Something To Think About At The End of 2006

Posted by Kirk M. Wellum @ http://redeemingthetime.blogspot.com/

Every year The Barna Group lists the 12 Most Significant Religious Findings from their annual surveys. This year there were a number of things that caught my attention.

First, although Barna found that large majorities of people 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. Joined to this finding was the interesting sidebar that pastors like to believe that 70% of the adults in their congregation consider their relationship with God to be their top priority. Clearly, it is all too easy to live in a phoney world of our own making and to convince ourselves and those around us that all is well!

Second, three out of four teenagers say they have engaged in at least one type of psychic or witchcraft-related activity; which could include using a Ouija board, reading occult books, or having their fortunes told. However, only three of ten teenagers who go to church regularly reported that they had received any teaching on this dark side of life. This shows us that Christian leaders need to be more aware of what is going on in the lives of the people that they shepherd. There is too often a large gap that exists between what happens in church and what is going on outside of it. One reason for this is that clergy and laity are not living for the glory of God and seeking to bring every thought into captivity to Christ.

Third, personal holiness is not something that the vast majority of Christian give much thought to. When asked 21% of adults consider themselves holy but then go on to say that they have no idea what "holiness" is all about. And apparently only 35% believe that God expects people to become holy! Quite frankly, this is shocking unless you know what many Christians are like in their personal and private lives. It also shows what kind of unbalanced spiritual diets are being dispensed in churches dedicated to making people "feel better".

Fourth, assessing spiritual maturity remains an "elusive process" for clergy as well as individuals. This means that clergy and laity tend to look at "volunteer activity" or "ministry involvement" as a measure of spiritual commitment and health. However, there are reasons to doubt the accuracy of these benchmarks. We need to remember that if you measured the spiritual maturity of the scribes and Pharisees by their involvement in ministry they would pass with flying colors. And yet Jesus said that if our righteousness does not surpass that of the scribes and Pharisees we will not enter the kingdom of heaven let alone collect the rewards!

Fifth, faith before and after the momentous event of September 11, 2001 is little changed. Barna's group looked at 19 different measure of "faith" and none of them changed in a statistically significant way. Again, this is disappointing but not surprising. It takes more than crisis experiences to change people lives. It takes a supernatural experience of God's grace brought home to our hearts by the Holy Spirit. Without that, our tears will dry, our resolutions lie forgotten, and we will return to our old ways as if nothing had happened.

These, and the other findings, that Barna sets before us for our contemplation reveal that there is too much nominal Christianity and Christians who think that they are in better spiritual shape than they are. Just as obesity is at record levels so is spiritual sluggishness of mind and heart. The solution of many which is to cater to this indolence only makes matters worse. Perhaps we should consider what Barna calls Christian Revolutionaries as opposed to born again Christians or the equally meaningless evangelical label as a way of returning to a strong, vigorous and orthodox Christianity which takes the Scriptures seriously and lives in a way that is consistent with New Testament Christianity and not its spiritually neutered but politically correct and materialistic counterpart. Certainly, Christianity as a driving force both in people's personal lives and in the church and society at large has a long way to go if it is to shake the world again as it has in the past.