The Struggles of the Modern Church

George Barna has given us some great insights into the American Church over the years, and most recently he has given us these statistics in a new book called Maximum Faith. He lists four areas Western Christians struggle with, and I thought they were important to review. 

Obstacle 1: Commitment
On the one hand, four out of five self-identified Christian adults (81%) say they have made a personal commitment to Jesus Christ that is still important in their life today. More than three out of four self-identified Christians (78%) strongly agreed that spirituality is very important to them. Yet, less than one out of every five self-identified Christians (18%) claims to be totally committed to investing in their own spiritual development. Those figures help explain why a majority of self-identified Christian adults (52%) believe that there is much more to the Christian life than what they have experienced. 

Obstacle 2: Repentance

Most of the self-identified Christians in the U.S. (64%) state that they have confessed their sins to God and asked for His forgiveness. But the evidence is quite clear that relatively few self-identified Christians are serious about abandoning the lure of sin and handing total control of their life to God. In fact, the Maximum Faith research found that only one out of every eight self-identified Christians (12%) admitted that recognizing and grasping the significance of their sins had been so personally devastating that it caused them to crash emotionally. In fact, only about 3% of all self-identified Christians in America have come to the final stops on the transformational journey – the places where they have surrendered control of their life to God, submitted to His will for their life, and devoted themselves to loving and serving God and other people.

Obstacle 3: Activity
Mired in a culture that rewards hard work and busyness, it’s not surprising that tens of millions of self-identified Christians have confused religious activity with spiritual significance and depth. For instance, four out of ten self-identified Christian adults (39%) have participated in a combination of three “normal” religious activities in the past week (i.e., attending church services, praying, reading the Bible). But far fewer have engaged in another trio of deeper faith expressions: less than one out of ten have talked about their faith with a non-Christian, fasted for religious purposes, and had an extended time of spiritual reflection during the past week. Various spiritual disciplines – including solitude, sacrifice, acts of service, silence, and scriptural meditation – are also infrequently practiced.

Obstacle 4: Spiritual Community
Most self-identified Christians note that they feel comfortable and connected within their church. However, various measures show that there is not much vulnerability and accountability occurring within the context of those faith-based connections. Many self-identified Christians do not take their faith community seriously, whatever type it may be, as a place to which they should be open and held to biblical principles. Only one out of every five self-identified Christians (21%) believes that spiritual maturity requires a vital connection to a community of faith. Further, only one-third (35%) claims to have confessed their sins verbally to another believer at some point during the past quarter.

The changing climate within the Church should be a concern for all of us. My bottom line on most of Barna's findings, is that Christians do not understand the God they believe in. We have made Him into a western religious icon of "My God is Awesome" but I don't know why?  Just listen to the comtemporary Christian music and compare it to music written 100 years or more ago. How about the sermons today?  Listen to what preachers preached about in history, and it's completely different than what you will hear today.  It's time we get back to what the Bible teaches about commitment to God, about repentance, godly activity, and community. Until we do, we will continue to struggle with the four areas Barna's research uncovered. 

Keeping it honest and truthful...K