Synergy Resources

In 2019, 4,500 Protestant churches in North America closed their doors for good, while only 3,000 Protestant churches were started. Then, the COVID-19 pandemic hit, making an already concerning situation worse.  It is projected that by the year 2050, 35 million youth raised in Christian homes will disaffiliate from Christianity at a rate of over one million per year. 

The overall percentage of Christians in the population is expected to drop from 64% to 40%. The unaffiliated population will nearly double as a percentage of the U.S. population from 17% today to 30% in 2050, an increase of more than 50 million people. By 2070, the majority of our country could be unaffiliated if nothing changes. 

The average size of the American church in 2023 was 65 members. 80% of churches in America are plateaued or declining. Most of the growth is from transfer, or people switching churches. Reshuffling the Christian deck is not helpful. Christians going from one church to another to another is not Kingdom growth. Kingdom growth is someone who’s not a disciple of Jesus saying yes to Jesus, affirming the Gospel, and coming into the church through membership. 

Newly planted churches are more focused and effective at reaching unreached people. This is needful, because we cannot just shuffle membership between churches and call that a win.

The average cost for a new church plant that will exceed 200 people in attendance within five years of its launch is $325,000.

Church plants and revitalizations need pastoral leadership, deacons, and faithful members who can serve in the various areas of church life. 

The bottom line is this: Most denominations are not growing; they’re in decline. But God is at work. God will build His Kingdom. The gates of Hell will not prevail against His Church.

What Is Synergy?

Synergy is the combined power of a group working together that is greater than the power of individuals working separately. 

Our Mission:

Mobilizing trained disciples to multiply healthy churches together.

We have a stewardship. Consider: How will you make your one life count? We have one shot. In our generation, we have a chance to do a variety of things in a variety of places to glorify Jesus.   

What Can We Do To Help Synergy?

Encourage church membership and local outreach.

Offer GO City and other GO trips.

Offer seminars and workshops.

Expose students to the work that is being done and create a culture where their engagement in making disciples and multiplying churches is normal and expected.

What Can We Do as Christians?

We can all do and equip others to do the following:

• Work a job
• Live in a neighborhood
• Enjoy recreation in that location 
• Be a serving member of your church

Use all of these contexts as opportunities to be on mission to make disciples and help multiply churches. 

Vision

We envision students graduating every year having received excellent education and intentional discipleship grounded in biblical authority. We see them going out together to be a strategic in making disciples of Jesus Christ and multiplying churches in a wide variety of contexts. That will be normal for the Cedarville University graduate; everyone will embrace their role. 

Normal Christianity is a disciple-making reality.

Normal Christianity cares about the nations. We are going to the nations, sending money and prayers to the nations, or we are in sin.

Conclusion

It is not normal, according to the Bible, to have a Christianity that is comfortable and churches that are not growing but plateauing or even declining. That’s not good enough. If eternity is real and there are two options, then we have a task before us.

Dr. Jeremy Kimble, Professor of Theology and Director of the Synergy Initiative at Cedarville University, is passionate about teaching college and graduate students the truth of God’s Word. He is committed to teaching in the classroom, mentoring students, and speaking in church, camp, and conference settings. He served in pastoral ministry for eight years and is currently an active member and minister at University Baptist Church. Dr. Kimble's academic interests include biblical and systematic theology, ecclesiology, preaching and teaching, and the mission of the Church.

Synergy is the combined power of a group working together that is greater than the power of individuals working separately. The Synergy Initiative aims to help students plan strategically to graduate from Cedarville, go together with others from this place, and invest their energies, talents, and efforts in planting, revitalizing, and multiplying churches. As Cedarville graduates join up with other church members who are equipped to do the work of ministry, the combined effect of their efforts will accomplish, by God’s grace, abundantly more than only a couple of pastors in a church doing all of the work on their own. Thus, the goal is to equip students to leave Cedarville University ready to help establish and strengthen local churches throughout the nation and around the world.