Is it possible to spiritually “outgrow” a local congregation? It is not only possible, it happens more often than you’d think. One trend I saw in my poll of those over 40 was that a notable percentage of those who’d changed churches or decreased their level of “official” involvement at their present congregation did so because they’d…

Last week, I shared some preliminary results (here and here) and first thoughts (here) about what I was hearing from those who took my quick survey (here) asking those over 40 to reflect about their relationship with the local church. On Monday of this week, Dr. Scot McKnight highlighted the survey on his popular Jesus Creed blog…

We live as exiles. We’re called to be pilgrims. I am journeying through Scripture chronologically, stopping at a few oases along the way, in order to contemplate our exile experience. I’ll also offer some helpful thoughts about how Christ can reshape that identity and reorient our journey so we live as pilgrims. To read earlier…

Sidelined by loss. Pushed out by politics. Tired of doing, doing, doing. Invisible. Irrelevant. More time = greater availability to serve. Anxious to contribute. Longing to transmit the faith to the next generation. Mutually exclusive sentiments? Not when it comes to the relationship those of us over 40 have with the local church. [Read more]

The most remarkable part of the survey I posted last week came when I queried respondents about their current level of church involvement, how this current level compared to their involvement 10 years ago, and then asked why they’d answered as they had. [Read more]