“7 wide, 7 wide!” the producer shouted in a control room at Eagle Brook Church’s main campus in Lino Lakes. He peered at eight wall-mounted television monitors and switched from wide shots to dramatic close-ups, beaming this service to all of Eagle Brook’s statewide campuses. “Six, then nine on drop. Take six. Go ahead nine. Very nice!”
It was 11 a.m. sharp, the second of two Sunday services on a recent weekend at Minnesota’s largest church. The bandleader kicked things off in an understated way: “Hey everybody, welcome to church.” He launched into Christian rock songs whose lyrics were projected on two huge screens in this packed auditorium: plenty of Vikings jerseys, many of the 2,000 parishioners holding a cup of Eagle Brook blend coffee from the church’s Starbucks-esque cafe.
As the lead pastor of this campus spoke about finding community in this massive church, a clock in back ticked down to zero, ensuring all the campuses and online hosts stuck to the same schedule. Then Ted Cunningham, an author, comedian, pastor of a Missouri church and member of Eagle Brook’s teaching team, took the stage.
The leaders of Minnesota’s largest church don’t love the word “megachurch.” That comes with too many connotations: too politicized, too business-like, too impersonal. “I don’t like it at all,” senior pastor Jason Strand said in an interview. “The minute people label us ‘megachurch,’ there’s all sorts of thoughts and baggage comes with that.”
Eagle Brook prefers “multi-site church.” As Cunningham preached about time management, a message about centering God in our lives, his image beamed to a dozen more sites across Minnesota.
Eagle Brook’s numbers are mind-boggling. As American church attendance declines — 30% of Americans attend religious services weekly or nearly every week, according to a Gallup survey, down from 42% two decades ago — this Baptist-affiliated church has become one of America’s largest and fastest-growing churches.
An average Eagle Brook weekend has about 25,000 people worshiping in person. The 13th Minnesota location opened in September in Baxter, near Brainerd, and a 14th opens in Red Wing this weekend.
In Rochester on a recent Sunday, where services are conducted at the Mayo Civic Center until the church raises money for a northwest Rochester expansion on land it purchased for $600,000, the Lino Lakes sermon was simulcast to more than 100 people. At the new outpost near Brainerd, hundreds packed inside.