Learning From the Top 100 Fastest-Growing Churches of 2005

 

By Dr. John N. Vaughn

In each issue of Outreach, we share inspiring ideas, insights and stories of churches of all types and sizes. However, once each year, Outreach unapologetically reports on the largest and fastest-growing churches in America. We realize this is a narrow segment of the American Church. In fact, some researchers believe that church attendance is in decline throughout the country. However, in this report, our lens is focused on the growth of U.S. megachurches. We don’t look to these churches as “the best” or the “most spiritual”; they are simply the fastest-growing or largest and—because they appear on our Top 100 lists—command the Church’s interest and attention.

For our third annual report, Outreach again partners with Dr. John N. Vaughan of Church Growth Today to publish exclusively the  lists of America’s largest and fastest-growing churches. Vaughan is known internationally as the leading expert on megachurches. We’re grateful for his work and insightful analysis of the trends indicated by this research. He also brings his personal knowledge of thousands of churches to our report, to introduce us to six of the country’s largest and fastest-growing churches whose stories we believe will inspire and challenge you.

 

Great Commission Churches

 

Learning from America’s Largest and Fastest-Growing Congregations

With half of the year still remaining, 2005 is already a landmark year for church growth in America. Take a look at some of 2005’s milestones:

• The first U.S. church passed the 30,000 weekly attendance mark (Lakewood Church, Houston).

• The number of U.S. megachurches (2,000-plus attendees) passed the 1,000 mark.

• Overall attendance at the 10 largest non-Catholic churches reached 200,000 people; attendance at the 25 largest churches reached 400,000-plus.

And during the past six months of visits in 16 states to 180 churches, I’ve seen firsthand what’s happening in many of the churches on the Top 100 lists in this issue. More than ever before, churches are planting other churches, making the next generation a priority, serving their communities without an agenda, and lovingly engaging people who don’t see a need for church or Christ in their lives.

In this report, we’ll take you inside six of these churches selected from within the ranks of the Top 100 largest and fastest-growing churches. They have not always been large or grown exponentially, and some have faced challenges that would have defeated other congregations. But each one has learned the importance of learning to cooperate with God in their individual situations.

The churches we’ve profiled, Mars Hill Church in Seattle; The United Methodist Church of the Resurrection in Leawood, Kan.; New Birth Missionary Baptist Church in Lithonia, Ga.; Fellowship of The Woodlands in The Woodlands, Texas; Lutheran Church of Hope in West Des Moines, Iowa; and NorthRidge Church in Plymouth, Mich., were all chosen to represent the ever-increasing number of churches that have intentionally and unapologetically grown by reaching the unchurched in their communities—what I call Great Commission churches.

Enjoy their stories and the accompanying report. We hope each one with its unique focus will challenge you to renew your commitment to being a Great Commission church in the place where God has called your church to represent Him.

 

Making Cultural Missionaries

 

Mars Hill Church, Seattle

Last year, this postmodern church didn’t even surface on our list of the Top 100 Fastest-Growing U.S. Churches. This year, Mars Hill Church, Seattle, led by Mark Driscoll, is #54. Since 2000, the congregation that’s home to mostly formerly unchurched, hip, media-savvy 20- and 30-somethings has increased sixfold—growing from 500 to 3,600 Seattleites.

Exponential growth is one reason why Mars Hill is our “One to Watch” church. But perhaps the more intriguing element here is the fact that this church’s attendance is increasing in the country’s second-highest least unchurched city, where 70% of the population (563,000) is unchurched and where many other churches are struggling to stay alive.

Mars Hill’s growth is so astonishing that Lead Pastor Mark Driscoll often gets the question from area pastors, “How? What is happening at Mars Hill?”

Driscoll sums it up in four words—Mars Hill’s core values since he founded the church in October 1996—meaning, truth, beauty, community. It’s his hope that anyone who comes to the church, newcomers and members, will experience both these tenets each time they enter the doors, and take those same values with them into their daily lives.

Says Driscoll: “Our members live, eat and breathe the climate of Seattle. They function as the primary missionaries for the church to the culture. We have been placed in the culture to emulate Christ.”

Culture engagement has been a main part of Mars Hill’s DNA since day one, due in large part to Driscoll, who at age 34 is tuned into the culture that envelops most of the church’s attendees.

“For most of my young adult life, I have wanted to impact Seattle for God,” Driscoll says. Hence the church’s name—like Paul, he sees himself and his church going to a mostly secular but spiritual place (like Athens), engaging the city’s intellectuals and philosophers with the Gospel.

Carrying through on its namesake, Mars Hill offers numerous ongoing entry points to help Seattle’s young, urban creative-types see the need for a relationship with Christ. The church makes creativity and originality priorities—from writing original music (no contemporary songs whatsoever) and featuring multiple bands ranging in style from punk rock to folk rockabilly, to displaying art painted by members in the lobby.

Mars Hill is also deeply in touch with Seattleites’ love affair with technology. The home of Amazon.com and Microsoft is a magnet for young adults working in the tech industry. That’s why the church makes its sermons, original Christian music and religious classes available online via downloadable mp3 files. The church’s main site has at least 10,000 downloads. Moreover, Mars Hill also offers a password-protected site for members.

“This has been a stunning means of community for us,” Driscoll says.

Those who want to remain fully up-to-date can automatically download updates as they become available through the church’s podcasting service.

And Mars Hill’s Film and Theology nights—where people gather to watch a film and discuss how it relates to modern culture and the Gospel—continue to draw hundreds of viewers, many unchurched.

Twenty-seven years ago, Driscoll would never have dreamed he’d be leading Seattle’s best-known postmodern Christian community and one of the country’s fastest-growing churches. He grew up Catholic but stopped attending church in high school. As a student at Washington State University, he read the New Testament in two weeks—but disagreed with most of it. That same year, he took a philosophy class and read St. Augustine, and something clicked, he says. He re-read his Bible (a high school graduation gift from Grace, his then girlfriend, now wife), and that was the turning point.

Not only did he commit his life to Christ, Driscoll also answered the call on his life to “marry Grace, preach the Bible and plant churches.”

The church, birthed out of a 12-member living room Bible study, now offers him a platform from which to preach “straight from the Bible”; he knows many in Seattle haven’t studied it. He also tells the congregation how the Bible relates to their everyday lives, for example, referencing how the love he has for his four children is similar to God the Father’s love for His people.

And these days, he’s communicating en masse to city residents as a periodic religion columnist for The Seattle Times, as well as writing books (his latest, Radical Reformission, Zondervan) and traveling the country, consulting with other churches on how best to approach the world with a 21st century presentation of a first-century story—the same story that has transformed his life and the church he pastors.

Church of the Resurrection, Leawood, Kansas

At its primary Sunday morning worship services, Church of the Resurrection Senior Pastor Adam Hamilton can be seen wearing a traditional robe and stole. He shares the sanctuary with a pipe organ, and oftentimes with an orchestra and choir, as well. Yet it’s as likely that congregants will hear an African-American spiritual or a Southern gospel trio as Bach or Handel. With the exception of Saturday and Sunday night services, when rock music is the rule, the worship team at Church of the Resurrection prefers a balance of worship styles—a blend of the traditional and the contemporary.

That sense of balance permeates the ministries of Church of the Resurrection. An evangelical United Methodist Church in Kansas City’s southern suburbs, Church of the Resurrection describes itself as moderate, a mainline church holding to historical doctrines while believing passionately in the need for relevancy. The church encourages its members—many of whom come with little or no religious backgrounds—to ask probing questions. And it has resulted in one of the largest churches in the United Methodist denomination.

Hamilton has seen tremendous change in the church he planted in 1990. In its early days, the  congregation of 100 met in the McGilley Chapel Funeral Home, but rapid growth forced moves into ever-larger meeting spaces, before settling in its newly built 3,200-seat worship center. Growth has continued exponentially until today, with more than 8,000 worshippers every weekend.

Hamilton believes passionately in the necessity of revitalizing and re-establishing mainline churches. He insists, “Every pastor and church must ask three burning questions: Why do people need Jesus? Why do they need the Church? And why do they need your church?” They’re the same tough questions the unchurched are asking, he believes. And until churches can answer those questions themselves, they will be unlikely to answer them for their visitors.

Worship at Church of the Resurrection is likely to include sermons that address tough, topical issues. Homosexuality, abortion, self-esteem, substance abuse and depression are all recent sermon themes. And while biblical standards are always stressed, discussion is never banned, and all seekers are welcomed. An estimated 200 homosexuals plus 1,000 non-religious attendees arrive to worship each week, of whom some 200 are homosexuals. Worshippers come from a wide array of ethnic and socio-economic backgrounds too, a trend that’s likely to continue.

Dozens of Church of the Resurrection’s ministry teams assist the greater Kansas City area while extending its evangelistic arm. Rather than charging a single evangelism team with community outreach, efforts are shared equally by ministry teams, balancing the evangelistic responsibilities between many.

Newcomers learn of educational and ministry programs at the Connection Point located in the narthex. And once visitors feel ready, they’re encouraged to join small groups and start serving. Some active programs include multiple children’s, singles and Boomers ministries, foster care and food bank ministries, support groups for widows/widowers and Habitat for Humanity projects.

“Kansas City expects 10,000 people could move back into the urban core during the next 10 to 15 years,” says Hamilton, adding that he recently met with several area pastors to discuss the  vital role that strong churches have to help revive struggling churches and start new ones for a more livable center city.

And Church of the Resurrection believes that one way to begin that revitalization is to welcome everyone.

New Birth Missionary Baptist Church, Lithonia, Georgia

Imagine embarking on a 900-mile, 15-hour trip each weekend just to attend church. Imagine flying cross-country to worship. Some members of New Birth Missionary Baptist Church do just that. And if you ask them, they’ll tell you it’s worth the trip.

New Birth never claimed a mission to entice long-distance members. In fact, the congregation targets its evangelistic efforts at greater Atlanta’s unchurched men and youth. But their efforts have had such an impact that congregants are willing to travel to be a part of the church body.

New Birth traces its roots to Traveler’s Rest Baptist Church in Scottdale, Ga. In 1984, nearly 50 years after its founding, 150 of the congregation’s members split from the original church to ease the overcrowding of the growing congregation. That small group founded New Birth in Lithonia, on the outskirts of Atlanta. In 1987, the church called Bishop Eddie L. Long to be its second pastor.

Since Long’s tenure began, there has not been a year when the church hasn’t experienced substantial growth. In 1988, attendance averaged around 2,000, and it has increased annually by about the same amount. Average attendance today exceeds 22,000 each weekend.  

The results of New Birth’s focus on men and youth are evidenced each weekend. Approximately 40% of its weekly attendance are men, and more than half—some 12,000—worshippers are youth.

“A church must do at least two things right if it is to reach men,” Long explains. “First, the pastor must meet with men without women present. Second, the pastor must be open and honest if he expects to see change in the lives of the men in his church. Real men addressing real issues can bring real Kingdom change.”

Nation of Jesus is New Birth’s primary men’s ministry, open exclusively to men. Seminars and conferences throughout the year help instruct men on living godly, Christian lives. And New Birth’s athletic ministry has proven an integral tool in engaging men and youth, although programs are available for women, as well. Based on the belief that a strong body and mind equip Christians to lead strong spiritual lives, the athletic ministry is closely connected to Samson’s Health and Fitness Center, located on church property. Fitness equipment, personal trainers, athletic leagues and organized classes build strong bodies, but also serve as outreach tools and healthy pastimes. 

To further reach young men and youth, Long meets monthly with area school principals to discuss issues facing them and their students. When needs go beyond school resources, New Birth steps in to help, and church programs address youth issues like gangster rap, sex, crime, addictions and self-image.

Families are noticing the church’s success. “Many unchurched parents come to our church out of curiosity over the change in their youth,” says Long. “At that moment, we have their attention and their trust.”

At their current growth rate, Long predicts the number of New Birth’s youth alone could reach 20,000 by the year 2010. But the successful transformation of the church’s men and young people has done more than swell the church’s attendance. It has garnered the interest of other cities throughout the South. In the past three years, the church has daughtered three satellite congregations.

Lutheran Church of Hope, West Des Moines, Iowa

This past Easter, nearly 10,000 people filled Des Moines’s Veterans Memorial Auditorium. In an age of community-wide sunrise services, the event might not have garnered much attention were it not for the fact that these worshippers represented a single congregation and its invitees.

Lutheran Church of Hope (LCOH) attendees aren’t accustomed to worshipping among so many. Yet even if the church had invited no one outside its membership (members invited 28,000 people), chances are most still would’ve been surprised at their numbers. This 5,000-member church rarely worships as a single body—its largest worship space seats only 725.  

Since its inception, LCOH has had a knack for maximizing its limited space. Some would even go so far as to say they celebrate their restrictions, seeing their boundaries as an impetus for creativity. To make space for thousands of worshippers, the church has launched nine uniquely focused weekly services. Thursday nights target a postmodern audience. Two Saturday evening services invite attendees to “come as you are,” a maxim followed even by the pastor and staff. And six services fill LCOH’s facilities on Sundays, including four contemporary and two traditional.

Such diversity would’ve been beyond the wildest dreams of this church and its pastor, Mike Housholder, 41, when he arrived in 1993. Housholder  came to the struggling  congregation to find only 15 regular attendees in spite of two years of exhausting efforts to plant the new church. Coming to LCOH meant a major risk for Housholder. But after two more years of difficult but determined work, LCOH officially launched with 255 members.

During each of the next two years, attendance tripled. And today, more than a decade later, LCOH averages  5,000 attendees each week. The church is no longer seen as a lost cause, but rather one of the fastest-growing Lutheran churches nationwide.

“It has been part of our DNA to invite unchurched friends since the day we relaunched,” says Housholder.

Without ample space to house all of its worshippers, LCOH has been forced to add additional services. But it was the church’s sincere desire for local evangelism that convinced members they needed to do more than create carbon copies of the same Sunday service. If they were to reach a diverse population, they would have to diversify their worship styles as well. And at the heart of this varied worship is a wide array of musical styles: 12 worship bands, brass ensembles, an orchestra and several vocal choirs.

There were times when the church was tempted to step back, Housholderadmits, particularly when the sanctuary proved far too small for just its members. “But we were reminded that it was not our church or just about us. Part of growing is learning to give up control.”

As a result, LCOH strays from its stereotypical German and Scandinavian Lutheran roots, attracting a more ethnically and religiously diverse community. Almost half of the congregation hails from a non-Lutheran background, and nearly 70% of those who claim Lutheran heritage were nominal until they found this congregation. LCOH continues to reach out through Alpha, which enrolls 1,000 participants every year, and VBS, which embraces 2,500 children each summer.

“It was a risk for us, as a mainline Lutheran church, to attempt alternative worship,” says Housholder. “There weren’t many models, and we are theologically passionate Lutherans.” These days, LCOH has become the model for other churches. The church has set an example as a megachurch housed in a medium-sized building.   

“I have great love and respect for those first 100 people who stayed,” says Housholder. “They remained passionate about our continued change, giving up their comfort and embracing  change to help make this possible.”

Fellowship of the Woodlands, The Woodlands, Texas

“Mark” recently became a baptized member of Fellowship of The Woodlands. The milestone event occurred just five weeks after he listened to a sermon tape given to him by a church member. The conversion might not seem noteworthy—except that Mark had been an avowed atheist. 

But Mark’s faith journey isn’t unique at Fellowship of The Woodlands. Located 30 miles north of Houston, the church bears the unusual quality of a congregation for the non-religious begun by the unchurched.

Pastor Kerry Shook didn’t plan to found a church of people with no church background. In 1993, when Shook opened the doors for the first time at his new church plant in The Woodlands, he invited 150 members of his previous congregation to join him in worship. None of them came. Instead, 15 people with little or no church background arrived. “It was the best mistake I ever made,” Shook says.

Those 15 seekers formed the small but strong foundation of Fellowship of The Woodlands church. Attendance jumped from 15 to 430 by the second year and doubled again during each of the next five years to an average of 4,400 in 1998. In 1999, the church baptized 510 newcomers in members’ swimming pools. Today, the congregation averages 13,000 in worship every weekend, and since 1993, Fellowship has planted a new church every year.

And although Fellowship of The Woodlands is the church home to thousands of committed Christians, the congregation has never lost sight of its original vision, penned by Shook 11 years ago and posted on its Web site today: “I see a place where a person with no church background can come and feel comfortable and enjoy the service because the atmosphere will be non-threatening and friendly.”

And part of the church’s mission,  Shook says, is “to help people experience Christ—rather than man’s creation of religion—so they can take the Christ Experience back to the community and the world.”

It’s one thing to target the non-religious; it’s another to reach them. In this, Fellowship of The Woodlands is at an advantage. Because its membership was, by and large, unchurched a few short years ago, many understand nonbelievers and often maintain friendships with  non-religious people.

But the congregation also relies on more formal invitations. The church employs direct mail campaigns, and special guests, such as athletes and singers, headline in an unapologetic effort to bring in the unchurched. Powerful Christmas and Easter services also draw capacity crowds. Last year’s 10 Christmas presentations drew 31,000 before turning attendees away; last Easter saw an attendance of 29,000. In each case, only 17% of the attendees had ever been inside a church except for weddings or funerals.

On weekends, the church’s welcome begins well before services start. More than 500 volunteers greet newcomers and direct traffic. As visitors transition into members, they are likely to be embraced by one of hundreds of small groups and more than 70 church ministries. And once committed to Christ, they’ll likely become part of the church’s ongoing outreach.

Says Shook: “It is the responsibility of every Christian to share the Good News with those whom God brings us into contact.”

NorthRidge Church, Plymouth, Michigan

When Temple Baptist Church of Detroit made the list of America’s 10 largest churches in 1969, it had already been in decline for nearly 15 years. The church’s highest average attendance was 4,400 people in 1954. 

“It was a museum celebrating past victories instead of life change today,” says Brad Powell, senior pastor at Temple Baptist’s successor congregation, NorthRidge Church. “The most important value for members was how many generations their family had been in the church. This translated into how long you had been on the inside rather than on new first generation growth from the outside.” Powell, only 32 years old when tapped to lead the historic church in 1990, knew things had to change.

With new leadership and a renewed sense of mission, the congregation did change. But the process took time.

“Our congregation needed to learn that relevance wasn’t a sin,” Powell says. “The reason so many churches sit still is that they’ve been taught that the way they’ve done ministry culturally—the languages they’ve spoken and their traditions—those are akin to Christianity itself. Once they understood that you could maintain biblical integrity and speak to today’s culture, we led people throughtransition. Change is not something you do to your congregation, it’s something you lead them through.”

The process was a slow one, lasting nearly seven long years. But once the church had walked through the transition, Powell addressed a final question: Why should we care?

“Because the Church is Christ’s body on earth!” Powell asserts. “Because Jesus left heaven to seek and save that which was lost, and that’s the call of the Church!” 

Finally, in 1997 the congregation exploded in numbers. That growth precipitated a move to the western Detroit suburb of Plymouth, the area from which most of the church’s worshippers were coming, and a name change from Temple Baptist to NorthRidge Church. Today, church attendance averages 9,000 each weekend—up from 1,000 in 1990.

NorthRidge uses a variety of ministry tools to reach out to its community and to educate its membership. Community care programs include a food pantry ministry, financial counseling, hospital visitation and services to the area’s homebound residents. Support programs include ministries dedicated to abortion recovery, eating disorders, sexual addiction and gambling recovery, among others.

With newly discovered energy, a culturally relevant message and growing ranks, the congregation at NorthRidge Church believes it’s succeeding in reaching out to the unchurched in their suburban Detroit location.

“Our focus is unchurched Catholics, mainlines, evangelicals, atheists and agnostics,” says Powell. “We are reaching all different kinds of people. We are a multi-generational, multi-economic, multi-educational, multi-ethnic ministry. We are reflecting our community.”

The change hasn’t been easy. In fact, it’s made many congregants uncomfortable at times. But the congregation believes that it is once again fulfilling the Great Commission, and that is exciting, says Powell. “I have an 80-year-old guy who is still in leadership with me who basically said, ‘I hate everything about our music. But I love everything that we’re accomplishing because people are coming to Christ.’ ”

He adds: “If successful transition happens here, it can happen anywhere.”

 

-Outreach magazine, "Features," July/August 2005

©2005 Outreach Publishing. All rights Reserved. Usage and reprint permissions.