Backsliders: The UK’s Spiritual Epidemic
TRANSCRIPT
Epidemic
I have a huge heart for those who have wondered away from the Christian faith. I too was on the run from Christ. But as a fugitive, you have to keep pace, you become paranoid, you labour to harden the conscience, it becomes a daily activity to fudge the truth. Once you’ve met with truth, it’s hard to deny it. But deny you must. It’s a tragic life for the backslider, who having denied themselves, now must deny what they know to be true.
It has reached an epidemic scale in the UK. It is true that for every 1 person who converts to Christianity, 26 fall away from the faith[i]. We are now a dead nation. I wouldn’t say less religious or I suppose even less spiritual. Political movements display religious behaviour and aggressive assertion of what they believe to be the way. If anything, because of the vacuum caused through dead faith, competing religions and spirits of the age are well and truly pregnant.
The Bottom Line
Much could be said to pin down the why. The bottom line is this: We’ve walked away from the Word of God. And the research in this field exposes our shortcomings.
The Evidence
Let’s look at the evidence.
The biggest ever independent study in the west focusing on young people, revealed that it was the undermining of the authority of the Word of God which ultimately drove them out of church. Research analyst C. Britt Beemer revealed that two out of three young people are deserting the church largely because they began to doubt the accuracy of the Bible.[ii] We must step back and acknowledge the impression we leave is of spurious disconnected stories, departing from the greatest overarching true story of the gospel and the power it has to transform hearts and minds permanently. This same study detailed in Ham & Beemer’s book Already Gone exposed among other points that students who regularly attend Sunday school are actually:
more likely NOT to believe that all the accounts/stories in the Bible are true/accurate.
more likely to doubt the Bible because it was written by men.
more likely to defend premarital sex.
much more likely to believe that God used evolution to change one kind into another.
much more likely to question the Bible because they believe the earth is not less than 10,000 years old.
more likely to view the Church as hypocritical.
much more likely to have become anti-church through the years.
more likely to believe good people don’t need to go to church.[iii]
No one is questioning the dedication, intentions, or passion of children’s workers. You are most likely not thanked enough. There is though, a real problem that filters through the church veins. Children take things at face value, and they can detect when a story doesn’t add up. They may make all the right sounds, but if the roots are shallow, their faith will be scorched in the state school sun (Matt 13:5-6). If the authority of God’s Word is undermined in first foundational books, it leads to a slippery slide of unbelief about the whole of the Bible.
I have personally experienced all kinds of great ministries where God is clearly working. Undeniably there are astonishing things happening within the body of the church, and some brilliant God-fearing saints holding fast to the gospel of the Kingdom, its foundation and the finale. The reality across the board however, as Ken Ham says is a spiritual epidemic that has wiped out the land of our Christian forefathers. England was the home of our great spiritual ancestors—many of the greatest preachers, teachers, and evangelists of the last 200 years.[iv] I’m convinced it’s directly connected to the authority of God’s Word being watered down, and a distorted gospel being preached.
Research by ComRes for the Bible Society surveying UK church leaders showed:
Only 47% think the Bible is free from errors and some don’t believe the bible is inspired by God.
27% of leaders surveyed said they do not use the Bible "frequently" for preaching and teaching and 13% said that the Bible is not regularly taught at their churches.
More than a tenth also said they do not think that the church should work harder to promote biblical principles across society.[v]
So, to be clear, the research reveals there are many church leaders who do not view the bible as God’s inerrant Word, do not teach and preach frequently from the Bible, do not feel the bible actively challenges them to live in a way which runs counter to the present culture in Britain, or believe in promoting its principles.
All of this evidently manifests in the belief and actions of church goers who in the same survey admitted:
Only 35% said they read the Bible everyday. (45% read only more than once a week in a similar survey in America[vi]).
Only 57% believe the Bible should shape their daily lives "a great deal".
Only 60% believe the Bible provides moral guidance, sets out God's rescue plan for humanity and shows God's priorities.
Only 68% say the Bible is regularly taught at their church.
So, according to church goers, they seldom read the bible, it doesn’t shape their daily lives, they don’t believe it offers moral guidance, do not know that it speaks of God’s good news plan for mankind, and probably because according to them, they are not taught the Bible. How depressing is that? If we are not preaching God’s gospel of his plan for the King and his Kingdom, what message are we sending? This is a damning yet sadly not surprising indictment of the state of the church. It’s time to call the Church back to the authority of the Word of God, starting at the beginning in Genesis and pointing to the hope of the promised Kingdom.
There’s a whole heap of issues to face in the UK, sown from comfortable living, to over-spiritualising, over-realising theology, to the feminisation of the church, to something going astray in the pulpit. But the bottom line is we’ve walked from God’s Word, over to man’s word. The culture of today has a firm grip on the church.
We see in the Bible that when the leaders of Israel followed God’s word the nation followed suit. When they followed their own way, the nation fell. When the leaders of the church stray, so do the congregants “like sheep without a shepherd” (Matt 9:36). A country without a biblical backbone falls for temptation. The state of the nation is a reflection on the church.
Necessary change
We learn from the bible that in just one generation, you can lose everything. But equally, the next generation can regain what was lost. There is hope.
We are required to find a way to reach the next generation with biblical truth.
It starts with us
First off, we must believe what God says in his Word. It sounds obvious, yet we’re master cherry pickers. Jesus insisted that we “turn and become like children” (Matthew 18:3). Adult pride drives our obsessive urge for new theological perspectives, the hottest church strategies, and cool expressions. There’s nothing new under the sun. “The grass withers, the flower fades, but the word of our God will stand forever.” (Isaiah 40:8; 1 Peter 1:24-25).
The Church
A child like faith must manifest in the pulpit and ripple through the pews.
I sat in a church once with my wife before we had kids, and they had a puppet show prepared. The problem was, no kids turned up, and in fact I can’t remember anyone else turning up. So, they continued with the puppet show just for us, and then there was no proper preach. It was so awkward. I felt like we were being filmed for a YouTube prank video or something. But this isn’t uncommon. Up and down the country churches are dumbing down the bible to resort to puppet shows, and kid’s activities, and table top sales, which is great peripheral stuff... But not when it replaces the main thing. Not when it replaces the preaching of the Word of God.
Then we see churches at the other end of the spectrum that are bucking the trend of decline, commonly priding themselves on relevance. The trophy of relevance however, appears often only in the category of expression. We can all learn a lot from growing churches yet it’s important to remember that relevance in expression is not necessarily relevance in content. It’s that one draws crowds quicker than the other. We should welcome relevant expression, but without relevant content, it’s tempting to hurdle over doctrinal matters that the nation is struggling with in fear of offending to the decline of numbers.
Culture Wars
It always amazes me how little the average congregant understands about the foundations of their faith. Roots are shallow, detached from the middle east origins. We want to be drip fed on milk. We don’t want to get off the bottle and mature in faith. Especially when chocolate milk is on offer.
Within the culture wars the church overall has folded its hand. As an example, there is a huge difference in church culture between those whose members bring bibles and those who never have one to hand. Guess which type has been influenced by the world more than them being the influencers?
The gospel is disruptive. It is counter cultural. It is offensive. But “blessed is the one who is not offended by me” (Matthew 11:6) said Jesus.
Ashamed of the Word
Why are we so ashamed of the old testament and even parts of the new? On the Emmaus road Jesus revealed how the old testament is not just a Jewish history book. It’s written about Him. "And beginning with Moses and all the Prophets, he interpreted to them in all the Scriptures the things concerning himself." (Luke 24:27). It is alarming how common it is to hear leaders say, "don't worry about the old testament, just focus on Jesus". Or perhaps “the old testament, creation, eschatology is a distraction, just concentrate on Jesus”. They create a god in their own image and finish up worshipping a different Jesus. Our Lord was explicit in stating: "If they do not hear Moses and the Prophets, neither will they be convinced if someone should rise from the dead” (Luke 16:31). You may say that you’re convinced Jesus rose from the dead. But if you do not hear Moses and the Prophets, eventually neither will you be convinced Jesus rose from the dead.
What will it take
Either lukewarm or on cultural steroids. One way or the other, we have to stop watering it down, and start preaching the Word as it is written from start to finish. Paul said, “I am innocent of the blood of all, for I did not shrink from declaring to you the whole counsel of God” (Acts 20:26-27). It would take a paradigm shift for the church to return to God’s Word. It’s not as if we need more resources, or skillset, or called leaders. It’s strikes me that we don’t want to change, because if we did, we would soon enough be constrained to preach against our own practice. There’s a reason preaching through books of the bible is now uncommon. I understand that there are times for topical sermons, even topical series. But imagine for a moment with me, if every church in country preached through the books in the bible, and every person read their bible daily, brought it church, and held it during the sermon, light would shine on the darkness and expose every one of us. Perhaps we prefer to hide some things in the darkness. I suspect the only way to bring this nation to heed the Word of God, would be to go through the refiner’s fine. It’s not what we want. Fire is hot. But remember, “the Lord disciplines the one he loves, and chastises every son whom he receives” (Hebrews 12:6; see Proverbs 3:12). I suspect in the next couple of decades the heat will burn or refine every one of us.
Conclusion
We can’t bury our heads in the sand. It’s so easy to have the best of intentions and heart for God and then end up down a path and stop to think, oh where are we. If our hearts burn for the nation and we wish to diagnose the true health of the body, it’s essential we survey the Christian landscape in honest light, admit our failings, and do our bit no matter how small – God’s sees what we do in secret.
Again, there are churches who plough through the bible week after week and preach with sincerity and trembling, and may God multiply you. There are also signs of an undercurrent of those passionate for his Word, who are prepared to ruffle a few feathers to bring about righteous change. It is crucial we help the next generation build a biblical worldview, to value the bible as God’s Word which provides the authority and foundation of their faith.
We have to get back to the book. It’s not that we worship this book. Nobody loves the love letter. We worship the author, it’s the inspired Word of God, it’s our guide how to live, it speaks of our saviour and his grand plan to redeem mankind and the universe. We have to get back to the book.
It starts with us – in a childlike approach, to believe all of God’s Word, unashamed of God’s Word, preaching boldly God’s Word (without shrinking back) with each of us living out God’s Word, expecting our message to be counter-cultural. When we do that as a unit, the nation has an opportunity to turn.
Let us hear God’s Word today. As Luther heartened, “Let the man who would hear God speak read Holy Scripture.”
Message to Backsliders
If you are a backslidden Christian – I get it. I’ve been there, deep in that pit of sin.
But the best, most loving thing I could say to you – particularly you young men – is this: Get over yourself! Seriously. Get over yourself! Yes, they hurt you. Yes, we’re hypocrites. Yes, it was boring. Yes, your sin is a barrier.
The reality is that you are most likely using these thoughts an excuse to keep the church and therefore God at arm’s length, so you can continue in your sin without that sense of conviction. Don’t kid yourself in thinking you’re an atheist. You’re not an atheist, you’re an idolater. You love your sin more than God.
So, stop feeling sorry for yourself. Dust yourself off, drop the act, put off your excuses, put on Christ, and come home. You will be welcomed back, I can assure you.
"Today, if you hear his voice, do not harden your hearts as in the rebellion" (Hebrews 3:15).
[i] The Benedict XVI Center for Religion and Society, https://www.stmarys.ac.uk/research/centres/benedict-xvi/docs/2017-may-no-religion-report.pdf
[ii] Ham & Beemer, Already Gone: Why your kids will quit church and what you can do to stop it.
[iii] Ham & Beemer, Already Gone: Why your kids will quit church and what you can do to stop it, p. 39.
[iv] Ham & Beemer, Already Gone: Why your kids will quit church and what you can do to stop it, p. 17-18.
[v] Research by ComRes for the Bible Society, published 2008, http://www.eauk.org/church/research-and-statistics/attitudes-to-the-bible.cfm
[vi] LifeWay Research study, http://www.christianitytoday.com/edstetzer/2015/july/epidemic-of-bible-illiteracy-in-our-churches.html