LifeWay's Online Research Polls Top Ten Issues Facing Church
by Allie Martin and Jenni Parker
November 29, 2004
(AgapePress) - Ministry leaders worldwide are being asked to identify and explore the leading issues churches face today. This global survey is part of a Christian resource supplier's efforts to develop new, vital, and relevant resources for the Church.The E-business department of LifeWay Christian Resources of the Southern Baptist Convention has kicked off a two-month online research project titled "The Top 10 Issues Facing Today's Church." LifeWay is one of the world's largest providers of Christian products and services, including Bibles, church literature, books, music, audio and video recordings, church supplies and Internet services through LifeWay.com.
Through e-mailed and online surveys, Christian and evangelical pastors, staff, organizational directors, and seminary leaders of various denominations are being asked to list the issues most important to ministries. From the initial responses, the 20 most frequently submitted answers will be sent back to all the ministry leaders who gave input. During December, they will have a chance to use the same Internet survey tool to rank their top 10 issues from among those 20 most common responses.
Gary McClure is E-business marketing manager for LifeWay. He says this survey is providing a way for ministry leaders to share their challenges and opportunities with the broader Christian community.
"The local church has the privilege of helping people address issues from a biblical perspective," he notes, "yet the church itself must tangle with significant factors that in turn impact the church body. We'd like to bring these opportunities and issues to light, to provide supporting biblical perspectives and resources for each of them, and then share these findings so we all can learn."
McClure points out that at the project's conclusion a unique informational resource will have been compiled. But he expects this data generated from the survey will become a springboard for further insight and growth in the body of Christ.
"At the end of December," the LifeWay spokesman says, "we'll have these top ten issues that we as LifeWay will go back and address from a biblical perspective. You know, it's one thing to say these are the key issues; but we wanted to add some value and help ministry leaders understand really how to address them. So we'll look at, obviously, scripture references. We'll look at other resources that will help ministry leaders to deal with these issues."
Ministry leaders worldwide are being invited to take part in the online survey. McClure says after the information has been compiled into a list, LifeWay.com will begin unveiling the "Top 10 Issues Facing Today's Church" beginning with Number Ten in early February. A new topic will be explored each Monday until Number One is presented in April. Links to all the preceding numbers will be available in every article.
At the conclusion of the project, LifeWay will create a special report presenting all the topics with associated scripture, information, and other materials to help ministries address those issues. The report will be free for downloading from LifeWay.com.
