Ten Stops toward Maximum Faith

May 6, 2011 @ 0:03 By 29 Comments

George Barna, in his newest book, Maximum Faith, maps the ten stops along the path toward wholeness:

1. Ignorance of the concept or existence of sin. 1%
2. Aware of and indifferent to sin. 16%
3. Concerned about the implications of personal sin. 39%
4. Confess sins and ask Jesus Christ to be their Savior. 9%
5. Commitment to faith activities. 24%
6. Experience a prolonged period of spiritual discontent. 6%
7. Experiencing personal brokenness. 3%
8. Choosing to surrender and submit fully to God: radical dependence. 1%
9. Enjoying a profound intimacy with and love for God. 0.5%
10. Experiencing a profound compassion and love for humanity. 0.5%

What do you think of this schematic display of spiritual progress? Anything to add? subtract?

Barna thinks most are in a “mindless mutiny” and in a “hopeless meandering.” And he thinks many, many stop on the path. He sees five paths:

1. Moving sequentially: some go from 1 to 10. Others try other methods.
2. Settling for religiosity: some get to stop #6 and choose to settle for #5.
3. Exploiting cheap grace: they get to #6 and revert back to #2.
4. Becoming angry with God: they go through #6 but when they get to #7 they become angry with a God who would subject them to such a process of testing, and they often return as well to #2.
5. Traveling the biblical path: they leap from #3 to #7 and move onwards.

Filed Under: Prayer and Formation 29 Comments
About Scot McKnight

Scot McKnight is a recognized authority on the New Testament, early Christianity, and the historical Jesus. McKnight, author of more than thirty books, is the Professor of New Testament at Northern Seminary in Lombard, IL.

  • http://www.virtuphill.blospot.com phil_style

    This looks awfully similar to the much disputed Hierarchy of needs proposed by Maslow. The main objection I would have is that number 10 could exist outside of any religious framework, and therefore if it is in some way the “pinnacle” of the spiritual life – the spiritual life becomes a bit unnecessary.

  • Percival

    He’s describing my life last Tuesday!

    (What’s with the percentages?)

  • http://www.christianheresy.blogspot.com/ Michelle

    Trying to figure out exactly where I fit on this… looks interesting but I’m not convinced people neatly fall into one category; life is much my dynamic.

  • Dean

    Just another useless and distracting self-evaluation tool used to measure self and others.

  • Tim

    Interesting that other religions, such as Buddhism for instance, can get you to 10 without hitting on 4.

  • http://abcwesterville.org Mark Farmer

    Didn’t realize that my “prolonged period of discontent” was not “Biblical.” Shame on me ! (What verse is that again?)

    Phil @1- it also resembles the scale of conversion developed by James Engel in the 1970s.

  • Jerry

    Typical pseudo-scientific Barna stuff that doesn’t really matter.

  • http://www.manafo.blogspot.com david

    what do the % mean?

    Not an inspiring list nor paths – not one path is attractive. Moving sequentially looks like the best, but doesn’t seem all that realistic.

  • Scot McKnight

    The percentages are what percentages of Americans find that stop.

  • Carl Holmes

    YAWN…

    Just another diatribe from an increasingly irrelevant Barna.

    Spirituality is a dynamic and living thing. Statistics are flat, inflexible and boring. This is more tripe about “young people loosing religion” and how we are all slouching toward Gommorah.

    As most who read this blog know by now, we are not loosing religion, the religious dynamics of America are changing.

  • Jason Lee

    While it certainly makes sense that most Christians stop at “saved” and never grow much, these percentages cannot be claimed to apply to the American population, or even American Christians unless we know two things:

    1. The response rate of Barna’s survey.

    2. The amount of nonresponse within each question a respondent was asked.

    Without these two pieces of information, all we can assume is that these percents are the percent of those willing to take the survey and answer the question.

  • Jason Lee

    #10 et al.

    According to those who do social science research using high-quality data, Americans actually are losing religion (on certain measures of religion). It’s true that “the religious dynamics of America are changing.” But the only way we know they are changing is by using generalizeable data (which we analyze using many of the same statistical techniques drugs and medical procedures are based on). If we don’t analyze data, all we have are theories based on a very small range of vision and anecdotal evidence. It’s easier to fool ourselves and let our prejudices and pet theories run wild without data to check us.

    I agree that many researchers present their interesting findings in ways only their peers can penetrate. But there are others that present their findings in a way that is accessible to the literate public (e.g., Norris’ “Sacred and Secular,” Christian Smith’s “Soul Searching,” Robert Putnam’s “American Grace,” Mark Regnerus’s “Forbidden Fruit,” Rodney Stark’s “The Churching of America”).

  • MatthewS

    It seems like he’s attempting to quantify part of the “dark night of the soul” kinds of journeys/experiences that spiritual formation authors talk about.

    It does seem that many believers have come to the shores of real struggle and have chosen to settle rather than push through.

    It seems like he moved away from reporting what “is” to interpreting what “ought to be.” But even what “is” often seems non-linear and different for different people.

    His interpretation of the “biblical path” seems like invention to me. That path gives me the impression of someone who schedules 15 minutes of personal brokenness in their daytimer before they move on with their controlled, happy, productive day…

  • http://www.sequimur.com/banditsnomore Richard H

    Looks highly individualistic – unless “faith activities” is Barna shorthand for “connection to the Body of Christ.”

  • Dennis J

    experiencing a profound compassion and love for humanity is the pinnacle according to Jesus’ life. that other faiths can achieve the same thing really dosn’t matter.
    leaping from 3 to 7 is never the biblical path. there is always a 6.
    church structure has a lot to do with #5. some churches are created solely for churchiness.
    people flip flop through all of these throughout their lives.
    he should scrap the percentages.

  • Rick G.

    I think Alan Jamieson’s (who relied heavily on Fowler) stages of faith are a more accurate description… at least in my experience. It less detailed, but i think it better shows the benefit of being discontent or critical.

    1. The Innocent – Follow the faith of your parents.
    2. The Literalist – Accept teachings or readings as literal
    3. The Loyalist – Accept the teaching of your denomination, when you discover paradox or inconsistency.
    4. The Critic – Begin to question, find answers and make your faith your own.
    5. The Seer – Your faith is now your own, you don’t rely on a teacher or institution to tell you what to believe.
    6. The Saint – You recognize that everyone is at a different stage and you accept them where they are instead of trying to get them on your page.

  • http://LostCodex.com DRT

    Welcome to my life….

    However, this neglects the fact that there really are people who do not have to go through these as learning processes (which is how I see him presenting them), but are able to just be the higher stages (last two) via nature.

    It reminds me of someone putting the steps in place for someone to learn how to solve a complex mathematical model, but neglecting the fact that some people can just see the solution directly.

  • JoeyS

    I saw Barna present this material in the fall. When asked if these categories were static he replied that no, actually their findings showed that this order was not necessarily the same order for everybody. The common denominators though were that all who experienced a profound love for God had experienced a period of brokenness and that a profound love for other people seemed to flow out of a profound love for God.

    Hearing him explain it, rather than just seeing the outline of the ten stages was much more convincing. I encourage you all not to just brush it aside as irrelevant before actually engaging the content.

  • Mark B

    I don’t know if you can theologically and biblically say #1. The law is written on our hearts. It is not ignorance of that, but rather an intentional turning from that – an extreme version of #2.

    In Lutheran law/gospel dynamic, you don’t get to the gospel until #7. You might hear it intellectually at #4, but you are still trying to save yourself. Making the gospel a new law.

    I eat this stuff up, but the real problem with it is that it turns what only the Holy Spirit can do into a 10 step program for a better spiritual you. The law is good and wise, but you will never find the grace within in. And nowhere in any of the steps to you see the means of grace. You could try 1 – 10 and never be directed to the sacraments.

  • MD

    thanks, joeys (#18). too much casual judgment in the comments without having read or understood the book and its intent.

  • TJJ

    What, only ten stages? Seriously, is it really that complicated, etc.

  • Steve Barr

    I am confident that He who BEGAN a good work in me will CONTINUE it until the day of Jesus Christ.
    (I glean what is usable and true from books like this and toss the rest . . . as we should from most of the stuff out there.) Barna is right in that most folks are satisfied and not growing in God.

  • Darryl

    Barna is doing something quite useful and everyone’s post here is a demonstration. Barna, like Fowler, Piaget, Graves, Mower et al is providing a useful foil against which to fence. You can agree or disagree, but he at least gives a useful starting point from which to discuss.

    And if you’ve ever actually heard Barna speak you would more than likely agree he is not boring.

  • Tom F.

    It seems a bit linear for my liking. I don’t think you “finish” any of those steps, but rather you move along them in ever increasing spirals. (So there’s progress even as there is a return to some of the same things again and again.) I like that there is space for people to have periods of darkness.

  • Nathan

    I’m concerned with making “sin” the universal starting point.
    Not saying that “sin” (in a deeply robust participatory sense, not merely a narrow private/juridical sense) isn’t a reality or a good starting point in every moment and time and place.

    It’s just interesting to me that the spiritual journey is being given what appears to me an essentially moral-ethical genesis.

  • http://godswordourwordsandtheworld.blogspot.com Lee Wyatt

    More crucial in my opinion than trying to figure out where we are and maximizing our faith, we need to be more attentive to and growing in awareness of God’s “faithfulness” and our role in his mission. After all, Jesus said that only a “mustard seed-size” faith is necessary.

    Peace,
    Lee

  • dave p

    Scot,
    I am a fan of your work here on this blog and have really enjoyed the “Bell” series.

    By the bulk of the commentors it appears to me that the “descriptions” of the map points that Barna has chosen are being considered as presriptions rather than just what they were intended to be – an observable set of stops along a continuum of spiritual progress. They do not appear to be his prescription for what must happen, only a description of what he is observing. I have not read the book, so my comment is limited to what you described in your post. As a pastor of a small church in New England, I am intrigued by this “mapping” of the journey. It seems to highlight many of the dynamics that I encounter in my congregation and explains the “cycling” that I see in many people that I minister to. Including myself. My question is this – does Barna give any prescriptive advice or insight into the breaking of the patterns that he has articulated?

  • http://in-Spirit-us.com Mick

    I like Hagburg and Gulietz who follow Fowler’s work. However, I have come to # 7 in the past couple of years and am mindful of the regression to #2. I don’t know if it is anger at God for taking you through a time of personal brokenness or what feels like the hopeless, never-ending quagmire of it. Like Pilgrim wading through the slough of despair only at a different stage in the journey. Loving God and others can still be seen and even experienced to some extent but it feels far removed inwardly.

  • Tony Habgood

    The % mentioned is just a guideline to show the position that people in the surveyed group agreed with. What is interesting is that there seems to be a corelation in the congregation I work in in South Africa. If you use the Bible as a hand book you will find that these 10 steps are real in anyones Spiritual journey. A particular step may have more significance for different individuals but all must go through them or never become the person Christ could make you into.