Your doctor says you're healthy, no signs of disease; blood pressure and weight are within normal limits.

The fitness instructor says you're in terrible shape, resting pulse and body-fat percentage are way above normal; flexibility is poor, and you just flunked the treadmill test.

If both can be right, what does it mean to be healthy? And following the same analogy, what does it mean for a church to be healthy? What signs indicate a congregation is both free of disease and spiritually fit?

Leadership set out to answer those questions. We talked with a variety of pastors and leaders and gathered diagnostic tools and checklists, both descriptive and prescriptive.

We did not find just one answer, but we did find the many responses revealing. So here, with contradictions and redundancies intact, are various ways to identify and maintain a healthy church.

Finding the Focal Point

Church health is a matter of focus: a focus on Christ, not the church. Our focus determines whether we have a survival ...