Good News on the Nation’s Birthday

This year’s Fourth of July may seem a bit anticlimactic. It’s like we have been celebrating our nation’s 250th birthday for a whole year, with the pace picking up in recent months.

At the same time, as a nation we seem to be coming apart at the seams. The global village enabled by laptops, smartphones, smartwatches, and other devices has created a shouting fest, one rife with conflict. It’s where truth takes a back seat to those with the biggest megaphones. Or, a bazillion followers on Instagram.

Amid this cacophony, it’s always encouraging to find good news. I spotted some recently when I came across a news item that portends well for the future: an increase in church attendance for the first time in decades.

The findings were based on a report from the Hartford Institute for Religion Research. It found that in 2025 the median congregation welcomed 70 attendees, up from 65 in 2020, just before the pandemic.

Director Scott Thumma said this marked the first upward movement in the four decades he has tracked church attendance in America.

Surprising Increase

Skeptics would scoff at the idea that five more souls in church indicate much of anything. Indeed, researchers noted that the data should be viewed in a longer historical trajectory of decline, since attendance still trails that of a decade ago.

Yet the 8 percent increase surprised those expecting further decreases.

“Because of the historical trends, Thumma said they had expected more decline,” said a story on LifeWay Research’s website. “‘We were pretty surprised when we first saw the 2025 data’ . . .

“The research team went back and thoroughly checked their data, just to be sure, (added) Charissa Mikoski, assistant professor at Hartford Institute.”

I should note the news isn’t all good. Almost half (46%) of churches reported a decline of at least 5% over the five-year period, with 27% dropping by 25% or more.

Yet, 43% said they had grown by at least 5%, with 29% reporting 25% or higher growth.

Spiritual Search

So, what is the big deal about churches seeing more worshipers? Because it reflects a spiritual searching.

I talked recently with a pastor who says the modern trend is a mirror image of the Jesus Movement in the 1970s. Then, hippies disaffected with free love, drugs, and licentious behavior found a lasting solution in following Christ.

The same is true today, he said. I believe at the heart of our national malaise—discontent with the direction of everything from politics to gas prices—is a spiritual sickness.

The impressive technological advances of recent years have deceived us into thinking we don’t need God. But, as I discovered long ago in the middle of personal troubles that brought me low, the Lord can do a better job of directing our lives than we can.

As my wife and I discovered, He could manage our finances better too. That is significant when contemplating our staggering national debt. This year it mushroomed past $39 trillion, most of the red ink accumulated since the turn of the century.

At the heart of most financial problems is a spiritual one. An inability to live within one’s means is evidence of a reluctance to make difficult choices. Thus, keeping up appearances becomes more important than the truth.

So, like any other patriotic American, I will celebrate the nation’s birthday next week. But I will also be praying that the bubbling trend of spiritual yearning accelerates into a wave.