First off I just want to say thanks for mentioning the Reformed
Baptists. We appreciate it. I see two possibilities. Small Groups
/ Community, or this whole emergent thing. i think the emergent thing is more likely to own the
2010-2020 decade though.
JohnLDrury said...
Could it be Cross-cultural and even multi-lingual ministry?
This is where the major growth in many denominations is happening, and they are
getting on board. The local church without a Spanish-speaking service or at
least a recently daughtered one is the "cutting
edge".
maybe ....
Diane Muir said...
Well, that certainly flooded me with memories! I grew up as a
UMC pastor's kid and experienced ALL of those things. And I had never really
separated them into these categories, but you are right on. The 70s were filled
with Jesus people and Lay Witness Missions. We had huge Holy Spirit Conferences
and everyone was doing all they could to introduce Jesus to the world.
Evangelism Explosion was HUGE! And those teachings have stuck with me for
years. And then, I grew up - spent the early 80s in a local church where all I
heard was church growth. And I REMEMBER the concerns that Billy Graham was
creating half-baked Christians. Oh ... what did we know? Such amazing cycles of
Christian outreach we have faced in these short years.
What's to come? People are desperate to move back into intimacy with each other
and with their Creator. The computer has created an interesting world for us.
We have more information about everything ... than ever before. And we move at
a faster pace daily. Our churches will become havens. A safe
place from the world of insanity where we can communicate with each other.
These may be in house churches, or small groups / communities or small,
satellite communities off a large mega-church. I think we will return to
neighborhood (defined however you'd like to define that) groups where people
care for each other.
There is already a push to be more like the New Testament churches and as the
world separates us from each other, the church will bring us back together.
In smaller communities - where there are no mega-churches, they will still be
experiencing the worship boom of the 90s for quite some time. They are already
masters of community life. This is what the mega-church groups will try to
emulate.
This is fun to consider! I'm looking forward to what you think! And 2026? Oh, I can't wait to look back to this age and see
it as history.
Andrew Overby said...
My guess is that cultural relevance will be the next wave. We
see this already with sermon series designed around major movies. We already
hear terms like "redeem the culture." Instead of attepmpting
to create an alternative Christian culture we will be trying to be Christians
in our culture.
This has been a trip down memory lane. Just think of all the
money that's been made on each of these concepts! I don't know of one concept
that's been as divisive as the so-called "worship wars." How sad to
tell the 60-somethings..if it's too loud you're too
old...get with the program or find another church where you'll be more
comfortable. Where's the spirit of Christ in that statement?
Great article, Keith. I admire the way you can take
a topic and melt it down to managable, concise
points, easy to remember. Reminds me of "Strategetics!"
All the above comments are great. I think perhaps we will see this decade as
one focused on "Freedom in the Spirit." In trying to synthesize all
this history, we will take an "anything goes" stand. We will stay
united doctrinally, but in teh practical outplay we
will be open to whatever the Spirit brings.
Tim Hawk
Nathan
Crawford said...
I'd say that there may be two movements that may vie for the
spot. I'd say that one would be the Rick Warren movement, with its purpose
driven stuff and all that goes along with it. The other may be the emergent
church, or at the least, the reclaiming of some sort of tradition. Although, I
still think those emergents are reclaiming tradition
so as to be efficient at getting people to get in and stay in the church, which
falls under the Rick Warren model. So maybe, it's just Rick Warren.
My hope though is that it may be the melding of faith and action in trying to
do more than get people in the church by allowing the church to go out and meet
people in their settings and ways. Maybe I'd like to call this a social justice
decade. Won't happen, but it's my hope.
Scott said...
This generation will see a renewal of apostolic ministry (aka
the Ephesians 4 fivefold ministry team of apostle, prophet, evangelist, pastor
and teacher) leading regional networks of simple/organic/house churches.
I believe we will eventually see house churches in every neighborhood, making
the Church more easily accessible. These churches are easily reproducible and
will fare equally well in both urban and rural settings.
Two great resources are Neil Cole's book "
Scott Estep
I am not sure where the church is headed but here are my
thoughts about what could happen. I believe that singing and praise will be a
major part of worship but hopefully it will not overtake the preaching of the
word like it has in the last 10 years. I agree with John that more
multicultural settings will start to pop up especially in the urban areas. I
can see more demand being for a bi-lingual pastor instead of a pastor who can
sing or play the piano. Women will play a much more leading role in the church
than they are today, we are already seeing 2 or 3 women preachers on the television
where 10 years ago you saw zero. I think as land aquisition
gets hard and more expensive to do that churches will begin to look at
supporting a daughter church in the same town instead of buying a 50 acre plot
and building a million dollar facility. I also think that more churches will
get involved with private schools because of the frustration over the public
school cituation. Oh and Jesus will return on July
12, 2009;) J/K but I am sure there will still be those
who will try to set the date and more writings like the Da
Vinci Code will be in print.
Kris Heiple said...
nifty thoughts.
not to sound pessmistic, but
if the world makes it to the next generation--i
believe the evangelical emergents will own the next wave.
sending all the baggage and "forms of godliness
but not tapping into the power of God" to the fire and coming out with a
purer universal church.
Erskine said...
What a thought-provoking question! I've come up with several
ideas in the last several minutes and, being impulsive, I'm going to post them
and then think about it. :)
One possibility is "reality." Many Christians talk lately about being
"real," "relavant," and
"deep." It seems to me that many emergent churches are linked with
this at some level.
Another possibility, in my mind, is a crisis over "call." It's such
an archaic term and a sacred cow in my small area of the world. People just
don't understand the word as much anymore; they understand the principle. Then
there are denominations like ours that push the call so that we fill our
denominational colleges and universities and wind up scaring students away with
an archaic term.
I also think this decade is ushering in a season of persecution unlike any
we've seen before. It's not here yet, but I think it's inevitable with the
Religious Right controlling a large segment of world power. People will
inevitably link Christianity with Religious Right politicking, and
anti-Religious Rightists will become anti-Christians. (I hope I'm not too far afield with that. I'm not generally a dooms-dayer.)
By the way, when did IWU begin offering worship ministry as a major? I was
under the impression that a student there would have to double-major in
Christian ministry and music to come close to that.
If anyone has read this far, you should really read Dr. Drury's book "The
Wonder of Worship." It's in my top 25 non-fiction books. It's in my top 3
worship books. (There's a lot of rubbish out there.)
me again ^ said...
i forgot to mention the
increase in discilpleship..a
keen observation i've made is--evangelism is all the
craze, but where does that get new Christians besides "sneaking" into
heaven? I've got a bad feeling that a sad portion of church's
aren't feeding us. i'd like
to see more teaching and less decieving.
again, i don't mean to come
off anti-church, or pessimistic, but i can't let my
concerns go unsaid.
-A son in Christ
James Petticrew said...
I think this decade will be the decade of theology when the
pragmatism of the church growth movement will be replaced by the work of a new
generation of pastor theologians. These practical theologians will work the
opposite way from the church growth movement, they will start with God and work
out ecclesiology and missiology in the light of that
theology.
Rev. C. S. Roberts said...
It may be known as the age of "rethinking the church."
That could be good and bad. If all we do is think and not act then we have
failed and this decade will be remembered as a failed attempt to do something
great... and the Osteenesque crap will carry on and
grow and a generation will be lost.
Or the age of rethinking could be followed by the age of "recreating the
church." This is my hope and perhaps our only hope if we plan on reaching
out to anyone under the age of 35 today.
Thinking in
Ohio said...
Here's hoping:
The emergent movement... their theology is liberal, their hold on scripture
sinks into the mud (not a high and lofty stand), and their moral standards are
weak... but maybe, just MAYBE... they will leave a positive mark on this
decade.
I believe their greatest contribution is their apolgetics
and push for cultural relevance... in the emergent movt.
the unchurched find a "meeting place" where
they can come in contact with Christ without fear of intimidation or rejection.
The emergents are "gentle and respectful" (see 1 Peter) in their
evangelistic agenda and the unchurched find that attractive. Maybe they'll
teach conservative evangelicals that we can win back the culture without
declaring war on "liberals" and "sinners"?
I'm leaning toward a split between purpose driven and emerging
from what I can tell. The two seem to have competing structural views, so it's
hard to see them uniting. One also seems to come more from the Reformed side
(take a guess which) and the other from Arminian Pietistic streams.
Larry said...
I must be getting old--I remember them all ;-)
IMHO, the next "movement" will be toward community. Each of the
previous decades was about getting bigger. The next one will be about getting
smaller.
JustKara said...
I think it will be intimacy --small groups of caring
friends...even large churches will have to deconstruct their (our!) (my!) approch
to mega-religion, mega-worship, and mega-everything else. -JustKara
Keith.Drury said...
Good ideas so far... here's a summary of your nominations for
how this current decade might be labeled in the future--as to what God brought
back into His church during these 10 years:
Apologetics
Apostolic ministry & simple/organic/house churches
Cross-cultural and even multi-lingual ministry?
Intimacy, relationships, church-as-haven
Cultural relevance
Discipleship
Emergents
Freedom in the Spirit
Persecution
Reality
Rethinking the church
Rick Warren movement
Small Groups / Community, or this whole emergent thing.
Social justice
Theology—especially ecclesiology
So what do YOU think? Additions?
You support one of these?
--Keith Drury
Kurt A Beard said...
I'll go for individualist church movement. By that I mean
Churches do what works best for them movement or the non-carbon copy movement.
No more identical churches but churches that are locally stylized.
I'll call it the local dive movement as opposed to the national chain
movement.
One possible trend that has not been mentioned is the interfaith
trend that has been produced by a number of factors, the so called culture
wars, the New Age movement, etc. Does anyone think this is creeping into the
church? My guess is that some denominations are vulnerable to this, when they
have rejected orthodoxy. Maybe this is not "big enough" to count as a
trend, at least not yet.
Two thoughts come to mind when I think of how we will think of
this decade. One would be the decade of church planting. There has been a push
in many denominations to plant new churches.
The other is "the Purpose Driven Era". The popularity of the books
and the way they have been used throughout the church world brings this issue
to the forefront. I realize that it is a rehashing of the last three waves, but
it still has had an impact on the church nonetheless.
It seems to me I am seeing a greater and greater emphasis on
authenticity and mission mindedness; one leads to the other. It appears that a lot
of leaders are trying to bring us out of the so-called church growth and
worship eras into a soul searching time, when we are trying to get our hearts
right before the Lord. It seems that if all the people brought in during the
growth and worship phases would now turn their hearts and minds toward what God
wants done in the world, we would see a tremendous growth for the kingdom.
bumble
said...
I love the way you see one wave led to another in the past. And
follow that trajectory, I guess the next wave would be
community.
There's a need to build community to deepen the mega-churches (Community, not
neighborliness).
On the social/cultural side, the gen-M is much more
communal than Gen-Xers and Boomers. Community would
be the draw of the church there.
And mega-church can certainly crossbreed with emergents too (Rob Bell's church
is huge, and Bill Hybel's church could be communal
too)
Well, but what do I know. I am still haven't figure out how to even grow myself
yet...
Thanks for your
thoughtful responses and ideas. My hunch
is we never know in the decade what will be its contribution until the
following decade, but there definitely are hints, aren’t there. I find that I’m
tempted to mix my own opinions with my predictions. So I’ll just admit that and
do it: I’m hoping that this will turn out to be a decade of “spiritual
formation” or “relationships” and it will restore to the church an approach to
“church” that brings the next great
wave—becoming a “means of grace” to the world… but, like I admitted, I’m
probably mixing my dreams and desires with my predictions. My son Dave posted
his opinions posing as a writer from 2046.
Thanks again
for your thoughtful and helpful responses….
--Keith