Why Kids Leave Church
Feb 10, 2014 22:42:31 GMT -5
Post by PurplePuppy on Feb 10, 2014 22:42:31 GMT -5
Why Kids Leave Church
February 10, 2014 | Christine Pasciuti
Three out of five young Christians leave church after the age of 15. If one were to stand in a room full of hundreds of people and ask why that is, one should expect to get at least as many answers. The issue is personal; perhaps deep down, those of us who have influence over a child’s potential faith, either point our fingers at others, or partly blame ourselves for not setting a good enough example. For letting the kid hang with the wrong crowd, for not wowing the kid into faith, for not keeping church interesting enough, for not communicating the gospel smartly enough. So, what do the kids have to say?
A research study conducted over a five-year period and released a few years ago by the Barna Group, points to six different reasons why young people leave church. Interviews with teenagers, young adults, youth pastors, senior pastors and parents were compiled to produce the following results. Some kids may have chosen more than one reason below, hence the percentages do not add up to 100%.
1) Churches are overprotective, demonizing the outside world (approx. 25%)
2) Christianity is “shallow”; God is missing from the experience (approx. 20%)
3) The church is too confident in its doctrine; has an anti-science approach (approx. 25%)
4) The church is judgmental about young people’s sexual experiences; they feel guilty and judged, even if they know some of their behaviors were a mistake. (approx. 17%)
5) Exclusivity of the Christian faith; young people believe the church is “afraid” of other faiths (approx. 29%)
6) The church is unfriendly to those who doubt; young people feel they can’t ask life’s most important questions in church (approx. 30%)
David Kinnaman, Barna Group president and author of the book on these findings, You Lost Me: Why Young Christians are Leaving Church and Rethinking Church, suggests that churches should cultivate “intergenerational relationships” within their congregations.
In author Chuck Bomar’s book, Losing Your Religion: Moving from Superficial Routine to Authentic Faith, he poignantly points to identity in Christ as the underlying building block for strong faith in young folks.
“I have a growing concern that more and more people who call themselves Christians are unintentionally slitting the wrist of their faith. In a pursuit to be faithful, they try to will themselves into embracing habits and routines and disciplines they believe will cause them to be a “better Christian”. Although this seems like the right thing to do and seems to be the norm for our culture, it’s actually suicidal…”
“For example, youth leaders teach kids that they shouldn’t have sex before marriage, or they shouldn’t lie or steal; and they point to Scripture that speaks of these things. These are great lessons to teach kids, but we cannot miss a critical distinction…”
“The Scriptures never put these types of behavior standards out from a place of sin management like we tend to teach them. Rather, the Scriptures always speak of such things as an authentic expression of a transformed identity in Christ. God-honoring conduct is always the result of an inward faith working itself out. Not vice versa.”
Marc, a well-known Christian blogger, insightfully observes what the current church culture lacks when reaching out to kids, in this excerpt from a post on his website, Marc5Solas blog:
“We’ve taken a historic, 2,000 year old faith, dressed it in plaid and skinny jeans and tried to sell it as ‘cool’ to our kids. It’s not cool. It’s not modern. What we’re packaging is a cheap knockoff of the world we’re called to evangelize.” He further observes, “From a Noah’s Ark themed nursery, to jumbotron summer-campish kids church, to pizza parties and rock concerts, many evangelical youth have been coddled in a not-quite-church, but not-quite-world hothouse. They’ve never sat on a pew between a set of new parents with a fussy baby and a senior citizen on an oxygen tank. They don’t see the full timeline of the gospel for every season of life. Instead, we’ve dumbed down the message, pumped up the volume…”
Marc laments that the kids are being sent out into the world unarmed and utterly ignorant about their faith. You want your kids to “feel” the same experience you “feel” in your faith, but unless the very basics of faith captured in John 3:16 is etched upon the hearts of these kids—with understanding— they can quickly get lured away and involved in any secular do-good project with others in the community and “feel” great about those and themselves. Most likely they’ll feel quite a bit better than trying to produce “feelings” about a faith they haven’t really understood.
Kids are smart; they realize quickly after a few sermons that they can’t be good enough, and churches can often unintentionally reinforce that, without emphasizing the complete picture, which includes the absolute freedom that occurs when a child’s heart gives faith a chance and repents before God in prayer, asks for forgiveness, and receives the power of the indwelling Spirit of God. That part of faith is essential, no matter how “old fashioned” it may sound. If any church tries to skirt around the teaching of this very personal aspect of relating to God, they’ve already lost the kid before he or she has even left the church.
When anyone—kid or adult—grasps this miraculous aspect of their faith, they’ve “pierced the veil” and come to a powerful “aha moment”, where they realize they were never meant to be good enough by their own strength, and that God is not some military drill sergeant, in their face 24/7, demanding discipline. The breakthrough comes when a kid—hungry for God—begins to understand just how hungry God is for him or her, just how much he or she is loved, and just how wonderful a “Father” God can be. The kind of God that will let kids get so close to Him, that all the barriers to access are suddenly torn down. When kids get taught that concept early, the heart of a child can be captured to seek God in everyday life, and not in the pomp and circumstance of a church’s wooing process toward itself.
Churches today have gotten the “wooing” part down to a science. But wooing a kid’s heart to God is a task no church should attempt on its own. That task is shared with God; the church plants the seed and God sows. You can lead a horse to water, but you can’t make him drink. In the same way, you can lead a child to church, but you can’t force them to drink from that well of personal relationship with God.
So, how do you keep a kid in church for a lifetime? Get them in front of God, just as they are, in their homes, in their bedrooms. Get them comfortable with talking to God on a regular basis, in their own words. Tell them God will listen to anything they have to say, and He will help them solve their problems. This is where the phrase “God accepts us just as we are, but He won’t leave us that way!” is applicable. Getting kids comfortable with prayer and reading their favorite Bible verses can lead to intimacy with God. Get them so intimate with the Father that the imperfections in ourselves, our churches, or how good the entertainment is, or how “cool” the church is, won’t matter anymore. The Spirit of God has been invited into that kid’s heart.
From that point on, that child or young adult will begin to see the world around him or her through the eyes, heart and mind of Christ. And that kid will be so much better equipped to face the world and all of its challenges, through all the seasons of life. This maturity walk in faith is a miraculous process that happens from the inside out, not from the outside in.
link
February 10, 2014 | Christine Pasciuti
Three out of five young Christians leave church after the age of 15. If one were to stand in a room full of hundreds of people and ask why that is, one should expect to get at least as many answers. The issue is personal; perhaps deep down, those of us who have influence over a child’s potential faith, either point our fingers at others, or partly blame ourselves for not setting a good enough example. For letting the kid hang with the wrong crowd, for not wowing the kid into faith, for not keeping church interesting enough, for not communicating the gospel smartly enough. So, what do the kids have to say?
A research study conducted over a five-year period and released a few years ago by the Barna Group, points to six different reasons why young people leave church. Interviews with teenagers, young adults, youth pastors, senior pastors and parents were compiled to produce the following results. Some kids may have chosen more than one reason below, hence the percentages do not add up to 100%.
1) Churches are overprotective, demonizing the outside world (approx. 25%)
2) Christianity is “shallow”; God is missing from the experience (approx. 20%)
3) The church is too confident in its doctrine; has an anti-science approach (approx. 25%)
4) The church is judgmental about young people’s sexual experiences; they feel guilty and judged, even if they know some of their behaviors were a mistake. (approx. 17%)
5) Exclusivity of the Christian faith; young people believe the church is “afraid” of other faiths (approx. 29%)
6) The church is unfriendly to those who doubt; young people feel they can’t ask life’s most important questions in church (approx. 30%)
David Kinnaman, Barna Group president and author of the book on these findings, You Lost Me: Why Young Christians are Leaving Church and Rethinking Church, suggests that churches should cultivate “intergenerational relationships” within their congregations.
In author Chuck Bomar’s book, Losing Your Religion: Moving from Superficial Routine to Authentic Faith, he poignantly points to identity in Christ as the underlying building block for strong faith in young folks.
“I have a growing concern that more and more people who call themselves Christians are unintentionally slitting the wrist of their faith. In a pursuit to be faithful, they try to will themselves into embracing habits and routines and disciplines they believe will cause them to be a “better Christian”. Although this seems like the right thing to do and seems to be the norm for our culture, it’s actually suicidal…”
“For example, youth leaders teach kids that they shouldn’t have sex before marriage, or they shouldn’t lie or steal; and they point to Scripture that speaks of these things. These are great lessons to teach kids, but we cannot miss a critical distinction…”
“The Scriptures never put these types of behavior standards out from a place of sin management like we tend to teach them. Rather, the Scriptures always speak of such things as an authentic expression of a transformed identity in Christ. God-honoring conduct is always the result of an inward faith working itself out. Not vice versa.”
Marc, a well-known Christian blogger, insightfully observes what the current church culture lacks when reaching out to kids, in this excerpt from a post on his website, Marc5Solas blog:
“We’ve taken a historic, 2,000 year old faith, dressed it in plaid and skinny jeans and tried to sell it as ‘cool’ to our kids. It’s not cool. It’s not modern. What we’re packaging is a cheap knockoff of the world we’re called to evangelize.” He further observes, “From a Noah’s Ark themed nursery, to jumbotron summer-campish kids church, to pizza parties and rock concerts, many evangelical youth have been coddled in a not-quite-church, but not-quite-world hothouse. They’ve never sat on a pew between a set of new parents with a fussy baby and a senior citizen on an oxygen tank. They don’t see the full timeline of the gospel for every season of life. Instead, we’ve dumbed down the message, pumped up the volume…”
Marc laments that the kids are being sent out into the world unarmed and utterly ignorant about their faith. You want your kids to “feel” the same experience you “feel” in your faith, but unless the very basics of faith captured in John 3:16 is etched upon the hearts of these kids—with understanding— they can quickly get lured away and involved in any secular do-good project with others in the community and “feel” great about those and themselves. Most likely they’ll feel quite a bit better than trying to produce “feelings” about a faith they haven’t really understood.
Kids are smart; they realize quickly after a few sermons that they can’t be good enough, and churches can often unintentionally reinforce that, without emphasizing the complete picture, which includes the absolute freedom that occurs when a child’s heart gives faith a chance and repents before God in prayer, asks for forgiveness, and receives the power of the indwelling Spirit of God. That part of faith is essential, no matter how “old fashioned” it may sound. If any church tries to skirt around the teaching of this very personal aspect of relating to God, they’ve already lost the kid before he or she has even left the church.
When anyone—kid or adult—grasps this miraculous aspect of their faith, they’ve “pierced the veil” and come to a powerful “aha moment”, where they realize they were never meant to be good enough by their own strength, and that God is not some military drill sergeant, in their face 24/7, demanding discipline. The breakthrough comes when a kid—hungry for God—begins to understand just how hungry God is for him or her, just how much he or she is loved, and just how wonderful a “Father” God can be. The kind of God that will let kids get so close to Him, that all the barriers to access are suddenly torn down. When kids get taught that concept early, the heart of a child can be captured to seek God in everyday life, and not in the pomp and circumstance of a church’s wooing process toward itself.
Churches today have gotten the “wooing” part down to a science. But wooing a kid’s heart to God is a task no church should attempt on its own. That task is shared with God; the church plants the seed and God sows. You can lead a horse to water, but you can’t make him drink. In the same way, you can lead a child to church, but you can’t force them to drink from that well of personal relationship with God.
So, how do you keep a kid in church for a lifetime? Get them in front of God, just as they are, in their homes, in their bedrooms. Get them comfortable with talking to God on a regular basis, in their own words. Tell them God will listen to anything they have to say, and He will help them solve their problems. This is where the phrase “God accepts us just as we are, but He won’t leave us that way!” is applicable. Getting kids comfortable with prayer and reading their favorite Bible verses can lead to intimacy with God. Get them so intimate with the Father that the imperfections in ourselves, our churches, or how good the entertainment is, or how “cool” the church is, won’t matter anymore. The Spirit of God has been invited into that kid’s heart.
From that point on, that child or young adult will begin to see the world around him or her through the eyes, heart and mind of Christ. And that kid will be so much better equipped to face the world and all of its challenges, through all the seasons of life. This maturity walk in faith is a miraculous process that happens from the inside out, not from the outside in.
link