1. A reflective spirit will come over evangelicals, initiating several years of serious self-examination resulting in the discovery of just how far we have drifted from the shores of orthodoxy.

2. The 80's style up-tempo-cheerleader-performance pace in worship music will fade faster than Sunday school bussing, and be replaced by a more pensive, reflective, mellow, (soulful, almost blues) 'balm in Gilead' style of music.

3. Promisekeepers will rally more than a million men for their gatherings, but the February ministers conference will be an attendance disappointment falling far below initial estimates of 70,000 ministers.

4. The latest idea among awakening churches will be a newly scheduled service designed for 'nothing by prayer.'

5. Evangelical pastors will bury the remains of the success movement, sending the surviving success 'n leadership entrepreneurs scrambling for new product lines.

6. The now-in-charge boomers will rapidly become the conservatives, attempting to cling to the 'gains' of our revolution becoming very much like the traditionalists we overthrew.

7. The term 'church growth' will all but disappear, being replaced by the newer phrase, 'church health'

8. Books on doctrine and theology will dominate the marketplace as the church seeks to rediscover what it really stands for, if anything.

9. Few people will care about what is happening in the 'superchurches' -- and the coming Millennial babies and younger Xers won't know the name 'Bill Hybels' any better than they know 'Jack Hyles'.

10. Alan Keyes won't win any Republican primaries even though he should.

11. Evangelicals will half-heartedly support Bob Dole as he loses next November.

12. 40% of professed evangelicals will vote for Bill Clinton as they chuckle their way home from refinancing their home and church mortgages at a 6%-fixed rate.

13. Evangelicals will forge a new peace with Roman Catholics not only officially but [more so] through adopting Catholic role models to admire (Mother Theresa) and absorbing the writings of influential Catholic authors (Neuhaus).

14. Middle-aged boomers, now able to see the 'end of the row' will now decide that a simpler life, smaller house, lower salary, and less famous pastorate would be a good thing, leaving those who scrambled to the 'top' perplexed that they are no longer envied.

15. The number of Americans on the net will double to 50 million by the end of the year, 'flattening' organizations and denominations, and changing forever the nature of publishing.

16. Increasing tensions with Russia will raise specters of a 'cold peace' after Boris Yeltsin is not elected in June.

17. The latest push in church planting will be 'Xer churches' but the boomers will resist the notion saying, "What's wrong with the way we do worship?' (Once the revolution is over most revolutionaries become conservatives.)

18. There will be a resurgence of interest in the devotional classics, the early church fathers, fed especially by their easy availability on the Internet.

19. The 'Christian contemporary music industry' will make its contribution the America's GNP of $1.2 Billion (that's 'B').

20. The home school movement will usher in the home college movement as universities and colleges scramble to be first on the net - by the end of this year you will be able to work on every degree except a doctorate on-line, (and a Ph.D. too, if you're satisfied with a bogus one).

21. Denominations will follow the Southern Baptist's lead as para-church and profiteers increasingly perform the services traditionally provided by denominations.

22. The church will be increasingly divided between those who think revival is already occurring and those who believe the church is close to apostasy.

23. Tony Campolo will say something which gets himself in trouble.

24. Preaching will be 'in' again.

25. Your on-line service (AOL, Compuserve, etc) will become increasingly irrelevant as the WWW becomes dominant, local services provide better access, and the giant phone companies jump into the fray.

26. Hillary Clinton will be spotted somewhere in this country again and they will have to toss out all those milk cartons they printed up.

27. A prominent evangelical institution will retain a staff member who admits to being 'a practicing homosexual committed to a single life partner.'

28. There will be a resurgence of 'High church' elements of worship among evangelicals searching for roots, stability, and something that is older than Madonna.

29. The 'Christian Coalition' will become more coalition and less Christian. 30. John Maxwell will join Amy Grant and Michael W. Smith as the next 'crossover artist.'

31. Islam will make continual gains among American black males producing a competing new beefed-up-for-males sturdier strain of Christianity.

32. A new strain of religion - something like fundamentalism --will sweep younger people in their late 20's and early 30's, totally perplexing the liberal-minded boomers who still remember something like legalism.

33. Evangelicals will privately admit that we've lost the abortion battle; the radical anti-abortion foes will have more trouble rallying the church then resisting NOW.

34. While traditional style Sunday school classes will continue to have problems, the newest craze in discipleship will be intense evening Bible courses complete with homework, tests, and even college credit.

35. There will be a bull market in end-times interest.

36. The 'remnant mentality' will make great strides in the coming year.

37. A prominent evangelical's moral failure will be exposed. (A free one.) 38. Robert Tilton will make a comeback.

39. By the end of the year the term 'Evangelical' will finally mean nothing, for by then it will have come to mean everything.

40. The day of the personally tailored E-magazine will arrive as pastors subscribe 'a la carte' to their own personal preferences in columns, resources, features and news. (I hope you'll remember this column as you come into your cyber-kingdom!)

So, what do you think?

Like all futurists, I just connect the dots to see where it is headed... and where there are no dots... hey, I guess. What do you think? What is your chief 1996 prediction you'd make for Evangelicals... or your own church... country... organization... denomination... whatever... for 1996?

EVANGELICAL LEADER OF THE YEAR