David Murrow gives some fascinating and believable predictions about the the church in 50 years. I’m hoping for a robotic praise band who will show up on time and play in time!

Only God knows the future. But if current trends in Christianity continue, we can expect great change in the church by 2062. I predict the church will become both larger and smaller; less centralized and more efficient at meeting people’s needs. Doctrinal differences will continue to shrink, and emphasis on mission will continue to grow. Here are my predictions of what we can expect the church landscape to look like fifty years from now:

The mid-size congregation will disappear. The church-on-the-corner that’s been the bedrock of American Christianity since colonial days will cease to exist by 2062. These churches of 50 to 500 souls will become too expensive to staff and their aging buildings too difficult to maintain. These so-called “family churches” are already losing members to megachurches that offer superior preaching, music and programming. Pastors are shunning their pulpits, preferring to plant new congregations. In their place we will see:

Megachurches will accelerate the establishment of satellite campuses. Some of these will have a physical building holding hundreds of worshippers, and some will be microchurches of less than 50 people. These churches will have little or no staff. Microchurches will be led by a layperson (or couple) and will meet in private homes or in rented spaces. These will not be “house churches” as we know them now, because they will be affiliates of…

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Pastors are like information sponges. If they aren’t studying, they are receiving a regular deluge of information from church members. I asked twenty-two pastors to share with me the most common items they hear from their church members. In the past, this information came in the form of letters, in-person conversations, and telephone calls. The digital age has made emails, texts, and social media more common.

Eleven of the pastors were above the age of forty, so an equal number were under forty years old. Here are their top ten responses in order of frequency. Each response is followed by a quote from a representative pastor in the interview.

1. Requests for hospital visits and other visits to those who are ill. “If I said ‘yes’ to every one of these requests that I got, it would be a 60-hour a week job. I have to disappoint and even anger some folks, because I can’t get to everyone.”

2. Requests to attend events and meetings at the church. “I really wish I could be omnipresent. It seems like I’m supposed to be at every wedding, every church meeting, and every Sunday school class function. I do my best, but I sometimes disappoint some folks.

3. Criticisms. “The criticisms that bother me the most are those that begin with ‘I love you pastor but . . .’ The words that follow are usually anything but loving.”

4. Updates on someone’s health. “I have to say that I appreciate those in my church that keep me updated about how someone is doing. Now, some of them go overboard with the details, but it does help me set priorities to visit and call.”

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Steve Law on musty church lobbies:

Your church lobby tells new people in about 3 seconds the kind of people that your church wants to have. Okay, maybe just 2 seconds. It is really, really, really fast and most churches do not even know what they’re doing.

I walked into one church and this is what I saw:

• Faded, worn out mauve carpet that “died” several years ago
• Furniture that I last saw in my 80 year old aunt’s house – and she died 25 years ago
• Bare walls on one side and pictures of old stuff on the wall
• A chandelier

I looked around to see if it was a church or funeral home – everything told me I was in a funeral parlor or at least a place that my great Aunt Clara (born circa 1900) would enjoy. It was like a museum – okay, you get the picture. It was not a drawing card for 20- and 30-somethings. It was not even attractive to anyone under 60 – but most people had seen it for so long that they felt it was just part of the church. But anyone who was new to the church and walked in there was immediately turned off by what they saw.

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Does your church think it’s too cool to sing Christmas music… at Christmas? You might want to rethink that.

Christmas music is nearly inescapable every December — and according to a new LifeWay Research study, most Americans enjoy it, Baptist Press reports. According to the poll, 70 percent of Americans enjoy hearing Christmas music in December and 86 percent believe school choirs and bands should be allowed to perform religious Christmas music.

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