How can pastors and church leaders effectively measure “success” in a rural church, with the unique aspects of ministry in rural contexts?
What Is a ‘Friendly’ Church?
"In this book, I want to draw attention to a crisis in congregations that may not be on many people’s radars: too many churches are less friendly than they realize. Unfriendliness might be furtively devouring your church’s ministry, effectiveness, influence, and longevity...."
‘I’m Not Being Fed’ and Other Ridiculous Christian Complaints Every church makes a choice, whether consciously or not. And most churches never say it out loud: who are we actually designing this for?
The worship style, the Sunday morning vibe, the language from the stage, what gets celebrated as a win — all of it adds up to an answer. And that answer either welcomes people far from God or quietly tells them they don’t belong.
This is one of the most important and most avoided conversations in church leadership today. Let’s have it.
The Coming Baby Boomer Cliff: What Happens in Churches When They Are Gone? Replay
If you missed the live webinar, I am posting the links to the replay and the slides. You may want to share this research with your church's leadership team.
The Episcopal Church is aging. Where are the young people? A campus minister gives his perspective.
What Churches Should Do About Inactive Members
In this episode, Josh and Sam address a widespread reality in many churches: bloated membership rolls and shrinking attendance. Across North America, millions of names remain on church rolls even though those people haven’t attended in months... or years. In some cases, membership lists are four or five times larger than actual weekly worship attendance. The result? Confusion, unhealthy metrics, and weakened accountability. A growing number of congregations are rethinking the issue: clarifying expectations, tightening processes, and distinguishing between truly inactive members and those with legitimate life circumstances.
Benefits of Hosting a Digital Event for Women
A digital event can support your leaders, enhance the ministry you’re stewarding, and open new doors to invite women into what God is doing.
Have you seen the TEC Trajectory Study invitation?
Why we need your parish’s voice—yes, yours.
For the last few months, Forward Movement has been supporting the TEC Trajectory Study, a denomination-wide research project on Episcopal congregations led by the Rev. Dr. Christopher Corbin (Rector, Trinity Episcopal Oshkosh; Evangelism MAT Coordinator, Diocese of Wisconsin). It’s the full expansion of the narrower Bright Spots Study Forward Movement published last fall, and it’s now nearing the close of its main data-collection window.
Wave 2 closes May 27. If your parish was invited and hasn’t participated yet, this is the last meaningful window. If you weren’t invited and you think you should have been, we’d like to fix that—keep reading.
Evangelicals on the Canterbury Trail: Reflections on the Pilgrimage to Anglicanism Nearly 40 Years After Webber’s Classic
By now, the pattern is familiar. A young evangelical becomes disenchanted with her religious upbringing, discovers the liturgical church, and “walks the Canterbury Trail,” joining an Anglican or Episcopal church. She may even conclude the Anglican tradition is insufficiently Catholic and turn to Roman Catholicism or the Eastern Orthodox Church.
Back in 1985 when Wheaton College professor Robert Webber wrote Evangelicals on the Canterbury Trail, the phenomenon struck many as an intriguing novelty. Decades later, the initial trickle has become a steady stream. Wheaton, Illinois, now boasts four Anglican churches and one Episcopal congregation chock full of former evangelicals. When the Anglican Church of North America (ACNA) was formed in 2009 by theological conservatives who left the Episcopal Church, it provided an attractive alternative to the mainline Episcopal Church. Consequently, many ACNA parishes today include many converts from evangelicalism—often this group forms the majority.
What has driven pilgrims from evangelical Baptist, Presbyterian, Free Church, and non-denominational ranks? What have they found to be the chief attractions of Anglicanism?
In recent years, there has been a fair amount of criticism of our cultural institutions. Whether they be political, academic, or ecclesiastical, anyone comfortably in a place of leadership in any institution is in the crosshairs of this criticism. Things have only gotten worse on their watch, after all..
Older pastors and confessional churches have been lumped into this kind of criticism as well, either for not being focused enough on social justice and activism; or, by those sympathetic to Christian Nationalism, for having what seems to be an incredulous posture to politics and culture..
The general mood, even on topics other than culture and politics, is that the church and its gatekeepers have become comfortable, weak, and even corrupt.
Leader Stopped Doing — and Congregational Singing Got Louder
My congregation sings louder than they did a year ago. That sentence sounds simple, but if you lead worship, you know how hard it is to actually move the needle on congregational participation. I have been their worship leader for just over a year, and the difference is real: more voices, more volume, more engagement.
I started paying attention to why after reading about the ongoing decline of congregational singing in American churches. The trend is well documented and still very much alive today. Congregations are getting quieter while stages get louder. So why was our church going the other direction?
It came down to ten things I deliberately did not do. None of them are complicated. Most go against common instincts in modern worship culture. Here is what changed everything.
Also See: The Coming Baby Boomer Cliff: What Happens in Churches When They Are Gone? SlidesWhere Are the Young Adults? with Allen Wakabayashi
The Episcopal Church is aging. Where are the young people? A campus minister gives his perspective.
What Churches Should Do About Inactive Members
In this episode, Josh and Sam address a widespread reality in many churches: bloated membership rolls and shrinking attendance. Across North America, millions of names remain on church rolls even though those people haven’t attended in months... or years. In some cases, membership lists are four or five times larger than actual weekly worship attendance. The result? Confusion, unhealthy metrics, and weakened accountability. A growing number of congregations are rethinking the issue: clarifying expectations, tightening processes, and distinguishing between truly inactive members and those with legitimate life circumstances.
Benefits of Hosting a Digital Event for Women
A digital event can support your leaders, enhance the ministry you’re stewarding, and open new doors to invite women into what God is doing.
Have you seen the TEC Trajectory Study invitation?
Why we need your parish’s voice—yes, yours.
For the last few months, Forward Movement has been supporting the TEC Trajectory Study, a denomination-wide research project on Episcopal congregations led by the Rev. Dr. Christopher Corbin (Rector, Trinity Episcopal Oshkosh; Evangelism MAT Coordinator, Diocese of Wisconsin). It’s the full expansion of the narrower Bright Spots Study Forward Movement published last fall, and it’s now nearing the close of its main data-collection window.
Wave 2 closes May 27. If your parish was invited and hasn’t participated yet, this is the last meaningful window. If you weren’t invited and you think you should have been, we’d like to fix that—keep reading.
Evangelicals on the Canterbury Trail: Reflections on the Pilgrimage to Anglicanism Nearly 40 Years After Webber’s Classic
By now, the pattern is familiar. A young evangelical becomes disenchanted with her religious upbringing, discovers the liturgical church, and “walks the Canterbury Trail,” joining an Anglican or Episcopal church. She may even conclude the Anglican tradition is insufficiently Catholic and turn to Roman Catholicism or the Eastern Orthodox Church.
Back in 1985 when Wheaton College professor Robert Webber wrote Evangelicals on the Canterbury Trail, the phenomenon struck many as an intriguing novelty. Decades later, the initial trickle has become a steady stream. Wheaton, Illinois, now boasts four Anglican churches and one Episcopal congregation chock full of former evangelicals. When the Anglican Church of North America (ACNA) was formed in 2009 by theological conservatives who left the Episcopal Church, it provided an attractive alternative to the mainline Episcopal Church. Consequently, many ACNA parishes today include many converts from evangelicalism—often this group forms the majority.
What has driven pilgrims from evangelical Baptist, Presbyterian, Free Church, and non-denominational ranks? What have they found to be the chief attractions of Anglicanism?
Also See: “Evangelicals on the Canterbury Trail” revisitedA Veil Before the Eyes of the Enemy: On Tolkien, Foolishness, and the Ordinary Means of Grace
In recent years, there has been a fair amount of criticism of our cultural institutions. Whether they be political, academic, or ecclesiastical, anyone comfortably in a place of leadership in any institution is in the crosshairs of this criticism. Things have only gotten worse on their watch, after all..
Older pastors and confessional churches have been lumped into this kind of criticism as well, either for not being focused enough on social justice and activism; or, by those sympathetic to Christian Nationalism, for having what seems to be an incredulous posture to politics and culture..
The general mood, even on topics other than culture and politics, is that the church and its gatekeepers have become comfortable, weak, and even corrupt.
Leader Stopped Doing — and Congregational Singing Got Louder
My congregation sings louder than they did a year ago. That sentence sounds simple, but if you lead worship, you know how hard it is to actually move the needle on congregational participation. I have been their worship leader for just over a year, and the difference is real: more voices, more volume, more engagement.
I started paying attention to why after reading about the ongoing decline of congregational singing in American churches. The trend is well documented and still very much alive today. Congregations are getting quieter while stages get louder. So why was our church going the other direction?
It came down to ten things I deliberately did not do. None of them are complicated. Most go against common instincts in modern worship culture. Here is what changed everything.
Image Credit: St. Thomas Episcopal Church, Alton, Rhode Island
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