A COMPARATIVE STUDY OF THE GROWTH OF PROPHETIC FAITH CHURCH INTERNATIONAL (PFCI) AND INTERNATIONAL CENTRAL GOSPEL CHURCH (ICGC)-PRAYER TEMPLE, 2005-2015.

Abstract

God from the beginning of creation made His intentions clear with respect to growth and reproduction when He blessed mankind to be fruitful and multiply in Gene sis 1:28 in the old Testament. In the New Testament too, Jesus Christ‟s Great Commission to the church to make disciples is seen to be in conformity to the Old Testament blessing for living things to bear fruit. It therefore becomes an issue if a church for any reason cannot obey the reproduction command. Hence an empirical research was conducted to find out if the assertion above were true and the factors impeding the numeric growth of PFCI. This thesis sought to analyse the growth of the Christian church today and used ICGC and PFCI as case study. Primary data was gathered from interviews and administration of questionnaire from pastors, elders, current and formal members of the selected churches and finally people from the vicinity of the selected churches. Secondary data was collected from relevant literature, articles in journals and online sources. From the study, it was found out the churches that have experienced regular growth did so through the wheels of evangelism; through obedience to the Great Commission in Matthew 28:19-20. It is recommended that churches should refrain from the practice of “recycling of people”. What this means is that most of their members were not won through their own evangelistic efforts rather they were extracted from other churches.