Churches and ministers must put as much thought into saying goodbye to pastors as they do to finding and greeting new ones, congregational consultants say. “Closure is a major issue,” said Bill Wilson, director of the North Carolina-based Center for…
Why Christians must stay on social media despite the hassles and hostility
While sometimes fun and useful, Facebook, Twitter and other social media sites can also be nasty, even scary places. But is that reason for churches and Christians to abandon social media completely? Editor and social media critic Richard Clark took…
These pastors see rural America — and its churches — as a growing mission field
Relatively few ministerial candidates want to lead small country congregations. It’s understandable. Those settings require pastors to provide all the functions usually divvied up by larger church staffs: pastoral care, preaching, teaching youth and children, paying the bills and preparing budgets. But there are unexpected rewards in rural churches, say some pastors.
Perspective, faith are key to successful new year’s resolutions, say ministers
A chorus of voices these days advise Americans against making New Year’s resolutions. But some ministers advise that new goals, especially spiritual ones, be undertaken at a calm, steady pace and in the context of faith.
2017’s top religion stories are a doozy
The year 2017 may not have been the biggest ever for religion news in the U.S. or the world, but it has to be close.
Angry that the religious right has hijacked the word ‘evangelical’? Let it go, experts say
Thinking of ditching the term “evangelical” to identify yourself as Christian? Get in line. Clergy, scholars, congregational coaches and innumerable laypeople are expressing increasing anger and disgust that the once respected term no longer describes their commitment to Christ and church.
Can Trump’s combative social media style help pastors, churches promote the gospel?
Many observers are raising concerns that some pastors share in President Trump’s hard-core fan-the-flames approach to social media. But there are, other ministers say, confrontational and gentle approaches to social media that can be healing and prophetic.
Author dispels small thinking behind small-church myths
A lot of Christians share the assumption that the bigger the church, the more blessed it is. One of the biggest flaws in that assumption is that it’s poor theology. “God is not more concentrated because there are more of…
The expansion of Google Maps is changing the way missionaries operate
Services such as providing church planters with the religious makeup of specific communities were once the monopoly of denominations and other large groups. Now they are also available from third-party providers.