Under the radar

It is sometimes said that accountants only ever deal with history, with what has happened, and can never really tell you what will happen.  In similar vein, historians by definition are skilled at recognizing, and analyzing key events of the past but only a very few people from any discipline are able to fully grasp the significance of events as they are lived.  And yet, as leaders of Christ’s church that is exactly what we are called to do.

Recent statistics from the UK suggest that church attendance has leveled off over the last 5 years.  The huge declines of recent decades seem to have ended and there might even be a degree of growth.  That is not to say that all our problems in the UK church have ended, only that our opportunities look different.  I would not be in a position to know to what extent these UK developments are mirrored elsewhere in Europe but there is some evidence that some other nations are moving in similar directions. 

I must confess to a degree of personal satisfaction that the figures have revealed such a trend, partly because I have been saying the same thing for around five years, based purely on personal observation gained from nearly a quarter of a century of frequent travel and conversation with church leaders all across the UK.

On this basis I am encouraged to take a further risk and speculate that there is a quiet revolution going on across the UK.  The church is engaging in a degree of missional activity that is potentially breathtaking and yet, for the moment, remains entirely under most people’s radar, or scope of observation. 

Let me illustrate this conviction with some figures from one particular part of the UK, an area that can be easily identified and defined in terms of population and church attendance.  I am not going to name the area but it has a population of 80,000 people and a weekly church attendance of close to 4% of the population – somewhat below the national average. 

Around 10 years ago a new church was planted which has since become 3 related congregations.  A total of 500 people attend these congregations, many of them are new converts or Christians who have returned to the faith.  A fourth congregation is planned and it may not be too long before this lively group of congregations number around 800 people or 1% of the population of the area. 

That is fairly remarkable in itself but even more interesting from my perspective is that the same church recently took the lead in calling together Christians from across the area – Roman Catholics through to Pentecostals – to a gathering which challenged the whole church to covenant together in mission.  Some 3,000 people attended the event (close to 4% of the population and therefore nearly the whole church going population) and committed to working together.

Most of this is “under the radar” and so unnoticed by the usual methodologies that we have for collecting statistics and information.  My observation is that this kind of quiet revolution is taking place in community after community across the UK.  For the moment it is hidden, in years to come, historians can come to the scene and offer us indications as to how this all happened.

Martin Robinson 5 December 2010