Jude 2

Found this article very interesting in connection with the discussion on church growth, releasing of leadership etc.........

New Amish Community Every Month in U.S.
Press Release (Aug 7, 2012)
"The Amish are one of the fastest-growing religious groups in North America. They're doubling their population about every 21 to 22 years, primarily because they produce large families and the vast majority of daughters and sons remain in the community as adults baptized into the faith, starting their own families and sustaining their religious beliefs and practices." -Joseph Donnermeyer

(Columbus, OH)—A new census of the Amish population in the United States estimates that a new Amish community is founded, on average, about every 3 1/2 weeks, and shows that more than 60 percent of all existing Amish settlements have been founded since 1990.

This pattern suggests the Amish are growing more rapidly than most other religions in the United States, researchers say. Unlike other religious groups, however, the growth is not driven by converts joining the faith, but instead can be attributed to large families and high rates of baptism.

In all, the census counts almost 251,000 Amish in the United States and Ontario, Canada, dispersed among 456 settlements, the communities in which members live and worship. The 1990 census estimated that there were 179 settlements in the United States.

If the growth of the Amish population continues at its current rate, the Ohio State University researchers predict that the census could exceed 1 million Amish and 1,000 settlements shortly after 2050, and these numbers will bring economic, cultural, social and religious change to the rural areas that attract Amish settlement.

I will piggyback on this one too. I personally see a need for rural plants. Right here where we live, people are just as redneck, country, backwoods, backwards and lost as they can be. I do not hear church strategists forming plans for them. Their setting presents challenges, but the wonderful thing is their expectations are not very high to begin with. And no I am not joking or condescending. They are increasingly tech savvy, but culturally they remain simple. That is a HUGE advantage since the Gospel itself is simple. They don't want bells and whistles. They want hope. They want a place to be. But they are also ignorant, slow minded, require patient leading and need not to be abandoned soon.

dolfan, I think that one plan would not work across "rural areas" because theu can vary greatly with the region. I grew up in a fairly rural area in Illinois, now live in a rural area in KY. Night and Day differences in the culture and needs of the communities.

Generalized plans don't always fit, seek God, look at good models that are working, and don't be stuck in "the way we've always done it" Those are the most important things.

Pastor Bill wrote:dolfan, I think that one plan would not work across "rural areas" because theu can vary greatly with the region. I grew up in a fairly rural area in Illinois, now live in a rural area in KY. Night and Day differences in the culture and needs of the communities.

Generalized plans don't always fit, seek God, look at good models that are working, and don't be stuck in "the way we've always done it" Those are the most important things.

Paul here>>>>>since I posted this article let me share what I saw as the key point. It was the fact that they contributed the vast majority of their growth by keeping their own......not loosing their children. If any organization, cogop, cog, aog, Baptist or whatever was able to simply retain their own then growth would occur.

Also I do think that general plans work, with local tweeking. If I may defeer to McDonalds...In the Philippines rice is the staple instead of frys... In some places its a veggie type burger, in some place beer and wine are served.....The general concept is still the same just tweeked to fit the local clientele.

I agree Paul, it's just that often people don't take into account the local culture and do that tweaking.

On the not losing our kids, yes, that's a BIG need right now. I'm blessed with a great youth group where my kids can be very active, but so many of our churches don't have that, and we lose too many because they haven't felt a part of the church.

Upon first reading I thought you were saying we should all have more kids! we've had 3 and unless God says differently and reverses a surgery, that's as far as we can go!

Pastor Bill wrote:dolfan, I think that one plan would not work across "rural areas" because theu can vary greatly with the region. I grew up in a fairly rural area in Illinois, now live in a rural area in KY. Night and Day differences in the culture and needs of the communities.

Generalized plans don't always fit, seek God, look at good models that are working, and don't be stuck in "the way we've always done it" Those are the most important things.

Oh, I'm sure you're exactly right. I don't know about a general plan or any of that. I'm increasingly skeptical of those. But, there is a need for plants of churches in rural areas. I agree that even from county to county the "personalities" of rural folks can be different.

I'll give you an example. I live in Lawrence County, Alabama. I work in Morgan County, Alabama. Lawrence County is almost completely rural; its largest town (Moulton, where I live) has a population of 3,500. Morgan County has one city of over 50,000 (Decatur, where I work and was born and raised) and one smaller town of about 15,000 (Hartselle). These counties adjoin one another, their primary towns are all within 20-30 minutes of each other. But, for all their similarities and proximity, they are very different in the way their rural populations live on the whole. I see both on a daily basis, up close, in my work.

Lawrence County folks are plain and simple but not old fashioned. They are uneducated but they revere the school system. You have "made it" in life if you are a school teacher; if you are in education, you are beyond criticism. Any comments about the system there and they look at you like McCarthy would a Communist. They are riddled with poverty. The pervasiveness of smoking is such that even preachers smoke and dip and chew there, in abundance. One of the county's most beloved pastors is a successful car salesman and a profligate chain smoker. To suggest to anyone in Lawrence County that smoking is somehow a moral issue or a biblical one draws a cold, dead stare of contempt. Now, that's not the end-all, be-all to them, but it is an illustration of the kinds of backwardness and upside-downness that plagues them. They are drug-ridden, tattooed (badly at that), and their favorite pastime is talking about one another/who went to school where (before dropping out)/and what they had to do to keep their car or truck running yesterday -- all while smoking. They are, in a word, short-sighted. Their world is very, very small, and they like it that way. And, they are so, so, so just ... lost. The easy-believism of local Missionary Baptists (and I don't fault MB's everywhere, but they are rampant in Law. Co.) and their insistence that you don't have to live in any particular way after you pray the prayer and get baptized has created a culture of people who simply don't think God matters. Much. The local folks who do have some raising and sense about them are cloistered and separated by social choice and stratification, which is very apparent on Sundays (even while they're all standing in the same line to buy cigs before & after church).

Morgan County, on the other hand, is far more hillbilly, if I can use that word. The eastern side of the county is very hilly compared to the western side and compared to Lawrence County. You get a lot more rural folks that are like that one unmentionable episode of the X-Files, if you know what I mean. And, while meth is rampant everywhere, in eastern Morgan County it is to those folks what cigarettes are to people in Lawrence County. It is just insane. And, don't bother with loving the school system in Morgan County's most rural expanses. Some of those kids will not even bother going, and by the time the court system bounces the families in and out of court and maybe even jail for not sending the kids to school, the kids are old enough to commit juvie offenses and wind up not being able to attend a public school anyway. They finally just wear out on fooling with those kids and simply wait for them to commit felonies so the Department of Corrections can warehouse them. That's why so much of my work is more like social work than practicing law. And, just as MB's have done some harm in rural Lawrence County, the whole church has pretty much made rurals in Morgan County live as if God doesn't matter simply by ignoring them. THAT is fed by what exists in the towns and the edges of towns as a sort of caste and clique system of people who are in church but -- in my own guesstimation -- probably not really in Christ. They simply don't love, but rather pity or have outright contempt for, the country folks.

Both need church plants. Desparately. But, you better know who you're dealing with or you'll be nowhere fast. They are similar in many respects, but even between two next-door-neighbor counties, they are very, very different.