The State of the Church is Hopeful
Greetings, brothers and sisters in Christ. My name is Zachary King. I have been serving as general secretary of the CRCNA since July 2022. For those of you who don’t know me, the majority of my ministry work has been in mission—in Nigeria, in Haiti, and as director of Resonate Global Mission. I am married to a pastor—my wife is a hospice chaplain—and I am the proud father of four teenagers. I am thankful for all of your prayers and encouragement in the past year.
This is my first “State of the Church” address to synod. I toyed with the idea of leading with a line like “Fellow delegates, the state of our denomination is strong!” But that’s not such a good idea. Why? Is it because our denomination is struggling with church closures and membership decline (which Overture 12 reminds us of)? Is it because, like so many other denominations, we’ve seen an increase in separations between pastors and congregations? Is it because we are facing divisive issues? No—none of those is the reason. That line is a “canned” opening used by politicians and pundits—but that’s not why I shouldn’t use it. The fact of the matter is that in all my travels I have yet to encounter a strong church or denomination.
As I’ve preached and attended classis meetings this past year, I’ve shared the letter of Jeremiah to the Babylonian exiles (Jer. 29) as a way of understanding our current reality. Jeremiah wrote that letter at a time of massive disruption. The exiles had lost everything they had valued: families, homes, communities, businesses, and even the focal point of their faith, the Jerusalem temple. Yet, in a time of weakness, Jeremiah’s message from God was one of hope: “Build houses and settle down; plant gardens and eat what they produce. Marry and have sons and daughters. . . . Increase in number there; do not decrease. Also seek the peace and prosperity of the city to which I have carried you in exile. Pray to the Lord for it, because if it prospers, you too will prosper” (Jer. 29:5-7).
In my experience God’s people have always struggled—pressed and persecuted by the world, torn by division. The church has always been weak, yet God is always strong. And therefore the church has hope.
In moments of weakness, disruption, and vulnerability, God strengthens his people to follow him into mission and ministry. For the rest of the time before us, I want to share how God is strengthening the CRC to follow his Spirit into mission and ministry through our denominational ministry plan, Our Journey 2025, and its four milestones:
- Cultivate practices of prayer and spiritual discipline.
- Listen to the voices of every generation, shaping us for ministry together.
- Grow in diversity and unity by seeking justice, reconciliation, and welcome.
- Share the gospel, live it missionally, and plant new churches in our neighborhoods.
This ministry plan is not one that I or previous leaders hatched. You, the leaders and members of the CRCNA, provided the feedback that led to the creation of this synodically approved ministry plan. I am convinced that Christ’s Spirit is working through it in our disrupted times. So let’s see how God is strengthening us to follow him into mission and ministry.
Milestone 1: Cultivating practices of prayer and spiritual discipline
When you build a house, you start with the foundation. When Christ builds his church, he starts with the foundational, spiritual connection with him. That’s why the first milestone calls us to cultivate practices of prayer and spiritual discipline, transforming our lives and communities by the power of the Holy Spirit. Our connection with God is essential, especially in turbulent times.
- In 2019, according to Yearbook data, average Sunday attendance was 77 percent of total membership. That means that in any given week, approximately three-quarters of all church members would be in the pews attending services.
- This number became hard to track during the COVID-19 pandemic. Yearbook survey responses from churches included reports of pre-COVID numbers or estimates of those attending through online worship. Generally this showed a slight drop to about 76 percent of total membership.
- In more recent years, though, as churches have reopened their doors and can once again tally attendance more accurately, we’ve seen that this number has dropped significantly to only 66 percent of total membership. One-third of our members are not worshiping consistently, and this parallels declining worship attendance trends in other denominations.[1]
Strength: And yet there are signs of hope. In my travels and conversations, I am increasingly hearing reports of deepening practices of prayer and reflection. Many pastors and leaders have peer-mentoring relationships that include prayer, Scripture reflection, and accountability. Many participate in spiritual direction and have regular spiritual retreats. It seems that challenges are driving CRC leaders toward God and that they are recognizing a deep need for spiritual renewal.
For example, the CRCNA held its first-ever prayer catalyst gathering earlier this year—a result of the work of our denominational prayer shepherd, Jon Hoekema. I and forty other leaders spent three days in unscripted prayer, seeking God’s guidance. If your classis or church doesn’t have a prayer catalyzer, contact Jon, and he can help you take the next steps.
Further, personal devotions and prayer seem to be strong among our members and have been growing. When we compare individual responses from people who took the denominational survey in 2017 or 2018, and took it again in 2021 or 2022, for example, their responses to these two questions showed significant increases:
- “I actively practice spiritual disciplines such as prayer, Bible reading, silence, and personal reflection.” (increase: +0.13, from 3.92 to 4.05 out of five)
- “Every day I earnestly think about God's Word in my life.” (increase: +0.11, from 3.95 to 4.06 out of five)
Opportunity: Our denominational agencies want to support this movement of the Spirit in the churches. For example, ReFrame’s robust prayer ministry receives prayer requests daily and has a network of over 8,000 prayer champions willing to pray for these needs. Our new congregationally focused agency, Thrive, has developed a Faith Practices Toolkit and other resources that are being well received across North America. Our prayer shepherd, Jon Hoekema, will be helping to plan regional and binational prayer opportunities in person and over Zoom. God is renewing the churches and members of the CRCNA through the cultivation of practices of prayer and spiritual discipline. This is the most hopeful reality of our disrupted moment.
Milestone 2: Listening to the voices of every generation
Growing out of our deep listening to God, the CRCNA’s ministry plan calls us to the second milestone: Listen to the voices of every generation, shaping us for ministry together.
Disruption/challenge: One of the biggest disruptions facing the church in general and the CRCNA in particular is the space opening up between churches and their young people. Those of us who are pastors, teachers, and/or parents have shelves full of books on this subject, and we see this sobering trend in our churches. Pew Research noted before the COVID-19 pandemic that the population group showing the greatest decrease in religious affiliation was the youngest—millennials.[2] That trend has increased since the pandemic.[3]
Strength: With our focus on catechism training and Christian education, historically we’ve trained our young people well. But that is not the same as seeing our youth remain connected to the CRCNA. There is one hopeful data point, however: although not many young people take our denominational survey, if we look at the responses from those who have participated, we have some things to celebrate. Of those between the ages of 12 and 29 who took the survey (around 50 respondents each year), we’ve seen significant growth in their perceptions of how the church is doing in all of the Our Journey 2025 milestones.
It is especially noteworthy that their perception of how we are doing at “listening to the voices of every generation” has improved dramatically. This is worth celebrating.
One area of listening that I want to celebrate is the improvement in our binational efforts to listen to each other. With thanks to the CRCNA staff, senior leadership, the Council of Delegates, and our U.S. and Canada ministry boards, the organizational relationship between our American and Canadian ministries has improved immensely over the past several years. Staff, delegates, and board members see the value of contextualized ministry in both countries, and they value opportunities to work together in shared projects in the U.S., Canada, and around the world. As we’ve grown in our listening across generations, we’ve also listened better across our national border.
Opportunity: As we consider the disruptions we face in intergenerational relationships, I would like to highlight the opportunity of mentoring. Helping emerging adults to navigate the next steps of their life with confidence starts with a caring faith community. Mentoring can be a beautiful illustration of the vows we make at children’s baptisms. In Denver, for example, First CRC decided to repurpose an unused parsonage to turn it into a discipleship house for emerging adults. Every year, four or five young people are invited to live in the home. During the week, they work at jobs they have found in the area. They are also encouraged to be a missional presence in the neighborhood and to be active participants in the life of the church. In exchange, they live rent free and receive vocational mentoring from a church member, discipleship from church staff, and the space and grace to learn and explore as they are intentionally enfolded into the church community. The program has been an amazing support to the young people involved, and it has helped them navigate not just the early part of their careers but also how to make their faith their own as they enter adulthood.
We are in turbulent times. But mentoring presents a great opportunity to prepare the generations for faithfulness and leadership in our churches and communities.
Milestone 3: Growing in diversity and unity
The Ministry Plan’s third milestone is Grow in diversity and unity by seeking justice, reconciliation, and welcome, sharing our faith as we build relationships with and honor the cultures of our neighbors and newcomers. Ephesians 3:6 articulates this milestone well, stating that people of all nations who confess Christ are “heirs together with Israel, members together of one body, and sharers together in the promise of Christ Jesus.”
Disruption/challenge: For many years CRC congregations assumed an ethnic and cultural homogeneity. While this was comfortable for many of the members, it is not Christ’s vision for the church. Today one-fifth of all CRC members come from nonwhite backgrounds. That number is growing as ethnic-minority groups continue to affiliate and plant churches at a higher rate. If you look around at your fellow delegates, you will see the disruption and challenge we face: our ethnic-minority leaders are not adequately represented at our synods and classis gatherings. I’ve learned that many of these leaders don’t feel comfortable either because of language barriers, lack of welcome, inattentiveness by the majority, and so on. Faithfulness to God’s vision of the church requires us to embrace our ethnic-minority leaders and congregations.
Strength: But God is working in us. A few weeks ago I drove to Ottawa, Ontario, and participated in the Canadian National Gathering. It was encouraging for me to witness the deep faith of Indigenous believers as they personally shared how the Holy Spirit, Creator Spirit, is at work in them. Our faith always grows when we encounter people from other cultures who help us see our blind spots and assumptions. They challenge us to recognize our need to be reconciled to God and to repent of sinful patterns of behavior. I pray that our Caucasian majority will take opportunities to learn about Christ at the feet of believers from other countries and cultures.
Opportunity: God is at work in the movement of international congregations that have affiliated with the CRC. Currently there are a handful of Venezuelan churches in Classis California South, and it is possible that interest could grow. I have appointed a Global Vision Team to develop a partnership framework for a global Christian Reformed Church. There is much to learn from others, including the Reformed Church in America, on this matter. Lord willing, this idea will grow into a major discussion at future synods. Despite this disrupted moment (and our many flaws), God is growing the CRC into a denomination that values diversity and unity.
Milestone 4: Sharing the gospel, living it missionally, planting new churches
Prayer and spiritual discipline are foundational. Listening to every generation and growing in diversity and unity are critical to our healthy functioning. However, Milestone 4 is what God created us for: to share the gospel, living it missionally, and planting new churches in our neighborhoods. Our churches exist to share God’s love with a hurting world.
Disruption/challenge: A concrete commitment to proclaiming and living out the gospel in our communities and around the world has been a consistent struggle for us. Our Yearbook statistics remind us how few join our congregations through conversion and adult baptism. Yet Scripture tells us that this is the primary way healthy churches grow. We’ve struggled to plant churches, which has been persistently our lowest score on the denominational survey. Responses to the survey question “Our congregation is involved in the birth of new churches and discipling communities” remained flat and under a level 3 (2.76 average score out of five). There has also been a significant decrease in our holistic commitment to reaching the unchurched in our community and beyond (decrease: -0.14, from 3.56-3.42 out of five). Similarly, our practice of addressing the concrete needs in our communities continues to be a growth area for us. All of this points to the great temptation to become more and more insular as our culture changes around us.
Strength: In the kingdom of God, what seems like a weakness can be a strength. As many of our churches have become marginalized in both influence and number, we’ve needed to prayerfully discern the Spirit’s mission movement for our new context. Do you remember ever being at a synod where we’ve discussed the nature of virtual churches, as we will with regard to Overture 13? Or consider the Study of Bivocationality Task Force report that we will discuss later this week. In the stories that Jose Rayas, Scott Van Voorst, Rick Abma, Jennifer Burnett, Andrea Baas, and Nicholas Baas have shared, we witness the reality that many of our pastors can’t be fully supported by their churches. On the one hand, this is very disruptive to our historical leadership model. On the other hand, we see value as more and more ministry leaders work in business, health care, community programs, and other fields where they regularly share their faith with nonbelievers (just like their congregants!). Many of our churches are growing by welcoming immigrants into their congregations. Those new members make the best evangelists as they reach out to nonChristians from their own backgrounds and welcome them into CRC congregations. In our weakness, God is doing an amazing thing in the midst of our disruption!
Opportunity: As congregations, we exist to proclaim the gospel in our words and in our lives. We are in a disrupted moment. There is a strong temptation to make “survival” of our viewpoints and our churches our focus. Yet our purity, our holiness, our theological convictions, and even our very existence are instrumental and secondary to God’s fulfillment of his mission through us. We are God’s tools, God’s handiwork. What if we spent at least as much energy in reaching out locally and globally through word and deed as we do deliberating our theological disagreements? Jesus Christ died and was raised for hurting and lost people. Don’t get me wrong. The issues we are facing are critically important to what it means to be faithful to the gospel in a shifting world. As Paul says in Ephesians 2, we have been saved by grace through faith to do good works that bring praise to our Father among all people. Even in our disruption and weakness, Christ can work through us to share the gospel, live it missionally, and plant new churches in our neighborhoods.
Conclusion
When I started my address to you, I shared my struggle to communicate about the “state of the church.” Should I be unrealistically hopeful? Should I be resigned to the challenges?
As I’ve preached on and prayed over Jeremiah 29 this year, God has led me to the conclusion that we have hope precisely because we are hard-pressed, torn by strife, and disrupted by our world. The message in Jeremiah 29 set the stage for a new era of vibrancy and growth among God’s people in exile. They had been scattered throughout the known world. They had to establish new synagogues. They learned about living faithfully as a religious minority. They became the foundation for a new kingdom movement inaugurated later by Jesus Christ and the Holy Spirit. Those scattered exiles became the springboard for a gospel mission that started in Jerusalem, and spread through all Judea and Samaria, and to the ends of the earth (Acts 1:8). We are believers today because of that great disruption and hope.
But hope is mysterious. “Hope that is seen is no hope at all. Who hopes for what they already have? But if we hope for what we do not yet have, we wait for it patiently” (Romans 8:24-25).
What is the state of our church? It is hopeful. In all our disruption God is strengthening the CRC to follow his Spirit into mission and ministry.
[3] See an article written in Christianity Today by a CRC church planter, Michael Moore: christianitytoday.com/ct/2022/march-web-only/church-statistics-return-in-person-nones-dones-umms.html.
