Revival Outside the Walls

The Rev. Dr. Ronald Moore

Dec 08, 2025

It is tempting to believe that the decline of the Church means the decline of Christianity. That is the mistake the Church of England’s recent statistics make—and the same illusion many American denominations are beginning to share. A reduction in attendance is not always evidence of a waning faith; sometimes, it signals that the Spirit has moved elsewhere.

According to the Bible Society’s new report The Quiet Revival, church attendance among young adults in England has grown dramatically over the past six years. But the Church of England’s own numbers tell a different story: congregations are smaller, children fewer, and the long-term decline continues. So which is true?

Both—and neither. The Church of England may not be growing, but Christianity is not dead. What is happening in the United Kingdom is a re-alignment, not a recession. The revival is real; it has simply gone outside the walls.

The Spirit Moves, Even When the Institution Does Not

The Holy Spirit is not confined to a chancery office or a cathedral nave. He moves through the streets, the campuses, the living rooms, and even the digital commons where hungry souls gather to pray and learn. History has never known a true revival that began in the bishop’s palace. Every great awakening began with repentance among ordinary people—fishermen, farmers, students, and outcasts—who rediscovered the holiness of God and the authority of His Word.

When a church becomes more concerned with affirmation than salvation, it ceases to be a vessel of grace and becomes a monument to its own decline. Yet even there, God does not leave Himself without a witness. When the institution falters, the remnant rises.

The Remnant Pattern

This “revival outside the walls” is part of a larger, biblical pattern. When Israel turned to idols, God sent prophets to the wilderness. When the Temple became corrupt, Christ went to the mountains and the shore. When medieval religion hardened into superstition, reformers preached in fields and taverns. God has never needed a bureaucracy to be believed; He has only needed hearts that tremble at His Word.

The West’s ecclesiastical decline, then, is not the end of Christianity—it is the pruning that precedes fruit. It is the moment when the living branches of the vine must push beyond the old latticework of institutional religion and bear fruit in the open air.

It may look disordered to the statisticians, but heaven recognizes it as growth.

A Word for America

This same movement is quietly beginning on our own shores. While the mainline churches shrink and some evangelical movements chase trends, a quieter stream of believers is returning to historic faith, liturgy, and Scripture. They are not leaving the Church; they are leaving the show.

And in that return, a new strength is forming. Like England, our own revival will not begin in conference halls or denominational offices, but among those who kneel, repent, and believe again that God is holy and His Word is true.

The quiet revival is not confined to one country. It is the sound of dry bones stirring across a weary West. The numbers will never capture it, because it is happening where statisticians rarely look—in hearts made alive again by awe.

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