thedesocios.com

Demographics and Church Planting

I subscribe to the Church Marketing Lab flickr pool.
Yesterday one of the contributors posted this info on a forum:
“Target demographic of our church: people who have never been to church, or those burned out on church and haven’t been in a long time.
Ages: 20s & 30 somethings”
Then today another said his church was “pursuing the un- or de-churched.”

I got to thinking about this and realized that I havent heard of a church seeking to minister to the “60-70 year olds who always loved church” market.
It seems like a few things need to noted. One a church should be seeking to engage its community, if you live in an town where only 20% of the population is 20-30 then I wonder if you are not being faithful to the call to engage your surrounding. Two, of course most people know the stat that says that most people become Christians when they are in their teens and twenties, but when we go after this group only, are we sending a message that says that we are willing to sacrifice today for tomorrow, that we think some how the Holy Spirit has a window of opportunity.

On the opposite side though in my mind it seems kind of like a given that a church is going to put effort into reaching those outside the kingdom. One might make a valid case that if a church is not trying to reach the world with the message of Christ, they have not received that message themselves.