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by Brian Shilhavy, Health Impact News: Earlier this week, on February 17, 2026, agrochemical maker Bayer, who purchased fellow agrochemical maker Monsanto in 2018, and inherited the Roundup brand of herbicides containing glyphosate, which has been linked to cancer, announced a $7.25 billion settlement with cancer patients due to their use of glyphosate. Agrochemical maker […]

Young adults are disappearing from our churches at an alarming rate. In 2023, nearly 4 in 10 claimed no religious affiliation, and many raised in Christian homes disengage from the church before age 30. These trends grieve pastors and leaders who long to “tell to the coming generation the glorious deeds of the LORD, and his might, and the wonders that he has done” (Ps. 78:4). Against this backdrop of dispiriting long-term data, some recent studies suggest a growing spiritual interest on the part of younger people, with accompanying increases in church attendance. It’s too early to say if the decades-long decline in young-adult church participation is slowing or even reversing. Nonetheless, church leaders may face an opportunity to respond to what God is doing among young adults in ways that counter disengagement trends. In this moment, many congregations feel stuck, unsure where to begin, unaware of the cultural and developmental complexities shaping young adults, or simply resigned to discouraging trends. But there’s hope. We identified “magnetic churches” across the country—congregations experiencing unusual fruitfulness in their ministries to young adults. Their witness is clear: Reaching emerging adults is possible when churches embrace a prayerful, biblical, and gospel-centered posture. From this study, we found six strategic moves that offer a path forward for young-adult ministry in your church. 1.  Come to terms with reality. Faithful ministry begins with embracing reality. As Derek Melleby observes, “In order to help young people develop a lasting faith, the church needs to have an understanding of the cultural conditions in which young people live.” Unfortunately, many congregations, including pastors, are unfamiliar with the lived realities of today’s twentysomethings. How do we correct this? In their book Sustainable Young Adult Ministry, Mark DeVries and Scott Pontier write, “The only chance we have to really understand young adults is . . . getting to know them personally, not simply learning about them in abstract.” Introduce yourself to twentysomethings inside and outside your church. Be curious. Ask questions. Listen well. Build relationships with young adults, and be intentional about cultivating their trust. Church leaders may face an opportunity to respond to what God is doing among young adults in ways that counter disengagement trends. As you do, you can read books like Kevin DeYoung’s The (Not-So-Secret) Secret to Reaching the Next Generation, David Setran and Chris Kiesling’s Spiritual Formation in Emerging Adulthood, or other resources linked in this article. Books like these help to inform what you’re learning in your personal interactions. With newly acquired knowledge in one hand and humility in the other, leaders should honestly assess themselves and their churches. Imagine experiencing your congregation for the first time as a nonbelieving young adult, or as a Christian twentysomething eager to grow, belong, and serve. Be brutally honest. Invite young adults into this evaluation process. Avoid defensiveness. Renewal and repentance start by first coming to terms with reality. 2. Pray. Prayer must be the foundation of our efforts to engage young adults. Scripture reminds us that “the fear of the LORD is the beginning of wisdom” (Prov. 9:10) and “the prayer of a righteous person has great power” (James 5:16). Charles Spurgeon warns, If a church does not pray, it is dead. Instead of putting united prayer last, put it first. Everything will hinge upon the power of prayer in the church. Prayer expresses our dependency on God; opens us to the Spirit’s conviction and leading; and, in the Lord’s mysterious providence, is a means by which he works in young adults’ hearts to bring them to faith and repentance and to produce greater Christlikeness. 3. Put together a multigenerational team. Neither a single leader nor siloed, age-specific strategies can make a church magnetic for young adults. DeVries and Pontier recommend starting with a multigenerational team that will pray, build relationships, champion this work over the long haul, and leverage their gifts for the task. This team should include motivated lay leaders, key young adults, elders, deacons, and staff. Becoming a church that better engages young adults necessitates congregational buy-in because, in many cases, pastors and elders need to lead systematic change. For example, financial and staffing priorities might need to shift from other efforts, or a long-serving leader might be asked to share responsibilities with a younger one. Such change can be uncomfortable for existing members, so pastors must biblically shepherd their flocks. Congregations are more likely to embrace the challenges associated with becoming a magnetic church when leaders gently and firmly guide them toward a Scripture-grounded vision of God’s multigenerational household (Eph. 4:11–13; Titus 2:1–8; 1 Pet. 5:2–3; 1 John 2:12–14). When employed wisely by pastoral leaders, multigenerational teams can play an invaluable role in this process by modeling intergenerational ministry, catalyzing young-adult outreach and discipleship, and contributing to congregation-wide efforts to become a magnetic church. 4. Cultivate hospitality and community. For many, the notion of reaching young adults evokes images of extensive evangelistic campaigns. Yet reaching twentysomethings doesn’t begin with programs but with hospitality. Tim Keller says, “Hospitality is an attitude of heart and a practice . . . that seeks to turn strangers into guests, friends, and eventually brothers and sisters.” In magnetic churches, young adults personally invite their friends, and then other older members of the congregation warmly welcome them. Simply inviting to take a group of twentysomethings out for lunch after church can open the gate onto a pathway toward deeper engagement with the church. After all, when young adults more regularly attend corporate worship and sit under the preaching of God’s Word, they’re experiencing the means God uses to convert sinners. Community marked by mutual dependence and love (Rom. 12:4-5; 9–11; 1 Pet. 3:8) also plays a critical role in reaching young adults. As one pastor puts it, “Our most powerful tool of evangelism [with respect to young adults] is our life together as the people of God.” Magnetic churches encourage young adults to develop friendships with each other and with those from other life stages. Small groups, shared meals, serving together inside and outside the church, and corporate worship are all ways churches can cultivate community. Such churches provide young adults with a rare commodity in today’s world: a place to belong as they learn what it means to be Jesus’s disciples. 5. Disciple and evangelize concurrently. Magnetic churches recognize that discipleship pathways for young adults often serve dual purposes—edifying believers while evangelizing the curious (1 Cor. 14:23–25). This can be a protracted process. Keller emphasizes that Christ-centered preaching and ministry “both grows believers and challenges non-believers.” In such an environment, young adults of various stripes are both discipled in the gospel and introduced to gospel truths for the first time. Magnetic churches soberly embrace their disciple-making mandate and carefully consider how to present everyone, including young adults, mature in Christ (Col. 1:28–2:3). Across these congregations, common discipleship pathways emerged in our study: contextualized, rigorous biblical instruction; small groups; meaningful service; and mentoring. Young adults consistently expressed a desire for biblical instruction that’s theologically rich and attentive to their lived experience. Moreover, they expressed a longing to develop deep relationships with their peers and older adults. Many were motivated to learn from a mentor. 6. Prepare young adults for the long haul. Young adults want to live purposeful lives. Mindful of this impulse, magnetic churches help this demographic understand that Christian discipleship encompasses all of life. Leaders instruct young adults in the creation mandate (Gen. 1:27–28; 2:15). These churches aim to ground young adults in their identity as redeemed image-bearers and to equip them with a biblical understanding of vocation. In this way, magnetic churches direct young adults away from self-focus and toward obedience to God’s commands for “every square inch” of life. Magnetic churches direct young adults away from self-focus and toward obedience to God’s commands for ‘every square inch’ of life. Magnetic churches also equip young adults to live in light of the Great Commission (Matt. 28:18–20) by providing personal evangelism training and encouraging participation in community outreach, global missions, and church planting initiatives. Becoming a magnetic church is a marathon, not a sprint. It’s a process that calls leaders to continually count the cost and place their confidence not in strategies but in the Lord. Engaging twentysomethings will require a willingness to experiment, to learn from mistakes, and, especially, to persevere. But as you undertake this task, be assured of the promise that Christ will build his church; not even the gates of hell can prevail against it (16:18).

On My Shelf helps you get to know various writers through a behind-the-scenes glimpse into their lives as readers. I asked Winfree Brisley—editor of several books, including the Disciplines of Devotion series—about what’s on her bedside table, her favorite fiction, the books she regularly revisits, and more. What’s on your nightstand right now? What’s on my nightstand and what I’m reading are two different questions. I tend to have more books sitting around than I can realistically read. But I try to always be working through at least one fiction book and one Christian nonfiction book. For fiction, I’m currently reading Middlemarch by George Eliot. I used to alternate between contemporary fiction and classics, but more and more I find myself staying with the classics as I struggle to find contemporary works that aren’t unnecessarily dark or explicit. However, Theo of Golden was a delightful exception that I enjoyed last year. I’m also reading Matt Smethurst’s excellent book, Tim Keller on the Christian Life. I’ve read and listened to a lot from Keller, so the teaching is familiar. But Smethurst’s use of quotes from Keller and anecdotes from his life and ministry really bring the teaching to life in a beautiful way. Speaking of bringing teaching to life, I also recently finished Radically Whole by David Gibson. It’s a reflection on the book of James, particularly working out the theme of double-mindedness. I’ve always struggled a bit with James, but Gibson’s insights helped me appreciate it and apply it in a deeper way. What are your favorite fiction books? I read Pride and Prejudice for the first time in 8th grade, and I’ve been hooked on Jane Austen’s novels ever since. Though I’ll happily read any of her books, Persuasion is probably my favorite at this point. The reason I love Austen’s books, and the reason they’re worth rereading, is that their value isn’t in the plotline. It’s in the character development. No spoiler alerts are necessary. The guy and the girl are going to get together in the end. The beauty is in getting to know the characters along the way. What are some books you regularly reread and why? Other than Austen’s novels, I don’t regularly reread many books in their entirety. However, there are some that I go back to again and again for particular chapters or arguments. One of those is C. S. Lewis’s The Four Loves. His exploration of the different types of love is insightful on both a philosophical and a practical level—particularly his reflections on friendship. Given that love is so foundational to the character of God and to our relationships with him and one another, I often go back to this book to inform my writing and teaching. Given that love is so foundational to the character of God and to our relationships with him and one another, I often go back to this book to inform my writing and teaching. Jen Wilkin’s Women of the Word is another book I frequently pull off the shelf. As I consider how to best teach and train other women, I certainly can’t improve on what she has outlined there, so I gladly borrow her 5 P’s of study—giving her credit, of course. And I return again and again to Alexander Maclaren’s Expositions of Holy Scripture. His volumes on the Gospel of John are dear to me, and his sermon on John 21:7 has probably shaped me more than any other sermon I’ve heard or read. What books have most profoundly shaped how you serve and lead others for the sake of the gospel? When I was starting out as a high school English teacher in a Christian school, I stumbled on Leland Ryken’s Realms of Gold: The Classics in Christian Perspective. I was looking for particular help teaching Shakespeare and Hawthorne and others from a biblical perspective, and I found that. In fact, although I loathed The Scarlet Letter as a student, it became one of my favorite novels to teach once I saw it from Ryken’s perspective. But even more importantly, Ryken instilled in me something he calls the literary imagination. He writes, “It is possible to set up a profitable two-way street between the Bible and literature, with the Bible enabling me to see a lot in literature that I would otherwise miss, and literature enabling me to see and feel biblical truth better.” That became a framework that shaped not only how I taught literature but how I thought about all sorts of areas of life. This has informed my writing over the years, my Bible teaching, the way I engage culture and nonbelievers, and even how I parent. If we’re paying attention, we can see the truth of Scripture everywhere, even in unlikely places, and we can apply the truth of Scripture to everything, even to things it doesn’t speak directly about. Though that seems obvious to me now, at the time I first encountered Ryken’s work, my intuitive approach to the world reflected a more rigid sacred-secular divide. He helped me begin to understand how to make “every square inch” theology practical. What’s one book you wish every pastor would read? Rory Shiner’s One Forever: The Transforming Power of Being in Christ is well worth a pastor’s time. It not only gives you an incredibly effective analogy for explaining what it means to be “in Christ” that you can use in your teaching and preaching, but it also provides a helpful example of how to make a complicated doctrine clear and accessible to the average Christian. And it’s less than 100 pages! The more I write and teach, the more I realize that there are so many words and phrases from Scripture that we regularly say in Christian circles without ever really explaining what they mean. “In Christ” is one of those. In fact, I didn’t realize how poorly I understood that concept until I heard a speaker use Shiner’s airplane analogy. Well-formed illustrations and analogies can accomplish a lot more than simply engaging listener attention. They really can enable people to understand theological truths in meaningful ways. What’s your best piece of writing advice? When you’re ready to write, sit down at your computer. If you need to think, do it somewhere else. I need to read and think and work out arguments before I have anything worthwhile to put down on the page. If I try to do that thinking work with a blank document and a blinking cursor in front of me, I just get discouraged that I’m not making progress. Instead, I find it helpful to identify a specific argument or illustration that I need to work out and then go on a walk to think it through or forgo a podcast and process it while I’m driving. Even once I’m well into a writing project, if I get stuck, I often walk a lap around my neighborhood to think through my problem. There’s something about getting my body moving that seems to get my mind unstuck. As editor of TGC’s new Disciplines of Devotion series, what’s your hope for this series aimed at Christian women, and what are ways that individuals or churches can use these resources? For years now, as I’ve talked with women about their spiritual lives, I’ve heard a consistent frustration. They want to grow in knowing the Lord. They want to have a rich devotional life. But everything else in life seems to get in the way. So I’ve been wrestling with this question of how we can equip women to grow in devotion to the Lord even as they live in an age of endless distraction. As I’ve looked to Scripture and considered the examples of faithful believers in church history and some in my own family and church, it stands out to me that discipline helps us grow in devotion. Habits and disciplines often get a bad rap in the church because we’re concerned about legalism. But as Dallas Willard explains, “Grace is not opposed to effort, it is opposed to earning.” As I’ve looked to Scripture and considered the examples of faithful believers, it stands out to me that discipline helps us grow in devotion. My hope for this series is to give women practical examples of the sort of effort that helps us grow in relationship with the Lord. Scripture points us to a variety of practices, and they’re not as complicated as we often think. So each booklet explores one discipline and offers three very accessible ways to practice it. There will initially be six booklets: Prayer, Fasting, Sabbath Rest, Worship, Evangelism, and Bible Study. Readers can pick one or two that particularly interest them, or read the whole series. And the booklets include discussion questions, so they would make great content for small groups or discipleship relationships. What are you learning about life and following Jesus? I’m learning to turn to prayer more readily and more frequently. In a world of endless information, googling and scrolling can easily become our go-to source of help. But no parenting tip from social media has ever moved the hearts of my sons. Crying out to the Lord on their behalf has. No time management hack has ever given me peace and joy when my inbox is overflowing, deadlines are approaching, and there aren’t enough hours in the day. Crying out to the Lord has. I’m finding the testimony of the psalmist to be true in my life day after day: “I sought the LORD, and he answered me and delivered me from all my fears” (Ps. 34:4).

The Gospel Coalition is pleased to announce the addition of eight new members to its Council, the group of mostly pastors who provide direction and leadership to TGC. These are the newly appointed Council members (in alphabetical order): Derek Buikema: lead pastor at Orland Park Christian Reformed Church (Orland Park, Illinois) Trent Casto: senior pastor of Covenant Church of Naples (Naples, Florida) J. T. English: lead pastor at Storyline Church (Arvada, Colorado) Sam Ferguson: rector of The Falls Church Anglican (Falls Church, Virginia) Philip Miller: senior pastor of The Moody Church (Chicago, Illinois) Jeff Norris: senior pastor of Perimeter Church (Johns Creek, Georgia) Scott Redd: pastor at Briarwood Presbyterian Church (Birmingham, Alabama) P. J. Tibayan: pastor-theologian at Bellflower Baptist Church (Bellflower, California) Nominated by the TGC Board and elected by the Council, these newest additions bring the total number of active Council members to 52. See the full list of current Council members as well as Council Emeritus members. “The local church is TGC’s heartbeat,” said Mark Vroegop, TGC’s president since early 2025. “We want to equip pastors, other church leaders, and churchgoers with the resources they need for faithful Christian life and ministry. And TGC’s rootedness in the local church has always been strengthened by our Council. This group of trusted, experienced leaders from a variety of denominations and ministry contexts keep TGC on mission and connected to the practical needs of local churches. I know the addition of these eight new Council members will be a massive win for TGC’s ongoing efforts to help renew and unify the contemporary church in the ancient gospel.” TGC’s Council convened for the first time in 2005, at the invitation of Don Carson and Tim Keller. Out of that first gathering, TGC was formally organized, adopting our Foundation Documents in 2007. Ever since, the Council has gathered annually to encourage one another and provide guidance to the staff team leading the many fronts of TGC’s global ministry. Check out TGC’s latest resources by visiting TGC.org or subscribing to one of our newsletters. Support the ministry of TGC by joining TGC Collective or making a gift to our Ancient Gospel, Future Church campaign.

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