given week.
Rapid Increase in Alternative Forms of The Church Are Changing the Religious Landscape
October 24, 2005
(Ventura, CA) For a rapidly growing number of Americans, a local church is no longer the place to go as their primary religious meeting place. A new study by The Barna Group shows that new forms of religious experience and expression are growing in popularity, drawing millions of people closer to God but farther from involvement in a congregational church. New ways of experiencing and expressing faith, such as through house churches, marketplace ministries, and cyberchurches, are becoming the norm for millions of people.
The Growth of New Models
For most of the past century, the local congregational church was the go-to place for people interested in experiencing God and being part of a community of faith. The United States has more than 300,000 Protestant congregations and some 20,000 Catholic parishes that have been the primary gathering place for Americans. During the past decades, about two-thirds of the nations adults have been attached to one of those congregations, with roughly 40% of adults showing up for religious services and programs in any given week.
Prophetic Worship & Apostolic Preaching @ UCLA
God is asking us to press in at this hour to prayer war for “heaven on earth” to come to our university campuses. Do not relent, press in, the breakthrough is waiting to break out! This is dependent on the level of our spiritual hunger & violence. The kingdom of heaven suffers violence and the violent take it by force (Matthew 11).
This past Wednesday at UCLA we experienced a taste of heaven on earth, but it came with a cost. We got out onto campus and sensed the Lord was asking us to go into the middle of campus and lead out in prophetic outdoor worship & outdoor proclamation of the Gospel. As we walked up onto campus there were thousands of students walking up and down Bruin Walk. Normally, we would sit at the patch of grass where there were not many onlookers (free speech area), but on Wednesday the main steps at the top of Bruin Walk were open with no student organization tabling~ we took it by faith.
Prophetic Worship & Apostolic Preaching @ UCLA
God is asking us to press in at this hour to prayer war for heaven on earth to come to our university campuses. Do not relent, press in, the breakthrough is waiting to break out! This is dependent on the level of our spiritual hunger & violence. The kingdom of heaven suffers violence and the violent take it by force (Matthew 11).
This past Wednesday at UCLA we experienced a taste of heaven on earth, but it came with a cost. We got out onto campus and sensed the Lord was asking us to go into the middle of campus and lead out in prophetic outdoor worship & outdoor proclamation of the Gospel. As we walked up onto campus there were thousands of students walking up and down Bruin Walk. Normally, we would sit at the patch of grass where there were not many onlookers (free speech area), but on Wednesday the main steps at the top of Bruin Walk were open with no student organization tabling~ we took it by faith.
CHURCH MISSIONAL OR TRADITIONAL?
http://tallskinnykiwi.typepad.com/tallskinnykiwi/2005/09/church_missiona.html
As you read the awakening findings, statistics and analysis below (George Barna, Revolution) may we begin to pray into and ask God for understanding on how the church in the “Western Context” is to move forward in communicating the Gospel to the next generation. I have been all over the world and just recently in Taiwan. It is interesting to see how many “first world” countries like Taiwan adopt a “western church model” and seem to get “western church results”. Many times we western cultured Christians think “bigger is better” and the bigger, nicer and more efficient our church is then we are somehow doing the will of God. As humans we tend to worship unconciously what we can touch and see, thus, the bigger and more spectacular it is the more we are attracted to it, but this seems opposite to what is explained as the “kingdom of God” (the last shall be first and the first shall be last). I pray that we do not simply follow hype, but rather we each follow the leading of the Holy Spirit. The church in Taiwan has declined from 3% to 2.7% as I talked with church leaders there. Could it be we are seeing a similar shift worldwide for those nations who embrace a traditional western church model that we are losing Christ-followers instead of gaining them? Everywhere I go without bringing up the topic young leaders express to me their frustration with the western church model, whether its traditional-church, mega-church, or a contemporary postmodern church, somehow it is not connecting with them at the heart level. This makes me think more and more how do we go back to the heart of the New Testament Apostles and once again live out a apostolic life, faith and mission? Again, I’m a proponent and supporter of God’s Church, wherever, however and whomever. I speak at, support and love the western church believers wherever I go, but there is something happening in this structure and its people that the Holy Spirit is bringing to attention and we must have ears to hear and eyes to see. (The below is a continued conversation and article on George Barna’s new book/findings “Revolution” let the 3rd Great Awakening begin to rumble!)
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