Real Threats To Our Convention Of Churches

Several times a year some prominent leaders in our convention sound alarms about imminent existential dangers facing our Convention of Churches. I believe they mean well, but their warnings often miss the mark. 

Why? 

Because their interaction with a range of churches is limited. They largely associate with healthy mid-sized to larger churches of their particular tribe within our larger convention. 

While I’m not completely certain, I don’t hear of many or any of the national leaders who are pushing the alarm buttons walking into the doors of churches running under 100. The ones that have been in decline for 60+ years.
The churches dealing with deferred maintenance, controllers or gatekeepers who refuse to let go of tradition, who stifle efforts to move the church forward because it will lessen their power and change their Sunday morning experience.

I've not heard if they have sat around tables, in dark damp and dank fellowship halls, talking to Pastors, Committee heads who just want to keep the church going but not really advance the Gospel. 

The National Leaders sounding the alarms are somewhat insulated and I think I can say with fairness a bit isolated. 

I'm around those tables, answering calls and questions, intervening to assist a church in crisis, be it the Pastor or the Committee Leaders, Deacons, a Student Pastor or a concerned Congregant. They are not mentioning concerns that the prominent national leaders are, not even close.

When most people think about the challenges facing churches today, they usually point outward.

• Culture.
• Politics.
• Secularism.
• Demographic shifts.
• Economic pressure.

Those realities matter. But I am increasingly convinced that the greatest threats facing many churches in our convention are not primarily external.

They are internal.
They are spiritual.

And unless we diagnose them honestly, we will chase false alarms, we’ll think the problems are in places they’re really not.

Declining attendance, membership losses, budget pressure, conflict, pastoral turnover, and ministry fatigue rarely emerge out of nowhere. They are usually downstream from deeper spiritual and cultural realities inside the church itself.

I believe several interconnected issues are undermining the health and future of many churches in our convention.
I see them in the churches I described above with all too common frequency. 

These are the issues over which we should be sounding the alarms.

Deficient Discipleship

This is where the breakdown begins.

We have generation upon generation of church members and attenders whose level of biblical education far exceeds their level of faithful obedience.

In short, they know more about God’s Word than they live out..

That is not merely an information problem. It is a formation problem.

Barna research has repeatedly shown a widening gap between Christian identification and actual spiritual practice. While many Americans still identify as Christians, far fewer demonstrate lives shaped by biblical conviction and active faith practice. Barna describes this as a shrinking influence of faith in everyday life.

Lifeway Research has likewise noted that many churchgoers possess biblical familiarity while struggling to integrate their faith into everyday living and witness.

That reality should deeply concern us. What are we actually doing then? 
Holding services, hearing a message and then going home? 
We are not forming sold out disciples en masse. 

A church can have Bible studies, conferences, podcasts, sermon series, and classes and still fail to make disciples if people are not increasingly obeying Jesus, demonstrating transformed character and evidencing the Fruit of the Spirit.

Biblical literacy without surrender produces spiritually immature believers who know the language of faith but resist the demands of faithfulness.

The Elevation of Personal Preference Over the Will of God

When discipleship weakens, preference rises.

​The church begins to function from the authority of personal perspective rather than surrendered obedience.
“I think…”“I believe…”“I want…”“In my opinion…”

Those statements are not automatically sinful. But they become dangerous when they outrank more important questions:

• What does God want for us?
• What does His Word say?
• What does the life of Jesus show us?
• What would faithfulness require?

Christianity Today recently described modern evangelicalism as experiencing a “loosening” of shared authority structures, doctrinal confidence, and institutional trust. The article specifically noted that phrases like “Pastor John knows best” or “the elders say so” no longer carry meaningful authority for many believers.

That reflects something much deeper than generational preference.
It reflects the rise of theological individualism.

When personal preference becomes the functional authority of the church, mission suffers because sacrifice suffers. Churches become increasingly governed by comfort, nostalgia, fear, and control rather than surrender to Christ.

Eventually the church stops asking:

• “What does God want?”
• And starts asking:
• “How do we preserve what we prefer?”

Diminished Evangelistic Passion

Once preference overtakes surrender, evangelistic passion almost always declines. Why?

• Because evangelism requires inconvenience.
• It requires sacrifice.
• It requires courage.
• It requires prioritizing lost people over congregational comfort.

Church, it is plain and simple: many of our churches have lost their passion for seeing people far from Jesus come to faith in Him.

We have increasingly outsourced gospel witness to:

• programs,
• pamphlets,
• events,
• and pastors.

Meanwhile, many believers no longer personally share their testimony or actively engage people far from God.
Research examining church growth patterns consistently shows that churches with declining evangelistic engagement also experience declining vitality, aging congregations, and weakening community connection.

Historically, evangelistically vibrant churches tend to demonstrate:

• stronger discipleship,
• younger membership,
• greater resilience,
• and healthier leadership pipelines.

Churches that lose evangelistic urgency eventually become preservation-oriented institutions rather than mission-oriented movements.

The Loss of Restorative Correction (Church Discipline)

Deficient discipleship and diminished mission eventually produce another serious problem:

Many churches no longer know how to confront sin, division, gossip, rebellion, or unhealthy behavior biblically and lovingly.

• Old Bill is as mean as a snake in church business meetings, his passive aggressive attacks and slanderous speculation are never confronted-just excused because that’s just how he’s always been. 
• Sister Susie, who has been rocking babies in the nursery for years, spins webs of gossip and division. 
• The church secretary (also a church member) is given a pass because of her longevity and sacrifice during difficult days of the church’s history, yet is not called to account over her regular undermining of the past four Pastors. 

Everyone sees it, thinks it's not right but isn’t sure what to do. 
So instead, they avoid correction altogether.

But avoiding correction is not compassion.
It is neglect.

Church consulting and church health research consistently identify unresolved conflict, accountability avoidance, and informal power structures as major contributors to congregational decline.

When churches refuse to address dysfunction:

• unhealthy people gain influence,
• fear governs conversations,
• gossip replaces truth-telling,
• and leaders become hesitant to lead clearly.

A church that cannot correct cannot remain healthy for long.

Restorative correction is not about domination.
It is about discipleship.
It is about loving one another enough to call each other back to faithfulness before damage deepens.

The Rejection of Pastoral Authority

This is often where the progression culminates.
When discipleship is weak, preference is elevated, evangelistic passion declines, and correction disappears, pastoral authority becomes the next casualty.

Pastors are welcomed as:

• encouragers,
• counselors,
• ceremonial leaders,
• and weekly communicators.

But when they attempt to:

• lead,
• confront,
• challenge,
• correct,
• or guide the church toward costly obedience,

resistance rises quickly.

Research increasingly points to declining trust in institutions and spiritual authority structures across American Christianity.

But this issue must be framed carefully.
This is not an argument for authoritarianism.

Biblical pastoral authority is not domination, ego, or control.
It is shepherding under the authority of Christ and His Word.

Yet many churches today do not want shepherds.
They want pulpiters to tickle their ears and chaplains for their preferences.

And when a church becomes governed by preference rather than surrender, faithful pastoral leadership will eventually feel threatening.

The Progression Should Cause Alarm

The progression is not random.

It follows a deeply coherent spiritual and organizational pattern.

• Deficient discipleship creates spiritually immature believers.
• Spiritually immature believers elevate preference over surrender.
• Preference-driven churches lose evangelistic urgency because mission requires sacrifice.
• Churches without mission become internally focused and resistant to correction.
• Churches resistant to correction eventually reject pastoral authority itself.

That progression is coherent spiritually, organizationally, and sociologically.

And frankly, this explains the real and present danger facing the stability of our Convention of Churches, we should be sounding the alarm bells over these things.

Final Word

The greatest threats facing many churches in our convention are not primarily cultural, political, or demographic. 
The greatest threats to the Churches in our Convention are not what the prominent leaders are putting forth. 

Unless we diagnose our threats honestly and accurately, we will continue treating symptoms  or chasing the enemy du jour while the deeper disease spreads. 

What do we need? How can it be remedied? 

Faithful local shepherds, informed prominent leaders, real strategies (both spiritual and strategic) praying and leading together in unity addressing the real threats.

Pastos Shepherding well, developing Disciples who will inhabit and lead Churches willing to ask:
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• What does God want for us?
• What does His Word say?
• What does the life of Jesus require of us?
• Are we willing to surrender our preferences?
• Are we willing to receive correction?
• Are we willing to follow faithful leadership?
• Are we willing to recover our burden for people far from God?

When a Convention of Churches humbles themselves before the Lord, acknowledges the truth about their true condition, renews its commitment to mission, and submits itself again to Christ and His Word, an enduring vital and vibrant church will emerge.

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