106 thoughts on “David Kinnaman is wrong: How the church really lost the millennials & what we can do to keep the next generation.”

1. Well, Matt, here you go again. Some people just can’t leave well enough alone. Whaddawegonna do? First, I’m gonna tell you I love this. I’ve not read Kinnaman’s book, so I’m responding primarily to your prescription. I think you’re right on. From 1 year old to 101 years old, we are called to make disciples. That’s never easy. And I add, as I commented on a previous post, I think we need to make disciples whose Jesus makes sense in and of a very large world. Parochial Christendom seems not to be standing the scrutiny of the university and of questioning adults. So before we send them to be scrutinized, let’s equip them.

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   • Thanks, Jimmy. You do know that I blog to entertain you, don’t you? Kinnaman’s book actually has much to recommend it. He is also a Phoenix guy.

     You have accurately seen through my true agenda…and the subject of part 2: The church isn’t discipling. Discipleship is walking with people prayerfully for a long-time, helping them take risks, loving them and never leaving them. About the praxis. The real “doxi” the “glory” is in hearts wildly in love with their Savior who walk in joy and gratitude and share that joy simply because those in love just have to tell folks. We both had great models of discipleship in our own lives. We don’t necessarily want to adopt all of the theology, but certainly do want to imitate the way they love and give.
     I am enjoying being with your new priest up here.

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2. Great Post, Fr. Matt. Just shared to my Facebook…

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   • Thanks, brutha!

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3. Matt, what about the identifiers like “post-Christian”? Are you saying that these have been environmentally conditioned, and as such are largely distractions from what’s really going on? 😉

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   • Hi Ron,
     I think I understand your question but may be way off. Here is my stab at it: Have you seen Taunton’s article on “atheists” in Atlantic Monthly last spring? It was fascinating. He interviewed a bunch of post Christians. He just said, “Tell us the story of your journey out of the church and into atheism.” The overwhelming response was that they lost their leader for one reason or another. The church has made it about program and message. Discipleship was always about life-on-life and love rather than information. I think we are programming them out.

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4. Reblogged this on Solomon's Porch – Nashville.

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5. Matt, this is a very insightful and telling account of ecclesiological malpractice. The problem, as you noted, has been program based, age segregated ministries. And that’s not all! It’s a bad ecclesiology. We made church a synonym for congregation and ignored the church of the home and the church of the synagogue (such as camps, cross-generational interaction in many settings etc.) The youth ministry “industry” made a business of this false ecclesiology and reinforced the whole whacky business. In my denomination of the ELCA it continues today. And we were asking the wrong question. We were asking, “How do we get kids to church (aka congregation)? We should have been and should be asking now, “How do we form faith and make disciples?” When DAvid Anderson and I wrote FROGS WITHOUT LEGS CAN’T HEAR, back in 2005 this is what we were trying to get at . And we had only one research study to work off of. Now we have hundreds. And they all say the same thing…bad understandings of ecclesiology lead to malpractice in faith formation. Keep up the great blog. You nailed it today my friend.

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   • Amen! I really appreciate your camp/parish/denom perspective on this, Paul! I wish there was an easier way to let this comment add to conversation. Many of my evangelical friends don’t know what we are talking about when we say “ecclesiology.” …much in the same way many of our folks don’t understand the need for a transformational experience that they provide. One without the other leaves a hole in our Gospel. Any ideas? I wonder if anyone would do a fb page? I want to find a way to have people discuss different topics. My “cool church” post had two or three profound but very different conversations going on. We need a way to separate them.

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     • I’m afraid that many of the ELCA leaders realize that we have no consensus when we say the word “ecclesiology.” When the ELCA came together in 1988, one of the major issues that wasn’t really worked out was an ecclesiology. We are now reaping what we sow around our lack of theological understanding and one of the ways it has gotten us in trouble is around this very issue. Add to this that many of the “mainline” traditions are so fractured right now that I actually think it is impossible for us to come to any sort of agreement around this important word!

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       • Hi Russell,
         You might be right. One would hope that Christians could rally around the big rocks of the faith. In the Episcopal Church, a body that in theory is united around the agreement to pray the same words rather than hold the same theology, that has proven most difficult.

         When we unite around the wrong ecclesiology (like, for instance, the church existing to save itself) that is (and should be) catastrophic as well.

         Do you have any wisdom to offer the conversation in this regard?

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         • Matt the problem is that with the ’79 prayer book we are not praying the same words, the BCP has 6 Canons for the mass and EOW has three more plus Rite II. Then look at the prayers of the people. What common words.

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6. Great article Matt! We must quit focusing on “losing them” and start looking for long term solutions to the why we lost them. You’re right a major reason in we catered to them and programmed them right out. We need a return to strong one on one discipleship that builds relationships that don’t allow young people to disappear without someone recognizing they are gone.

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   • Hi Mik,
     Great to hear from you, old friend. I love when you put “relationships” in “discipleship.” The church has had a hard time not seeing discipleship as merely the transfer of information rather than the working out of the Good News of grace in a new community of people walking together.
     …I like when people refuse to let people leave, not compulsively but “I love you, and I am your friend regardless of where you sit.”

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7. Woohoo, you are
   on a roll!

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   • You are funny, NG. Hope you are well.

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8. Matt,
   Your article echoes material published in a book by Professor or Youth, Church and Culture at Princeton Theological Seminary, Kenda Casey-Dean, in her book “Almost Christian.” She suggests one solution to this is for the church to help youth (and adults) understand we are called to a greater mission of changing our world. Thanks for your thoughts

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   • Thanks for chiming in. Dean’s book was a great followup to Chris Smith’s Soul Searching. I think there are a lot of voices saying the same things these days. The faith as a discreet experience of Jesus in a vacuum and the church as a provider of “worship experience” won’t have long term staying power for many sociological and economic reasons even if we cannot muster the theological clarity to move from it.

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9. We do not separate our kids out of the sanctuary. However, we still are concerned about keeping the youth in church. Once they are confirmed its like they have no reason to keep attending. I think it’s so important to give kids a solid foundation, but, myself included, isn’t it common to walk away from church after high school? I was blessed with a foundation but also given freedom and my own choice as I got older. So when I got married and started a family, I then chose to return. I think we can mentor and encourage our youth, but isn’t it ultimately a personal decision?

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   • Hi Tara,
     Thank you for commenting. You are most correc that people make up their own minds about church attendance in college. I am not sure where you are located, but in the west parents allow kids to make their own decisions in jr and sr high. At our church we do not have patents asking kids to get confirmed. I wish we did. In our context the student is the onramp into church for the parents. Our biggest issue is transience-in an urban area of poverty people move or run into immigration issues.

     If Faith has been personal (a conversion), communal (a peer group AND a multigenerational group), missional (a task to do in the world), and relational (life on life mentors who walk with kids) they generally don’t want to leave when they graduate.

     In a personal anecdote, my daughter loves the college she is at 2 hrs away, but we have to continually encourage her separation because she loves the community of our little church and the fellowship of youth leaders and students and the blessing of being used of God in other’s faith formation.

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10. Matt Marino, I appreciate much of what you have said. You are on target when you imply that we have entertained rather discipled youth, etc. However I am not without my concerns. It is true that many youth went to their youth groups because they were jazzed up and entertaining. But many went to their youth fellowships because they were starving for authentic and meaningful relationships. What is your answer to the dwindling numbers of youth on Sunday morning? You state: “Let’s repent where we failed them…and put students into the sanctuary on Sunday morning.”

    You seem to identify the pivotal decision that made the church-train jump the tracks was the decision to segregate the youth from where “real” church–the sanctuary–where you imply only the true church can be found. After all you say that youth who spent years in youth ministry “never actually were in church.” That is to say you imply that such segregated youth were never part of the church since they were meeting…hmmm…I guess in the wrong room of the building? Since I don’t see any mention of a physical “sanctuary” in the N.T. and only see references that the old wineskin of physcial temple/sanctuary has been replaced by a temple/sanctuary made up of LIVING stones, then I think we need to give both your analysis and your proposed solution pause.

    For starters I believe the ultimate reason youth leave “the church” after they graduate youth group is because they just spent years experiencing church as true community and dynamic relationships. Then when they graduate from the “youth group” they are told they have graduated to “adult Christianity” and must now move into the big room. And is “adult Christianity” in the sanctuary? Sitting as a passive spectator week after week hearing sermons where the extent of MOST people’s interaction with other Christians is when the paster says, “Now take a minute to greet your brother and sister in the name of the Lord.” Perhaps they steal a few more minutes on their way out the door walking to their car. Then they try to live the rest of the week on a max of 5 minutes of Christian fellowship! No wonder there is so much dysfunction in the body of Christ today. Most adult Christians are NOT experiencing the church at all! They just heard a sermon and walked out the door. But since the greek word for church (ekklesia) speaks of a “relational gathering of people” and has nothing to do with a physical sanctuary or building, can we really say the majority of adult Christians are experiencing a life-giving gathering of people? Hardly.

    The reason most graduated youth don’t bother to come back to the sanctuary–the only place where you think true church is taking place–is because they rightly discern that graduating to “adult Christianity” is to enter a dead-zone where they become spectators instead of relators. They are given a place in a pew and told to stand when they are told to stand, sit when they are told to sit, read when they are told to read, and listen when they are told to listen. Fine–but that is a service. That is not church.

    Most youth leave the “church” because adult Christianity revolves around attending a service, rather than engaging in real relationships. I would argue that an individual who has spent 40 years listening to a sermon and then quickly walks to his car saying nare a word except “God bless you” hasn’t been to church in 40 years.

    To your credit you do say that we need to incorporate youth into “rigorous discipleship, multi-generational relationships, and youth serving as full members of the church…[and] connect them to the community of faith.”

    That sounds good. But what does that mean? What does that actually look like? I dare say if the church is ever going to create such an environment as you suggest, it is going to require that we radically alter our current perception of the church as a sanctuary, a service, or a building–instead of a people actually DOING life together.

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    • Hello Strider,

      Thank you! Most excellent thoughts.

      I think most of us would agree with you that there is something inherently passive about the 4 song and sermon model…and that the “Body of Christ” as 90 minutes of attendance rather than living life together is life-sucking.

      I am in no way advocating giving up age-appropriate meeting and teaching. I am merely saying that when we build affiliation bonds with the youth pastor and youth ministry (in another building with another name and other leaders) that we never connected them to the church. That has an effect on the youth (who do not connect), but it has another, more dangerous and more insidious effect: the effect it has on the adults, who never allow young people an active role in the church. If young were in the sanctuary…and reading scripture…on the greeting team, giving testimonies, on the prayer team, and (dare I say) preaching on occasion, then their voices would be heard.

      When you describe it as needing to look like life-on-life, I am right there with you.

      What I would love to see it look like is the subject of a future post. This is, after all a blog post. The length of the post just outlining the idea that “they didn’t leave the ‘church’, they were never a part of it” took more than most will endure.

      I think radical re-orienting is going to happen. I don’t think people will sit still for anything less…in fact, I think they aren’t sitting still already. I think they have already started building community other places. For example, I just got back from a 3 day clergy retreat. We were sharing the camp with 50 young adults in something called U and Improved. It was sort of a non-religious youth group for 20somethings. It was bizarrely familiar. It appeared to be providing community, friendship, leadership development…many of the things that youth ministry provides without God. One of them said they started a year ago with 10 people and now have a few hundred and are working on a national rollout.

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      • Thanks for the follow-up thoughts. I don’t think we are very far apart at all 🙂 The church does indeed need each other–young and old and I think we agree that that need must transcend sitting next to each other in a pew. In many ways I think our flaw is trying to “do church” all in one day…actually in one hour. Worship, prayer, preaching, teaching, fellowship…we try to squeeze it an hour service in what has become known as “church.” I think the Sunday service ought to be a time of celebration and public teaching that reinforces church life that has been taking place throughout the week. But that would require that Christians are actually coming together, sharing meals, praying for each other, talking over coffee, a beer…whatever. Just get together and be vulnerable and transparent with each other.

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        • Funny! You could preach my sermon (on article 31 of the Anglican articles of Religion: What happens when we sin? It is from Hebrews 10:11-18 and Matthew 26:17-29). I end with the Eucharist, not as a re-sacrifice, but as a family celebration of God’s victory over sin and death in the once-for-all sacrifice of the cross and the family meal of the people of God…one that would happen day after day (acts 2:42-47).

          I do love the “that would require that Christians are actually coming together”…I would merely add, “and inviting the unchurched to join us in God’s goodness.”

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          • A hearty amen to that 🙂

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11. Beng the parent of two young adults, the challenge they present the church is keeping it relevant. My wife and I kept both of our kids in the sanctuary for worship. Actually, our church did not have a separate youth worship service, but even it did, we would have kept our kids in the sanctuary. But now that they are out of the house, they do not attend church because they simply don’t see its relevance in their lives now. The over arching strength of today’s cultural and societal issues that, to them, the church appears to be intolerant of leads them to believe in a hypocrisy of Christianity. We talk with them a lot to show them that Christianity loves the sinner but is intolerant of the sin. Both of my kids are good kids. But, I believe (hope) that as they continue to mature, they will return to the church as it see its relevance. That’s what I did. Thank you for your insight. I truth in what you have said.

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12. The Book of Judges starts with a sentence (2:10) that we usually gloss over, “And there arose another generation after them who did not know the Lord or the work that he had done for Israel.” This is a terrible indictment, especially when we understand that there are not enough years on the timeline for this generation to have been more than grandchildren or great-grandchildren! The wording is important…they did not know…they had not been introduced. it doesn’t say they chose to leave! Somehow, the grandparents and parents had not demonstrated that their God was worth serving and living for.

    I wonder if this is what Matt is seeing? A younger generation that looks at their parents and grandparents and doesn’t see a generation for whom their service and dedication to God makes a difference. They are not living victoriously. Their work ethic is no different from the Philistines they work with. Their divorce rate is the same as the non-believers. Their church involvement is…not. They live lives of depression and defeat. Why would the kids choose their God?!

    This is manifested in age segregation…a few dedicated individuals trying to save the next generation…and unwillingness of the older to engage the younger.

    If so, then the key to saving the “leavers” is to revive the “stayers”. They must be taught to live victorious, righteous, shining lives that attract others for Christ. We need to review our advertisement…our own lives. We need to “parade” these examples in front of the younger generation instead of closeting them.

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13. Excellent points. I have two thirty-something children and one is actively involved in church and the other is not. We went to two very different churches when they were growing up. One was a small church and the other was a mega-church with a Christian school. I thought we needed the larger church so that my children could connect with youth programs, but in retrospect it was not the answer and the programs offered were only entertaining my kids and not discipling them. The smaller church has much to offer but they need to see the teens as active participants in the life of the church and not ignore them.

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    • Hi Pam, thank you for writing. I am very interested in your story. Could you share more?

      There is some inferred evidence that churches with no youth minister retain students at the same or higher rate as those who do. I have reported that on other posts such as “cool church.”

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14. I have something positive to say: you’re both right. You and David Kinnaman are each right. If you weren’t right, there would be no exodus. If he weren’t right, there would be a return. Changes need to be made on both fronts.
    On the bright side, you’re completely right — he’s just not wrong. That’s all.

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    • Thanks, Javier. That made me smile. 🙂

      I think Dr. Kinnaman is right about many things. Just not that they were “lost” by the church. I think that the generation of the segregated youth programs never had an affiliation bond with the church but rather with the youth program.

      …actually I also think the methodology of changing what the church does after the methodology of having changed what the youth programs did in response to opinions back when they were in HS then creates an insecurity in attendees and the appearance of desperation on the part of the church…neither of which works toward the desired results.

      I am not sure that there is a return that comes from pandering to focus group-think. The group doing the best with young adults in Phoenix (which is where I assume you are from your screen name) is PhoenixOne. They are value driven/data supported. They do lots of surveying, but it is for the benefit of partner churches rather than to change their own practice or theology.

      Thanks for commenting! Are you in Phoenix? If so, what church?

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15. It is interesting that several people that go to my church posted this article on their facebook. About a week later, the editor of our newsletter posted that we shouldn’t bicker about service styles or approaches but be submissive to the Holy Spirit and go with the program.

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    • Interesting.

      Since a bunch of folks are talking about it, the things in the article might be part of where the wind of the Spirit is blowing for your church. It would be interesting if it were the body that was being submissive to the Spirit, wouldn’t it. 🙂

      It seems that the Lord is raising up voices asking for a church that is more in love with Jesus and helps us to learn to walk with God and love others rather than following models that amount to licking a finger and seeing which way the wind of the culture is blowing.

      Thanks for commenting, Robert. I appreciate your taking the time to write.

      Blessings,
      Matt

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17. Fantastic! Great food for thought here. If you could, tell me how you define discipleship? Definitely not for judgment, just wanting common definition to help in reading.

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    • Hi Jay,
      Thanks for the kind words, and great question!

      In blog posts you are either trying to say a lot about such a narrow topic that you miss a bunch on the sides or a little about a broad subject, in which case you miss a bunch in the middle.

      When I think discipleship I am thinking about helping someone be able to walk with Jesus in such a way that they experience intimacy with God and can, when led by the Holy Spirit, help someone else to faith and maturity in Christ.

      When I think of discipleship I think: relational (life on life) and missional (results in the desire to give Jesus to others). How to get there is generally done least well with a curriculum, and best when we teach people to love doing the things Christ-followers have spent 2000 years loving doing: Scripture, a life of prayer, serving others, worship, sacrament, community, and sharing the hope that is within us.

      I’m not sure if that is less than or more than you were asking for, but those are my starting points anyway.

      Thanks again for the question!

      Blessings as we draw near the celebration of the Savior’s arrival.

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      • Thanks Matt. I appreciate your definition. I usually find if you ask 10 church leaders their definition of discipleship you get 10 answers. I see Jesus walking with a group, closely and intimately, teaching with words and by modeling the way of Love through Christ. This partnership seems to be what is missing. We keep trying classes, 40 days of purpose, whatever but not the long-term, life-on-life work that discipleship calls us into. I wish i had this as a young person but am finding it now. It has been life-changing. I pray for the same for our young followers today.

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        • Hi Jay. That is a nice definition. love, long-term and walking together. The one thing I like to make sure to include is to do those things around a shared mission.

          Thanks for asking us to clarify. It has enriched the conversation.

          Advent blessings,
          Matt

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    • Hi Sturgie, I replied yesterday on my phone but it does not appear to have taken. Sorry about the tardiness in getting your comment up. Btw, great blog!

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19. so, what.

    dead serious, here. SO WHAT if they aren’t attending church?

    are these people following the teachings and commandments of jesus? shouldn’t the actual test of a believer in jesus (as god, himself) have a better test of a person’s merits than putting butts in pews and dollars in baskets?

    maybe, just maybe, this generation is actually living closer to “love each other. as i have loved you, love each other. by this, i will know you are my disciples, if you love one another.”? and take jesus seriously at his word to care for the poor, disenfranchised, vulnerable, outcasted (by the “holy” church)?

    my agenda is crystal clear: bemoaning church attendance is (in my opinion) worshiping the institution and mechanisms over the living gospel. “preach the gospel everywhere. use words only when necessary.”

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    • Hi Just John Boy,

      I am not disagreeing with you at all, but that isn’t the point of my article which is a response to the question “Why aren’t the 20-35 yr olds coming?

      The article is not about how we should evaluate spirituality.

      Whether or not young adults not attending is a good thing is another question. Whether or not all experiences of being in a church are created equal is as well. And whether or not orthopraxy is better than orthodoxy is yet another.

      Those are great questions for another blog post!

      Thanks for commenting.

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20. The day when young people are to be seen and not heard is long…….gone. Young people want to be a part, not onlookers. Young people should be on church councils, should teach Sunday School, should be made a real part of the congregation.

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    • Hi Scott,
      I couldn’t agree with you more! Many kids in evangelical church have never even seen the inside of the sanctuary, let alone have a voice in it.

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21. Hey Matt- first time reader, followed the link from the “Kissing Fish” page on Facebook. I was heavily churched as a kid- baptised Catholic as a baby, parents found Christ when I was 2 and raised fundamentalist Baptist along with Christian school until high school- my parents wanted to send my brother & sister to a different (bigger, better) school which was Lutheran, so we became Lutheran. I liked that a lot- I’m a big history geek- and appreciated the idea that I was worshipping with more history behind the service than a church built as part of suburban sprawl in the 1970s. After high school, though, I got out into the big world and realized how overprotected and sheltered I was from what was happening out there. I learned about other denominations and other beliefs. I learned that atheism wasn’t the same thing as devil worship. And I just didn’t go to church. College programs or not, I wasn’t interested in sitting there for a couple of hours on Sunday. Between working my way through college and having a social life, I just didn’t want to spend the time.

    I went back to church because my husband and I had moved to another state and I had started seeing a therapist. My most frequent complaint was that I just didn’t know how to meet people and I was lonely. She suggested a church, and that’s how I became Episcopalian. I discovered that those were my people all along. It didn’t hurt that I really wanted my young son to learn about church stuff and the Bible. The church we went to welcomed us and took care of us, even feeding us daily when I was put on bed rest when I was pregnant youngest son after only having been part of the church for a year.

    Fast forward to now- we’ve moved again, and we went church shopping. That was the most awkward thing ever- some churches trying really hard to get you to stay, some not even noticing that we were there. We found a church, we go some of the time- we’re pretty inconsistent. We’re not really invested. The rector and assistant rector are very nice- the assistant moving to our town right after we did and she’s been wonderful. But there’s not many people there like us. Not many young people with kids. My oldest son is too old for kids programs, too young for youth group so he hates going. It’s a small church, so my kids go to regular service in the regular sanctuary. They hate it, they don’t get it, and they don’t listen, but they are there.

    What would honestly get us invested is someone who isn’t paid to be there caring about whether or not we are there. A church mentor, if you will. The bottom line is that people want to see people like them. They want people in a similar stage of life. They want their ideas to be listened to and not discounted. They want to be valued as part of the community. But first, they want to feel like part of that community.

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    • Hi Lyndsey,

      Now I am going to have to look up “Kissing Fish.” 🙂

      Thank you for sharing your story!

      It is amazing to me that people will say they want people x in a church and yet do nothing to welcome them when they visit.

      It is really hard to be the first investor in an idea, isn’t it? Having lived in a small town for a bit in which we were THE young couple in church I can relate with the weirdness of being in that place. I hope your new church will love you and your children and value them. If they don’t then move to Phoenix and come to our church plant. We would love to have you!

      blessings,
      Matt

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22. While I think this article is a good diagnosis of the problem, I think that it is incomplete.

    I haven’t stopped attending church since I graduated college 2 1/2 years ago. I have, however, stopped being part of the church.

    I still show up on Sunday mornings. But wherever I go, I am almost completely ignored.

    Churches are structured around families. If you don’t have a family, you are put into a box like this article so astutely described. Youth ministry. College ministry. And after that? No one knows what to do with you.

    If you’re not married, you’re not an adult. That is how the modern American church sees things. And we millennials are part of a generation that’s getting married later and later for economic reasons.

    It takes a long time to build a stable career as a millennial in modern America. Much longer than for our parents’ generation. My parents had me when they were 25. I’ll be 25 in four months. At that time, I will have been in higher education nearly twice as long as my parents. I’m unmarried, never been in a serious relationship, have hardly any money, and have moved several times in the past few years to some new corner of the world while pursuing higher education. It’s impossible to work towards marriage in such a situation. And I know I’m not alone.

    Inter-generational economic differences are a huge rift through the church that no one is talking about. In one church I told one middle-aged woman that I was likely spending the next year unemployed and she burst out laughing. I just about screamed “IT’S NOT FUNNY!” in her face. Instead I just walked away.

    Post-college Millennials in the church face a wall of negative judgments from the minute we step inside the doors on Sunday from people who don’t know any better. Those with successful careers wonder why we can’t just “work at a factory or a newspaper like I did when I was your age” and consider us lazy and entitled (Hint: those jobs don’t exist anymore). Those with successful marriages see fit to prod us to get married at every turn, because in the modern American church marriage is the ideal and singleness is something to tolerate if you must (never mind that Paul said the exact opposite).

    Whatever you do, don’t blame liberal politics. If liberal politics were why we left the church, we’d just flock to churches with liberal politics. Yet mainline Protestant churches have declined more sharply than conservative ones.

    No, we millennials often embrace liberal politics as a substitute in the void that church has left in our lives. Liberal politics provides a supportive community working towards a common goal and promising an ultimate end point of justice and equality. It’s a substitute for religion, not a cause for rejecting it.

    In short, we millennials just want to be treated like adults. We want to be included. It’s not that hard. We don’t want to be catered to. We don’t want to be entertained. We’re human beings like the rest of you, and we’d like to be treated as such.

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    • CW, that is a fantastic, articulate assessment. Can I post your comments as an addendum “guest post”? This article has started generating a lot of traffic and your comments might be read by more as a “guest post.” Let me know.

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      • Sure, please do!

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        • Do you want to edit at all? Send me a photo and a brief bio from your blog perhaps? Thanks again. Well said!

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          • I will, but it will have to wait until tomorrow afternoon if that’s OK.

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            • Sure. My email is matt@azdiocese.org

            • Sent!

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24. Loved the original post – and loved the following comments even more. Thank you Matt for posting and hosting. I especially liked the comments from StriderMTB and cwjones. They point out the disconnect between much congregational culture and the culture Millennials are living in. Most denominational structures are built on a solid middle class economy and mind-set. Those are disappearing in the western world. And the rule of evolution is: When the environment changes, the organism must change its form to draw sustenance from what there is more of in the environment – or die.

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26. Very well-written. I think in the midst of the “show”, the church forgot about the hearts and souls of teenagers who were hurting and needed a Savior. So when the show was over, the kids left the building feeling empty, and they didn’t have the ties that made them want to return. Meanwhile, the liberal media was bombarding them with continual messaging and acceptance for their differences.
    While I agree that the church needs to tackle difficult issues (LGBT, for instance), the real issue is that people need to know that they are cared for in every dimension, and that God has a plan for them.

    Reply

    • Amen, Marcia!

      We are so busy telling people what to so that we sometimes forget to tell them what God has done.

      Advent blessings.

      Reply

27. I am not entirely in agreement with this for two reasons.

    The conversion rate in modern times has declined but society is different, religion in schools, poverty, basic needs challenges etc. We can not expect the past to be the model of the future otherwise the conversion could be a lot lower.

    Secondly we should not be arrogant to think that a single service is appropriate for all. I’ve seen stale services drive away everyone but the aging congregation as it did not want to consider the growth or just become lazy. The fact our churches has youth is something to celebrate regardless where they are in the church. Better they are here to work with than not.

    Without the youth rooms would they still be in church?

    Reply

    • Hi Nik,

      Thanks for commenting.

      I am a bit fuzzy on what you are arguing for in your first comment. I think you are arguing that cultural change affects conversions in the church. I am not sure anyone would argue that point. Could you clarify, though, just so I am sure?

      I am making the case that segregating youth from the rest of the church sets up a dynamic where students have no affiliation bond with anyone but youth leaders, which leaves them disconnected as adults.

      I am also making the case that this sets up a secondary problem, that of making students see the church as something that exists for them, rather than they for it – becoming consumers of religious “experiences” rather than producers of Kingdom fruit.

      I am also not sure we are talking about the same thing here. You mention youth rooms. I am not arguing against youth rooms or against age appropriate youth groups. Just against youth WORSHIPPING in separate rooms from the adults. The issue isn’t arrogance at all-it is core values (a faith for life rather than just high school) and data (the data seems to indicate that churched students with NO youth program attend church at a higher rate than those with youth programs-i.e. youth programs may have a negative effect on future church attendance, raising the huge question of why?).

      I would agree with you that a “stale” service without life is certainly a problem! However, the answer to that problem does not need to be to sow the seeds of students later disengagement through segregation. The answer does not have to be “big church is dead, lets protect kids from it.” We can imagine multiple solutions to that problem. One might be, “Big church is dead, lets help them have a more passionate faith.”

      What I am arguing for is connecting students to other adults and pastors. The problems caused by segregating are, at this point, clearly demonstrated by the data and far and away worse than the problems they solve. If we put a bandaid on a femoral abrasion and send the soldier back into the field, we shouldn’t be surprised when the patient bleeds out a few hours later. I am trying to stop the bleeding.

      Do write back and straighten me out on what you are trying to say in your first point!

      Reply

28. As in most situations, they are always more nuanced than we can articulate in one post but I’m not sure your comments are entirely accurate. Some questions/thoughts:

    1. Does this mean that you think that denominations/congregations that did not have this segregated youth policy are not experiencing an equally high drop out rate as those that did?

    2. Using the title ‘David Kinnaman is wrong…’ is somewhat misleading. Whether the youth you mention were in a segregated youth group or not, whether they had made some profession of faith or not, whether they had been on a mission trip or not – they WERE part of a church body and we (the church) DID lose them. To be fair to Kinnaman he does mention that there is a need for intergenerational discipleship.

    3. I absolutely agree with you that we should not have segregated youth to the extreme that we have done and continue to do. I am certain the church as a whole would have changed for the better if we had actually engaged and listened to these youth through some kind of intergenerational discipleship. But maybe our churches would be a little more like Starbucks but not from a consumerist point of view. We can learn a lesson here. When the ‘lost’ go into Starbucks they probably feel more instantly accepted (albeit that it’s in the guise of ‘tolerance’) than when they attend a church for the first time. Maybe if we exhibited more Godly ‘grace’ in the church we might be hanging on to more Millennials – and have the lost wanting to hang out with us.

    4. The rapid change in culture due to technology has resulted in a cultural shift akin to industrialization in my view – I am certainly not a historian (nor a theologian). Do you disagree that the factors that Kinnaman mentions are not viable and critical factors to youth/young adults now distancing themselves from the church?

    5. It sounds like you are inferring that if the youth HAD been engaged and discipled they would be involved in the church as we have it now. I would disagree, as I say in #3 I think the church would look very different in structure and attitude. More principals less rules, challenging but inviting, more engagement with our communities and less programs, etc. So ‘yes’ they would be in the church, but the church would look very different to what it is right now (generalizing ‘church’).

    I agree with the underlying intent that you have to point out that we made a mistake along the way in not engaging all generations in discipleship. This is obviously a vital emphasis within the church right now – thanks be to God. But we should not, and cannot, ignore the impact of cultural shifts that have changed the landscape of church and discuss how we should respond.

    My 5cents. Thanks for reading. Peace

    Reply

    • Hi Andrew. Thanks for the comments. I am currently hiking a mtn but look forward to responding more completely later.

      Blessings.

      Reply

    • Hi Andrew,
      Sorry it has taken me awhile to get back to you. A few thoughts:

      1. First off, I am fairly sure this is more about congregational practice than denominational practice. Mega churches have much more in common with other mega churches than with other churches of their own tradition. Second, the data does seem to indicate that students in churches without youth programs retain a significantly higher percentage of students than do churches with youth programs. The data has been reported in my “What’s so uncool about cool churches” post. The data is from two different surveys. I am actually going to make that very question the study of a doctoral program.

      2. I am really just saying that his title is wrong. My premise is that we created an affiliation bond with a youth pastor, a youth program (usually with another name than the church’s name), and then put them in a second room. When they graduate or the staff moves or the student ages out, students often have no affiliation with the larger church, no relationships in the rest of the church and have been taught “this is a cool thing to be a part of as it gives to me…i.e. we have made consumers rather than servants (the subject of my “Mormon Bishop to the megachurch” post (https://thegospelside.com/2012/09/30/mormon-bishop-to-the-mega-church-thank-you/).

      3. I totally agree with you! A place of grace, that loves well and teaches people the scriptures and helps them to live it beats a place of rules for living any day, in my book. Jesus didn’t like sincere but self-righteous pharisees much. We seem to have a hard time remembering that.

      4. As I recall Kinnaman interviewed “drop outs” and asked “why?” I think that methodology has limited value. More interesting to me is Alex Taunton’s narrative interviews (in Atlantic Monthly, April 2013) that had drop outs share their “journey.” When drop outs talk about “why?” they share the stuff that is in the cultural water. When they shared their journeys they said 2 things: 1) they don’t really want Christians not to believe their stuff. 2) When they left their was almost always a leadership disconnect-staff left, were fired, they aged out…some sort of loss of relationship with “their person”. I think that is much more interesting than people leaving over theology. In 30 years of youth ministry almost no one joined over theology and almost no one left over theology. They joined and left over relationship, love, respect, challenge, acceptance, etc.

      5. Your number 5 sounds pretty beautiful to me. I’m all for that! That sounds like the body of Christ: the love and humility to listen to everyone and trust the Holy Spirit to move in even, dare we say, the young.

      Thanks for the really solid push-back. You have some great things to say and are obviously thinking about the health of Christ’s body.

      Thanks for joining the dialogue. Stick around and bring more!

      Reply

29. Pingback: Why do we gravitate to segregate…? | john.a.lawson

30. Very truth not forgetting the fact that trying to entertain them with games n equip them wth intentions, good manners, politeness etc.and not with what Jesus told us, the word, the Bible so when the solid foundation is not build then the whole house will fall sad but this is what most churches r experiencing or how about the new ‘age’ of churches not having Sunday school n Bible studies during the week only a Sunday service so when the church is being fed once a week then their member r spiritually weak……time to go back to the Biblical pattern that God stablished!!!!!

    Reply

    • Hi Al, Surely we have very weak formation in many churches. In other’s we have rule based formation. Both of those seem destructive. A 1 Tim 1:5 (“The goal of our instruction is love from a pure heart a clean conscience and a sincere heart.”) approach seems much more productive, Christlike and helpful for the world, the Kingdom and the individual.

      Thanks!

      Reply

31. Hey there,

    Have you read “Sticky Faith”? That’s a good book that also evaluates many of the same issues. But my comment is about a statistic you referenced. The 2008 Pew statistic about students attending church at 1/2 the rate of their parents and 1/4 the rate of their grandparents. This would essentially mean students are leaving church at the same rate as their parents left church, right? Because their parents were staying in church at only 1/2 of the rate of their parents.

    I don’t say this to dismiss the issue. Cutting the rate of Christians in half every generation is a huge issue that needs to be looked at and addressed. But I’m not sure that blaming modern youth ministry per se is fair, since the 50% per generation decline started before a lot of today’s youth ministers were even born.

    Again, not trying to say change isn’t needed. Just trying to broaden the perspective of the issue.

    Reply

    • Hi John,

      Thanks for commenting.

      I should let you know that in criticizing modern youth ministry I am engaging in self-reflection – I am a modern youth minister. I have led in youth ministry for 30 years this year, in suburban, rural and urban contexts…including starting them from scratch and building my last one from 40 a week to at one point more than 500 per week. So these are faithful wounds of a friend.

      I also should say that I like Sticky Faith. I also like Kara personally. She is a first-rate youth minister, educator and human.

      You have implied a really good point: There is data to be gathered that has not been yet. I am hoping to do just that in a project.

      The critique on modern youth ministry is from data that is clear and from scriptural, historic and logical principles that we disengaged ourselves from for easy results. We would all agree that the data on drop off and drop out is clear. The “why?” is the part that needs more research.

      Any thoughts?

      Reply

32. I love all the conversation about our youth and young adults. Additionally, like so many I have been praying for a long time how to engage both the tried and true adults of our body of Christ with the young in the body of Christ. One of the most exciting things I am seeing while somewhat uncomfortable for the tried and true is the interactive parts of worship. Times when we are challenged to talk with each other about matters of faith, discipleship and our spiritual journey. Celebrating what God has done, is doing and will do.

    I am thankful to many of the wonderful ideas from David Lose and other colleagues on this journey into a more transforming style of worship where all are invited into Salvation History and sent to invite others.

    Reply

    • Hi Christi,
      Thank you for commenting. I am familiar with David Lose’s name from a website that I have great appreciation for: working preacher. What is his work on “interactive worship” of which you speak? How are you using it in your worship-community context?

      Reply

      • Hello again Matt:

        At the very website Working Preacher there is a tab “Craft of Preaching”. Usually once a week David remarks theologically on the text coming for the new week. It is there I have found several opportunities to not only challenge the congregation but myself. Some of the things I have experimented either following the exact challenge from David or building on it based upon the community I currently serve.

        One week in the middle of the sermon I had the congregation pair up with someone either older or younger than they are. They also could not be related to that family member. This meant getting up and moving around the sanctuary during a worship (Heaven forbid in a Lutheran Congregation) LOL Once they were paired they were asked to share about a specific prayer concern they had and then actually pray for that person need.

        One week during Advent the congregation was given a plain piece of paper. During the sermon time, they were asked to make a list of all the things they needed to complete prior to Christmas Day in order for it to be the best Christmas ever. Then on the back side of the list they were encouraged to daydream about what they hope Christmas will be like? What kind of day they wanted to have. List their hope and dreams for the world. The final step was to return to the other side and circle the items that would contribute to their hopes and dreams for a blessed Christmas. David Lose tied it together with the theme of re-orientation – bearing the fruits of repentance.

        For the High Festival of Jesus Baptism, David suggested lifting up Baptism as the day to celebrate more than our own birth dates. He suggested giving everyone a candle and asking them to light it in remembrance of their Baptismal birth date. From David’s inspiration and God’s, this it what transpired during service. Instead of the usual Affirmation of Baptism at either the beginning of the service or immediately after the sermon. I was inspired by God to turn the service upside down. We began with announcements, Call to Worship, Gathering Hymn and then went directly into the Gospel Lesson. The sermon was given with a focus on Baptism and God’s word as being enough because that’s where our identity comes. Then after the sermon, the congregation(including all children) was invited forward to gather around the Baptismal Font. At the font they were given candle holders (like on Christmas Eve) with new candles and a copy of the Affirmation of Baptism service. The Affirmation was said by all, then the candles were lit. They were invited to remember their Baptism but also to celebrate Christ’s Baptism. We sang Happy Birthday to Jesus, blew out the candles. They were encouraged to take the candles home to light frequently in remembrance of their Baptism and then as they were returning to their seats, with a Boxwood branch, the members were sprinkled with the Baptismal waters from the font. The service then continued with the other lessons, prayers and offering. At the offering they were reminded that God gives them everything they need but wants every good thing for them, so after the offering plate had been passed, each person in the congregation received a card, business sized from God to say everyday, “I am God’s child, deserving of Love and Respect. God will use me and is using me to change the world.” The Holy Meal was shared and then all were sent to love and serve the Lord. It was probably one of the longest services any one of our Lutherans had experienced, but from the comments I have received it didn’t seem long and it was meaningful.

        One other thing I try to do as an inspiration from God is whenever possible I have all of the children in the church assist me with specific parts of the worship. I.E. – Shoebox ministry – during the children’s message we spoke of ministry but then all of the children laid their hands on the boxes and repeat prayed a prayer God gave me over the boxes. The congregation always is invited to pray along with the children.
        or
        Noisy offerings for the Kangeroo Kids Backpack ministry. The children collect the offering in metal pails (like the old lunch pails) and then they bring it as an offering before the Altar and again we pray a repeat prayer.

        While none of this is perfect, it is interesting. I have four young men in a three year Confirmation program. They have been given a rigid program of things they must do in Confirmation but it is also understood that as their pastor, I am willing to entertain any question, to pray for them and walk with them throughout this important part of their Christian Education. I don’t believe I have ever had so much fun as I am having with these young men.

        Additionally, the Young Adults are bringing to my conversation many things they would like to see in worship as a part of the body of Christ and I am encouraged.

        We do live in a time of Great Emergence as Phyllis Tickle would say but it is exciting. I am blessed that God has called me to some interesting ministries. One of which includes praying on FB with real prayers when someone asks for prayer and another that God has challenged me to do by putting a daily devotion on FB. I am no writer or great Theologian but each day God gives me something to say and there are some who say they are benefiting from it. What can I say, but Thanks Be to God!

        Sorry for the length of this post, but as you may be able to tell, the Holy Spirit of God is moving and I am so thankful to be a part of it. If you would like more information, let me know and I’ll try to supply accordingly. These experiences in my life are nothing less than a miracles.

        Peace be with you and all pastors who seek to accomplish God’s work with their hands, feet and voices. God bless you!

        Reply

        • Hi Christi,
          It sounds as if God is moving in powerful and gracious ways in your life and in your parish.

          I will go to the “Craft of preaching” tab and check it out. Lots of good ideas out there between you and David.

          Blessings to you, Christi, and thank you for sharing all of the creativity going on in your parish. Give us the name and town, then if any readers are close they might come worship with you.

          Reply

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34. Very deep and thoughtful perspective. While I do agree that this fault within the body fits students transitioning within the walls the church, there is another unique dynamic of post moderns who have absolutely no connection to the church outside of say a youth ministry or small group. As a youth pastor, I have personally experienced hundreds of teens who’s only real connection to the gospel message was through the youth ministry, and while efforts are maintained to acclimate and assimilate these students to the greater body many feats are encountered 1. Many of their parents are not Christians so they don’t want them there on Sundays and don’t take youth groups seriously 2. Many of the students have limited transportation to say a Sunday service, and I’m sorry this is not the age where students just travel anywhere 3. The church at large does not make enough of an effort to maintain the purity of the message while shifting the uniqness of the methodology and approach. Some ways I’m trying to get these particular students assimilated is 1. building the bridge of relationship between the senior pastor 2. Inviting them out to church functions and events 3. Church small groups and courses 4. Also participation in the greater aspects of the body (worship, technology, etc). The church cannot maintain a standard of who gets to assimilate and offer their talents and who cannot based on who your parents are and are not in the church. We must grab them now, raise them, and empower them as they rise up

    Reply

35. The crop we reap is determined basically by the seed we plant and how well as well we tend the plants.
    If I do not tend the plants and remove the weeds, my whole garden turns useless.

    I attended a writer’s conference decades ago where about 45 attended.
    The first speaker began with a question.
    “How many of you want to be writers?” Every hand shot up high.
    He then asked:
    “Well, why are you here instead of home writing?”

    To paraphrase:
    “Are we wanting things to be different in our individual parishes?”
    Every hand goes high.
    “Why then do we spend time writing our observations instead of making things different in our individual parishes?”

    Reply

    • Hi Raymond, Thank you for teeing up the opportunity to say…”That is why we are experimenting with some different things!”

      http://www.mystjudes.com

      🙂

      Reply

      • Hi, Matt

        It’s all about relationship. We all love being entertained. Nothing wrong there. There’s also a hidden curriculum: our inner self longs for something deeper but doesn’t know how to find it. Jesus understood that. So he “hung out” and “did stuff” with his guys and let them all learn from one another. Took longer than preparing and giving a 30 minute lecture but lasted several centuries longer.

        In psychotherapy sessions when I did more than 50% of the work no change happened. I learned slowly the only power for change is in the patient. That seems true for both individuals and formal groups alike. The title of an older book may fit here: “How Will They Hear If We Don’t Listen?”

        Keep experimenting. The best way to do anything is yet to be discovered. That makes life exciting.

        Reply

        • Hi Raymond,

          Thank you for your always insightful comments!

          Your note reminds me of a conversation with a friend who is a Psychologist. When he was getting his certification hours he was still volunteering in a Young Life club. I asked him why he stayed involved with kids while doing graduate work and picking up lots of supervised counseling hours. He said, “Last week in our large counseling practice’s supervision meeting my supervisor asked the room, ‘Is anyone seeing significant life-change in a client? Anyone?’ I keep doing this because I see kid’s lives changed.” I know that you are aware that the power of Young Life is relationships between trusted, time-invested Christian mentors, Christian peer groups and getting kids to involve themselves in the mission of the Gospel. If we did a better job of those in the church it would sure help.

          Reply

          • You are doing a “better job of those in the church” than you realize. You are there. Don’t do exactly the same things as YL. But you are doing the Church thing. I read a post on the blog Entrepreneur where the guy suggested we stop setting goals for ourselves and instead just do the process. He said he’d set his goal to write an article each Monday and Thursday. At the end of the year he looked back to discover he’d written the equivalent of TWO COMPLETE books. Conclusion he made: if he worked toward a goal, way far off, it demoralized him, just plodding along. But when he focused on the system, the process, the everydayness of life, he progressed and had fun.

            As you might surmise, I’m pretty conservative in my theology. The “awfulness” of our culture’s tailspin and influence on so many I’m not surprised. My theology tells me there is a spiritual battle going on between the Lord of Creation and the forces of Evil. But the final battle is won in in and through the Cross.

            Working with kids is tough. Looking back at my adolescence, I think it’s a wonder my parents were able to do anything with me. And I was one of the tame ones. The cultural crisis we are in, and have been in for decades, involve things we cannot control. We’re not bystanders yet sometimes we think “Gee whiz!” Life is tough. It also is wonderful. Hang in there. Sometimes God puts us in places working with people who are ready to change. Sometimes in places to simply be there for people who are not yet ready for change but still to be there.

            “It ain’t over ’til its over.”

            Reply

            • 🙂 You must have read my April 20th post.

              Thank you for the encouragement.

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37. Pingback: ➠ Matthew Marino: David Kinnaman is Wrong | Rev'd Up

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39. “Young adults in Barna’s qualitative studies have compelling stories to tell about the church being fearful, controlling, anti-science, and mean to the LGBT community.” And that sir, should be enough answer for you. Instead of making up your own reasons and assumptions, because that is simply put pretty arrogant and disrespectful to those people you know.

    Reply

    • Hi Roel,
      Thank you for commenting. Blogs without comments are like singing in the shower.

      The young adults in Kinnaman’s book have VERY compelling stories to tell. My issue isn’t with the stories from the qualitative research, but with the methods of the quantitative portion…and with ending up where you hoped to end up, which always makes research suspect in my book. Barna research is almost always viewed with raised eyebrows by hard research people for that reason.

      For another study that I found far more interesting check out my post “Mean People Suck, but that’s not why Millennials left the church.” I compare Kinnaman’s work to Alex Taunton’s, someone who did research and found conclusions very different from the assumptions he started with.

      In Barna’s case, the lion’s share of the “data” is from quantitative phone interviews in which people are given questions in such a way that what you are really finding out is their interpretation of events. What Barna’s research gives you is a better indicator of the dominant narrative at the time of the interviews than why people actually did something. This is like people in the 70’s thinking margarine is healthier than butter or someone from a place with no immigrants angry about immigration – not all passionately held beliefs are based in truth, but in its’ interpretation through the lens of cultural messages.

      The compelling stories are not only the best part of “You Lost Me”, but arguably the only part that is statistically valid…at least according to friends that work at places like The Search Institute and other organizations that are a bit more rigorous in their methods.

      Thank you again for commenting. And feel free to disagree any time! It is the beauty of the internet – we throw ideas out there to have them challenged. It is how we grow!

      Reply

40. Very good post. I am experiencing some of these issues as well..

    Reply

41. I think I would put a greater weight on the ancillary argument, parents not passing on faith in the home. We expect too much of the church to do the work of faith on behalf of the parent. While we have removed children from the sanctuary, more troubling is we have removed responsibility from the parents, and yes replaced it with purpose driven segregated youth ministries. Connecting to the greater church is important but not if we don’t connect faith to that child’s life, home, relationships, and every day decisions. If it does not seem important all week for the parent, I am not sure how a congregation and sanctuary would replace it.

    Reply

    • Hi Jay,
      I generally agree with you.

      In this case, though, the assumption of Kinnaman’s research was on kids who stayed in the church through high school…which is a different situation from that as faced most often by those of us in the Mainline, where families no longer read scripture in the home or encourage church attendance. (The evangelical world is 15 – 20 yrs behind the mainline in this.)

      As you say, the family is step one (Deut. 6, Ps 78:1-8). The church is step two. A mentor step three. A Christian peer group step four. We have given them a peer group without the other three. The mentor and the church become especially important during late adolescence when young people are (developmentally) learning to take their cues from outside of the home. The power of the Christian home to form is primary until early adolescence. By late adolescence, though, the family makes a transition to supporter of relationships with those who share parent’s values: church, coaches, para church, etc. Steven Tighe has a PhD research project he will publish on this.

      Reply

42. Pingback: The Super Bowl or What the Church Can Learn from a Football Spectacle | Zac Talks

    • Hi Zac,
      Great post. Well done!

      Reply

43. I think you’ve got a point regarding age segregation playing a big part in millennials leaving the church, but I don’t think Kinnaman is wrong. One sign of this is that the percentage of Americans who identify as Christian is shrinking rapidly – according to the Christian Science Monitor (5/25/15), 70.6% of Americans identified as Christian in 2104; in 2007, it was 78.4%. This is more than leaving church, it’s a matter of rejecting an entire faith. If we look only at segregation, I think we will fail to address real problems.

    In my experience, in speaking with young people and college students, I am convinced that much of this exodus is due to the evangelical church’s stand on LGBT issues. I don’t think the church has done a good job of wrestling with this, and of addressing the real science that comes more and more to light. Young people are going to school with kids who are coming out as gay or trans*. I sit on sexuality panels in college classes, and, when asked whether they know gay people or have gay friends, almost every hand goes up. Young people are getting to know their neighbors, schoolmates, and family members who are LGBT, and they see that the condemnation of LGBT people by evangelical leaders is both untrue and unjust; it’s based on just 6 or 8 Bible passages, taken out of context, and applied in a double standard that ignores the many more verses that condemn behaviors common in the pastors and Christians who condemn LGBT people. They see the pain that causes. And so they reject Christianity as a whole.

    I think the Christian church needs to step back and really consider the science and scriptural information regarding gay and trans* people, and end the condemnation. The job of the church is to lead people to God, to Jesus. Instead of informing LGBT people that they’re terrible sinners, we should simply lead them to the Gospel, and let Jesus convict them of their sin. Because, when you get right down to it, the condemnation of homosexuality itself, or of monogamous, committed homosexual relations, as a sin, is a judgment that is nor ours to make. “Judge righteous judgment.” “Judge not, lest ye be judged.” “First, remove the beam from thine own eye; then you can see to remove the splinter from thy brother’s eye.”

    As the science becomes more clear, as law and society transform more completely to embrace our LGBT brothers and sisters, I believe we will see more and more exodus from the church, until we fully embrace those LGBT brothers and sisters in Christ, and welcome them and their partners into our pews as full members of the family of Christ.

    IMHO.

    Reply

    • Hi Rebecca’s Daughter, You are right that a disconnecting methodology alone is not enough to do this. Families that do not participate in the “faithing” of their children is also part of the equation. So is the moving on of the culture and it not being cool to claim something that you don’t really believe anyway. However, Kinnaman used a flawed methodology (a very small sample of face to face interviews with multiple choice questions that led to the conclusions they expected in the phone surveys). I talk about that in another post “Mean People Suck…but that is not why millennials left the church” People knowing LGBT people is certainly not why people actually leave the evangelical church, however. If it were, then LGBT affirming churches would be exploding. They are not. Several months ago I was in Tacoma, which is certainly not the hotbed of conservatism. On a Sunday morning I drove past (and attended) affirming churches that were empty, while buildings formerly inhabited by mainline churches had lines around the building to get in. This included a church that had been part of the Mars Hill boondoggle. If your premise were correct, the notoriously closed to lgbt practice churches would be empty and the ones open would be filled. We just don’t see that.

      Reply

      • Don’t get me wrong – I agree with you regarding the “disconnecting methodology” as one aspect of why young people leave the church. However, I think the disconnecting methodology is not enough to explain the rapid disassociation young people have with Christianity itself. Many people who never darken the door of a church still identify as Christian. If the only issue were LGBT prejudice, you might expect people to switch to affirming churches, but it’s a lot more complex than that. Antihomosexual is just one of the six factors Kinnaman identified in “unChristian.”

        So why do so many young people not just stop going to church, but reject the entire concept of Christianity?

        David Kinnaman’s methodology may be suspect, but that alone isn’t enough to reject his entire premise. Do you have data that shows he’s wrong? His argument resonates with me, both in the experience I’ve had with pastors and Christians I’ve known, and with the young people – my children, nieces and nephews and their friends – in my life.

        How do you explain so many people not only staying out of church, but rejecting Christianity completely? They’re not saying church is boring or pointless, they’re saying Christianity is wrong, it’s BS, the capital “T” Truth lies elsewhere. Christians are failing to convey a message that accurately portrays Christ and His teachings, or this wouldn’t be the case. It’s not enough to bring young people back into the church. We need to examine our entire message. We need to look carefully at the relationship between the Bible and science, between Scripture and homosexuality and transsexuality as we understand it today, between our actions and our words, between our politics and our pulpits. We need to rediscover a robust and inclusive spirituality. Certainly there are some churches that do that, but there are a lot that don’t.

        Regardless of any flaws in his methodology, I find the case that Kinnaman makes compelling – but not necessarily complete. There are a lot of factors involved. Conservative Christianity’s hatred of LGBT people is just one of them.

        Reply

44. Hi Matt,
    I’ve enjoyed reading your opinion on the book You Lost Me. While I agree a lot of what you said were true, there are several points and questions I would like to mention in addition to what you said.

    Before I start making points, I apologize if any of what I say is inappropriate, but I thought that it would be necessary for me to be honest about what I thought after reading the book and reading your comment on the book.

    1. You asked, “Did the church “lose” young adults by being fearful, anti-science, controlling and hostile?”, and you answered that the millennials never belonged to a church in the first hand. As a millennial and someone who grew up in church, I do understand the way that christians view life, but I have to disagree with this statement. I once belonged to a church, because I grew up in a mega church where I could find people from every generation. Then what made me get disconnected from church? First, church people can be too unrealistic and exclusive. One great example is science vs. religion. A lot of christians just try to deny what scientists say about the Bible just because they feel uncomfortable hearing it. They think that what they hear is completely dishonoring the Bible. I’m not saying that what they feel is wrong, but I want to ask them, “Technically, God also created science. If they deny science, then wouldn’t it be same as denying God?” Also, I find some churches very controlling as well. I know of a church that prohibits college students from dating. First, as a fellow college student, I think college is the best time to explore and meet new people. During the process of meeting a new people, getting into a relationship can definitely happen. Of course, there has to be some discipline, but prohibiting it completely? No. I don’t think so. Second, I don’t think church has right to control college students dating. If it were high school, then it would make sense. College? I don’t think so. Technically we are grown-ups and we sometimes need to learn from tangible experience, whether it is good or bad. I also find some churches condemning their students for dating a nonbeliever. It is true that the Bible says, “Do not be bound together with unbelievers; for what partnership have righteousness and lawlessness, or what fellowship has light with darkness? 15 Or what harmony has Christ with Belial, or what has a believer in common with an unbeliever?” (2 Cor. 6:14-15). But the situation back then and the situation now is not really the same. It is not always possible to find someone in Church. Sometimes, God might use believers to lead their significant others who are nonbelievers to God. One of the examples is my parents. My dad, back then when he was a college student, was far from religious. My mom, whose family had a very strong christian background, took my dad to church. Now? They have been married for 23 years and are still strong together. As a result, I don’t think it is always a bad idea you have to remember that the Bible is ultimately written by people and there is no way you can confirm that what is in the Bible is ALWAYS what God says. You can’t expect that the Bible is always perfect, since it is written by people who were inspired by God, not by God Himself. You see, the problem about church is that they sometimes deny the world completely and take Bible too literally. This might have worked in the past, but as this generation focused on “accepting others’ opinions” as David Kinnaman mentioned, it really does not work anymore. Rather, it will drag millennials away from church because they don’t really know where exactly they have to stand. Thus, I have to say that I completely agree with the statement.

    2. When he said “You lost me”, ut not only means that “I am going to withdraw myself from church”, but also means that “I don’t know what is going on so I will step back”. I personally perceived this way because the latter is how I am right now.

    3. You seemed to criticize youth ministry for “segregating youth from the larger community in order to do programs “attractive” to students” and churches for “only creating a program that fits younger generation’s taste”. Well…. If it is not attractive, then how do you expect students to be involved? How do you expect students to be willing to learn about Jesus when they are taught in a way that is not necessarily understandable to them? Why do you think that letting students be part of larger community will solve the problem? Have you ever thought about the possible conflict that the integration of different generations in one community can cause?

    4. You mentioned that “The exodus of young adults from the church is a reality caused, not primarily by cultural change or negative message, but by ill-advised leadership decisions by youth pastors, senior pastors, parents and church boards.” and that not letting young adults meet and have interaction with older generations caused them to stray from church. While I agree that some of your statement is true, because segregating generations makes it really difficult for other generations to understand each other. However, I think cultural change has to do with a lot of millennials staying away from church. Some of examples I can think of are LGBT issues and cohabiting. As Obama passed the new law to allow same-sex marriage in every state, I noticed that a lot of churches were very furious about the decision. I do understand why they would be angry though, because that is against what the Bible says. While I do think that it is against the Bible too, I don’t really agree with the way that churches show their expressions. I’ve seen some extreme hatred comments like, “homosexuals better go to hell”, “God will punish them greatly”, and so forth. Just because the decision was against the Bible doesn’t mean that they can judge people however they think. It is not their job to judge, and all they have to do is pray. About cohabiting, as you know, getting married right away is not as easy as it used to be for several reasons. Sometimes, they really just cannot afford to get married because if you think about it, wedding ceremony costs a lot of money. In the meantime, we want to make sure that whoever we thought to spend the life with have similar lifestyle as we do, or at least be aware of our significant others’ lifestyles. Some, I know, do it for its sake, but not everyone is like that. There are legitimately many people who do it to have an idea of how their intended live. Personally, I don’t think that is such a bad idea. I don’t really know how you would perceive this, but this is just how I see.

    I’ve grown up in Church for my whole life, and a lot of the way I thought was very conservative. However, this school year I have been challenged in pretty much every single part of my belief because I go to a public school where drug, party, and sex are rampant. I graduated from christian high school, and I found that my high school did not really prepare me to face the real world. In fact, I sometimes blame the christian education I got because my academics were extremely affected by the confusion I got from the mismatch between the real world and the way that I was taught about the world in class. Then I spent my first semester of Freshman year being lost and confused all the time. In addition, older generation churchgoers sometimes say that “You have to do what is true, not what feels right”. I want to ask them back, “Do you always do what is true? How do you know what feels right does not always equal to what is true?” They try to explain their reasonings, but I mostly find myself not understanding what made them think like that. As a result, I realized that going to church was not so good idea because I just kept getting lost, as the book’s title says, between the world and the church. Don’t get me wrong. I do believe in God, and I believe that Jesus died for my sin and that’s how I am here now. I also still do have relationship with God, too. However, it occurred to me that church people can take the word too literally. I think sometimes flexibility in interpreting the word is necessary since we also technically belong to the world as of now. I don’t think God would be happy if we are solely within the church and don’t go out to the world because that would make it impossible for us to deliver the word.

    Reply

    • Hi Cindy. Thank you for such engaging and thoughtful comments. Thank you also for sharing your story of growing up in the church. The issues you report were exactly the ones my wife and I worried about the church creating when our kids were young.

      I am in the midst of moving and a bit pressed for time but I will try to respond to some of the questions you raised tomorrow.

      Blessings as you engage in the work of college – figuring out who you are and what you are made to do in God’s world.

      Reply

    • Hi Cindy,

      Thank you again for your comments yesterday. Let me take a stab at starting a dialogue on some of the stuff you raised…

      You took issue with my statement, “millennials were never ours to begin with,” since you attended church. I am sad that you are not currently attending church, but given the experience you and your friends have had, frankly, I wouldn’t attend a church like that either). I was really making a rhetorical flourish with that statement. Lots of millennials have left the church. Statistically, however, according the the Pew study of 2008, y’all attend church at 1/2 the rate of my generation. My generation attends at half the rate of my parents generation. So statistically, you are the first post-church generation in America…so as a rule, millennials are 80%+ unchurched.

      Churches prohibiting dating. I am really glad that you see how weird it is that a church would try to be that controlling. As far as science goes, fundamentalism has been historically anti-science. However, science was invented by Christians trying to understand how God works. Many of the early European and American scientists were church attending, believing people. I join you in being disappointed at many churches suspicion of science. There are churches that are very pro-science. I am a member of one. We even have a society for clergy who are also professionally trained scientists. Some fields of science have high numbers of participating Christians (like Astronomy for instance). Others, like biology, not as much. Generally science and religion answer different questions. Science answers “What?” and “When?” Religion answers, “Who?” and “why?” Those are separate categories of questions, therefore, there is no necessary problem between science and religion.

      In the second part of your first point you seem to be arguing that since the bible was written by humans it is fallible, therefore what it says about human relations can be ignored. I would respond by saying that it sounds to me as if you have received highly fundamentalist interpretations of scripture that are controlling and could become harmful. The answer to badly interpreted scripture is not to throw out scripture, though. That is throwing out the baby with the bath water. Are you aware that the bible was considered highly problematic in the early church? It was considered mythical and unrealistic by secular writers of the second through fifth centuries who argued against Christianity. It was the Christian sexual ethic that caused the biggest issue. So, “the bible not being realistic for our times” is not a new argument at all. Actually, from the arguments between pagan and Christian writers we know that it was people following the difficult teachings of the bible with joy that was the most powerful evangelistic tool in the early church. People watched the followers of Jesus loving the least, last and lost…rescuing abandoned babies, caring for widows and orphans, and being glaringly trustworthy sexually (celibate outside of marriage, monogamous within) that made people desire to convert to Jesus from much easier pagan religions.

      2. Given your experience of the church, I don’t blame you. I would go somewhere else too.

      3. As far as integrating students into the life of the larger church, after thirty years of leading youth ministry (from small churches to groups of around 350 sr high and 200 jr high) I can say that doing what fills a room for a show is not what leads to lasting involvement in the faith or in the church. It sounds as if you might be the product of such a ministry…and you are not in the church right now. Might it have helped you be more interested in the church if, instead of being about the indoctrination of what not to do and what to be afraid of, you had had mentors who walked with you and helped you have a relationship with God? Might it have helped if instead of being entertained on Wednesday night if the youth group had helped the old ladies of the church and develop friendships with them? Would it not have been more interesting to be helping make the main service happen as real and valued participants of the adult church rather than segregated into another room? In churches that do those things, the data suggests young adults stay in the church at a much higher rate.

      In your fourth point you talk about two things. In response to the first, Like you, I am shocked at the sad display of fear, hostility, and open hatred toward lgbt people by many churches and many Christians. I find it bizarre and embarrassing. I usually ask these people what they think of homosexuality. When they say, “I think it is a sin.” I then ask them how Jesus treated sinners. The answer of course is that he was “a friend of sinners.” “so,” I advise them, “Given your own interpretation of the Bible, if you want to be faithful to Jesus, go become friends with an lgbt person.” 🙂

      The second part of your paragraph is about cohabitation. All I can say about cohabitation is that it is a really bad idea. Like all bad ideas, of course, it sounds so good at the time. It has never been easy to be married. But you do not need an expensive wedding to get married. You need to make a promise to God to be faithful to someone in front of your family and friends so that they will hold you to that promise when the going gets hard-which it does for everyone. There is no rule that says you need an expensive ring, a fancy dress, or that you owe your friends an overpriced catered meal. I have seen the costs of marriages that go south. I want to do everything in my power to maximize the chances of my marriage being successful. Cohabitation is a really good predictor of marital failure. The only thing I remember from my college Sociology major is that, statistically, people who live together before they are married have a marital success rate slightly better than if one of them had a hard drug habit, and worse than every other factor they surveyed. One cannot play marriage. You are either committed or not. A boy who will shack up with you prior to marriage will shack up on you after marriage. We are who we are. The data, not the bible, bears that out.

      Cindy, your last paragraph about your experience at a Christian school makes me sad for you and for students everywhere who attend legalistic schools. I taught at a Christian school when I first graduated from college. I watched what was going on in the high school, and what happened to those students when they went to college. I started actively advising parents to put their kids into public high schools. I watched as the school taught fear and bizarre biblical interpretations and left students unprepared for basic college biology, chemistry, and physics. Like you, I find (many) Christian high schools particularly unhelpful in preparing students to live in the actual world. Your story is one I have watched played out hundreds of times in my thirty years of working with high school and college students. I am really sorry about this. Your parents were doing their best and decided to spend a pile of money to send you to a school that they thought would be helpful. As a parent, I can tell you that we do our best and pray that we did the right thing.

      By the way, I think you are probably being too kind to call the church and school upbringing you received “conservative.” I would call it “fear-based indoctrination.” My friends who do this mean well. But when we say, “God said it, I believe it, that settles it” we do not teach people how to read the Bible to find God and surrender our lives to him. We do not teach them how to be kind to others and surrendered to God in our own lives. We just end up teaching fear, judgment and build fearful, angry people. And fear and anger DO drive people from the church. But, sadly, I am not saying anything you don’t know.

      My article about David’s book was a way of poking at the church’s segregationist methods. I wrote another post (addressed to pastors) that you might be more interested in. It is called “Mean People Suck, but that isn’t why millennials left the church” It discusses the stories that those who have dropped out tell about how it happened. It is very interesting that when people are asked, “Why did you leave?” They tell one story. When they are asked, “Tell me the story of how you dropped out of church?” they tell a very different story.

      Cindy, I think you must be a really sharp young lady to hang on to your faith in God given the bad showing his people have made of things. My encouragement would be to find a community of faithful people who are more interested in helping people walk with God than in helping them have a list of do’s and don’t and groups of people to avoid.

      Keep in touch. I am curious about your spiritual journey.

      Reply

      • Good evening Matt,
        I thank you for well-written, thorough answer that you have given to my opinion.
        First of all, I would like to thank you for encouragement. It really means a lot to me.
        However, after reading your comments, I still have several questions I would like to ask.

        1. I think I asked questions about dating, but I don’t really see an answer for my questions… Did you forget to touch on that?
        2. If Bible is considered not realistic, then why do churches still use Bible?
        3. About cohabiting, I think it really is case by case. Really some people cannot be married for many reasons. Sometimes it can be due to family problem. Are you still against it?
        4. I also don’t understand why older generations tell us, “Do what’s true, not what you think is true”. Well… How do they know what’s true? Did they always do things that are true? If they do say that they know what’s true, then I would have to say that the older generation is only a group of hypocrites.

        Thanks for your response.

        Best,
        Cindy

        Reply

45. Hi Cindy,
    You asked a bunch of questions, so I am going to try to be thorough…which may be way more than you want. If so, I apologize for not giving you a more condensed version.

    As I read your questions I get the sense that you were so fully indoctrinated in the fundamentalist world of “Don’t do A, A leads to Z.” that it may have actually created in you what it hoped to scare you into avoiding. Fundamentalism (and progressivism and all other extreme doctrinaire positions) have a fearful “If you allow dancing it will lead to sex” mentality. “Don’t allow dating it will lead to cohabitation.” “Don’t taste a beer, you will become an alcoholic.” (A progressive version of this might be, “If you allow any limitation on abortion, no matter how late in the term it will lead to rape victims being jailed.” See how that works? You take an action and package its most extreme case as an inevitability. Unfortunately, for many children of fundamentalists, “Don’t date” does often turn into “cohabitation.” Cohabitation is NOT a logical choice to make from going on a date with someone and being smitten by them. Any more than marrying them on that first date is.

    Your question #1:” I think I asked questions about dating…”
    This question is one of how you use the Bible. It sounds as if you attended a very narrow church that interpreted the Bible along these lines: “Unless scripture tells you to do something, don’t.” Other traditions say, “Unless the Bible forbids, use your freedom in Christ wisely.” I think the latter works better. A better question than “Does the Bible allow dating?” (because dating was not a cultural phenomenon in the first century) is, “What do you hope to gain by dating?” There are a bunch of legitimate reasons to date: a) To gain relationship skills you will use when you are married someday. b) To find “Mr. Right” – the person you love and want to spend your life with. c) To become Mrs. Right for that guy. d) To do all of these things and not do things that you will be embarrassed about later. (For example, when dating I used a simple rule: “If this person ends up married to my best friend, is what I am thinking of doing right now going to mess up our friendship?” That question is a good test as to whether or not I am doing something physically that overruns the commitment present in the relationship.) e) Have fun (not sexually, but building great friendships), having a good time socially.

    When you start with the question, “what do I hope to gain?” dating starts to sound like a good idea, does it not? In fact, when you ask that question, the more people you date the better. Better 100 than 1. If you date 100 guys, you will: a) develop more relational skills, b) have a much better idea of who you are compatible to build a life with, c) become a better you as a result, d) not do things you will regret later (a therapist friend once told me that in 20 years of marital counseling not a single person has ever come to him and said, “I really wish I would have had more premarital sex. It would have helped my marriage. But he has had more than a thousand say, “sexual experiences before marriage are harming my marriage today.”) e) Have more fun. So my dating advice is to make a list of 20 fun, attractive, high-character, Christian guys and date all of them. Then make another list of 20 and work your work your way through that one as well. 🙂

    Your #2: “If Bible is considered not realistic, then why do churches still use the Bible?”
    Again, it is not the Bible that is unrealistic, it is the interpretive grid you are describing being taught. Fundamentalism has the idea that you can only do what is explicitly set forth in the Bible (for example, if dating is not in the Bible, then you can’t date. If you follow that line of thinking, cars aren’t in the Bible, so we shouldn’t drive.) The other interpretive framework is that Christians are free to do what is NOT morally forbidden (like the ten commandments) or replaced by the sacrifice of Christ (such as sacrificial rules and food codes).

    In this mix is the issue of our hearts. Christians are not primarily a group of people who follow rules, but primarily those who, out of gratitude for God’s love for them, allow Jesus to be their Lord. It is a matter of living in relationship with Jesus. You have to figure out your motives. If your motive is to figure out how to follow Jesus in a more honest way…what do you do with science, and wanting to not sit around alone on a Friday night, etc. Or if your motive is to do whatever it is what you want to do. People in love ask, “How much can I do to show I love you?” rather than, “How much can I try to get away with and still keep this relationship?” Ask yourself that question in your relationship with Jesus. Somewhere I remember you saying, “everyone in my college parties,” but there are always people who are not if you want to find them. And you know as well as I do that you do not have to do what others are doing.

    Your #3. “About cohabitating, I think it really is case by case. Really some people cannot be married for many reasons. Sometimes it can be due to family problem. Are you still against it?”
    Your real question here seems to be about premarital sex. Premarital sex is a really, really bad idea. When a behavior is approved around the world and across cultures there are reasons for that. Same when behaviors are frowned upon across cultures and across centuries. In general, sex outside of lifelong commitment is unsafe physically and, especially, emotionally. There may be other things that are worse (like a meth habit), but premarital sex will not help you. Remember that the Bible was not assembled to help people have a repressed life but to help them have a great one. Sometimes we don’t understand the reasoning behind things when we are young. Something not seeming right to me, does not mean that it isn’t. I don’t understand gravity, but I live with it. 🙂

    #4. “I also don’t understand why older generations tell us, “Do what’s true, not what you think is true”. Well… How do they know what’s true? Did they always do things that are true? If they do say that they know what’s true, then I would have to say that the older generation is only a group of hypocrites.”

    Did we always do what was true? Obviously not. The reason older people say, “Do what is right” is because they are hoping that you won’t make the mistakes that have haunted us. A friend once told me, “a fool never learns from their mistakes. A smart person learns from their mistakes. A wise person learns from OTHERS mistakes.” They are hoping for you to be wise.

    Generally, the more amped up someone gets when arguing with you about something, the more important it is to them. When you look at the conversations you are having with others ask yourself, “Who is amped up? Why are they amped?” Generally, people have a multitude of motives, some good, some self-serving. I try to listen and figure out the reasons for the emotion. Then I try to find the reasons I am resistant to what they are saying. My resistance is usually the result of me trying to desperately hold onto something that perhaps I should not hold onto.

    Cindy, thanks for asking your questions. In the Christian view, we are unique creations of a loving creator. Everything we do with our lives, therefore, matters. We have two kids. They are both in college. We also probably average twenty to thirty young adults in our house each week. So, although I have been out of college for a long-time, working with college students, I spend a lot of time with people in the three public universities and the two Christian ones near me. You CAN find a Christian life that is about your walk with God and a community of others loving God with you, rather than an all-or-nothing set of rules. It is a much more joyful way of walking with God.

    You are in my prayers. 🙂

    Reply

46. The church lost me about three years ago… And it wasn’t because I didn’t to go. I worked in and spent 98% of my high school career in the church. I would love to go on how, but I would rather have a conversation in real life, rather than typing it on the computer. I don’t even consider myself to be a christian anymore. I feel like the religion has become too dogmatic, rigid, and systematic. I do how ever consider myself a radical for Jesus Christ.

    I just don’t follow the com-modified version of Jesus…..Some have never stepped foot in a church and will say the church lost them. I on the other hand was in love with church.

    Reply

    • Hi Shalako,
      Thank you for commenting. If you are in Houston I would love to buy you a cup of coffee and hear your story firsthand. It sounds to me like you are coming from a place I wrote about in another post, . Are you from an evangelical or catholic background? Mostly I am not seeing it as overly rigid as much as overly rigid about absolutely the wrong things: external behaviors instead of helping people to connect intimately with God and be the community of faith to love and serve a hurting world. Instead I hear more and more of the church whining about how much we are hurting.

      Btw, Are you named after a Louis L’Amour character?

      Reply

    • Same here. You are not alone. I was Christian at one point but honestly some of the things that are happening in church and some of the things that people say just make me so sick that I don’t really want to even think about it anymore. It is true that we need to focus on God not on people, but to me that even sounds absurd as hell.

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      • Hi Dino. Thanks for joining the conversation. How crazy are the things you are hearing in your church? Is this crazy like you would hear from a coworker or a whole other level of crazy?

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47. I agree that we should not be looking to make a show but worshiping God and making disciples. However, I do not know of any church in my area that has strictly youth services. Most churches on the contrary do include youth in there Sunday morning and night services. I’m not saying some don’t go the route you refer to but most do not. I believe we should be teaching our youth how to show Grace and love to others. The world has a bad idea about Christians because some scream they are going to hell instead of showing the the love of our savior.

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    • Thanks, Little Sparrow. I would guess that if you check the 5 largest churches in your area you will find that many/all the youth groups will have “youth worship” that is effectively identical to Sunday morning. Many students use that as their “church.”

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48. I appreciate your passion and firm belief. I am deeply concerned that we are all pointing a finger at others when there are three in our hand pointing right back at ourselves. We will all likely continue to point fingers at what is not working until we gain unity in the body of Christ and actually practice the ecclesia that Jesus launched through his apostles. Let’s stop criticizing newer when if we are perfectly honest all practicing an a-biblical form of “church” that is simply a temple model approach to the Gospel of Jesus that was started roughly 300 years after his life when the Roman Empire legalized it and 1500 years later when King James changed the word and made us English speaking followers believe the word “church” belongs in the Bible. What you see as traditional church and Millennial attracting environments are both huge leaps from first century ecclesia. One is just less legalistic!

    Reply

    • Hi Be. Thanks for the thoughtful comments. It is Ash Wednesday (which has its roots in the 4th century ironically) and I am preaching at our four services and so I can’t take time to give your articulate reply the time it really deserves. I am making an assumption here that by “ecclesia” and “Temple model” you are referring to liturgical the pattern of worship. That pattern actually predates the legalization of the faith (which I think was not good for us, btw) by centuries. If you read Justin Martyr’s First Apology written around 150, the form of the mass is not only identical to the form and order as practiced today, it is assumed as a universal and ancient practice. Not only that, but every writer of the New Testament at least hints at the practice of the Eucharist, indicating that it was around in some form by the time of and pre-dates the New Testament books. I do appreciate your call to unity. Although, if you have ever worked on staff at a large church, you would probably find a good deal of legalism if you suggested deviating from the usual pattern of worship expected by the senior pastor and board. That is why every generation has its’ “worship wars.” Have a blessed day as Christian’s around the world remember our brokenness and utter need of a savior.

      Reply