One Degree to Another
There has been a lot of discussion in the last few weeks about the trend of millennials leaving the church and the rise of the “nones,” which is the title that has been given to those who have no religious affiliation. (You can read Pew Research’s article here.) Much of the discussion has centered on why the church is to blame for these trends along with suggestions for what the church should do to change in light of these trends.
My desire today is not suggest what is leading to this trend. Instead, it needs to be pointed out that these kinds of trends should not catch Christians off guard. Our church has been working through the Gospel of John recently, and one thing that stands out in this Gospel is the opposition that Jesus encountered. In the first chapter, John says 10 He was in the world, and the world was made through him, yet the world did not know him. He came to his own, and his own people did not receive him.” Later he reports that Jesus’ opponents opposed him at every turn and in one place said that he had a demon. They eventually were able to arrest him, convict him, and murder him. Jesus said that his followers should expect the same. If the master of the house is murdered, what can the servants expect?
The church in the United States, and particularly in the South, is not accustomed to these realities. We have enjoyed a place of privilege in our culture and thought it strange to find a person who was not a member of a church somewhere. Those days are fading fast and we should not be shocked by it. People are not born Christians, and we should not be surprised that people who are not Christians don’t like our message and don’t want to affiliate with our churches.
So what should the church do? First, we should continue to be faithful to the core of our message. We do not shrink back from declaring that the only hope for people is found through faith in the life, death, and resurrection of Jesus. We will not make progress by abandoning our message and changing it to something else. This might swell our numbers, but there will only be a formal religion with a different creed.
Also, we must continue to love our neighbors. The tendency among some has been to lash out at those who are not Christians and develop a bunker mentality. This is unacceptable as well. We love our non-Christian neighbors the way that Jesus loved the people that he encountered and we love as we have been loved by Jesus. Faithfulness to the Gospel and loving our neighbor is not a strategy to get the millennials back in the church, but a simple expression of what it looks like to follow Jesus.
Related Posts:
Reaching the Next Generation
For Further Reading:
Everyday Church by Tim Chester and Steve Timmis
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