Speech Part One – What IS changing in the Church World

(Long Post Warning)

This is the first part of my speech to the Cornerstone Knowledge Network. The speech was in four parts:

Things that ARE changing in the Church World

Things that AREN’T changing but some say they are

Things that AREN’T CHANGING YET but I think are coming

Things that SHOULD BE changing but don’t seem to be happening

Some caveats:

One, this is all my opinion based on my keyhole view of the world. Feel free to disagree.

My key hole that I see through involves lots of leaders of very large churches in US (and a few in Europe). The avg size for our clients is around 3700 in weekly attendance.

I believe that the things these churches deal with often set the tone and direction for other churches (for better or worse). So some will read my observations and say “that doesn’t apply to my church.” Fine by me. You may assign a particular point to another bucket. Fine with me.

My attempt with these lists were to help these business leaders whose livelihoods depend on working with churches be better equipped to deal with their challenges.

And part of this reflection is based on my comparisons to some notes from conversations with Senior Pastors of large churches 15 years ago. So they are “what has changed.”

So, Things that I think ARE CHANGING:

I am just going to touch on them here and if demand is great enough write a small booklet or a blog post on each one.

1. The rise of Multi Site churches – multi site changes everything as we say.
2. Social Media penetration – I read that 85% of Americans aged 18-29 logged onto at least on

   on
   

   e social media site in August 2009. That’s one month not year to date. I think widespread
   adoption of this communication medium changed how we perceive leadership so I think it changes churches.

3. Internet Campuses – They’re here and they are about to be “in a box” so any size church can have one if the want. For some this will be a fad but for others this is going to be a big part of their reaching strategy going forward.

4. Growth of Teaching Teams – that is a big, accepted change from when I joined
   Leadership Network almost 15 years ago. It’s almost like everyone wants to do it now while they may not know quite how to do it.
5. New Church Development by young 20/30s. People say this generation is not going to church. They are. They aren’t going to existing churches, they are flooding some new churches.
6. Online giving – this number continues to rise and some churches in Europe tell me that they get 80% of their giving through this channel. That is way above US. So I think eventually the number will rise. They tend to get it by automated draft by the way. Probably the most consistent way to get it.
7. The iPhone revolution of communications. Probably more accurately called the smartphone revolution with others now coming on market. How will we communicate in the future – lots being driven via these hand held devices. Pay attention to that.
8. Big change – Availability of appreciated stock . So what does that matter. Lots of gifts in the past came through that type of giving. When it ain’t around no more its hard to build an extravagant building. Might be a good thing.
9. Availability of home equity. Not as much as there used to be. Plus is that it is driving folks to be more fiscally responsible. My guess is that it might have some short term affects on churches in subtle ways.
10. More thinking of church “beyond the walls”. In Leadership Network language that means “Externally Focused Churches” being the best church FOR your community. (We have lots on this one)
11. Lots more multi racial churches (though perhaps not multi cultural churches). We have been tracking these numbers for some time. What this means? Well if you are in the building and advisement industry, (like these people are ) it means that the committee or team you are working with may have different assumptions within their own team to be worked through.
12. Mobility of Americans – I recently read how that total percentages were down. I attribute mobility factors as a big reason for megachurch attraction. If people aren’t moving at least 10 miles away as much, they tend to stay in their same patterns.
13. The book/magazine/church conference business – Anything print seems to be suffering so there is a big restructuring going on there. Also in the church conference business, there are going to be a few winners, a few that can survive and a lot that go under. So a restructuring there as well.

OK – that was the highlights of my first list.

Any to add?

Some may actually be on one of my other lists but I would love to hear your thoughts. Just hit the old comments button and send them in.

Dave Travis

Managing Director

Leadership Network

Comments

[Todd McKeever]

Thanks for a good post. I just made reference to your post in my blog (http://www.take2ministries.com/blog/read/church_changes/).

Again thanks for the great spring board to get the thinking going this morning.

[Linda Lowe]

Great ideas. Would like to know more details concerning the "Internet Campuses" and "Externally Focused Churches".

[Ayırma Büyüsü]

great post on externally focused churches and internet campuses.The details given are well point out all details.