Whether you are searching for a new church home or leading a congregation, the fundamental question remains the same: “Is this church healthy?”

Understanding and evaluating the marks of a healthy church ensure a community that thrives spiritually and fulfills its mission.

What does a healthy church look like?

The simplest way to evaluate the health of a church is to look at Scripture.

A thriving church exhibits signs like genuine love for one another (John 13:34-35), a commitment to prayer (Acts 2:42), and a passion for spreading the Gospel (Matthew 28:19-20).

These Biblical principles guide us in recognizing and cultivating a church that reflects God’s heart. This list of 12 signs serves as an evaluation tool to help you assess how well your church aligns with these, and other, Biblical principles.

Measurements are Important Signs of a Healthy Church

As the old proverb says, if you measure it you can manage it.

Some people like to measure membership while others prefer attendance. Others like to count salvation decisions or baptisms.

However, others completely forgo the emphasis on numbers. They say these measurements bear no relation to church health and are therefore meaningless in a health assessment of their local church.

They prefer the intuitive and qualitative approach which focuses on the hospitable nature of the church like relationships, culture, attitudes and atmosphere.

I think there’s room for both a quantitative and qualitative approach to measuring the health of a church.

Quantitative Measurements

There are a number of quantitative elements I like to measure when assessing the health of a congregation. The first nine signs use numbers to help reveal patterns in the life of a church. The final three examine mission, relationships and communication.

1. Membership

Stewardship of people is close to the heart of God.

In the book of Acts chapter 20, pastors are admonished to keep watch over the flock the Holy Spirit has given them. This means knowing who attends your church.

The total membership of a church should be segmented into three areas: adults, high school youth, and children.

When I talk about total membership, I’m not referring to formal membership but to everyone who attends your church and has attended in the last 6 months.

Total membership should be calculated at least every 3 months and trends noted.

2. Attendance

Hebrews 10:25 mentions meeting together on a regular basis as greatly important to spiritual development. Weekend worship service attendance should be counted and again segmented into three areas: adults, high school youth, and children.

Attendance ratios for these three areas can be an indicator for the health of a church. In my consulting work, I use 70% adults, 10% high school youth and 20% children as reference proportions when discussing the church’s age profile.

If children and youth numbers are too low, the church is in danger of decline and ultimately death as the church members grow older. This can certainly stop the church from growing.

Demographics of the surrounding region will obviously impact these ratios as well.

Keep the comparison consistent: Count each weekend’s attendance across your services, then calculate the average over an agreed period. Divide each age category’s average by the total average and multiply by 100. Use the same period when comparing results.

3. Visitors

Counting your visitors makes sense on a whole range of levels. You can track your worship service visitor numbers against your history and also arrest trends that indicate poor health.

A dearth of visitors is a definitive sign of a church in decline.

Likewise, a good flow of visitors is an indicator of a healthy church, aligning with the Great Commission in Matthew 28:19-20.

Regularly monitoring these numbers helps ensure your church is effectively reaching and engaging with the community, fostering spiritual growth and outreach.

Record first-time visitors separately from return visits. Agree whether you are counting people or households and keep that definition consistent from month to month.

4. Median age

I recommend that churches compare their median age to their region.

Discovering that your church is markedly older than the surrounding community should be a red alert wake-up call to a church and probably indicates ill health.

Discovering you are markedly younger means you may have a fruitful decade awaiting you, or it may indicate you are not offering programs to connect with middle-aged and older citizens.

This will have an impact on your financial and spiritual health.

Titus 2:4-7 Encourages multi-generational ministry to occur with the older generations pouring into and mentoring the younger. If you don’t have one generation or the other, this valuable relationship is lost.

If you’re in Australia, the government site QuickStats is a helpful guide to finding out information about your region.

How to calculate it: Arrange the ages from youngest to oldest. The median is the middle age, or the average of the two middle ages when there is an even number of people. Compare that with the median for your local area using the same population scope, including children and youth.

5. Biblical Discipleship

I think medium and large churches should aim to have over 50% of their adult members involved in regular fellowship such as a small group or Bible study.

Significant relationships are harder to form in these size churches. Small groups are vital to developing the health of a church, which is inseparably linked to strong personal relationships.

Proverbs 27:17 encourages a spiritual sharpening of one another, something that happens best in close relationship.

Small churches should consider offering groups for relationships, Biblical discipleship, and overall spiritual growth if they find that the Sunday worship gathering and organic connections are not sufficiently meeting their members’ relational or spiritual needs.

Strong involvement in groups is a healthy church must.

6. Serving

The health of a church body is closely linked to the ratio of members serving.

Philippians 2:3-8 highlights the importance of this service by emphasizing the need to humbly consider others’ needs above our own.

When people make a conscious contribution to a church, they become more involved and feel more connected. Plus, they gain and develop skills as well as build better relationships with other believers as they serve one another.

All these factors combine to build hope and confidence within the heart of a believer, which in turn yields healthy attitudes and helps the church be healthy.

In my consulting work, I encourage small and medium-sized churches to aim to have over 70% of their adults coming together to serve the church in some capacity.

Due to a range of factors larger churches tend to suffer from higher levels of the spectator syndrome so consequently, ratios drop as churches grow larger.

Healthy churches regularly recruit new volunteers in their church.

Calculation: Unique adults serving during your agreed reporting period ÷ adults in your regular church community × 100. Count each person once, even if they serve on several teams.

7. Biblical Evangelism

The health of a church can be measured in part by the number of people coming to faith. As Christians, it is our responsibility to reach the lost and share with them the life available in Christ (Ephesians 1).

I like to measure these ‘decisions’ in three distinct ways.

A first-time decision records the first time a person makes that decision to follow Jesus.

A rededication is when someone returns to faith after a significant amount of time away from Christ.

Lastly, a person can make what I call a refresh decision when they are seeking assurance of their decision to follow Christ.

Accurate measurements of these salvation decisions made in your church help towards assessing the health of your church.

If there are very few first-time and rededication decisions, that is a sign of a church that is not healthy.

Likewise, people coming to Christ and biblically discipled into baptism is one of the indicators of a healthy church.

8. Baptisms

Baptisms are a concrete number that helps ascertain the health of a church.

How many baptisms are considered healthy?

I use annual baptisms equivalent to 7% of average attendance as a reference point in my consulting discussions about church health.

For instance, if your average attendance is 200 then you would expect to see 14 people baptised in any given year. A lower ratio prompts me to examine evangelism, discipleship and the pathway into baptism more closely.

1 Peter 3:21 speaks of baptism as a sign of a clear conscience before God.

Healthy churches make disciples and baptism is a key indicator in that journey. Baptism must be considered a primary number in assessing the health of a church.

Calculation: Baptisms over the past 12 months ÷ average weekly attendance for those same 12 months × 100. For example, 14 ÷ 200 × 100 = 7%.

9. Finance

From before the days of the early church to modern times, giving to God has been viewed as an act of worship.

Giving per head is another indicator of health. People give when they make a strong connection to the church leadership, direction and culture.

You can assess your giving per head by simply dividing your average weekly giving by your average weekly attendance for the same period. Be consistent about whether that attendance includes children and youth.

The difficulty is assessing this against the norm because local demographics play a major role in giving levels.

Assessment is best done against your own historic levels of giving and other churches in your region.

It’s also worth noting a vision-centred church budget is one of the key marks of a healthy church.

Qualitative Measures

Qualitative measures are difficult to measure and the most accurate assessments are done by leaders outside the church or by newcomers who look at things through fresh eyes.

The church will look different to them than it would to a regular attender. They are able to better assess the way the pastor and leadership are carrying out these measures.

I’ve restricted myself to three ways a church can measure this so, this is not an exhaustive list and they are just as important as the quantitative measurements.

10. Sustained Implementation of a Clear Focus

Firstly, is there a clarity of mission and purpose that is based on the key New Testament elements of discipleship (think Paul and Timothy) and evangelism?

If not, then a church will operate in a fog of uncertainty and confusion and health will undoubtedly deteriorate.

If yes, then is there a sustained focus on implementing the mission? Sustained implementation of the New Testament mission is evidence of good health.

Unhealthy churches lack alignment around the mission and ministry of the church.

Commitment to mission is another one of the key signs of church health.

11. Warmth of Relationships and Fellowship

Language reveals the warmth of a church. What does the church look like?

What is the pastor preaching in their sermons? How do the congregants talk to each other?

Is the language cynical, negative, unbelieving and critical? Is the language supportive, candid, kind and faith-filled?

Is there laughter, encouragement and prayer or is there a brooding, negative atmosphere of discouragement and difficulty?

There’s no doubt joy brings strength and vitality to a church. This is key to growing a healthy church.

12. Clear Communication

Clearly communicating essential information gives people confidence and hope, which impacts church health.

As church growth trends from small to medium it’s important to help people move into an “It’s impossible for everyone to know everything” mode.

If this is not done, people will perceive there is poor communication when in fact the church has outgrown its historic communication channels.

Healthy churches regularly communicate the main things with clarity and precision.

So there you have it, my incomplete list.

Assessing the health of a church is a complex mix of art and science and is best done with the help of mature people from outside of the church who bring fresh eyes and an objective view.

What would you say if someone asked you, what the signs of a healthy church are?

Use These Signs in a Quarterly Church Health Review

Bring the nine numerical measures to a quarterly leadership meeting using consistent definitions and reporting periods. For annual measures such as baptisms, use a rolling 12-month figure. Review the trends alongside stories of discipleship and changed lives.

Ask trusted newcomers and an outside leader for feedback on your mission, relationships and communication. Choose one area to improve, assign someone to lead the next step and set a review date.

If you need help interpreting what you find, explore a church health consultation.