A Few Thoughts on the Future of Local Churches in America
Since 2013, I’ve been pondering what the future of local churches in America would look like. I’ve only journaled my thoughts and shared some of them in personal conversations. I have never made them public. I even made a list in 2015 because I was planning on doing a blog-article about this.
Some of my thoughts on this are below.
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At some point, maybe soon, but not too far in the future, I do believe there will come a time in the U.S. where churches will have to exist without their 501c3 status. If our eyes are open to the country’s shifting political and social landscape, it’s not hard to miss the storm brewing in the distance. The state and the federal government will require things of local churches—e.g., what we can’t preach or do—that would cause us to choose to obey God or keep our incorporation. (FYI, I do not consider the Covid19 outbreak as an example of this; but I do think it has played into believers’ fears and has caused some to disobey God).
As churches, we don’t comply with the government for “compliance sake”. We comply according to God (Rom. 13:1-10, 1Pet. 2:13-17). However, churches are not businesses or institutions, though we go through similar legal and insurance processes. Furthermore, these processes are recommended and required only in first-world countries, not globally. Also, to make matters muddier, the initial collaboration of the Church and the State was established for power, not God’s mission. Nevertheless, God has providentially used this collaboration to expand His spiritual kingdom despite man’s underhanded purposes and selfish motives from past to present. But God’s providence is not a signature of His approval of this collaboration, nor its perpetuity. Sometimes, sadly, it sounds and appears that many American Christians believe God’s signature is upon this union.
The local Church is a people assembled by God, structured according to His design, and under His authority (Acts 20:28-35, 1Cor. 12:12-31, Eph. 4:7-16, 1Tim. 3:1-13, Tit. 1:5-14, 1Pet. 5:1-5). Hence, when we don’t comply with the government, that’s because the compliance is not in accordance with the standard/principles of God for His Church in Scripture (e.g., Acts 5:27-42). Thus, when our government or its citizens persecute us for obeying God over man, we are counted worthy for suffering in obedience to God (1Pet. 3:13-17; 4:12-20).
If you think this is a stretch, look at the Church in Asia—which, by the way, they are thriving more in their organic nature than their legal incorporation. Also, about 3/4ths of Christian churches in the world don’t have incorporation status. They simply exist as they are where they are.
Similar to how homeschool is the alternative to traditional school, I forecast that house churches will eventually be the Christian response to continue biblically operating as New Testament churches in America. The local Church started in homes. It’s remained mainly in homes globally throughout history. So, I think we will naturally return there as governments find ways to attempt to censure and obstruct the Church.
I know many pushback on house churches. Whether their reasons are valid is irrelevant if that becomes the only way to assemble as a local church. But I do wonder if some pushback is more from fear of losing a paid career in “full-time ministry”. I mean, seminaries are expensive, and it’s not much more you can do with an MDiv or ThM outside of ministry or academia. And that also makes me wonder, has the Church in America become too dependent upon the American machine that it can’t see itself operating independently from it? Maybe that’s why so many American Christians fight to maintain it. But let’s not forget, bi/covocational ministry was common during the New Testament and still is globally. The local church can survive without the traditional model of “full-time ministry”, and we, as pastors, can stretch in our trusting God to provide us with means to take care of our families as well.
I’m not a prophet. These are merely my thoughts from the landscape my spiritual eyes see on the future horizon for local churches in America.
What about you?