Church Landscape Review: Open Doors in Boston
Open Doors in Boston
Outreach, Welcome & New Commitments to Christ in Boston Area New Churches 2019-2023
“Listen! I am standing at the door, knocking; if you hear my voice and open the door, I will come in to you and eat with you, and you with me” (Rev. 3:20).
Churches in Boston are answering the divine knock at the door. And the results are encouraging.
They’re opening doors of opportunity: responding to the needs around them with courage and care. As they build trust and partner with local organizations, they’re seeing transformation.
They’re opening doors of belonging: welcoming newcomers to become regular attendees, many of whom have no background in Christianity.
They’re opening doors of faith: seeing over 1,000 people come to Christ in a five-year period, averaging a new believer every 1.5 days.
The Applied Research team at the Emmanuel Gospel Center explored these trends in Open Doors in Boston: Outreach, Welcome & New Commitments to Christ in Boston Area New Churches 2019-2023. It’s part of the 2025 Church Landscape Review project, which revisits the churches the team had originally interviewed as church plants in 2014, with the goal of exploring how the Boston-area church landscape has evolved over the past decade.
Like other reports in the project, Open Doors includes data, commentary, reflection questions as well as next steps for ministry leaders.
This particular report is also accompanied by a collection of stories behind the data, “Open Doors in Boston: Stories and Reflections.” These encouraging stories are varied and beautiful—stories of healing, community partnerships, long journeys to faith, and moments of encounter with God. They reflect what is possible when churches open their doors and hearts to their neighborhoods, step into the needs around them, and follow God’s lead with creativity and courage.
Visit the Church Landscape Review project page for more information about the methods, participants, and terminology used in the study. There you will also find a series of reports to be released periodically throughout 2025:
