November 6, 2025
If we’re serious about trying to reach lost sinners and fish for people like Jesus told us to, then it’s essential we understand the beliefs, behavior, and belonging of those we’re fishing for so we can use the right kind of “bait.”
November 5, 2025
The top ten ways parents can increase the probability they pass down their faith … according to the data!
July 1, 2024
In life, I was trying to fit into all kinds of groups, but didn’t. Yet in this group called “the church” (where I didn’t want to fit), I fit! . . .
July 1, 2023
By Kent E. Fillinger The number of unaffiliated, nondenominational Christian churches in the United States grew by almost 5,000 congregations and nearly 9 million people from 2010 to 2020, thus making it America’s largest Protestant “denomination,” according to the U.S. Religion Census. In 2010, unaffiliated, nondenominational Christian churches had an estimated 12,241,329 adherents in 35,496 congregations, which represented 4 percent of the overall population. By 2020, the number of people worshipping in those churches grew to 21,095,641, and their share of America’s religious population increased to 13.1 percent, representing 6.4 percent of the nation’s population. How Many Churches Do We
November 1, 2022
By Kent E. Fillinger Giving USA 2022: The Annual Report on Philanthropy for 2021 reported charitable giving rose for its fourth consecutive year, reaching its highest level in history, $484.8 billion. Total giving increased 4 percent in current dollars but decreased 0.7 percent in inflation-adjusted dollars. About two-thirds (67 percent) of total giving came from individuals, the fourth straight year individual giving totaled less than 70 percent. The wealthiest 1.4 percent of the country accounted for 86 percent of charitable donations, according to the Philanthropy Roundtable. Giving is highest among those in their 60s and 70s. Charitable giving since World
June 22, 2019
By TR Robertson David Embree has led Christian Campus House at Missouri State University in Springfield for 41 years. I talked to him about the state of campus ministry, past, present, and future. QUESTION: Why is campus ministry important? ANSWER: As Charles Malik [former president of the United Nations General Assembly] said back in the ’60s, if you want to impact the world, impact campuses. Eighty-five percent of kids from our churches go to non-church-related schools; [it] is going to be one of the most challenging intellectual and spiritual experiences of their lives. We need to be the church on
May 13, 2018
By Haydn Shaw We’ve been warned this will be the last Christian generation unless we do something now. That concerns many, quite understandably. Ten years ago, my mother-in-law, who lives with us, gave me some material on how to teach a Christian worldview to our children. She told me she had heard someone claim that unless we do something drastic, most of our children will leave the church, and ours will be the last generation of the Christian era. She didn’t know if that was true, but she wanted to make sure we taught her grandkids everything they needed to
January 26, 2018
By Kent Fillinger My three daughters and I went to New York City for the first time last October. Our visit to Ellis Island was a definite highlight! I was amazed to learn what more than 12 million people encountered at Ellis Island. One part of the Ellis Island National Museum of Immigration had the history of migration and the peopling of America. I found one display titled “Push and Pull Factors.” The sign said, “Historians talk about the ‘push’ and ‘pull’ factors that influence migration. ‘Push’ refers to the reasons people leave one place to go to another. ‘Pull’
August 11, 2017
For the first time, Emmanuel Christian Seminary at Milligan College will host the 2018 Stone-Campbell Journal (SCJ) Conference on April 6 and 7 on its Johnson City, TN, campus. The theme “Theology of Others: Judaism, Islam, and “˜None-of-the-Aboves,”” will be developed by Ellen Charry, Margaret W. Harmon Professor of Theology, Princeton (NJ) Theological Seminary; Evertt Huffard, dean, Harding School of Theology (Memphis, TN); and Richard Knopp, professor of philosophy and Christian apologetics, Lincoln (IL) Christian University. Charry will present “”˜The Wall of Hostility Has Come Down”: Reconstructing the Theological Relationship Between Judaism and Christianity”; Huffard will present “Allah Is God:
June 16, 2017
By Justin Horey In the fall of 2016, Restore Church of Silver Spring, Maryland, opened “The Living Room,” a coworking space where individuals have access to open office space, a kitchen, Wi-Fi, printing, scanning, coffee, and tea for a small monthly membership fee. The Living Room is one of a growing number of shared office environments around the country tailored to freelancers and telecommuters who don”t need a full-time office but prefer not to work out of their home. “The Living Room gives us a space where we can connect in relationships,” said pastor and church planter Aaron Thomas. “By
March 1, 2015
By LeRoy Lawson Washington Journal: Reporting Watergate and Richard Nixon”s Downfall Elizabeth Drew New York: Overlook Hardcover, 2014 Seven Men: And the Secret of Their Greatness Eric Metaxas Nashville: Thomas Nelson, 2013 The Rise of the Nones: Understanding and Reaching the Religiously Unaffiliated James Emery White Grand Rapids: Baker Books, 2014 I have been reliving a nightmare. Not just my bad dream, but our nation”s. Nightmare isn”t even my word. It”s Gerald Ford”s, part of his August 1974 swearing-in remarks. Richard Nixon had left the White House in disgrace. “My fellow Americans,” Ford told the country, “our long national nightmare
September 14, 2013
By Darrel Rowland For decades Americans fled the city for suburbs, and their churches followed them. But the trend has reversed””at least for now””with more people moving into the city. Will churches return with them? That”s a key question because the statistics showing the new boom in city growth collide with findings on spiritual beliefs, such as those compiled by pollster George Barna. The country”s current demographic upheaval is stark. From 2001 to 2010 only five U.S. cities grew faster than their surrounding suburbs. Now most cities are outstripping the “burbs, which hasn”t happened since the 1920s. A U.S. Census
July 25, 2011
By LeRoy Lawson American Grace: How Religion Divides and Unites Us Robert D. Putnam and David E. Campbell New York: Simon and Schuster, 2010 The Book that Made Your World: How the Bible Created the Soul of Western Civilization Vishal Mangalwadi Nashville: Thomas Nelson, 2011 Pause Points: The Mindful Pursuit of Health and Well-Being Gene Harker and Curt Smith Bloomington: WestBow Press, 2011 Well, it”s happened at last. The third-largest “religious” group in the United States is “Nones,” people who claim no religious or institutional affiliation. The group is more numerous (17 percent) than mainline Protestants (14 percent). Only
April 7, 2026
John B. Penrose Jr
April 7, 2026
David Faust
March 27, 2026
Rick Cherok