What is your view on...

[missmuffet]

It is not the denomination of the Church it is what is taught about God inside the Church. 

[Michael37]

15 hours ago, Dennis1209 said:

I don't know if this is wide spread or just localized to my area or not. I live in a county in Tennessee that's best defined and described as a good place to retire. There have been so many churches that have closed their doors around here. My own church at present is doing well financially, however, there are no children present to replace us; we appear to be a dying Church. The overwhelming percentage of our congregation is my age (67) or much older; our attendance / membership is shrinking by the month.

I briefly asked our interim Pastor his thoughts on this and how we might get our children's attendance much improved. He expressed he though decent paying employment was a major cause and this being more or less a retirement area of the country was a major reason? I can't say I totally agree with his thoughts, as the schools around here are packed with children.

With the exception of mega-churches and those that have programs and activities to interest, entertain and draw children; does anyone see a trend of lack of children in Bible believing, Gospel preaching churches? Or is this possibly just localized to my regional area?

Hi Dennis1209, This happens frequently, the decline of local expressions of the body of Christ, but true believers will always be led by the Holy Spirit as to where they are to fellowship and with whom so it isn't a crisis when things wind down as you describe, in my view - just time to trust God for what happens next.

[Marilyn C]

17 hours ago, Dennis1209 said:

I don't know if this is wide spread or just localized to my area or not. I live in a county in Tennessee that's best defined and described as a good place to retire. There have been so many churches that have closed their doors around here. My own church at present is doing well financially, however, there are no children present to replace us; we appear to be a dying Church. The overwhelming percentage of our congregation is my age (67) or much older; our attendance / membership is shrinking by the month.

I briefly asked our interim Pastor his thoughts on this and how we might get our children's attendance much improved. He expressed he though decent paying employment was a major cause and this being more or less a retirement area of the country was a major reason? I can't say I totally agree with his thoughts, as the schools around here are packed with children.

With the exception of mega-churches and those that have programs and activities to interest, entertain and draw children; does anyone see a trend of lack of children in Bible believing, Gospel preaching churches? Or is this possibly just localized to my regional area?

Hi Dennis,

I loved to teach Sunday school, (years back) & I can sympathise with you. However the difficulty is that there is a major shift in the Body of Christ and many don`t realise it. Previously various truths that were revealed by the Holy Spirit over time came to be the main focus of a denomination, (eg the Baptist. later Pentecostals etc). And now it is not a new denomination or non denomination that is the focus, but HOW we gather.

People are opting out of the old way of gathering. A survey was done to find out how many people went to Church meetings and how many didn`t. Previously if people didn`t go to regular Church meetings then they were not Christian. But to the surprise of those who did the survey, they found out that many people who don`t go to the old type of church meetings, are still Christians and meet in a variety of ways. They were labelled the `dones,` as in having been done with the organisational system.

Marilyn.