American Church part 1

It seems that I have not been posting and well for the few followers that read my blog, I apologize. Life has been busy and God has really been pressing different things on my heart. (Tune in into future posts to find what these are) One thing that I have learning lately is that God is sovereign over all creation and over my life. He is and always will be faithful to me where the only question that lies is will I be faithful to Him in return? My desire and hope is that I live for Him and Him alone for His glory alone. May I never stop seeking Him no matter how tough times may get. He can handle all my burdens and then some. He is my comfort in the storm and my guiding light in good times and bad.

On another note, I found these statistics on one of the blogs I've been reading and found them fascinating so that is why I will share them with you. There was a study conducted by the Notre Dame Congregational Study done on American churches. Here are the statistics: (I found it interesting and maybe you will too)

Leadership
95 percent of congregations are led by a head minister, while about 4 percent by an assembly of congregational members.
About 80 percent of head ministers are male, and 20 percent are female.
Head ministers have held their positions for an average of 8 years. Of course, some ministers have been at their congregation for a significantly longer number of years (the highest is just over 50 years), which may make the average number of years misleading. The median number of years at the congregation is 5, which essentially means that half of pastors have been at their congregation for less than 5 years and half have been at their congregation for more than 5 years. The average age of head ministers is about 52 years.
Membership
207 people regularly participate in the life of the average congregation. However, several very large congregations pull up the overall average. Interestingly, the median congregation has 77 people who regularly participate in the life of the congregation. That is, about half of congregations have less than 77 regular participants, and half have more than 77 participants.
Of course, many more people are associated with the congregation than regularly participate. On average, 522 people are associated with the congregation. Again, this is high due to a few extremely large congregations. The median congregation has 150 people who are associated with the congregation in some way.