going to church on Churches

Too Busy for God? American work culture is all-pervasive. For many members of your congregation, it can be a real fight to get actual time off—and cell phones and the internet has made it possible to...

By failing to come to grips with how cultural dysfunctions deeply impact the health of the church, our leaders will continue to fail to discern an essential reality concerning the nature of change: Cu...

The Church should be the society of the forgiven and the forgiving.

What is the place of the church in relation to God’s mission? Pastor John Stott offers some crucial thoughts, For the church lies at the very center of the eternal purposes of God. It is not a div...

Leader: As Christ’s Church here on earth, we are invited to be a part of a bigger story, welcomed as members of a larger community, and called to a greater mission.  In humble repentance we must ack...

[R]eliable quantitative research around this has brought some helpful insights to light. Jim Davis, Michael Graham, and Ryan Burge have released the largest study ever done on dechurching in America i...

A missionary family who has started organic churches in some of the most dangerous fields in the world once returned to the states for furlough. On the first Sunday back, they visited a large Baptist ...

Three pastors got together for coffee one day and found all their churches had bat-infestation problems. “I got so mad,” said one, “I took a shotgun and fired at them. It made holes in the ceiling, b...

Who's Playing Hooky? There’s a local market not too far from the church – and, sometimes, I’ll go there after Sunday morning services to grab some sweet corn to go with dinner (it’s New Jersey, b...

People don’t enter a church; the church enters a building.

In downtown Helsinki, there is a small building called the Kamppi Chapel. It’s not a place of worship, strictly speaking, but it’s as quiet as any cathedral. Quieter, in fact, because there are no ech...

The more I understand people and their needs, the more I am persuaded that God has uniquely designed the local church to respond to those needs.

The story goes about a young man (or woman!) with dreams of growing a small church nestled in rural Oklahoma. Despite his relentless efforts, the church continued to teeter on the edge of extinction a...

The membership of every local church is no accident; it is by divine design. There is no one there who is a spare part, a third foot, or second nose. There is no one there who is not necessary, or who...

Rick Warren, perhaps the most famous missional code breaker, surveyed his community and found why people in his community did not go to church. He found that there were four primary complaints about c...

Leader: Therefore, brothers and sisters, since we have confidence to enter the holy places by the blood of Jesus, All: by the new and living way that he opened for us through the curtain, that is, t...

About 2 out of 3 American adults who regularly attend church or other religious services say they go for their kids.

I do not go to church because it is enjoyable (usually it’s not), or because it is never dull (usually it is). I do not go to church because it satisfies my private needs and wishes (it seldom does). ...

Presbyterian minister Michael Lindvall begins his fictional story about a pastor in the Midwest in The Good News from North Haven like this: I am the pastor of Second Presbyterian Church. There is...

Pastor: Glorious Lord, You have worked the salvation of the world through the death and resurrection of Your Son. Give strength to our praise, and let our hearts and mouths be filled with the joy of...

The Danish philosopher and contrarian Soren Kierkegaard once compared Christians of his time to a flock of geese in a barnyard. Every week, they listened to an eloquent speaker who recounted the stori...

The Barna Research Group reports that in the United States about 10 million self-proclaimed, born-again Christians have not been to church in the last six months, apart from Christmas or Easter.

The story is told of a man who had gone to church for several years but suddenly stopped attending. His pastor dropped by one evening unannounced. The man answered the door and invited him in. Of cour...

And having a high priest over the house of God; Let us draw near with a true heart in full assurance of faith, having our hearts sprinkled clean from an evil conscience, and our bodies washed with pur...

Having therefore, brothers, boldness to enter into the holy place by the blood of Jesus, by the way which he dedicated for us, a new and living way, through the veil, that is to say, his flesh, and ha...

As was the normal routine on a Sunday morning, a wife got ready for church. She got up, had breakfast, showered, got dressed, put on makeup and was ready to go. It was just as she was ready to leave t...

Since 1991, the adult population in the United States has grown by 15%. During that same period, the number of adults who do not attend church has nearly doubled, rising from 39 million to 75 million—...

Writing to his parents while imprisoned on the day of Pentecost, the German Dietrich Bonhoeffer said this: At the tower of Babel all the tongues were confounded, and as a result men could no longe...

Pastor: We worship today in the name of God the Father,  People: Praise to our creating God! Pastor: In the name of His Son, Jesus Christ: People: Praise to our redeeming God!...

Pastor: Heavenly Father, as Your Son humbled Himself for our salvation, give to each of us and to every member of Your Church a confident faith in Christ’s Passion for us, so that during this Holy W...