As the National Church moves further into the embrace of false teaching, denying Christ and overthrowing the authority of Scripture it’s not surprising that rank and file members continue to flee the Episcopal “Church” at a shocking rate. Already in a 40+ year decline, the newly released numbers for 2008 highlight the continued departures from this sinking ship. Here are some “highlights”:
- Another 3% of members lost over the last year.
- The 5 and 10-year loss in active members accelerating.
- 5-year loss in ASA (Average Sunday Attendance) continues at 14%.
- 10-year loss in ASA (Average Sunday Attendance) accelerating.
- 55% of all churches declined more than 10% in past 5 years!
- Median Average Sunday Attendance (nationally): An anemic 69!!
And people honestly think that the National Church is moving in the right direction – incredible!!
Compare this to St. Andrew’s (let’s be clear, Scripture tells us that the Lord builds the house – this is to His glory, not ours – the consequence, I believe, of keeping “the main thing the main thing”):
- In 2007 our ASA was 1300.
- In 2008 it was 1515.
- In 2007 our membership was 2451.
- In 2008 our membership was 2698.
What’s the difference between the National Church and St. Andrew’s? Quite simply: Jesus Christ. We truly believe He is who He said He is and that His written Word is authoritative in all matters of belief and practice. Acknowledging that we are by nature at enmity with God and sinners in need of redemption; we know ourselves to be fully dependent upon His grace and Spirit to receive what we do not possess. And now, possessing Christ and His Spirit, by His power, we seek to conform our individual and corporate life to His image rather than re-creating Him in our image.
Is it any wonder that the Presiding Bishop and her Executive Council delayed release of the numbers and denied knowlege of this report? Really, she/they did. How’s that for honestly and transparency? Read about it here.
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I feel sorry for the Episcopal Church. I pray that the Light of Christ be revealed to them the way it was for Saul (Paul) and knock them off their high horse of morality and Holier-than -thou beliefs.
Thankful for all who are remaining true to Jesus in these dark times!
There are some pretty huge and growing heretical churches out there as well. Maybe ECUSA just isn’t “sexy” enough. You know, like Lakewood or Saddleback.
I recall reading something about church growth and viability that says that a church needs 70 pledging units in order to remain viable. A pledging unit can be a family or a single person and that number will always be less than membership and average Sunday attendance.
With median attendance a paltry 69, we know that half of the congregations cannot be viable for the long term. A further look at the statistics shows that 66% have an ASA of less than 100.
Steve, I know you well enough to know that you will not leave the path God has called you to follow; we all know this about you and love you for your stand.
Christ followers and Christ believers are not ashamed of the Gospel and neither are you. Preach it as you have since you were brought here by the Lord.
This so-called “split” is nothing more than the Lord separating the sheep and the goats. So be it; it is not a surprise to me at least.
The believers that attend St. Andrews are not stupid people. For the most part they are highly intelligent and high in moral training and have come to Christ through hardship and we are here to stay in His care where we know we have safety.
Preach Christ; that’s why we come to St. Andrews.
Ditto Brutha!
I hear those Southern Bells Ringing!
The Lord is with you, Steve. You are called to this place for a time such as this with a people such as us. We stand with you.
All: we aren’t like Saddleback, et al, and we’re growing. Parishes don’t come any more traditionally Anglican than All Saints in San Antonio. We are what TEC was 50+ years ago: Bible-believing, reformed catholic and evangelical. If we can do that, others certainly can. You don’t have to sell out to the World to grow!
We’re praying for real, Holy Ghost revival in all the One, Holy, Catholic and Apostolic Church.
Blessings, all–and Maranatha!”
The Truth will set you free. The problem is TEC would not know the truth if it hit them up side the head. But But Jesus can melt the heart of stone and save the sinner even at the hour of his
death. Can I hear a Amen!!
“I am the way the truth and the life” It doesn’t get much clearer than that. Jesus is leading us by truth to truth – The Lord is with you Steve!
90,000 people have left the Episcopal “church” over the past 5 years. Think about that, 90,000 people. Gone. Almost 2,000,000 gone in one generation. Breaks the heart.
they are in a better place …………….
Here is what happened in North Carolina. Planted a Great Commission/Contemporay church in 1992. Moved into a new building in 2001. Attendance approached 400 in 2003. 2008 attendance-120. Mid-2009 attendance 60. Church and property sold in August 2009.
JB- Why? A lot left unsaid.
This article seems to smack of “we’re better than you are.” While St. Andrew’s persues another path, we should be praying for and lifting up our brothers and sisters who are not led by the same light. Even in failure, they are still part of the church, and it must hurt the heart of God.
Thanks, Karen. I tried hard to state as clearly as I could that it was the Lord accomplishing this work at St. Andrew’s. That’s what I meant when I wrote above:
I also tried to direct glory to Christ by noting that the blessing we’ve received was not a result of our work by His Gospel:
So, while I tried to communicate this sentiment – clearly failing in your eyes – I do appreciate the opportunity to say again what I have said hundreds of times from the pulpit of SAMP: It is the Lord who receives the glory for St. Andrew’s.
Where I think we will disagree is my assertion that as TEC has abandoned the Gospel message I believe that they have ceased to be a “church.” I do think the heart of God is grieved – over the apostasy emanating from the national “church” – not over the numerical decline. In fact, I would suggest that it is the work of the Holy Spirit emptying the pews of TEC and leading His children to safe, healthy, faithful pastures.
PS – I’m not sure what you mean by a “different light”. Christ alone – as revealed in Scripture – is the ONLY light and He leads us into all Truth, the fruit of which is unity.
Steve, I don’t see your post “smacking” of “we’re better than you.” In fact, I hear echoes of both Bishops Salmon and Lawrence who’ve wondered aloud why the National Church is not beating a path to the Diocese of SC and parishes like yours to find out what is happening and why it’s happening.
Karen, I would not say that it is a matter of failure of method or practice or effort on the part of the National Church. Instead, I think you hit the nail on the head – they follow a different “light” maybe the “angel of light” – old slewfoot, himself. And by so doing they, like the blind guides Jesus spoke of, decieve many.
Q: “What’s the difference between the National Church and St. Andrew’s?”
A: St Andrews is in one of the most conservative* states in the US.
*some might say regressive, even.
Yes, and I spent a few hours in my garage this week and became a car, a regressive car at that.
I do sincerely hope that there more distinctives between St. Andrews and the National Church than mere geography. I suspect that with 5 five consecutive minutes of careful observation, we could come up with a few. How about this for starters – The National Church is a full participant in abominable and apostate theology that affixes millstones around its leaders necks and marches them on an acclerated path to hell! Now I’ll start working on points 2-100. Regressive thinking? Guilty!
I don’t see this split as God seperating the goats and the sheep. There are probably many believers in the TEC that might remaing there for some time. At least that’s how I interpret the “visible” and “invisible” church. I hope that we don’t have a vision at St. Andrews that there are not tares in the congregation. Usually when that happens the preaching goes from: “everyone needs to hear the Gospel” to “we all got the Gospel now give me the application of it without preaching repentance and the forgiveness of sins….and then serve communion. Really quite dangerous. If we stop talking about the Gospel, especially to our kids we will walk the same path in a generation.
It’s always fun to watch biblically orientated people draw dualing scriptures.
Danny, I hope that you hear a message of ongoing repentance and embrace of the gospel at SAMP – but I know that what is intended in the mind/heart doesn’t always come out of the mouth.
Don’t have a problem with the preaching at SAMP. However, I think there is a huge temptation in the evangelical landscape to preach things like: “7 tips to spice up your sex life” or “your best life now: 10 things that will……”yada yada yada. Those guys will be judged harshly. These topics are sometimes preached to a congregation that is thought to be totally regenerate down to the last person. i.e., if you don’t really believe the Word regenerates people when it is heard and taught, why teach it at all? Just make up your own stuff.
A Brutha:
Please do not forget the interchange with our Lord in Matthew 7:22ff:
Lord, Lord, did we not prophesy in your name, and cast out demons in your name, and do many mighty works in your name?’ And then will I declare to them, ‘I never knew you; depart from me, you evildoers.’
The separation of wheat and tare, sheep and goats is indeed accomplished by our Lord Jesus Christ, and on the last day. To be most honest, the Christian tradition from the very first days of our faith would be for each of us to humbly acknowledge that “I am tare”, “I am goat” following St Paul’s teaching that “Jesus Christ came into the world to save sinners, *of whom I am chief*”
To believe anything else is rather presumptious.
[...] Diocese of South Carolina and pastor of one of the largest churches in the Episcopal Church (TEC), summarizes TEC’s recently released 2008 numbers – which [...]
“denying Christ?”
I have been part of the Episcopal Church for over 50 years. I’ve worshipped up and down my home state and in perhaps half the states of the USA. I have never, NEVER heard or seen anyone, clergy or lay, from Washington state to Arkansas to Virginia, denying Christ.
For the last 30 years I have served the Church in three dioceses as deacon, priest, college chaplain, rector: every single public liturgy and every Daily Office is done in submission and to the glory of Jesus who is Lord and Savior; every liturgy holds within it a strong renewal of either the Nicene or the Apostles’ Creed.
I have worked with six bishop diocesans, who were and are representative of the breadth of orthodox theological thinking of the Episcopal Church, and not one of them has ever needed to cross fingers while proclaiming the Resurrrected Christ as Lord of all Creation and Savior of humankind.
It is an out and out lie to say that “the Episcopal Church” denies Christ.
That there are some fringe-y folks who may do so — that can be granted: but those do not represent the Episcopal Church. The Church has always had its kookier theological fringe, and the Church has worked to love them as their Savior loves them, and not cast them out from Christian fellowship.
Julian, I think Rev. Wood is simply restating what our Bishop, Mark Lawrence, has said in his clergy day address. You may find the Bishop’s letter posted on the website of the Diocese of South Carolina: http://www.dioceseofsc.org.
Good grief, Julian. WHICH Christ are you talking about? You are either blind or choosing to look the either way. I dare say that your lens is distorted. You must be saying that the LEADERSHIP of the Episcopal Church is its fringe.
Gee, Craig. “Which Christ?”
I only known ONE Christ: Jesus Christ Son of God Savior. Do you know any other?
You seem to have taken all the ad hominem attacks made on other Episcopalians and learned how to use them well. It’s one way to deflect from the issue, isn’t it?
Your attempt to re-word what I said into “the leadership of the Episcopal Church” also is a red herring. Since Stephen Wood is a Deputy to Convention, and Mark Lawrence is a Bishop of the Church, it would seem that they are included in the “leadership of the Church” – aren’t they?
Just as in an earlier era, Stephen Bayne, John Allison Hines, Clarence Haden, John Walker and John Spong overlapped as Bishops of the Church. They certainly did not agree with one another: yet they could disagree without the diatribe so freely dispensed from blogs such as Stephen Wood’s on which we are commenting. They also could and did continue to meet together as Bishops of the Church and to consecrate the Sacrament and receive it together. Their godly example is one that many Episcopalians and many Christians of other family rooms in the mansions of Christianity could well emulate.
No, Craig: it is your lens that has been deliberately distorted. The wild-eyed accusations of widespread denial of the Christ as Savior and other false aspersions cast against faithful Christians are lies. And they are no longer accidental lies or lies told out of ignorance: they are deliberate disinformation that is used to separate the sisters and brothers of the Faith one from another.
Many Episcopal leaders would not know Biblical orthodoxy if it came up and bit them in the butt. The fact that we are even having this dialogue is an exercise in absurdity. Bottom-line, if you do not step up and label the current leadership of the Episcopal church as abominably apostate, there is no question that you and I worship a different Christ.
For you to lump Steve Wood with the current leaders of the Episcopal church is naive and offensive. I challenge you openly to repent for your own good before it is too late.
No, there are not many mansions for the leaders of this group. We are not sisters and brothers with these people. They are evil and their evil behavior will be exposed in time. You are a part of them because you defend their beliefs and behavior and therefore aid and abet it. You are just shocked because someone openly challenges you on it. One day soon these “dialogues” will not be necessary. We will completely invest our total energy in building the Kingdom rather expunging this kind of error.
Julian, the best way for you to eliminate confusion is to declare yourself. Shun false harmony. Come out from these people or declare yourself one of them. If you declare yourself one of them, you will reap the eternal consequences of your association with them.
Craig: I have no difficulty declaring myself.
I am a Christian, baptized, child of God.
I am an Episcopal priest, vowed twice to be loyal to the doctrine, discipline and worship of Christ as this (Episcopal) Church has received them. I have signed that oath twice in public, and hew to it to this day. I have no difficulty owning obedience to the bishop diocesan who has been elected and consecrated for the diocese in which I serve.
You, fortunately for you and me alike, are not my judge: I put all my trust, all my hope, all my confidence in the Lord Christ. It is sad that you choose not to worship the Lord of all, whose joy is to forgive, whose actions were and are to include — even to the Syrophoenician woman, the ten lepers, the tax collector, the Roman centurion, and the Pharisee Nicodemus; whose teaching radiates peace among all those who call upon his holy Name. But that is your choice.
I do not have to lump Stephen Wood with the leaders of the Episcopal Church: he has done so himself by standing for and being elected as a Deputy from the Diocese of South Carolina to General Convention. If Stephen Wood does not want to be a leader in the Episcopal Church, then he should resign that position. If he does not believe in the oaths he made according to the Book of Common Prayer, then he should have the courage to abjure those oaths, leave the Church and its company and find a Christian home in which he can lead and in which he can worship and be inspired.
You have not yet named any one quotable item that makes of the vast majority of Episcopalians “evil” in thought or behavior. Can you do that?
I am in no need of repentance for speaking the truth as it is revealed to me, any more than Stephen Wood is in need of repentance for speaking the truth as it is revealed to him; each of us realizing that according to St. Paul, in this life we see dimly, as through a smoky and distorting glass. It is only in the life to come that we shall see totally clearly. That realization should cause all of us, you included, to speak with a rather large dose of humility, noting from the beginning that excellent phrase, “I could be wrong.” Your hubris in attempting to override the Lordship of Jesus, who is the Only One who can make the kind of judgments that you are doing will have its own reward, but it affects me not one whit.
Jesus hears my confession of those things done and those things left undone daily: Jesus’ forgiveness, renewal and Spirit’s regeneration are given me daily. Does Jesus hear your confession? And do you submit your thoughts and desires to the Light of the World? And do you listen to the still, small voice of God? And does that transform your life so that you see others as the children of God — or do you continue in your hubris?
If you believe this dialogue is absurd, then you may end it at any time. That’s up to you. But if you think for one minute that your vitriol is convincing, please know that you are failing.
We could break down each action of the Episcopal Church in last 40 years, line that action up with Scripture, evaluate how the Episcopal Church has responded and draw a conclusion. Therefore, I will not go into detail here about which decisions and actions are evil and which are not. That process has been done repeatedly, is well documented and unfortunately speaks for itself. It is this process that drives all of my beliefs. If you see arrogance or hubris, then I accept that. It is very likely that you are seeing an accurate picture. The context supports a definite viewpoint. A given individual can choose to examine the record and choose for themselves. The choice is that clear.
“Conservative” believers would have left the Episcopal Church a long, long time ago and many did. They would have seen the choice as simple intuition. Others out of love, patience and honor, remained hoping that “dialogue” would change things. They have seen with the last convention how that patience has been rewarded. Others still, like those in our own diocese, are choosing to be even more patient. In my own personal view, the time is for patience is over – in fact long, long past.
Julian, I accept your testimony as it is. Please forgive me for judging you personally or other individual Episcopalians. (Read “condemning” you.) It is not my place to do so. I acknowledge that there are and will continue to be many sincere and genuine believers who will remain in the Episcopal Church. However, at this very late date,if you remain in the Episcopal Church and are not outraged by what has transpired and are not motivated to actively address those issues for change, then I question your theology, judgment and commitment. At this point, one of us is VERY wrong. My goal is not to convince you. You are convinced. Because you are an Episcopal priest of long tenure, the standards for you are much, much higher. People listen to you and pay attention to what you have to say. Your profession and confessions may stir others. They do not stir me. For me, there is a clear gap between your profession and their subsequent actions. My goal is to challenge you and others who have similar beliefs as you. However, future efforts are better directed toward advancing the Kingdom. Further discussions like this do not advance the Kingdom. They distract from it. Therefore, I will redirect my energies.
I believe that one day soon you will have a stirring in your heart like you have never had. It will shake you to your core. It will be the Holy Spirit stirring and convicting you. You will be faced with a new decision about how you will respond. This decision will have nothing to do with church polity.
Craig,
I take your words at the irenic tone in which they are said.
Yesterday at Mass, during Communion, we sang the lovely hymn #304, and I prayed for you, as you were at Mass also; prayed that all of us take to heart the truth expressed in the lyrics of that hymn:
As Christ breaks bread and bids us share
Each proud division ends
That love that made us makes us one
And strangers now are friends
And thus with joy we meet our Lord
His presence always near
Is in such friendship better known
We see and praise him here.
Forty years is not a long time in God’s time, nor even a long time in Church time. It was just about forty years ago that clergy and laity who participated in the civil rights movements in Arkansas and Mississippi and California and other locations were excoriated for their actions which they grounded in Holy Scripture study and the prophetic call for justice to roll down like rivers. I believe that action, over the last forty years, has brought Godly fruit forth. I see the children and teens of my town walking with friends of all different colors, whose parents live in the same part of town and work side by side and attend church together. That is something that would never have happened in my youth. That in the Church we have moved our understanding of Suffragan Bishop from being a lower-rank, second-rate episcopacy restricting bishops of color from administration over Anglo clergy and laity to being an associate episcopacy generally in collegiality with the Diocesan, and that we have had and have now a number of Diocesan bishops of color, is one of the fruits of that once-condemned action.
The liturgical reform movement that began in the 1930s at Solemnes and has been at times resisted and deeply criticized in both the Roman Catholic and Anglican Communions led to the restoration of the Holy Eucharist as the primary worship celebration on Sundays and Feast Days for us Anglicans. That reform (and the Cursillo movement coming to us from Spain) opened the way for the Charismatic movement of the 1960s, which in its maturing has influenced even the most anglo-catholic of Anglicans an dbrought a rich new source of hymnody and restored spiritual praxis to Episcopal congregations all over the United States. Those are just two of the major shifts within the Episcopal – and wider catholic – Church of the last forty years. And those are changes I give thanks for!
Thank you for praying for the fire of the Holy Spirit in my life: the Holy Spirit has been at work in me, known and loved and sometimes (as with Paul and Teresa of Avila and others) much resisted) but always irresistible. I believe the Holy Spirit is likewise at work in you, and that you are deeply aware of that work.
Please know that I shall continue to pray for you daily, by name, that you contine to be filled with the Spirit’s cleansing fire and filled as well with Christ’s reconciling love. I believe there shall come a time, in God’s good time, with Christ at the head, that the Spirit’s pricks will shove us into humble bowing together before the only real Authority, who is Christ the Lord.
Go with God, and be at peace.
Julian, I am truly touched and humbled by your most recent post. Despite my self-righteous like rantings, I am aware of my broken, sinful nature. Many, many times I feel like the poster boy for total depravity! Thank you for reaching out.
You make a wise and excellent point that 40 years is not a long time. Helpful perspective. The civil rights movement is an excellent teaching example. I suggest that this “recent unpleasantness” (curious choice of words for a Yankee Boy) is as old as the church and even older. As The Eagles say, ‘Sooner or later, we’ll find out in the long run’!
However ……
I sincerely appreciate your praying for me. Please continue to do so. I covet that. Pray that God continues to reveal His wisdom and direction to me and shows me how to walk in a manner worthy of His calling. I will pray for you as well.
Perhaps one day we can even meet face to face – talk for the sake of talking, share ideas for the sake of sharing ideas. In the process, I would sincerely hope that genuine brotherly love and a bond between Christian brothers would break out.
Go with God and be at peace as well
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