Resource Review · Christian News Websites
Christian Standard
The flagship magazine of the independent Christian Churches and Churches of Christ since 1866 — the one publication that takes the Restoration Movement seriously on its own terms.
- Editor rating
- 4.0 / 5
- Starting price
- Free articles · print subscription extra
- Free tier
- Yes
- Platforms
- Web · Print · Email newsletter
- Developer
- Christian Standard Media
- Launched
- 1866
The verdict
Christian Standard has quietly become the indispensable publication for a tradition most American Christians have never heard of — the independent Christian Churches and Churches of Christ. If your church is part of the Stone-Campbell Restoration Movement, this is your magazine. If it isn’t, you’re still reading the most reliable window into a 5,000-congregation tribe of evangelicals that the rest of the press routinely misses.
Try Christian Standard ↗Opens christianstandard.com
Christian Standard is the magazine of the independent Christian Churches and Churches of Christ — the instrumental, congregationally-governed wing of the Stone-Campbell Restoration Movement. It has been published continuously since 1866, which makes it older than most denominations and older than every other publication on this list except a handful of mainline weeklies. That longevity matters. When you read Christian Standard you are reading a magazine that has covered its tradition through Reconstruction, two World Wars, the 1906 instrumental-music division with the a cappella Churches of Christ, the 1971 separation from the Disciples of Christ, and the slow movement of independent Christian Churches into the broader American evangelical mainstream.
It is not Christianity Today. It doesn’t pretend to speak for all of evangelicalism. It doesn’t cover Catholic news. It doesn’t referee the Reformed civil wars that dominate so much Protestant journalism. What it does — and what nothing else does at this scale — is cover the independent Christian Churches as a movement with its own theological commitments, its own history, its own colleges, its own missionary networks, and its own present-day questions about leadership, polity, and cultural engagement.
For readers outside the Restoration Movement, Christian Standard is the single best place to understand what these churches actually believe and do. For readers inside it, the magazine has been the connective tissue of a famously non-denominational tradition for over 160 years — the closest thing a movement that rejects creeds and central authority has to a shared voice. That’s the thing the site is doing well, and the thing nobody else is doing at all.
✓ The good
- Restoration Movement coverage with no competitor — the only mainstream publication treating the independent Christian Churches as a distinct tradition with its own news, history, and leadership questions
- A 160-year archive — the magazine has been continuously published since 1866, which means scholarly work on Stone-Campbell history routinely cites Christian Standard primary sources
- Church leadership focus that respects congregational autonomy — articles assume elder-led, locally-governed churches rather than denominational hierarchies, which fits the tradition exactly
- Practical missions and church-planting reporting — the independent Christian Churches operate one of the larger non-denominational missionary networks in American Protestantism, and the magazine covers it seriously
- Free article access — most online content is available without subscription, with print and digital subscriptions adding the full magazine experience
- A measured editorial voice — Christian Standard has historically held the irenic center of a tradition that can get sharp-elbowed, which makes it more useful than the partisan blogs
- Cross-pollination with the Bible colleges — Ozark, Cincinnati Christian, Johnson, Lincoln, Hope International, and the others all show up regularly, which gives readers a window into how the tradition trains its ministers
✗ Watch out
- Almost invisible if you aren’t already in the movement — the site assumes readers know what "RM" and "independent Christian Churches" mean, and rarely defines its in-house vocabulary
- Print-first sensibility — the website is functional but feels like a magazine front-end, not a digital-first newsroom; navigation and search are workmanlike rather than excellent
- Limited breaking-news muscle — Christian Standard is monthly in spirit, so daily news cycles in the broader evangelical world will be better covered at Christianity Today or Religion News Service
- Narrow scope by design — coverage of Catholic, Orthodox, mainline Protestant, and Latter-day Saint news is essentially nonexistent, because that isn’t the magazine’s job
- Light on hard-hitting investigative journalism — the magazine is closer to a movement journal than a watchdog publication, which some readers will read as a feature and others as a limitation
Best for
- Members and ministers of independent Christian Churches and Churches of Christ
- Bible-college students and Restoration Movement historians
- Researchers studying American religious tradition outside the usual Reformed/Catholic/mainline lanes
- Church-leadership readers who want elder-led, congregational polity reporting
Avoid if
- You want a daily evangelical news feed across all traditions
- You expect coverage of Catholic, Orthodox, or Latter-day Saint topics
- You want investigative reporting on denominational scandals as your primary diet
- You aren’t interested in any specific tradition and just want general devotional content
What Christian Standard is
Christian Standard is a religious magazine, published since 1866, that serves as the de facto journal of record for the independent Christian Churches and Churches of Christ — the instrumental wing of the Stone-Campbell Restoration Movement. It is not a denominational publication in the technical sense, because the tradition it covers does not have a denomination in the technical sense. The independent Christian Churches are congregationally governed and reject formal hierarchies above the local elder board, which means Christian Standard functions more like a movement journal than an official organ.
The site at christianstandard.com publishes news, opinion, history, leadership essays, missions reports, and theological reflection — most of it free to read, with the full magazine experience available by subscription. Editorial work happens through Christian Standard Media, which also publishes a sister title (The Lookout) and historically has been one of the central publishing institutions of the tradition. The magazine has been edited by some of the most influential figures in 20th-century Restoration Movement history, and the back catalog is a primary source for scholars working on American religious history.
Why the Restoration Movement reads Christian Standard
The Stone-Campbell Restoration Movement — born on the American frontier in the early 1800s under Barton W. Stone and Thomas and Alexander Campbell — is one of the larger American Christian traditions you’ve probably never heard of. It now exists in three streams: the a cappella Churches of Christ, the independent Christian Churches and Churches of Christ (which use instruments), and the Disciples of Christ (a mainline body). Christian Standard covers the middle stream, which by most estimates includes more than 5,000 congregations and somewhere around a million members in the United States alone. That is larger than several well-known denominations that get vastly more press.
No other mainstream publication covers this tradition as its primary beat. Christianity Today will mention it occasionally; Religion News Service will cover the bigger stories; The Christian Chronicle covers the a cappella cousin churches. Christian Standard is the only place where the independent Christian Churches are treated as the main subject rather than a footnote. For ministers, elders, and members of those churches, that makes the magazine functionally irreplaceable. The Restoration Movement is famously decentralized — no bishops, no synods, no central office — and Christian Standard has been one of the few things holding the conversation together for 160 years.
Restoration Movement coverage: the differentiator nobody else offers
This is the feature that makes Christian Standard matter. The independent Christian Churches and Churches of Christ are a major American evangelical tradition that, because of their commitment to "no creed but Christ" and congregational autonomy, have no denominational headquarters and no official spokesperson. The movement’s convictions are distinctive: weekly observance of the Lord’s Supper as the central act of corporate worship; baptism by immersion treated as the moment of new-birth response to the gospel (a position other traditions characterize as baptismal regeneration and read differently); a self-conscious effort to restore New Testament-era church practice; elder-led congregational government; and a historical aversion to creeds and denominational labels. Christian Standard covers all of this on its own terms — describing what the tradition believes and does without translating it for outsiders.
The practical result is that you can read Christian Standard for a month and come away with a clearer picture of independent Christian Church polity, worship, and leadership than you would get from a year of generic evangelical media. The magazine covers the North American Christian Convention (now Spire), the International Conference on Missions, the network of Bible colleges, the church-planting movements, and the leadership debates inside the tradition. Other traditions hold different positions on baptism, the Lord’s Supper, ecclesiology, and creeds, and Christian Standard does not pretend otherwise — it simply reports its own movement’s conversations the way it would if it were a denominational magazine, even though the tradition would not describe itself as a denomination.
The magazine plus the scholarly history: 160 years of primary source material
Christian Standard was founded in 1866 by Isaac Errett, one of the second-generation leaders of the Stone-Campbell movement, and it has been published continuously ever since. That makes the magazine one of the longest-running religious periodicals in American history. The archive is genuinely scholarly material — historians of the Restoration Movement working on dissertations and academic monographs routinely cite Christian Standard articles as primary sources, the way historians of mainline Protestantism cite The Christian Century or The Christian Advocate.
In practical terms, this means current articles sit inside an unusual depth of institutional memory. When Christian Standard covers a present-day leadership question, it does so against the backdrop of a magazine that covered the same kinds of questions in 1890, 1925, 1955, and 1985. Long-time editors like Edwin Hayden and Mark Taylor shaped the tradition’s self-understanding from the editor’s chair. For readers who care about church history — and especially for readers studying American Christianity outside the dominant Reformed, Catholic, and mainline narratives — the magazine functions as both current journalism and a continuing historical record.
Church leadership and ministry: practical content for elder-led congregations
A large share of Christian Standard’s editorial output is aimed at church leaders — preachers, elders, ministry staff, and Bible college students preparing for ministry. The coverage is shaped by the tradition’s polity: articles assume congregational autonomy, elder-led decision-making, and a preaching ministry that takes the New Testament text seriously. You will see practical pieces on shepherding teams, multi-elder leadership, preaching through books of the Bible, multi-generational ministry, succession planning at the senior-minister level, and the perennial questions about staff structure in growing congregations.
Because the tradition has produced some genuinely large churches — Southeast Christian in Louisville, Central Christian in Las Vegas, LifeBridge in Colorado, and a long tail of multi-site bodies — Christian Standard regularly publishes case-study material from those congregations. It also covers the smaller-church reality, which is most of the movement. The magazine’s strength here is that the leadership content assumes the tradition’s ecclesiology rather than importing leadership frameworks from elsewhere; it isn’t generic church-growth content with a Restoration Movement bumper sticker. That fit makes the practical articles more useful than the equivalent content in larger evangelical outlets for ministers actually serving in these churches.
Pricing
Free Online
Free
Most articles on christianstandard.com are free to read without registration, including news, columns, history features, and the bulk of the editorial output.
Digital Subscription
Around $24/yr (verify current pricing)
Adds the full digital magazine, archive access, and email delivery. Pricing has historically been modest — confirm at the official site before subscribing.
Print + Digital
Around $30–$40/yr (verify current pricing)
The full magazine in print plus digital access. The print edition is where the longer feature work tends to land first.
Pricing is straightforward and modest. Most of the website is free — the news, columns, history features, and the bulk of the editorial work are accessible without subscription. That alone makes Christian Standard one of the more open religious publications on the web, especially compared with paywalled mainline magazines.
The paid tiers add the full magazine experience — the print edition, the digital edition with the layout intact, archive access, and email delivery. Historical pricing has been modest by magazine standards, but the figures shift periodically, so the actual rates should be confirmed at the official site before subscribing.
For institutional readers — Bible colleges, seminaries, church libraries — the print subscription is the most useful tier. For individual readers who mostly want to keep up with the movement’s news and read the longer essays, the digital subscription is the balanced default. Casual readers will get a great deal from the free tier alone.
Where Christian Standard falls behind
No daily news cadence. Christian Standard is a magazine, not a wire service, so breaking-news coverage of the wider Christian world will be slower and lighter than what you find at Christianity Today, Religion News Service, or The Christian Post. If a story breaks at 9 a.m. that touches your church, you’ll read about it elsewhere first.
No cross-traditional coverage. The site does not cover Catholic, Orthodox, Latter-day Saint, Reformed, or mainline Protestant news as primary topics. That’s by design — Christian Standard knows what it is — but if you want a single publication that covers American Christianity broadly, you’ll need something else.
A workmanlike website. The site is functional and reads well, but it doesn’t have the editorial polish of Christianity Today or the multimedia depth of larger evangelical outlets. Search and discovery are serviceable rather than impressive. The magazine is print-first in spirit, and the website shows it.
Limited investigative journalism. Christian Standard sits closer to the movement-journal end of the spectrum than the watchdog-newsroom end. There is opinion, analysis, and reporting, but readers looking for the kind of investigative work that drives newer outlets like The Roys Report will find Christian Standard more measured and more institutional. Whether that is a feature or a limitation depends on what you’re looking for.
Christian Standard vs. The Christian Chronicle vs. Christianity Today
Different strengths. Christian Standard is the magazine of the independent Christian Churches and Churches of Christ — the instrumental wing of the Stone-Campbell Restoration Movement. The Christian Chronicle is the major newspaper of the a cappella Churches of Christ, the non-instrumental cousin tradition that separated from the independent stream in the early 1900s. Christianity Today is the flagship of broad American evangelicalism, founded in 1956 with Billy Graham’s backing.
Christian Standard is the best at the independent Christian Churches beat — no competition. The Christian Chronicle is better at the a cappella Churches of Christ — likewise no real competition. Christianity Today is broader (interdenominational news, cultural analysis, books, theology, global Christianity, and a much larger newsroom). The three publications serve genuinely different audiences and almost never overlap on news stories. Many Restoration Movement readers subscribe to Christian Standard for their tradition and Christianity Today for the broader evangelical picture, which is a reasonable combination.
If you’re inside the independent Christian Churches, Christian Standard is the publication that takes you seriously as a tradition with its own history and questions. If you’re inside the a cappella Churches of Christ, The Christian Chronicle does the same. If you want to read across the whole evangelical landscape, Christianity Today is the larger publication. None of the three is trying to be the others, and they are most useful when paired rather than ranked.
The bottom line
Christian Standard is not the right choice for everyone. It is a focused, tradition-specific magazine for a movement that most American Christians have never heard of, and it doesn’t try to be more than that. But within its lane, it is essentially the only player — the one publication that has covered the independent Christian Churches and Churches of Christ continuously since 1866 and treats the Restoration Movement as a tradition worth taking seriously on its own terms. For ministers, elders, and members of those churches, it is functionally irreplaceable. For everyone else, it remains the clearest window into a tradition of five thousand congregations that the rest of the press routinely misses.
Alternatives to Christian Standard
Christianity Today
The flagship of broad American evangelicalism. Wider scope, larger newsroom, deeper cultural and theological reporting. The natural companion subscription for any Restoration Movement reader who also wants the bigger picture.
The Christian Post
A daily evangelical news site with broader reach. Faster news cycle than Christian Standard, but with no Restoration Movement focus and a more general-evangelical editorial posture.
The Christian Century
The major magazine of mainline Protestantism since 1900. Different tradition, similar institutional gravity. Useful for understanding how mainline Christianity reports on itself, which is not Christian Standard’s lane.
Charisma News
Charismatic/Pentecostal-leaning news and commentary. Another tradition-specific publication, much like Christian Standard, but covering a very different segment of American Christianity.
Frequently asked questions
- What is the Stone-Campbell Restoration Movement?
- A 19th-century American Christian movement led by Barton W. Stone and Thomas and Alexander Campbell that sought to restore New Testament-era church practice and unite Christians under the slogan "no creed but Christ." It now exists in three main streams: the a cappella Churches of Christ, the independent Christian Churches and Churches of Christ (instrumental), and the Disciples of Christ (mainline). Christian Standard covers the middle stream.
- Is Christian Standard a denominational magazine?
- Not in the technical sense. The independent Christian Churches and Churches of Christ are congregationally governed and reject formal denominational structures above the local elder board. Christian Standard functions as the de facto journal of record for the tradition, but it is published by Christian Standard Media — an independent publishing operation — rather than by a denominational headquarters.
- How does Christian Standard differ from The Christian Chronicle?
- Both serve Restoration Movement traditions, but different ones. Christian Standard covers the independent Christian Churches and Churches of Christ, which use instrumental music in worship. The Christian Chronicle covers the a cappella Churches of Christ, the non-instrumental cousin tradition that separated from the independent stream in the early 1900s. The publications report on different congregations, colleges, missionary networks, and leadership questions.
- Do I need to be part of an independent Christian Church to read it?
- No. Most articles are free to read, and outside readers regularly use the site to understand the tradition. That said, the magazine assumes a reader familiar with Restoration Movement vocabulary and doesn’t define its in-house terms much, so the learning curve is steeper than at a generalist publication like Christianity Today.
- How big is the tradition Christian Standard covers?
- Estimates vary, but the independent Christian Churches and Churches of Christ are generally cited at more than 5,000 congregations and roughly a million members in the United States. That makes them larger than several well-known denominations that receive more press coverage.
- When was Christian Standard founded?
- In 1866, by Isaac Errett, one of the second-generation leaders of the Stone-Campbell movement. The magazine has been published continuously since then, which makes it one of the longer-running religious periodicals in American history and a primary source for historians of the tradition.
- Is most of the content free?
- Yes — most articles on christianstandard.com are free to read without registration. Paid subscriptions add the print magazine, full digital edition, and archive access. Pricing tiers shift periodically, so confirm current rates at the official site before subscribing.