Having your church super-sized

Did you see the article in the Lancaster New Era on Friday, February 17th? In the Faith and Values section, they had an excellent article on the growing mega-church movement and how it is seen in Lancaster County. I thought that New Era Staff Writer, Joan Kern, did an excellent job as she interviewed Rob Skacel, Executive Director of ministries at Lancaster County Bible Church which is currently running 5,700 in attendance. If you can get your hands on that section of that day’s paper, it would be worth your reading.

On that same page of the newspaper, Jane Lampman, who is a writer for the Christian Science Monitor, also wrote an article on Mega Churches which are on the rise in our nation. She spoke of Joel Osteen who draws the largest weekly church crowd in America today with 30,000 people in a total of three worship services. She also mentions Rick Warren who pastors in Saddleback, California and is most known for his best selling books as well as Bill Hybels who heads the Willow Creek Association where he mentors over 11,000 churches.

According to the article, Protestant congregations with regular weekly attendance of over 2,000 people have doubled over the past 5 years. One study has identified 1,210 churches in America with a weekly attendance average of 3,612 or more. Most of these are found down south but they are becoming more and more evident all across our country. However, this accounts for only 0.5% of all U.S. churches. There were four churches in Lancaster County that were identified as being mega-churches:

• Lancaster County Bible Church in Manheim (2005 average attendance of 4,600)
• The Worship Center in Lancaster (2005 average attendance of 2,260)
• Calvary Church in Lancaster (2005 average attendance of 2,200)
• Dove Christian Fellowship in Ephrata (2005 average attendance of 2,000)

Of the mega-churches throughout the country, two-thirds of them are affiliated with a denomination. According to Mark Chaves of the University of Arizona, “Something is happening that is leading more and more people to shift from smaller to bigger congregations within all denominations, liberal and conservative.” His research found that 15% of Southern Baptists attend the largest 1% of their churches.

The study found that there are many varieties of mega-churches in size and emphasis. 54% have between 2,000 and 3,000 members. Only 4% have more than 10,000 people. 27% of mega-churches have satellite locations and 37% of them have started a new congregation in the last 5 years. Four types of mega-churches were identified:

• Those that focus strongly on teaching as in the Baptist tradition
• Those that are seeker-sensitive and aim at evangelizing the unchurched
• Those that preach the prosperity Gospel promising health and wealth
• Those that are youth oriented churches with leaders that relate to popular culture