Evangelicals on the decline

 There have been several reports lately about the decline in numbers of evangelicals. This should not be a surprise! Mainline Christians and denominations have been in decline for many years, and now this decline is impacting evangelical churches. The Southern Baptist Convention has been reporting fewer baptisms for a few years now, and I'm not aware of any evangelical denomination that has seen an increase in baptisms or church growth.

What we are seeing is an increase in new churches, many of which are not connected to any denomination. Just yesterday I saw a new church that was meeting in a rented facility just a few blocks from my home. Another newer church in our community has just completed a very nice worship facility just outside the city. In the building where I have my auction center there are currently two churches meeting on Sundays on opposite ends of the building. There have been several new churches started in our small community in the past few years, and I know of only one affiliated with any national organization. It is a Calvary Chapel church. I doubt that many of the persons attending these churches identity as evangelical Christians. If someone asked, they would probably just say they are Christians.

There are numerous reasons why such churches are being started, but one of the reasons goes back to my post of yesterday. Most traditional churches do a poor job of reaching out or appealing to young adults, and these are the ones these newer churches seem to be reaching. Lately, I've been watching a lot of praise and worship videos on YouTube. The venues are filled with young adults worshiping God. Many of them have uplifted hands, they are dancing and jumping, laughing as they worship. Where are they on Sunday mornings? Most are not in our more traditional churches. These young people will pay $50.00-$200.00 a ticket to attend one of these praise events, but many will not be found in our traditional, evangelical churches on Sunday morning. It might be easy to criticize them or question their faith, but it might be time to question ourselves. What is it that keeps them from our churches? Why do many of them find the newer churches so attractive?

I know these are difficult questions, but how long will we continue to kick this can down the road? As I've written before, if our traditional churches are not going to do what it requires to reach our current generation, God will raise up churches that will. It appears He is doing just that.