We are not keeping up

I just finished reading a challenging book by Stephen Gray and Franklin Dumond called Legacy Churches. The book was challenging for several reasons, but one of the most troubling things I found in this book was how quickly the church is losing ground in its efforts to reach the world for Jesus Christ.

The authors reported that it is widely accepted that 40% of Americans attend church on a regular basis. However, they quote another researcher, David Olson, who found that the average church attendance in actually around 17.5 percent! They go on to tell us

"In 2007 the American population climbed to over 300 million. However, the attendance averages within most American churches has remained unchanged for well over a decade. In 1990, approximately 52 million American attended worship each week. Fifteen years later, in 2005, the number remained relatively unchanged. While the United States population continued to explode from 1990 to 2005, the average worship attendance, as a percentage of the population, declined almost 3 percent...According to Olson's research, if the trend continues, by 2020 the percentage of Americans attending worship could drop from 17.5 percent to 14.7 percent."

The church already has lost much of its influence on society, and if these numbers are correct we are in danger of having even less impact in another ten years. The question I keep asking myself is what will the church do about this? Are we going to continue on doing the same things we have been doing which have already proven to be not very effective, or are we going to honestly assess everything we are doing as churches and denominations and prayerfully seek new visions from God for the future?

Our churches are growing older every year because we are not reaching younger people. Our values continue to be pushed out of the public arena because we have become so weakened that a large majority of the world no longer takes our values and beliefs seriously. We are failing to fulfill the Great Commission to the point that we will soon see 80% of our nation's population unchurched. We are being replaced by Eastern religions, cults, and a mixture of beliefs people combine to create their own religious system.

We have two choices. We can wring our hands, talk about how bad things are getting, and hunker down and hope to survive until the Rapture, or we can decide to become the church God has intended all along. At some point in history, a group of people shared a common vision to establish your church in order to reach your community for the Kingdom of God. It is time to recapture that vision. If the church is going down, let's go down fighting the enemy for every soul we can capture for the Kingdom of God. I bet your church sings "Rescue the Perishing" several times a year. Let's start doing that instead of just singing about it.

Two choices. Which one will your church make? Let me know.