More of the same?

Back to our dialogue on The Forgotten Ways. Whatever we might say about movements, it must be said in the context of the decline of the church as-we-know-it in the West at the dawn of the 21st Century. The fact is that we face a real dilemma with the declining appeal of variations of church growth models, as well as other inhereted configurations, of the church. What I will propose here is a statistical model that highlights this dilemma and poses some real issues we face.

My take on a combination of recent research in Australia conducted indicates that about 10-15% of our population is attracted to what we can call the contemporary church growth model. In other words, this model has significant ‘market appeal’ to about 12% of our population. The more successful forms of this model tend to be large, highly professionalized, overwhelmingly middle-class, and express themselves culturally using contemporary, ‘seeker friendly’, language and middle-of-the-road music forms. They structure themselves around “family ministry” and therefore offer multigenerational services. Demographically speaking they tend to cater largely for what might be called the ‘family-values segment’—good, solid, well-educated, citizens who don’t abuse their kids, who pay their taxes, and who live largely what can be called a suburban lifestyle.

Not only is this type of church largely made up of Christian people who fit this profile, the research indicates that these churches can also be very effective in reaching non-Christian people fitting the same demographical description—the people within their cultural reach. That is, the church does not have to cross any significant cultural barriers in order to communicate the gospel meaningfully to that cultural context. This situation will look something like this…

missional analysis of culture

Now, how does this apply in the US? Sally Morgenthaler reports the following statistics for the American scene. “The votes are also in about how much Americans love church.” She says… Despite what we print in our own press releases, the numbers don’t look good. According to 2003 actual attendance counts, adult church-going is at 18 percent nationally and dropping. Evangelical attendance (again, actual seat-numbers, not telephone responses) accounts for 9% of the population, down from 9.2% in 1990. Mainline attendance accounts for 3.4% of the national population, down from 3.9% the previous decade. And Catholics are down a full percentage point in the same ten-year period: 6.2% from 7.2% in 1990. Of the 3,098 counties in the United States, 2,303 declined in church attendance.

To intensify the problem we face in the new missional context we are finding ourselves in, George Barna predicts that “…by 2025 the local church [as we know it now] will lose roughly half of its current “market share” and that alternative forms of faith experience and expression will pick up the slack.” With these statistics in mind we can intuit that in America the current ‘market appeal’ of the contemporary church growth model might be about up to 35% (as opposed to 12% in Australia). But even if it is at this level of appeal, it is a decreasing one. Its time for a radical rethink taking into account both the strategic and the missional implications.

Firstly, when we analyze most evangelical churches, the vast majority of them, perhaps up to 95%, subscribe to the contemporary church growth approach in their attempts to grow the congregation in spite of the fact that successful applications of this model remain relatively rare.

Secondly, this is a strategic issue for us because various re-combinations of contemporary church growth theory and practice seem to be the only solution we have to draw upon to try halt the decline of Christianity. It seems to be the only arrow in our quiver—this can’t be a good thing. Church growth solutions so dominate our imaginations that we can’t seem to think outside of its frameworks or break out of its assumptions about the church and its mission. And that’s pretty tragic because it doesn’t seem to work for most of our churches and for the majority of our populations. In fact it has become a source of frustration and guilt because most churches do not have the combination of factors that make for a successful application of the model.

Missional issues:
So in Australia we have the somewhat farcical situation of 95% of evangelical churches tussling with each other to reach 12% of the population. And this becomes a significant missional problem because it begs the question, “what about the vast majority of the population (in Australia’s case 85%, in the US about 65%) that report alienation from precisely that form of church?” How do they access the gospel if they reject this form of church? And what would church be like for them in their various settings? Because what is clear from the research in Australia at least, is that when surveyed about what they think about the contemporary church growth expression of Christianity, the 85% range from being blasé (“good for them but not for me”) to total repulsion (“I would never go there”). At best we can make inroads on the blasé but we can’t hope to reach the rest of the population with this model– they are simply alienated from it and don’t like it for a whole host of reasons.

What is becoming increasingly clear is that if we are going to meaningfully reach this majority of people we are not going to be able to do it by simply doing more of the same. And yet it seems that when faced with our problems of decline we automatically reach for the latest church growth package to solve the problem. We seem to have nowhere else to go. Simply pumping up the programs, improving the music and audiovisual effects, or re-jigging the ministry mix, won’t solve our missional crisis. Something far more fundamental is needed.

Just to prove my point, here is a wonderfully intelligent and sharp guy who has given up on the church-as-we-know-it.

December 22, 2006 | Filed Under missional church, the forgotten ways |  

Comments

14 Responses to “More of the same?”

  1. frank doiron on December 23rd, 2006 1:17 am

    You know, the other day I was playing the “What if” game. The comment about giving to churches in Africa really hit home.
    “We’re not done supporting churches with our money. We’re just giving it to churches in Africa, who use the money for things like AIDS drugs and mosquito nets, to keep babies from getting malaria.” It really tugs at my heart and brings tears to my eyes.
    (The implication here is that we (in the west) spend our financial resources (billions) on things Jesus never even talked about. We really need to think deeply about this)….
    Over the Christmas holidays we (8 of us) are heading to Peru to work in an orphanage. (I live in central Canada). So when this fellow (Brandt) talks about helping the less fortunate ……. Wow.

    Anyhow “what if” our financial resources were not channelled into temples of brick and mortar….. but into the lives of people who do have nothing to eat, nothing to drink, nothing to wear. What if we helped the struggling single mom or dad? What if we use our money to help people start ministries to help living breathing temples……… With the guidance of the Holy Spirit and a joyful heart I think we would have a revolution.

    But somehow we seem to justify the billions spent on “church building” we come to for an hour and a half on Sundays. Sorry about this rabbit trail……..

  2. Brant on December 23rd, 2006 11:14 am

    Alan,

    First, I’m honored you read my blog, and doubly so that you linked to it.

    Second, this particular post — yours — makes me very, very thankful for the internet. It’s like fresh water to read others’ thoughts, and see how God is moving us, together. Anxious to read your book, too…

    Best,
    Brant

  3. Matt Tew on December 25th, 2006 3:24 pm

    Alan - I’d love to see more from the recent Australian research that you refer to.

    It’s tough convincing yourself and others some times to go with your heart (and what you are sure God is telling you to do) and move away from the typical modern church type model when all that seems to be successful is that type of church.

    An interesting thought that I’ve been chewing over though - it is in the nature of church-growth models of church to be self promotional. The same is not true of more organic, missional churches. The former type is also very quantifiable, large numbers in one place and so on, where the later isn’t.

    So, could it be possible that is success that we do not see, because it remains somewhat hidden - just be it’s nature?

  4. Alan Hirsch on December 25th, 2006 4:35 pm

    Matt, that’s where it gets interesting though. DAvid Barret and Todd Johnson (the premier world researchers on trends in religion) claim that what they call the ‘independents’, which certainly would include waht we call the organic church, as exeeding 400 millio people worldwide. If only 10% are in Western contexts, then there is a significant movement already, but by-and-large it goes under the radar.

    On the research, it is a combination of NCLS and Christian Research Association stats that I refer to. And it remains my take on it. But I think it is a fair take.

  5. Alan Hirsch on December 25th, 2006 4:38 pm

    By the way, I should say that it goes against my natural grain to use statistics to ‘prove’ that which should be so obvious in terms of eccelsiology and mission. Vision and a sense of the truth should be enough.

  6. Janet on December 27th, 2006 12:36 pm

    Thanks for using the stats anyway for the benefit of all the accountants, engineers, and Myer-Briggs STJ’s who really need them!

    Such people aren’t likely to be great missional innovators, but they might audit your books or act as your treasurer or donate money or give professional / legal advice… and they always remember which night is garbage night. God bless them all.

  7. alan hirsch on December 27th, 2006 1:39 pm

    :-) Good point Jan. I didn’t mean to be dismissive of different types. Its just that I think these things should make sense for the right reasons ot because of pragmatic stats. But hey! Thanks for the stats eh?

  8. Bob Carder on December 28th, 2006 2:09 pm

    One of the greatest and honest articles I have read. Why would we want to keep doing this? Let me illustrate from something that was shared with me from an anonymous author.

    What if farming was more like Christianity?

    What if…
    *Farming would be more about the barns than the fields.
    *Farmers would pretty much stay around the barns and have an office there.
    *The best farmer would be the one with the biggest barn.
    *Farmers would pray for it to rain in the barn and then pray for the barn to catch on fire.
    *Farmers would both plow and plant inside the barn.
    *Farmers could get voted out of the barn, similiar to the TV show, “Survivior”.
    *Because of all the activity inside the barn, they would develop a bad odor.
    *Due to the focus on the barn, the fields would grow more wild.
    *Activity outside the barn would become more like hunting.
    *Farmers would have more conventions, and while they were away, sometimes wild animals
    would come into the barn and cause all kinds of havoc.
    *The best farmers would be those who could give a sound talk about agriculture and use large
    words.

    NOW WHAT IF, CHRISTIANITY WAS MORE LIKE FARMING?

    -Anonymous

  9. Bob Carder on December 28th, 2006 2:29 pm

    Alan, by the way I just ordered your book and look forward to the read.

    Thanks,

    “God help us strip away Americanized Christianity and give us the courage to see Christianity through the eyes of Jesus.”

  10. Alan Hirsch on December 28th, 2006 2:51 pm

    Bob, your comment reminds me of that saying that we are very good, but we are playing the wrong game.

  11. Janet on December 29th, 2006 8:57 am

    Hey Al, I didn’t think you were being dismissive of different types of people… I just thought it was worth reflecting that different types of people learn differently.

    When I was teaching full time, my school got “into” Myer-Briggs and its implications for teaching. Because teaching is not just about conveying truth… it’s a lot to do with understanding how different people learn and developing activities that help them learn best… which is a whole separate discipline from researching “facts”, so to speak.

    So a Myer-Briggs “S” will need definitions, concrete examples, non examples to define parameters, and time / activities to process a new idea… while a Myer-Briggs “N” will tend to quickly grasp ideas and fit them into the big picture.

    So a rabid “N” like me will read your book and find the ideas immediately self-evident… “I just know this is true”. But not everyone’s like that.

    So… that’s a ramble attempting to convey that stats might go against the grain for a rabid “N” like you, but it’s actually a good and helpful thing in teaching all the “S”s of the world.

    For those who think I’m writing gobbly-gook, Myer Briggs is a personality test… see:

    http://www.teamtechnology.co.uk/mb-types/mb-types.htm

    (Apologies for getting way off track… can’t resist diversions!)

    Speaking of getting off the track… Neil Jansons has a question left hanging (post 29 under the six elements of apostolic genius)… Alan, I’m not sure if you want to tackle the tricky issue of revitalization later, or have too many threads running and missed checking this one, but Neil might want a response from someone of your considerable experience!

  12. Alan Hirsch on December 29th, 2006 11:41 am

    Jan, I trued an answer to Neil J’s post as suggested. thanks. I didn’t realize there was still a real live discussion going on there.

  13. JOLLYBLOGGER on January 9th, 2007 9:46 am

    Toward Hope: Do [North] American Christians too easily assume their surrounding culture is Christian?…

    …

  14. David on January 11th, 2007 6:13 pm

    I realise that Alan (this blog’s author) is committed to the Christian faith, but have you considered the broader context of our multi-faith society.

    So using your marketing/business terminology, the competition is across faiths.

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