Edmond Life and Leisure - July 11, 2024

Life.Church boasts an average attendance of 85,000 and topped the Outreach 100 list of the largest congregations in the U.S. for 2023.

Nation’s largest church based right here in Edmond

By Carla Hinton

The Oklahoman

Is the largest church in America based in Oklahoma?

Yes, Edmond-based Life.Church, with an average attendance of 85,000, topped the Outreach 100 list of the largest congregations in the U.S. for 2023, the second year in a row it has done so.

Internationally known for creating the popular, free YouVersion Bible App, Life.Church, led by founder and Senior Pastor Craig Groeschel, also has become one of the preeminent churches in America because it is a multi-site congregation, with offices and a church at Interstate 35 and Second Street in Edmond, plus a whopping 44 satellites across the country.

Outreach Magazine has compiled listings of the country’s largest churches and fastest-growing churches for several decades, collaborating with Lifeway Research, the official research arm of the Southern Baptist Convention, while also drawing numbers from the Hartford Institute for Religion Research. The 2024 listings are expected in the fall.

According to its website, the magazine contacts thousands of churches each year, inviting them to participate in a survey. The result is the annual Outreach 100 list of largest churches, which tracks numerical gains in attendance, and the Outreach 100 list of fastest- growing churches, which tracks percentage growth. They solicited participation from more than 13,000 churches. Outreach said churches were contacted multiple times by email and fax to be part of the self-reported survey that is based on attendance averages, not membership. According to the Outreach website, participating churches answered questions about their 2023 in person, weekend attendance averages for February and March as compared to their 2022 numbers.

Other Oklahoma congregations on the 2023 list of the largest churches was Church on the Move in Tulsa, which came in at No. 88, with 7,000 members. BattleCreek Church, a Southern Baptist church in Broken Arrow, also made the list at No. 94, with 6,560 members.

BattleCreek Church in Broken Arrow also was included in the 2023 Outreach 100 list of fastest growing churches as Life at the top No. 54, along with another Southern Baptist congregation, Together We Church in Yukon, formerly known as Trinity Baptist.

Groeschel founded Life.Church in 1996. Life Covenant Church, as it originally was called, began with about 45 people and has grown to include 18 satellites in Oklahoma and 26 satellites outside the state: two in Arkansas, three in Colorado, two in Florida, one in Iowa, five in Kansas, three in Missouri, one in Nebraska, one in New Mexico, one in New York, one in Tennessee and six in Texas.

For context, Life.Church is larger than a Houston, Texas, church that many people have long known as one of the largest churches in the country. That congregation, Lakewood Church led by prominent televangelist Joel Osteen, took the No. 3 spot on the 2023 largest church list, with average attendance of 45,000. Church of the Highlands in Birmingham, Alabama, came in at No. 2, with average attendance of 60,000.

Leaders with Life.Church declined requests for an interview, but shared a statement instead.

“As people have examined their lives over the last few years, we’re seeing a renewed sense of passion and hunger for God throughout our ministries,” Bobby Gruenewald, Life.Church pastor and innovation leader known as the creator of the YouVersion Bible App, said in a statement.

“People from all walks of life and across generations are facing very real struggles and thankfully they’re turning to the local Church for support. And in seeking God, they’re finding healing, community, and a true sense of purpose for their lives.”

Fast-growing church in Yukon

Together We Church is No. 48 on the 2023 Outreach 100 list of the fastes-tgrowing churches in the U.S., and the Yukon church was No. 94 on the 2022 fastest-growing list.

The Rev. Brian Mills, the church’s senior pastor, said the growth began after he started his first sermon series after arriving at the church from Arkansas with his wife, Jennifer, and their two children in June 2019. He said the church, originally

founded as Trinity Baptist, was founded in 1979 and had a weekly attendance of about 800 people. By the time he and his family arrived, about 300 were attending weekend services.

Mills said the congregation took to heart his first sermon series entitled “Together We,” so much so that they began inviting other people to church and became involved in mission efforts, and the congregation began to experience “crazy growth.”

The minister said the church grew 34% in 2019 and then the COVID-19 pandemic happened. But church members rallied behind a dream to build a food pantry and the church’s Together We Center, built on church property without incurring debt, includes a food pantry that other area churches contribute to, and a boutique that helps fund the ministry and also contributes to community residents. In 2022, the church’s first time on the list, Together We had an average attendance of 1,397 members, and in 2023, the average attendance was 1,879.

The pastor said he fully expects that Together We will be on the 2024 list of fastest-growing list, but the church is not going to “chase after a number.”

“If the Lord keeps growing us, we’re just going to be faithful with what God sends us,” he said.

“We just want to take care of people and we want to shepherd the flock that God sends to us.

“Every number has a name, every name has a story and every story has a destiny, and we want to be a part of that story. We want to be a part of that individual’s life.”