So How Are We Doing?

George Barna, the Christian pollster, has compiled a list. It’s called, “Barna Lists the 12 Most Significant Religious Findings from 2006 Surveys”. I would like to take some time to list these 12 things that Barna considers “most significant” and discuss several of them.

• Although large majorities of the public claim to be "deeply spiritual" and say that their religious faith is "very important" in their life, only 15% of those who regularly attend a Christian church ranked their relationship with God as the top priority in their life. As alarming as that finding was, its significance was magnified by research showing that on average pastors believe that 70% of the adults in their congregation consider their relationship with God to be their highest priority in life.

I think it’s important to notice that there are many people calling themselves “deeply spiritual”. There seems to have been some sort of disconnect between what spiritual people call “deeply spiritual” and what non-spiritual people call “deeply spiritual”. The world seems to be content to call moments of meditation or praying before flying “deeply spiritual”. Or calling the belief that there is a “higher power”, “something greater than ourselves” deeply spiritual. Meanwhile, no one has told them that the True God is spirit and that God desires that we worship Him in spirit and in truth.

These “deeply spiritual” people probably have never really even worshipped the True God. Do they thank Him for the wonders He has provided, the everyday things he does for us, the miracles that He blesses us with? Have they spent more than 30-minutes a week communicating with Him, reading His word, singing His praises? Do they have conversations with other people about their beliefs in the True God, help other people, not in their own name because they are such good people, but in the name of the True God who has blessed them with the ability to help? The larger problem is that the definition of “deeply spiritual” has become like too many other aspects of Christianity: it has become a matter of personal conviction. “If I think it is, then it is to me, even if it isn’t to you.” The Church needs to be out there helping people learn that there is a definite, objective Truth and that the concept of relative truth is a lie.

• Three out of every four teenagers have engaged in at least one type of psychic or witchcraft-related activity. Among the most common of those endeavors are using a Ouija board, reading books about witchcraft or Wicca, playing games involving sorcery or witchcraft, having a "professional" do a palm reading or having their fortune told. Conversely, during the past year fewer than three out of every ten churched teenagers had received any teaching from their church about elements of the supernatural.

This is a cultural thing. A hundred years ago, teenagers would not do these things because they were considered sinful. However, today, our culture reveres these things and even calls it “spiritual”. Buffy the Vampire Slayer, Harry Potter, Charmed…the list goes on. These “good” witches are acceptable to our children and so they have no problem trying to emulate them. The real problem isn’t the shows, for these types of stories have been around for centuries. The real problem is that we Christians have allowed our culture to accept these things as OK, since we are such a tolerant group. But when we do this, we are not being tolerant, we are being weak, unsteady and unsound. Tolerance is allowing people to choose their own ways, but it’s not agreeing to those ways or pretending that those ways are right or as valid as your own. We need to teach the world what we know. We don’t force them to agree, but we don’t condone their beliefs.

• The notion of personal holiness has slipped out of the consciousness of the vast majority of Christians. While just 21% of adults consider themselves to be holy, by their own admission large numbers have no idea what "holiness" means and only one out of every three (35%) believe that God expects people to become holy.

In 1 Peter 1:13-16, Peter writes to believers, "Therefore, prepare your minds for action; be self-controlled; set your hope fully on the grace to be given you when Jesus Christ is revealed. As obedient children, do not conform to the evil desires you had when you lived in ignorance. But just as he who called you is holy, so be holy in all you do; "

Holy means to be set apart. God is holy and as such, we are unable to reach Him on our own because He is perfect, sinless. We are imperfect and sinful. Because this is true, God is separated from us. But because he loved us, He found a way for us to come to Him, even though we didn’t deserve it or earn it. He did this by coming to this world as one of us, showing us how to be like Him, teaching us who He is and then taking our sins away from us so that we could approach God. He did this by becoming a sacrifice for our sins and dying on the cross.

So we can now come into God’s presence because of the work He did on the cross. But just coming into His presence doesn’t make us holy any more than going to pet store makes you a dog. It takes more to be holy than being saved to eternal life. Peter tells us that we need to be obedient. We can only be obedient if we know what God is telling us. We can only know that if we read and study His Word, the Bible. We can’t do something if we don’t know we’re supposed to do it. Without reading and studying God’s word, we can never be obedient. We are not to continue in our former ways, our former lusts. If we are, then we have not become new creations, which would mean that we are not really saved, because we know that in 2 Corinthians 5:17, we are told that “if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation; the old has gone, the new has come!” So we need to give up our old ways – and truth be told, we should want to give up our old ways once we really know Jesus. We do this because of the love he has shown us. Since he loves us so much, we want to return the sentiment. When someone does something good to you, your immediate response is usually: “How can I repay you?” “What can I do for you”?

Let’s not make any mistake about it – God desires that we be holy. We need to be different than the rest of the world. Let them see our holiness.

• The growing movement of Christian Revolutionaries in the U.S. distinguished themselves from an already-select group of people - born again Christians - through their deeds, beliefs and self-views. Revolutionaries demonstrated substantially higher levels of community service, financial contributions, daily Bible study, personal quiet times each day, family Bible studies, daily worship experiences, engagement in spiritual mentoring, and evangelistic efforts. They also had a series of beliefs that were much more likely than those of typical born again adults to coincide with biblical teachings. Their self-perceptions were also dramatically different than that of other born again adults.

In another article, Barna defines a revolutionary as follows:

• They had have a clear sense of the meaning and purpose of their life;
• describe their relationship with and faith in God as the top priority in their life;
• consider themselves to be "Christian";
• read the Bible regularly;
• pray regularly;
• deem their faith to be very important in their life;
• contend that the main objective in their life is to love God with all their heart, mind, strength and soul;
• describe God as the "all-knowing, all-powerful being who created the universe and still rules it today";
• have made a personal commitment to Jesus Christ that is important in their life today;
• believe that when they die they will go to heaven only because they have confessed their sins and accepted Jesus Christ as their savior;
• and say that their faith in Christ has "greatly transformed" their life.

Are you a revolutionary? Do you see these things in your life?

• Involvement in a house church is rapidly growing, although the transition is occurring with some trepidation: four out of every five house church participants maintain some connection to a conventional church as well.

Sometimes, I think we can see ourselves as a house church. We need to always remember that the size of a church doesn’t matter, the place where a church meets doesn’t matter. What matters is coming together to worship God in song and prayer, fellowship with each other, grow in faith through study, reach out to those who don’t know Him and build a relationship with Him. If any group of people are doing these things, then they are a church – whether they meet in a house, a hotel or a cathedral.

• Evaluating spiritual maturity remains an elusive process for clergy as well as individuals. Across the nation, the only measure of spiritual health used by at least half of all pastors was the extent of volunteer activity or ministry involvement. Adults were no more consistent in their self-examination of their spirituality.

It’s scary that there are church leaders who consider church activity a definition of spirituality. As in number 5, when we are doing those things that God has outlined in His Word, and we are growing our relationship with Him, we are being spiritual. Performing some ministry activity that the church has come up with doesn’t make you spiritually mature any more than going to McDonald’s makes you a hamburger.

And at this point, we should be seeing that there is a running thread through many of these. The incorrect definitions of spirituality, the false concepts of what church is, an understanding that holiness means doing and being those things that God tells us to in His Word are all concepts that we need to better understand as a nation and as a Church.

• Most Americans have a period of time during their teen years when they are actively engaged in a church youth group. However, Barna’s tracking of young people showed that most of them had disengaged from organized religion during their twenties.

My opinion is that many of them disengage in college and I think that’s because there are too many college professors who beat up on religious Christian teenagers. Most of these professors know of a few things they have read which were written by atheists and they rely on these things to debate and deflate these college kids. Most of these professors also have never debated a knowledgeable Christian who can respond to these things. Ironically, these same professors who can beat up so admirably on our children, find themselves stuttering as they try to repeat the same defenses they have used again and again, even when these defenses have been disposed of. Unfortunately, most of these professors became atheists themselves at 12 or 15 years old and so their knowledge of Christianity is that of a 12 or 15 year old. Most have not spent much more time researching the beliefs and arguments that mature Christians have regarding their faith. It is important that the Church teach their children the importance of continued growth in understanding and faith, otherwise, they will not be prepared when the battle begins and they do not have their church or families to help them defend their faith.

• A comparison of people’s faith before and after the September 11 terrorist attack showed that five years after the momentous day, none of the 19 faith measures studied had undergone statistically significant change. Those measures covered aspects such as religious behaviors, beliefs, spiritual commitment and self-identity.

We can see that this is true.

• Seven out of ten parents claim they are effective at developing the spiritual maturity of their children, but the Barna survey among 8-to-12-year-olds discovered that only one-third of them say a church has made "a positive difference" in their life; one-third contend that prayer is very important in their life; most of them would rather be popular than to do what is morally right. In fact, "tweeners" (those ages 8 to 12) deem their family to be vitally important in their life, but just 57% said they look forward to spending time with their family and only one out of every three say it is easy for them to talk to their parents about things that matter to them.

The age-old fable of being popular actually meaning something has probably been more detrimental to the spiritual growth of more people than probably anything else other than money and pride. We can see that this is true even at a very young age. We shouldn’t worry so much about what others think about us: we should worry about what God thinks about us.

• Relatively few people - just one out of every six - believe that spiritual maturity is meant to be developed within the context of a local church or within the context of a community of faith.

The church of TV has caused too many people to think that they don’t need to go to church. But the Bible repeated tells us that we are supposed to meet together.

Hebrews 10:25 Let us not give up meeting together, as some are in the habit of doing, but let us encourage one another—and all the more as you see the Day approaching.

Matt 18:20 For where two or three come together in my name, there am I with them.

Jesus expects to find us together when he comes. If we are not in a local church, we are unable to make a real difference. We also set ourselves up to be fooled by false teachings since there is no one who can tell us when we’ve been told the wrong thing. No accountability.

• Five of the highest-profile Christian leaders - Rick Warren, Joel Osteen, James Dobson, Tim LaHaye and T.D. Jakes - were unknown to a majority of the population. Most of those leaders were also unknown to most born again Christians.

Which, to me, isn’t all that important. It just shows that high-profile Christians aren’t making as big an impact as we would think or like. But God never intended for a few high profile people to do His work – He has always expected that every believer would pull his weight.

• The faith contours of America continue to shift substantially over the course of time. The proportion of adults who are born again has risen dramatically in the past quarter century, from 31% to 45%. During the past two decades, every spiritual behavior has fluctuated significantly, with recent upsurge in Bible reading, church attendance, and small group involvement.

This, combined with the other points made earlier, implies that there is more of a bi-polarity occurring: those who are true believers and those who are not. The middle ground is going away. This should not surprise Christians, because we know that Jesus is going to come to take away those who are truly his and that the rest will be left behind. He has told us that if we are not with him, we are against him. We should realize that as The Day draws near, we will see more or this.

Finally, Barna makes some conclusions around these points based on the surveys he did during 2006. Among those conclusions, he says this:

• "people do not have an accurate view of themselves when it comes to spirituality. American Christians are not as devoted to their faith as they like to believe. They have positive feelings about the importance of faith, but their faith is rarely the focal point of their life or a critical factor in their decision-making.”
• “if people’s faith is objectively measured against a biblical standard of how faith is to be practiced, Americans are spiritually lukewarm.”
• Very limited effort is devoted to spiritual growth. Most Americans experience ‘accidental spiritual growth’ since there is generally no plan or process other than showing up at a church and absorbing a few ideas here and there.
• Barna expects to see a widening gap between the intensely committed and those who are casually involved in faith matters. The difference will become strikingly evident between those who make faith the core of their life and those who simply attach a religious component on to an already mature lifestyle.

There we have it. The difference between being a worldly person, a person of false faith, a person of immature faith and a person of true faith have been placed before us. The purpose of putting this out in front of you is for you to recognize which you want to be, understand where you currently are, and know what you need to do to get from where you are now, to where you want to be. I pray that you ALL want to be people of true faith and will recognize what you need to personally do to get there – because no one else can do it for you.

Send mail to david@TheArkNY.org with questions about the church or comments about this site.
Last modified: May 23, 2007