Growth, Goals, and the Odd Pattern of Church Decline in America

Introduction

I’m frequently asked for reading recommendations, and what people usually want is a recommendation that’s tantamount to me endorsing whatever’s been written. I frequently disappoint people with those requests because at least half of what I read is about positions I disagree with.

Speaking of that, let’s read together the 2025 visions that GraceLife attenders turned in a few weeks back. Joking! But I will incorporate those into this morning’s sermon, and I’ll consider them alongside some reading—part of which is recommendable, part of which is pap. But that’s how writing goes. And sometimes that’s how sermons go.

As a former co-worker of mine in the writing business once said, there’s gold and gravel in all works. I’ll frame this sermon first, and then you can sift it out later.

We’ve officially moved into quarter 4 of 2024, if I can speak in business terms. After today’s sermon, we’ll have our usual Bible Fellowship time, followed by a church conference in which we’ll have to address more business and wrestle with how vision and finances and church and culture and hopes and disappointments twist and turn and tangle; and how they reveal and peel back and expose. It’s a mix of setback and solace. Grace and gut checks. Obstacle and opportunity.

Two weeks ago, we considered our church’s history all the way back to its founding in 1903. To some extent, we compared where we are now to where we/they were then.

In this sermon, I’d like to consider where we are now compared with where the church at-large is—that is, the American church at-large. I’m not much of a fan of that phrase; it’s too large of a cultural swath to measure. And it’s so large that it makes too easy of a target for cheap criticism. When’s the last time you heard someone use the phrase “American Christianity” in a positive sense?

Perhaps it should be used more positively. Because do you know who will rebuild the western part of this state (after historic damage done by Hurricane Helene)? It won’t be FEMA.¹ And that’s not only because the agency is out of money, but because the Carolinas will need to be rebuilt with more than brick and mortar. There will need to be the rebuilding of souls.

“American Christianity” is a phrase usually employed to lament either the materialism of the American church or the politicalization of the American church. And usually it’s lamented by those who make comfortable livings from the church and who, truth be told, don’t have a problem with politics in the pulpit until their particular politics are out of favor.

So let me introduce to you some ideas from a 2023 article from The Atlantic that I read last year. I’ve said already that I’m about 50/50 in my reading of things I agree and disagree with, so don’t hear me quote a source and assume support or guilt by association.

Understanding Church Attendance Decline in America

The article that caught my attention a year ago was titled “The Misunderstood Reason Millions of Americans Stopped Going to Church.”²

Especially in my pastoral role, I have a love/hate relationship with church attendance—one main topic of this article. It’s easy for church attendance to become an unhealthy measuring stick for all sorts of reasons. But neither is it a meaningless statistic.

The author of this article, Jake Meador (whom I know little about other than what any other internet sleuth would do when trying to learn more about someone), opens the article with these words:

Nearly everyone I grew up with in my childhood church in Lincoln, Nebraska, is no longer Christian.³ That’s not unusual. Forty million Americans have stopped attending church in the past 25 years. That’s something like 12 percent of the population, and it represents the largest concentrated change in church attendance in American history. As a Christian, I feel this shift acutely. My wife and I wonder whether the institutions and communities that have helped preserve us in our own faith will still exist for our four children, let alone whatever grandkids we might one day have.⁴

What this author has done is similar to the exercise I asked attenders of GraceLife to consider recently—it’s an assessment of the present with a look to the past with concern for the future. During the post-sermon Bible Fellowship times after that exercise, attenders were asked to vision-cast for 2025; they then submitted their list of goals for 2025 to me. Interestingly, there was only one item on those lists that appeared on all the lists in some spirit (though not using the same phrasing): growth or outreach. One group focused on growth in younger demographics, anything from children up to millennials. Another just called it “local outreach”; another mentioned “community investment.” Still another got a bit more specific, saying they wanted to see “members using their lives to grow the church.”

A healthy church will always have a general interest in growth because we desire to spread light in the world—indeed, to “be the light of the world,” as Jesus put it.⁵ Light spreads in darkness—we are not to hide it.

A healthy church will always have a general interest in growth because we desire to spread light in the world.

At times, specific desire to grow can be linked to different factors in a local body:

Hopefully, it’s fueled by a genuine excitement about what’s happening in the church and the desire for others to share in that good.
Perhaps a church is smaller than it once was and there is a desire to return to whatever is perceived as a baseline—to its “glory days” (cue Bruce Springsteen).
Alternatively, perhaps a church is larger, and even more growth is sought to reach whatever the church perceives to be its next calling.

We’re at a Crossroads

GraceLife Church lives at an interesting crossroads. There’s been a turnover of sorts. There’s a mixture of influx of new faces and departure of familiar friends. Those who have been attending for a number of years can see it. When I asked people to raise their hands a couple of weeks ago to indicate if you came post-2020 (COVID-19 era), it was about half of those present.

This can be a dangerous time for a church. I feel it as those who attend GraceLife do. To those who have asked “why?” regarding some departures, I’ve answered the only way I know how: honestly, heartfelt, but also with an earnest plea for the body to take care of itself, warmly welcoming new members.

Nostalgia and the desire for perpetual familiarity can pervert the Great Commandment to love God and neighbor as oneself. It can twist into a desire for self-comfort in our established relationships and routines, which we can brand as godliness.

Nostalgia and the desire for perpetual familiarity can pervert the Great Commandment to love God and neighbor as oneself.

The Age of Mega-, Giga-, and TeraChurches

Church decline in America is an odd thing as we see a decrease in overall numbers but an increase in church sizes—megachurches, gigachurches even (that’s a church with a Sunday attendance of over 10,000). We even see terabyte churches (that is, churches with over 100,000 members); those require multiple campuses, by the way.

This isn’t just an American thing, but it’s easy for us to claim ownership in a lot of areas. If you think materialism and cultural battles are American problems, you’re sadly mistaken.⁶

The question is, how do you seek church growth in a culture in which church growth overall is declining but also centralizing (into larger churches)? There’s more on this topic than we can reasonably discuss on a Sunday morning. And there are some aspects of this subject that are just not worth our attention.

But let’s take up this article’s central premise and tie it to what our own attenders have expressed as some chief concerns.

The article cites a book called The Great Dechurching,⁷ and as you might expect “religious abuse and … moral corruption in churches have driven people away.”⁸ But that’s not the main reason people are leaving church. Both the article and the book suggest that the defining problem driving out most people who leave is “just how American life works in the 21st century.” The author continues:

Contemporary America simply isn’t set up to promote mutuality, care, or common life. … Such a system leaves precious little time or energy for forms of community that don’t contribute to one’s own professional life or, as one ages, the professional prospects of one’s children. Workism reigns in America, and because of it, community in America, religious community included, is a math problem that doesn’t add up.⁹

Then, in talking about the difference between that expected exit related to some sort of moral failure or scandal, and this more banal reason for leaving, he writes:

Numerous victims of abuse in church environments can identify a moment when they lost the ability to believe, when they almost felt their faith draining out of them. The book shows, though, that for most Americans who were once a part of churches but have since left, the process of leaving was gradual, and in many cases they didn’t realize it was even happening until it already had. It’s less like jumping off a cliff and more like driving down a slope, eventually realizing that you can no longer see the place you started from.¹⁰

There are two factors that will be important for those of us who are “undechurched.” (See, anyone can coin a phrase.)

#1: We need to guard against becoming part of the crowd who slowly descend down the slope.

It’s easier to slide than you might think. So, I challenge you: Don’t be that person yourself. Yes, life is busy. COVID taught us to stay home, but those are excuses. Ultimately, we each have our individual commitments to the Lord and to His people, and we will decide whether we keep them.

In addition to watching yourself, don’t let others slip too far. Do not think we’ll succeed at community outreach if you can’t look to the person standing (sitting) to the left and right of you on a Sunday morning and say to them, “Come to Bible Fellowship today.”

#2: We need to engage the dechurched or unchurched at a level that understands that offering them one more program or activity will have no long-term success.

The best you can do programmatically is perhaps offer them some place to dump their children. But that’s not a guarantee of growth. If it were, you’d have much higher attendance levels at GraceLife based solely on having an academy (school).

Here’s what you’re up against inviting someone to church:

As the article author writes, “A person might be entering mid-career, working a high-stress job requiring a 60- or 70-hour workweek. Add to that 15 hours of commute time, and suddenly something like two-thirds of their waking hours in the week are already accounted for. And so when a friend invites them to a Sunday-morning brunch, they probably want to go to church, but they also want to see that friend, because they haven’t been able to see them for months. The friend wins out.”
“After a few weeks of either scenario, the thought of going to church on Sunday carries a certain mental burden with it—you might wantto go, but you also dread the inevitable questions about where you have been. ‘I skipped church to go to brunch with a friend’ or ‘I was just too tired to come’ don’t sound like convincing excuses as you rehearse the conversation in your mind. Soon it actually sounds like it’d be harder to attend than to skip, even if some part of you still wants to go. The underlying challenge for many is that their lives are stretched like a rubber band about to snap—and church attendance ends up feeling like an item on a checklist that’s already too long.”
And here’s where it all seems impossible; the article author continues: “A vibrant, life-giving church requires more, not less, time and energy from its members. It asks people to prioritize one another over our career, to prioritize prayer and time reading scripture over accomplishment. This may seem like a tough sell in an era of dechurching. If people are already leaving—especially if they are leaving because they feel too busy and burned out to attend church regularly—why would they want to be part of a church that asks so much of them?”¹¹

I refuse to ask less of you. I refuse to ask less of myself. Someone in a vision for 2025 suggested we “balance deep dives with lighter topics.” If by lighter they mean fewer deep dives into Scripture, here’s that sermon, I guess. There’s nothing light about the times; Scripture says the days are evil, so we’re to make the most of the time.¹² And, I’m not a light person. (Sorry, I’ve tried! It just gets weird.)

This all sounds kind of dire and exhausting. Should we just grind ourselves into the ground until we die? Probably not. It is probably better than vegging out on an endless scroll in front of a screen. But there’s probably life somewhere between those extremes.

Meador’s article describes American churches as “too … content to function as … an organization of detached individuals who meet together for religious services that inspire them, provide practical life advice, or offer positive emotional experiences. Too often it has not been a community that through its preaching and living bears witness to another way to live.”¹³

I hope you have positive emotional experiences. I hope you gain practical life advice. I hope you find inspiration. But a church based on that? There’s an example of such a church. It’s found in James 2: “Go in peace, be warmed and be filled” (v. 16). There’s your positive emotional experience, your practical life advice, your inspiration. But Scripture puts those words in the mouth of one whose faith, it says, is “worthless” to others (James 2:16–17). It is a religious pursuit I’m uninterested in.

There’s a lot of low-fruit picking in this article in The Atlantic—lots of unnecessary or unexplained potshots at American success, American values, etc. What it gets right, however, is the calling out of an increasingly unsustainable way of life that pushes away the only radical alternative that can alter its course. If you want to hear radical, hear the words of Jesus.

Jesus had a peculiar way of dealing with large crowds. I’m not sure what the disciples’ emotional experience was at this moment in their walk with him. I don’t know all the practical life advice they thought they had gained or thought they were following. I don’t know how inspired they felt at this point. But in Luke 14:25–27, we see this encounter:

Now large crowds were going along with Him; and He turned and said to them, “If anyone comes to Me, and does not hate his own father and mother and wife and children and brothers and sisters, yes, and even his own life, he cannot be My disciple. Whoever does not carry his own cross and come after Me cannot be My disciple.”

We must decide whether the body of Christ, the church, is just one of the memberships we hold among competing allegiances in this world, or whether our devotion to the body of Christ is the means through which we engage the world.

We must decide whether the body of Christ, the church, is just one of the memberships we hold among competing allegiances in this world, or whether our devotion to the body of Christ is the means through which we engage the world.

During the exercise I mentioned earlier, some GraceLife attenders captured that idea, describing a desire for a deeper relationship with Christ, for a church more alive in Christ, for a greater confidence in Christ. Deeper, more alive, greater confidence: these are thoroughly biblical things. They’re also hard. But they’re possible. They’re demanding of the individual and dependent upon community.

Looking Ahead: 2025 Goals

In the exercise a couple weeks ago, some people set numerical goals. We’ve actually hit one of them already. One person/group said they wanted 80 people in Wednesday night classes. Mission accomplished. We did that at our first GraceLife University on September 25. Hitting such a goal is not that hard—people just have to show up!

Here’s a numerical goal that’s harder: “financial solvency” (as someone wrote). Another one: “leadership stability.” I can give you leadership stability insofar as it is tied to integrity. The stability tied to financial solvency is a greater question. At times it forces itself as more of a math question than a mission question. It’s a difficult balance.

I look at our neighbors to the west whose lives have been buried under the unforgiving sludge of the Carolina mountains,¹⁴ and I am grateful for what we have. I look at our shortcomings and wish for more.

If there is to be growth, it will be the product of unity. Here are the areas in which GraceLife members’ vision aligns with what I wrote for 2025.

Member intentionality. This was often labeled as “connections” or “fellowship” or “community.” I have some ideas for how to meet this goal, and I’ll talk about them in time.
Prayer. One Bible Fellowship wrote down the goal of “intentional focus on prayer.” Forgive me for not doing more in this area.
Study. Don’t you do that a lot already? Yes, but given the other demands, I’m close to the margins being erased and drawing from a dry well. I cannot do that for the sake of myself, my family, or those in the GraceLife body. My life is in consumption and dissemination of God’s Word. But the seed stealing birds, and the rocks, and the thorns come even for the preacher.

The next two goals (remember, I asked people to write down 5) were not listed on the Bible Fellowship lists:

Campus improvement. Actually, the youth group listed this, but no one else did; maybe that’s because the youth meet in the youth house—they will therefore have different ideas about campus improvements than the rest of the adults at GraceLife. Campus improvements are both unimportant and yet vitally important. Our attenders are gracious enough to overlook our stained carpet and a few missing light bulbs. But growth via guests might not happen if a guest assumes we’ll take care of one another about as well as we do this facility.
TBD. I didn’t fill out my fifth item. I don’t know what it is. I decided to leave a little more time and room for God on this.

Stewart Adoption

I want to share something for 2025 that I think is fitting in some way toward everything I’ve just shared. It is deeply personal but will affect those at GraceLife as well. It is fitting, that is, with what I’ve characterized church life to be—radical and difficult and demanding and life-shifting. It will be a test of financial solvency and leadership stability. It is declarative of the gospel. It is an intentional investment. And it will in a small way, but an eternal way, grow the church.

In 2025, I need to leave for about 40 days. When we return, Lord willing, we will have two children with us whom neither you nor I have ever met, but who—the moment we set foot on American soil—will be American citizens and adopted children of the Stewart household.

Elizabeth and I have given our lives to the gospel. GraceLife has, in turn, given us our livelihood. Forty days abroad is a lot to ask. And that’s just the beginning of a long process of acclimation and parental and family needs. And so we ask for prayers for our family and for how we at GraceLife navigate this as a church that has, for better or for worse, chosen to hire core staff positions from out of one household (myself as pastor, Elizabeth as worship director).

Here are answers to the burning questions people inevitably have at this point:

When are we leaving? I don’t know.
Who are these kids? I know very little and can tell you even less.
How are we going to do this?
Why? The gospel.

If you want to know more about that last question—about what the gospel is—come (if you’re local) on Wednesday nights this fall to GraceLife University. We have a class called “What Is the Gospel?” and we’re going through that very question. And, if you’re still in search of that book recommendation, let me recommend some by the same name—the Gospels.¹⁵ I fully endorse them. I agree with everything in them. And starting next sermon, we’ll open those books up and begin our study of the resurrection from the dead, the next subseries in our larger series on the Oracles of God.

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