Thom S. Rainer is the founder and CEO of Church Answers, an online community and resource for church leaders. He has authored several books analyzing church health and church trends. Recently he posted an article on Ten Major Trends for Local Churches in America in 2023. The article can be found at https://churchanswers.com/blog/ten-major-trends-for-local-churches-in-america-in-2023.
Biblically Balanced Ministries was founded over 20 years ago to support churches and pastors in transition. The Ten Major Trends include several areas that the ministry of BBM has been focused on.
1. Rainer states, “Local congregations will emphasize evangelism more than at any point in the past three decades.” Several years ago the big movement was establishing vision and mission statements. Many churches have well established statements. However, it may be time for some churches to revisit their statement and do an evaluation of how effective they are in living out the statements. BBM has been helping pastors and churches in this area throughout our ministry. An objective outside look can be a great value to the effectiveness of evangelism and discipleship. One of the key ares of this process is to realize the importance of a clear and effective evangelistic ministry. Actually, a core balance point in BBM’s founding is between discipleship (teaching) and evangelism.
2. “The increase in the growth of diversity in congregations will be its greatest ever in 2023” is Rainer's second trend. Through personal experience in working with a diversity of churches, BBM can offer help in steering the church through the challenges of the diversity it is facing. Many churches are locked into ministry to a specific focus group. The result is a lack of diversity. This is often unintentional. The local church needs to see the need for diversity in ministry and relationships. An open evaluation of the demographics of the church can help the church to identify how they better minister to the changing communities.
3. “Church adoptions” is another trend. Churches need to move beyond the idea that autonomy means each church is on it’s own. Larger churches or even more effective smaller churches need to be ready to connect in ways to strengthen and encourage struggling churches. One of the major ways I have been able to help struggling churches is to find outside resources including other churches or church associations.
4. One of the points Rainer makes is a growing need for “intentional interim” or transitional interim pastors who do not simply fill the pulpit but offer a consulting process. This has been a vital part of the ministry of BBM for over 22 years.
BBM has been offering a number of ministries that directly relate to the trends noted by Rainer. Three of our specific ministries that address many of the trends are:
Pastoral Transition workshops and assessments
Vision and Mission Church Review (Balancing Your Vision)
Pastoral Coaching
Strategic Ministry Planning including a church demographic study
You can check out our ministries at www.balancedministries.org. I am always available to take calls or emails to discus these and other areas of ministry.