May 1, 2023
2022 Church Stats and Charts
Here are the charts for Christian Standard's annual survey of churches. These statistics are for the year 2022.
Series: Featured
May 1, 2023
2022 Annual Survey Fast Facts
AVERAGE WEEKLY IN-PERSON WORSHIP ATTENDANCE Megachurches: 5,136 (22 churches) Emerging Megachurches: 1,367 (37 churches) Large Churches: 714 (49 churches) Medium Churches: 361 (61 churches) Small Churches: 159 (83 churches) Very Small Churches: 51 (118 churches) _ _ _ AVERAGE WEEKLY IN-PERSON + ONLINE WORSHIP ATTENDANCE Megachurches: 6,375 (36 churches) Emerging Megachurches: 1,393 (45 churches) Large Churches: 705 (44 churches) Medium Churches: 363 (57 churches) Small Churches: 161 (87 churches) Very Small Churches: 53 (101 churches) _ _ _ TOP 3 FASTEST-GROWING CHURCHES (2021-22)* Megachurches: 67.4%: Southbrook Christian Church, Miamisburg, OH 53.8%: Southeast Christian Church, Louisville, KY 53.7%: The Crossing, Quincy,
May 1, 2023
10 Personal Practices That Will Lead to Greater Unity
By Rubel Shelly How can you and I “make every effort to keep the unity of the Spirit through the bond of peace” (Ephesians 4:3)? Here are 10 practices each of us should consider: • Pray for the unity of the church. If Jesus prayed for the unity of all who would believe in him through the apostles’ message (John 17:20-26), how dare we not pray for it as well? Pray for Christians you know from various backgrounds. Pray for the “tribes” other than your own. Don’t pray for them to change but for God to let you love them.
May 1, 2023
Distinct Views on Christian Unity
3 Christian Leaders Share Their Perspectives on a Crucial Topic for Today’s Church
May 1, 2023
Can Divergent Streams Flow Back Together?
By Daryl Reed I saw a cartoon that pictures a church membership class. The teacher is showing a diagram titled “Churches and Christian Movements Throughout History.” On the left side of the chart a dot is labeled “30 AD,” representing the first church. To the right of that is a large tree of many successive generations of Christian movements. The teacher is pointing to a place further out on the tree and says, “So this is where our movement came along and got the Bible right.” A student responds, “Jesus is so lucky to have us.” I’m embarrassed to say
My Response: Inerrancy Is a Hill to Defend to the End
By Jerry Harris, Publisher Christian Standard enjoys receiving feedback from our readers. Some of the best comments and letters are printed in our “Interact” section at the back of the magazine. I have personally received both positive and negative comments on articles I’ve written; up to this point, I have never responded, because I believe those viewpoints are also instructive. But when I received this letter from Dr. David Kiger, the librarian at Milligan University, about a phrase I used in a recent column, I knew it was essential I respond. Here is his unedited letter: _ _ _ – LETTER
From ‘Fringe’ to ‘Family’
By Randy Wheeler “What kind of impact could we have on the city of Milwaukee if we had 1,000 millennials who were on fire for Jesus?” Pastor Ken Lock posed this question to a small group of friends as they dreamed about the kind of church they wanted to plant. In 2018, Evolve Church was born. One year later, Evolve had 1,000 millennials attending who were on fire for Jesus! Then COVID hit, and for the next 19 months the church was locked out of the high school they rented, services went online, and Evolve began to search for a
March 1, 2023
Chronicles of Grace (from the CS Archives)
The Perspectives of Our Editors and Essayists Over the Years
March 1, 2023
Why the Resurrection Matters
By Steve Wyatt His name was Cleopas—and he felt hopeless. So did his friend. These two friends had gone to Jerusalem to join up with Israel’s latest, greatest world-changer—another prophet, this time from Nazareth, who was rumored to be the one who would forever end Rome’s tyrannical reign. But instead? Although they had left hopeful, they were returning hopeless. Have you ever been there . . . hopeless? • Yes, these guys were believers. • Yes, they had grown to deeply love Jesus. • Yes, they had dropped everything to follow him. Here’s the problem: Jesus was trapped behind a huge stone, and
What Is This Year’s Easter Message?
Veteran Preachers Share Plans for Their 2023 Resurrection Sermons
March 1, 2023
The Grace-Filled God of the Entire Bible
By Marty Solomon The idea that the God of the Old Covenant is a God of law, while the New Covenant shows us a God of grace, is a common concept that often undergirds our reading of the Bible. This is likely made worse by the idea that the Hebrew Scriptures depict a God that is full of wrath. Even if we reject this idea on principle, it seems to have affected so much of how we read the Bible. I think most of us, whatever our opinion of the Old Testament God vs. New Testament God, would affirm the
March 1, 2023
Who Are the International Churches of Christ?
By Bobby Harrington I like to think of the historical roots of Christian Churches and the Restoration Movement through the lens of three fellowships that emerged from the time of Thomas and Alexander Campbell and Barton W. Stone in the early 1800s: to our left are the Disciples of Christ and to the right are the a cappella Churches of Christ. In reality, the picture is not that clean. The RENEW.org Network was launched five years ago as a renewal movement within the Restoration Movement. At RENEW.org, we seek to provide clarity in our postmodern time by articulating the best
March 1, 2023
An Example Worth Following: A Tribute to Ben Merold
Ben Merold, 96, a beloved minister in Christian churches and churches of Christ for almost three-quarters of a century, died November 16, 2022. _ _ _ By Doyle Roth Ben Merold lived his life fully committed to Jesus. He served God by serving many churches over his ministry career and touching the lives of millions of people. Ben truly was a man of God. Don Sanders, leadership development pastor at Harvester Christian Church and director of The Merold Institute, said this about Ben when he introduced him at a graduation ceremony not long ago: Ben is a church consultant, a
March 1, 2023
Living by Grace in a Challenging World
By Doug Crozier In his 2012 book titled Grace, Max Lucado wrote, “Grace is God’s best idea. His decision to ravage a people by love, to rescue passionately, and to restore justly—what rivals it? Of all his wondrous works, grace, in my estimation, is the magnum opus.” Our challenge as Christians in today’s world and culture is to live and breathe and exhibit God’s grace. We will do so by following the roadmap God gave us in the Old and New Testaments. The Bible is the inerrant Word of God! In my work with The Solomon Foundation, borrowers have a
March 1, 2023
Grace Unites Us
My journey in the International Churches of Christ and beyond . . .
March 1, 2023
What Is Grace?
By Mark E. Moore Question: What do we have to do to be saved? Every religion has its own answer to this question. Some encourage sacrifice; others, service; others, rituals of purification or meditation. What all (but one) have in common is some human effort to achieve favor with God. This may include knocking on doors with pamphlets, giving away wealth, self-flagellation, or confession and restitution. The common thread, however, is human effort to reach God’s height. Grace Is God’s Salvation Christianity alone moves in the opposite direction. Rather than us climbing upward, Christianity asserts that God moved downward. Salvation
January 1, 2023
What Is Truth?
A word study traces the Bible’s primary terms for truth—emet in the Old Testament and aletheia in the New—showing truth as lived faithfulness and embodied in Christ, with a call to “don’t adjust it; trust it.”
January 1, 2023
Grace and Truth
New Testament Theology Embodied in Jesus and Carried Out in Cultural Chaos
January 1, 2023
How Do We Arrive at Truth?
By Tyler McKenzie In his book Blue Parakeet, Bible professor Scot McKnight explains that every semester he gives the students in his Jesus class a test. Part one has 24 questions inquiring what they think Jesus is like. Here are four examples: Is Jesus moody? Is Jesus talkative? Does Jesus think marriage is old-fashioned and should be done away with? Does Jesus prefer to go his own way rather than act by the rules? This set of questions is followed by another that asks the students what they think they are like. Here’s the catch. Both parts are the same
January 1, 2023
Truth and the Bible Worldview
By Bobby Harrington and Daniel McCoy This article could well have been only a paragraph long. We could simply have written this: A “worldview” is your overall view of the world. Having a biblical worldview means that the teachings of the Bible fill in your answers to the big questions about reality. For example: Why do we exist? If you have a biblical worldview, your answer will include how God created us to bear his image and rule over his creation. What’s the source of our deepest problems? According to the Bible, our misery stems from our decision to mistrust
