Intentional Faith

Healthy and growing churches pay close attention to the people they count as members, as well as those people who are not yet a part of the flock. These churches know that new people are the lifeblood of a growing church. Like a spigot, they want to keep the valve open for the flow of new people, and most importantly, they want to ensure that nothing impairs or cuts off the flow of new people to the church.
With that in mind, pastors need to be aware of five significant facts about first-time guests looking for a church home.

1. Visitors make up their minds regarding a new church in the first ten minutes of their visit.
Often, before a first-time guest has sung an inspiring song or watched a compelling drama or viewed a well-produced video vignette or heard a well-crafted sermon, they have made up their mind whether or not to return. In fact, if you ask most church leaders, far more time and energy are spent on the plan and execution of the worship service, with only minimal time spent on preparing for the greeting and welcoming of the first-time guest, which is equally if not more important. Most pastors would rather not hear this: The church’s ability to connect with first-time guests is not dependent on you but on those first lines of people who represent your church.

• Are parking attendants in place?
• Is there appropriate signage?
• Are your ushers and greeters performing the “right” job?
• Is the environment you take for granted user-friendly and accepting to guests?

2. Most church members aren’t friendly.
Churches claim to be friendly. In fact, many churches put that expression in their logo or tag line. But my experience in visiting churches as a first-time guest proves otherwise. The truth is that most church members are friendly to the people they already know, but not to guests.

• Observe to see if your members greet guests with the same intensity and concern before and after the worship service as they do during a formal time of greeting in the worship service. A lack of friendliness before and after the service sends a mixed, if not hypocritical, message to new people.
• The six most important minutes of a church service, in a visitor’s eyes, are the three minutes before the service and the three minutes after the service, when church members introduce themselves, seeking genuinely to get to know the visitors (not just obtain personal information like the market research data collectors at the mall), offer to answer any questions, introduce them to others who may have a connection (perhaps they live in the same neighborhood, are from the same hometown or state, or their children attend the same school), or any number of ways to demonstrate to the visitors that they as a church member care.
• A church would be wise to discover their most gregarious and welcoming members and deploy them as unofficial greeters before and after each service, in addition to designated parking-lot greeters, door greeters, ushers, and informational booth personnel.
• Don’t make promises the church can’t keep. My wife attended a church recently that calls itself “The Friendly _______ Baptist Church,” but no one spoke to her before the service, and when she sought information from the guest information booth, she was treated by the attendant as a bother. Mixed messages and unfulfilled promises do great harm in a church’s effectiveness in welcoming new people.

3. Church guests are highly consumer-oriented.
“If Target doesn’t have what I need, I just head to K-Mart.” “If the Delta airfare is too high, American might have a sale.” Capitalism has taught us that if we don’t find what we want, someone else down the street or at another Web site will have it. If your church building is too hard for newcomers to navigate, if they have to park in the “back 40,” if your people are unaccepting and unfriendly, another church down the street may have what they’re looking for. Or worse yet, they may decide getting into a church is not worth the effort and give up their search altogether.

• Pastors and church leaders need to look at their churches through the eyes of a first-time guest. Rick Warren says that the longer a pastor has been a pastor, the less he thinks like a non-pastor. That same thought would apply to thinking like a guest.
• The use of objective, yet trained, anonymous guests to give an honest appraisal is very important. Many retail outlets utilize the service of one or more “mystery guests” to provide helpful analysis of welcoming and responding to the consumer. Churches would be well served to utilize a similar service.

4. The church is in the hospitality business.
Though our ultimate purpose is spiritual, one of our first steps in the Kingdom business is attention to hospitality. Imagine the service that would be given to you in a first-class hotel or a five-star restaurant. Should the church offer anything less to those who have made the great effort to be our guests?

• Hospitality is almost a forgotten virtue in our society. When was the last time someone invited you to their home for a meal? But it needs to be reawakened.
• Church members can extend hospitality to guests by offering to sit with them during the church service, giving them a tour of the church facilities, inviting them to lunch after service, or connecting with them later in the week.

5. You only have one chance to make a good first impression.
More than a truism, first impressions are lasting ones. Little hope of correcting a bad first impression is possible. Your first-time guests have some simple desires and basic needs. They decide very quickly if you can meet those criteria. The decision to return for a second visit is often made before guests reach your front door.

• Are you creating the entire experience, beginning with your parking lot?
• Are you consciously working to remove barriers that make it difficult for guests to find their way around and to feel at home with your people?
• Do newcomers have all the information they need without having to ask any embarrassing questions?
• Are your greeters and ushers on the job, attending to details and anticipating needs before they are expressed?
• Does anything about your guests’ first experience make them say, “Wow!” and want to return?

The number one reason churches plateau and decline is that they’ve lost their outward focus. Church can easily become about what the existing congregation wants, instead of thinking about and serving people beyond the church walls. To combat this, church members must remember what originally made their church great. Was it the music, the programs, the schedule, the dramas, the preaching, or the kids’ ministry that made their church great? Those things were inspiring, excellent, and fun, but they are not what made the church great.
The thing that made them truly remarkable was the mission.

The mission of the church can be summed up in two key parts:

1. Reaching people for Christ.

2. Leading them to be fully devoted to him.
Let us remember that our churches do not exist for us. Our churches exist for the lost. Our churches are not here to make us (the believers) happy, meet our needs, satisfy our desires, or affirm our opinions. Our churches are here to reach people who are desperately far from God.
As church members, we must all ask ourselves some tough questions. What do I not like about my church? What if the very thing I don’t like is the thing that will reach people for Jesus? What do I love most about my church? What if the very thing I like most is the thing that is a barrier to reaching people for Christ? Am I willing to support changes that I don’t like? Am I willing to lay down my preferences and opinions for the sake of people who are lost?
I’m not saying that our own desires automatically contradict our mission. I’m saying that we must be diligent to never allow our desires to supersede the mission. What should we want more than seeing people come to faith in Christ? Nothing. Absolutely nothing.

There are many ways of categorizing people’s faith these days. In a new report from the Barna Group that is part of the State of the Church – 2011 annual tracking study, George Barna examines changes in 14 religious attributes in relation to some of those religious categories as they have unfolded since 1991. The four segments studied in the latest of the six newly-issued summaries are Catholics, Protestants, born again Christians, and self-identified Christians. Barna also offered commentary on the results in a new blog posting (www.georgebarna.org)

Self-Identified Christians
Most Americans – roughly four out of five – consider themselves to be Christians. For that majority, the past two decades have been a time of substantial religious change. Just as American society itself is in a state of substantial upheaval, so are those who declare themselves to be Christian redefining the core practices and beliefs of Christianity in America. Five of the six religious behaviors tracked underwent statistically significant changes since 1991, and five of the seven belief measures also changed notably.

The five transitions in religious behaviors included the following:

§ Attendance at a church service in any given week has declined among self-identified Christians by nine percentage points since 1991. Now only a minority of this group – 47% – can be found in church events during a typical week.

§ Adults from this segment are currently eight percentage points less likely to attend Sunday school in a typical week than was true twenty years ago. Less than one out of five (18%) now attend during a typical week.

§ Whereas 30% of the self-identified Christians volunteered at a church during a typical week back in 1991, that figure has declined to 22% today.

§ Bible reading dropped slightly over the last 20 years within this segment, going from 51% to 46%. This is another marker in which a majority of this group no longer participates.

§ Those who embrace the label “Christian” for themselves are now ten percentage points more likely to be unchurched than was true in 1991. The 31% who fit this profile have not attended any church service during the past six months, excluding special services such as weddings or funerals.

Among the belief measures tested, the following showed significant changes since 1991:

§ Three of the variables tracked reflected marginal change – five percentage points. There was a five-point increase in the self-identified Christians who claimed to have made a personal commitment to Jesus Christ (up to 75% in 2011); a five-point drop in the proportion who contend that that “God is the all-knowing, all-powerful and perfect Creator of the universe who still rules the world today” (now down to 77%); and a similar decline among those who believe that Satan is a symbol of evil but not a living entity (now standing at 53%).

§ The largest change in beliefs was the ten-point decline in those who firmly believe that the Bible is accurate in all of the principles it teaches. Only 43% of self-identified Christians now have such a strong belief in the Bible.

§ The percentage of self-identified Christians who meet the “born again” criteria – that is, those who contend they have made a personal commitment to Jesus Christ that is still important in their life today, and who also believe they will enter Heaven solely because they have confessed their sins and have accepted Jesus Christ as their savior – jumped by seven percentage points, to 48%.

This group’s views about personal responsibility to evangelize and the importance of religious faith in their life did not budge over the past twenty years.

Born Again Christians
This category is comprised of people whose beliefs characterize them as born again; it is not based on people calling themselves “born again.” This segment, which now stands at 40% of all adults in the U.S., experienced significant changes in relation to all six religious behaviors tracked by the Barna Group.

§ The largest shifts in behavior pertained to the 14-point decline in adult Sunday school attendance (now 26%) and the 12-point drop in volunteering at church (down to 29%).

§ Attendance at church services in any given week decreased by seven percentage points over the last two decades among born again Christians, falling from 66% to 59%.

§ The proportion of born again adults who read the Bible during a typical week, not including when they are at a church event, has decreased by nine percentage points since 1991. The weekly average now resides at 62%.

§ Two behavioral statistics increased since 1991, one for the worse and the other of little consequence. The unfortunate shift is the increase in the unchurched among born again adults, which has risen by five percentage points to 19%. The neutral transition is the eight-point increase in born again adults who attend a large church (600 or more people).

Only one of the seven religious beliefs measured among born agains shifted significantly in the last two decades. That was the nine-point drop in the percentage of those who firmly believe that the Bible is totally accurate in all of the principles it teaches. In 1991, three-quarters of born again adults held that view, but it has declined to two-thirds of them today (65%).

Roman Catholics in the U.S.
Roman Catholics continue to represent the largest religious denomination in the United States, at about one-fifth of the adult population. The Catholic population has experienced three statistically meaningful changes in religious behaviors and three in religious beliefs since 1991.

§ Catholics are now 10 percentage points less likely to attend church services than they were in 1991 (down to 49%) and 10 points less likely to volunteer at their church (down to only 9%). They are also more likely to be unchurched now than they used to be, increasing in this behavior from 20% to 29%.

§ The beliefs that have shifted in the minds of Catholics include an eight-point decline in those who firmly believe the Bible is totally accurate in all of the principles it teaches. That position has diminished among Catholics from one-third (34%) to one-quarter (26%). The other shifts were growth in the number who say they have made a personal commitment to Jesus Christ that is important in their life today (up seven points to 60%) and an eight-point increase in the proportion of Catholics who meet the born again criteria (now up to 24%).

Changes among Protestants
Protestants are also redefining the nature of their faith, as seen in the fact that all six religious behaviors changed significantly, and five of the eight religious beliefs tracked followed suit.

§ The four major church-related behaviors have all suffered in the past two decades. Church attendance in a typical week has dropped by five percentage points (down to 52%); adult Sunday school attendance has declined 11 points, to 25%; volunteerism is off by 11 points (now standing at 26%); and being unchurched has risen from 17% to 24%.

§ The likelihood of attending a large church (600 or more people) grew by seven percentage points. Fourteen percent of Protestant adults now align with such a church. That’s double the proportion discovered in 1991, but unchanged from a decade ago.

§ Personal Bible reading undertaken apart from church events has dipped by seven percentage points since 1991, now down to 57%. The good news is that this represents a rebound from the 48% registered in 2001.

Perhaps surprisingly, four of the five changes in the religious beliefs of Protestants represent change for the better.

§ The number of Protestants who have made a personal commitment to Jesus Christ that they consider to still be important in their life today has risen by eight percentage points, to 86%.

§ Protestants are eight points less likely to agree that Satan is merely a symbol of evil, not a living entity, than they were in 1991. About half of them (47%) accept that characterization of Satan.

§ Adopting a personal responsibility for evangelism has increased slightly among Protestants, from 33% to 38% over the past 20 years.

§ The proportion of Protestant adults that meets the “born again” criteria has risen from 53% to 65%.

§ The notion that the Bible is completely accurate in all of the principles it teaches is less popular among Protestants today. In 1991, 61% strongly believed that notion; today, 56% hold that belief.

One nation under God? Perhaps, but new statistics released by the Barna Group, as part of its State of the Church – 2011 report, suggest that there is great variety of religious belief and behavior found across the country. The latest in a series of six reports that track changes in America’s religious nature since 1991 reveals that some of the old religious stereotypes no longer hold water. Deeper insight into those variations is accessible through a commentary by lead researcher George Barna at his blog site, georgebarna.com.

Changes in the Northeast
Oddly, there has been limited change in Northeast in the past 20 years. The only three significant transitions have been the following:

§ Church volunteerism in the Northeast has dropped by 11 percentage points, from 23% in 1991 to 12% in 2011.

§ The proportion of unchurched adults in the Northeast climbed from 26% in 1991 to 41% in 2011.

§ Ironically, the likelihood of someone from the Northeast claiming to be a Christian rose by ten points during the 1991-2011 era, from 72% to 82%.

Changes in the South
Similar to the Northeast, there was not a lot of religious change in the South over the last 20 years. There were statistically significant changes identified in regard to just four of the 14 items tracked.

§ Adult Sunday school attendance dropped in the South by 10 percentage points, to 21%.

§ Attending a church of 600 people or more became somewhat more common in the southern states between 1991 and 2011, rising from 10% to 17%.

§ Qualifying as an unchurched person – i.e., someone who has not attended a church service during the past six months, other than a special service such as a wedding or funeral – increased from 20% to 31%.

§ The only belief that sustained significant change was the 10 percentage point decline in adults who strongly agreed that the Bible is totally accurate in all of the principles it teaches. That dropped the figure to half of southerners (50%) who hold this point of view.

Changes in the Midwest
The region with the greatest degree of religious change since 1991 was definitely the Midwest. Of the 14 religious variables tracked, 10 experienced significant change. Among the six religious behaviors, five saw a serious shift take place.

§ The biggest behavioral change has been the large reduction in church attendance in the Midwest. Pegged at 55% in 1991, average weekly attendance at a church service now stands at 40% in the central states.

§ Given the drop in weekly attendance, it is not surprising to find growth in the number of unchurched adults in the Midwest. However, the magnitude is substantial: a 50% jump, from 24% in 1991 to 36% in 2011.

§ Adult Sunday school attendance has declined in the Midwest since 1991 by seven percentage points, from 20% to just 13%.

§ Church volunteerism declined by nine percentage points in the Midwest over the past two decades, dipping from 30% to 21%.

§ Bible reading undertaken other than when attending a church event declined by seven percentage points since 1991. The current average in a given week is for 42% of Midwestern adults to read the scriptures.

Of the eight religious beliefs studied, five experienced significant changes.

§ Midwestern adults are less likely to describe themselves as Christian these days than was the case in 1991. The proportion slumped from 88% to 81%.

§ The percentage of Midwestern adults who contend that Satan is not a living entity but is just a symbol of evil declined by seven points, from 64% to 57%.

§ Those who strongly believe that the Bible is accurate in all of the principles it teaches dropped from 45% to 38%.

§ People’s views of God changed substantially since 1991, with a 13 percentage point drop in the number of Midwestern adults who believe that “God is the all-knowing, all-powerful and perfect Creator of the universe who still rules the world today.” That view was held by two-thirds of adults in the central states (65%) in 2011.

§ Despite the other indicators of deterioration in people’s connection with Christianity, the only region that experienced a significant increase in the proportion of born again adults since 1991 was the Midwest. There was a 10-point increase, rising to 42% in 2011.

Changes in the West
Of the 14 religious measures followed by the Barna Group for this report, half of those showed statistically significant changes in the West since 1991. Among the six behavioral measures tracked, three saw meaningful shifts.

§ Church attendance among western adults dropped by 11 points, from 47% to 36% in 2011.

§ The proportion of unchurched adults rose from 29% to 46% in the West during the last 20 years.

§ Bible reading during an average week declined by nine points in the West, sliding to 34% in 2011.

The research concerning the state of the eight belief measures among people living in the West reflected significant change had taken place among half of those variables.

§ Adults in the West are now eight percentage points less likely to say their religious faith is very important in their life than was the case in 1991, when 57% made such a claim.

§ Since 1991, belief in an orthodox view of God has plummeted by 13 percentage points in the West, down to 58%.

§ The Bible is viewed less kindly in the West these days, as the research points to a 13 percentage point drop in those who firmly believe that the Bible is totally accurate in all the principles it teaches. Whereas four out of ten adults (39%) in the western states held that view in 1991, just one out of every four (26%) does today.

§ Fewer adults in the West now agree that Satan is just a symbol, not a living entity. There has been an eight percentage point drop in such a perspective, moving from 63% in 1991 to 55% today.

Studying the changes that have occurred in the religious beliefs and behavior of adults based on race and ethnicity shows that there has been lots of movement since 1991 – but perhaps not in the ways expected. These findings are part of the State of the Church – 2011 report from the Barna Group, accompanied by a series of commentaries by George Barna at http://www.georgebarna.com.

Changes in the Faith of White Adults
Among the six religious behaviors tracked by Barna since 1991, white adults experienced statistically significant shifts in five of those behaviors.

§ Weekly church attendance declined by nine percentage points, dropping from 48% in 1991 to 39% in 2011.

§ Adult Sunday school attendance also dipped by nine percentage points, from 23% to 14%.

§ Bible reading dropped by five percentage points, sliding from 42% to 37%.

§ Volunteering at a church during a typical week fell by eight percentage points since 1991, from 26% down to 18%.

§ The proportion of white adults who qualify as “unchurched” – defined as having not attended any church services during the previous six months, other than those for special occasions such as a wedding or funeral – rose from 25% in 1991 to 40% today.

§ The only religious behavior among the six tracked since 1991 that did not change significantly was attending a church of 600 or more people. Among whites, that proportion remained constant (17% in 1991, 18% in 2011).

Of the eight religious beliefs that have been followed by the Barna Group since 1991, white adults showed significant shifts in three of those.

§ White adults are six percentage points less likely to have an orthodox view of God today than was the case in 1991. (Such a perspective was described in surveys as believing that God is “the all-knowing, all-powerful and perfect Creator of the universe who still rules the world today.”) In 1991, 72% of whites held that view; today it is 66%.

§ The Bible is on shakier ground among white adults these days, as witnessed by the seven percentage point drop in those who firmly agree that the Bible is totally accurate in all of the principles it teaches. That has declined from 43% in 1991 to 36% today.

§ Despite the other challenges represented by changes in the religious faith of whites, the proportion of them who can be categorized as “born again” – defined as having made a personal commitment to Jesus Christ that is still important in their life today, and believing that they will enter Heaven solely because they have confessed their sins and have accepted Jesus Christ as their savior – has increased. In 1991, 35% of white adults fit that profile, compared to 41% in 2011.

§ White adults showed no significant shifts in beliefs related to the importance of their faith, their willingness to self-identify as a Christian, having made a personal commitment to Christ, believing that Satan is merely symbolic, or adopting a sense of responsibility for sharing their faith with those who believe differently.

Changes in the Faith of Hispanics
The ethnic group that reflected the most profound level of religious change over the last 20 years was Hispanics. Not only did Hispanics see the greatest number of the 14 religious variables shift, but the magnitude of the changes they have experienced dwarfed the changes relevant to white and black adults.

Of the six religious behavior factors tracked, Hispanics have experienced statistically significant change related to five of those domains.

§ Church attendance dropped by 21 percentage points, from 54% to 33%.

§ Adult Sunday school attendance among Hispanics declined from 28% to just 9%.

§ Bible reading plummeted from 55% to 30%.

§ Attending a church of 600 or more people is much more likely these days among Hispanics. While that was the case among less than 1% of Hispanics in 1991, 24% attend a large church today.

§ The percentage of unchurched Hispanic adults has doubled in the last two decades, jumping from 20% in 1991 to 40% today.

§ The only behavior that did not transition substantially in the past 20 years was church volunteerism. While even that statistic sank from 22% back in 1991 to 13% in 2011, the gap is not sufficiently large to exceed the maximum possible sampling error.

There were many changes in the religious beliefs of Hispanics, too. Of the eight core beliefs measured, Hispanic adults showed major changes in relation to half of them.

§ In 1991, two-thirds of Hispanic adults (66%) said their religious faith was very important to them. Today, only half hold that view (51%).

§ Orthodox views of God are far less common among Hispanics today. In 1991, almost nine out of ten (88%) held such an outlook. Now, barely six out of ten do so (62%).

§ The veracity of the Bible has taken a beating in Hispanic circles over the last two decades. In 1991, 62% of Hispanic adults strongly agreed that the Bible is accurate in all of the principles it teaches. That has dropped to just 32% now.

§ Evangelism is viewed much more dimly these days by Hispanics. While about half of them (48%) felt they had a personal responsibility to share their religious beliefs with those who believe differently back in 1991, less than two out of ten (18%) possess that same view today.

Changes in the Faith of Blacks
The most stable group of the three racial/ethnic segments has been the blacks. During the past 20 years, they have undergone significant change in just two of the 14 religious variables tracked.

§ In 1991, 38% of black adults volunteered at a church during the course of a typical week. That figure had fallen to 30% by 2011.

§ Twenty years ago nearly nine out of ten black adults (88%) held an orthodox perspective on the nature of God. Today the figure is eleven percentage points lower (77%).

Comparative Standing
The Barna report indicates that the segment that possesses beliefs most likely to align with those taught in the Bible are blacks. On five of the eight belief factors, blacks were more likely than either whites or Hispanics to reflect a scriptural view. Specifically, blacks were more likely than other segments to say:

§ Their religious beliefs are very important in their life today

§ They have made a personal commitment to Jesus Christ that is still important in their life today

§ They believe that God is “the all-knowing, all-powerful and perfect Creator of the universe who still rules the world today”

§ They strongly agree that the Bible is totally accurate in all of the principles it teaches

§ They have a personal responsibility to share their religious beliefs with other people who might believe differently than they do.

When the data pertaining to religious behaviors is examined, blacks stood out from the crowd on five of the six behaviors. In particular, the study shows that blacks were the most likely to:

§ Engage in church-centric activities, such as attending church services, attending a Sunday school class, and volunteering at their church during typical week

§ Read the Bible, other than at church events, during a typical week

§ Blacks were the least likely segment to be unchurched. In fact, they were only half as likely as either whites or Hispanics to be unchurched.

It’s hardly news that men and women think and behave differently. But a new analysis of national tracking surveys conducted over a 20-year period by the Barna Group profiles specific differences between the genders in relation to 14 religious beliefs and behaviors of significance. The report is the third in a series of six that constitute the annual State of the Church report released by the Barna Group. This year’s report became public simultaneous to the release of the latest trends book by author and researcher George Barna, entitled Futurecast.

Women and Faith
No population group among the sixty segments examined has gone through more spiritual changes in the past two decades than women. Of the 14 religious factors studied, women have experienced statistically significant changes related to 10 of them. Of those transitions, eight represent negative movement – that is, either less engagement in common religious behaviors or a shift in belief away from biblical teachings.

Five of the six religious behaviors tracked showed significant change.

§ Church attendance among women sank by 11 percentage points since 1991, declining to 44%. A majority of women no longer attend church services during a typical week.

§ Bible reading has plummeted by 10 percentage points, declining from half of all women reading the Bible during a typical week (excluding that done during church events) to just four out of ten doing so today (40%).

§ Sunday school involvement is less common among women these days, down seven points from the 24% mark noted in 1991.

§ Women have traditionally been the backbone of volunteer activity in churches. However, there has been a nine point slide in the percentage of women helping out at a church during any given week. That drop reflects a 31% reduction in the non-paid female work force at churches.

§ The only religious behavior that increased among women in the last 20 years was becoming unchurched. That rose a startling 17 percentage points – among the largest drops in church attachment identified in the research.

The only religious behavior tracked among women that stayed stable was the percentage who attended a church of 600 or more people, which has remained at 16%.

Although the core beliefs of women have undergone comparatively less turbulence, five of the eight beliefs tracked registered significant change.

§ Women are six percentage points less likely to say their religious faith is very important to them than they were in 1991. Even so, nearly two-thirds of them (63%) hold their faith in high regard.

§ When it comes to views on the devil, women are five percentage points less likely to write off Satan as merely a symbol of evil. Sixty-one-percent did so in 1991, but that has been reduced to 56% now.

§ Perceptions of the reliability of the Bible have taken a hit, as the percentage of women who firmly believe the Bible is accurate in all of the principles it teaches has declined by seven percentage points to 42%.

§ An even larger drop has occurred in the proportion of women who possess an orthodox view of God. Those who contend that God is the “the all-knowing, all-powerful and perfect Creator of the universe who still rules the world today” has slumped from 80% in 1991 to 70% today.

§ The percentage of women whose beliefs qualify them to be classified as born again Christians has risen significantly in the past 20 years. In 1991, 38% of woman said they had made a personal commitment to Jesus Christ that remained important in their life, and also said they believed they would go to Heaven after they died solely because they confessed their sins and accepted Jesus Christ as their savior. Since then, the figure has increased slightly to 44%.

Men and Faith
While men have not undergone changes on as many religious indicators as women have since 1991, men experienced statistically significant shifts in relation to six of the 14 religious factors studied. Four of those transitions were behavioral while the other two were shifts in belief.

The four behavioral changes were all negative from a church’s perspective.

§ Church attendance declined by six percentage points among men, The research showed that the proportion of men who had attended a church service, other than a special event such as a wedding or funeral, during the week prior to their survey interview fell from 42% to 36%.

§ Sunday school attendance declined by eight percentage points among men since 1991. Only one out of eight men (13%) presently attends such a meeting in a typical week.

§ The percentage of men who volunteer at a church during a typical week has slipped by six percentage points since 1991 to its present level of 18%.

§ The proportion of unchurched men has grown by nine percentage points since 1991. Today an estimated 39% of all men can be deemed unchurched – that is, having not attended a church event, other than a special service such as a wedding or funeral, in the past six months.

The two religious beliefs that witnessed significant change were having a personal responsibility to share their religious views with others who believe differently (down five points, to just 23%); and firmly believing that the Bible is totally accurate in all of the principles it teaches, down by ten points to only one-third of men (33%).

Among the surprises emerging from the research was the fact that despite decreases in core religious behaviors men are no less likely to read from the Bible these days than they were 20 years ago (41% in 2001, 40% in 1991). In fact, men and women are now equally likely to read the Bible during a typical week, thanks to the recent decline Bible reading among females.

July 27, 2011

The three oldest generational segments of America’s population have been actively redefining their faith over the past two decades. A new analysis of Barna Group data from nationwide tracking surveys covering the last two decades reveals that in regard to 14 religious variables examined, each of the generational segments has experienced significant change concerning about half of those variables. On the heels of the release of his latest trends book, Futurecast, author and researcher George Barna added this generational analysis as part of the State of the Church series of reports from the Barna Group.

Young Adults: Baby Busters
An examination of the behavior and beliefs of adults born after the Boomer generation – i.e., those born from 1965 through 1983 – showed that there has been a lot of realignment taking place within this segment. Three of the six religious behaviors and five of the eight religious beliefs have undergone statistically significant change since 1991.

Among the behaviors that have shifted were:

§ Bible reading undertaken during the week preceding the survey interview, excluding reading that occurred during church events, jumped nine percentage points, reaching 41% in 2011.

§ Volunteering at a church during a typical week also grew by nine percentage points. The proportion climbed to 19% in 2011.

§ The proportion of unchurched Busters – i.e., those who had not attended any church services during the past six months, not including special events such as weddings or funerals – hit 39% in 2011. That represented an eight percentage point increase since 1991.

Five belief-oriented measures also witnessed significant change among the Busters during the past twenty years.

§ The percentage of Busters who describe themselves as Christians increased by nine points. Currently, 80% embrace that label.

§ Making a personal commitment to Jesus Christ became much more fashionable among Busters during the last twenty years. Sixty percent of Busters have done so, a rise of 12 percentage points since 1991.

§ Busters have become less indifferent toward the existence of Satan. Since 1991 there has been a ten percentage point drop in those who believe that Satan is simply a symbol of evil but not a living entity. However, a majority of Busters (55%) still concur that Satan is not a living being.

§ Busters are less prone to believe that the Bible is totally accurate in all of the principles it teaches than they were twenty years ago. The proportion of those who strongly affirm the complete accuracy of the Bible’s principles has declined by 11 percentage points during that time, dropping to 35%.

§ Being born again is more common today than ever among Busters. In 1991, only 23% met the criteria – saying they have made a personal commitment to Jesus Christ that is still important in their life, as well as believing that they will experience eternal salvation only because they have confessed their sins and accepted Jesus Christ as their savior. In 2011, 37% of Busters could be classified as born again.

The World Changers: Baby Boomers
No generation has been as widely chronicled as the Boomers, the post-war group born from 1946 through 1964. At every stage of their existence, this generation has redefined America’s ways of life – including its faith and spirituality. Four of their six religious behaviors and two of their eight religious beliefs tracked in this study have undergone statistically significant change since 1991.

The four religious behaviors that shifted included the following.

§ Church attendance plummeted by 12 percentage points, dipping to 38% in 2011.

§ Sunday school attendance by Boomers fell by nine points, from 23% in 1991 to just 14% in 2011.

§ Volunteering at churches was less likely among Boomers in 2011 than was the case twenty years ago, declining from 28% in 1991 to 18% in 2011.

§ While the Boomers have never been the generation most likely to attend church, during the past 20 years the percentage of unchurched Boomers has risen dramatically, jumping up 18 points! At 41%, they are now the generation most likely to be unchurched, surpassing the 39% level among Busters.

The pair of religious beliefs that have yielded substantial change in the last two decades are declines in those who hold an orthodox view of God (down six points, to 67%); and a reduction in those who are strongly convinced that the Bible is totally accurate in all of the principles it teaches (down seven points, to just 38%).

The pre-Boomer Segments – aka the Elders
This generational equivalent is a combination of the Builders (1927-1945) and Seniors (born prior to 1927), representing adults who are presently 66 or older. While many might assume that there would be little change in the spiritual lives of these folks, other than that brought on by physical infirmities, the survey data paint a different picture. Four of the six behaviors tracked experienced significant changes, and three of the eight beliefs followed also showed noteworthy shifts.

The four behavioral shifts involved these dimensions:

§ Sunday school attendance dropped by eight points, from 28% in 1991 to 20% today.

§ Bible reading undertaken during the past week, apart from such reading during church events, declined by eight points as well, moving from 54% to 46%.

§ Unexpectedly, older Americans have gradually become more open to attending large churches. During the last 20 years there has been a 12-point increase in Elders who now attend a church of 600 or more people. Neither of the other generations reflected any proportional change in this dimension, suggesting that the growth in attendance at large churches is predominantly attributable to either transfer growth among post-Elders or to Elders leaving small churches in favor of larger communities of faith.

§ The proportion of unchurched climbed eight points since 1991 among this group. Today three out of ten adults 66 or older (29%) are unchurched.

These are the trio of beliefs that experienced significant change since 1991.

§ The number of Elders who have made a personal commitment to Jesus that is still important in their life these days rose by ten percentage points. That level now stands at three out of every four elderly Americans (76%).

§ Concurrently, the percentage of Elders who meet the born again criteria (described above) increased by 11 points. Elders are far more likely than their younger colleagues to be classified, based on their beliefs rather than self-identification, as born again (49%).

§ The proportion of Elders who believe that “God is the all-knowing, all-powerful creator of the universe who continues to rule that world today” has dropped by nine percentage points. Presently 71% have adopted that view, down from 80% in 1991.

In light of these results, George Barna has provided interpretive comments regarding these trends on his blog site, georgebarna.com. During the coming week (August 1 – 4) Barna will release four additional summaries regarding how the 14 religious factors tracked since 1991 have shifted according to people’s region, gender, ethnicity, and religious affiliation. He will also continue to provide commentary after each release on his blog site.

July 25, 2011

George Barna, author of the new trends book Futurecast, has just released the first in a series of assessments of how America’s faith has shifted in the past 20 years on 14 religious variables. In the series of briefs, Barna explores not only the aggregate national patterns, but also digs into how matters have changed according to gender, ethnicity, region, generation, and religious segments.

Religious Behavior
An examination of six religious behaviors tracked over the past 20 years among American adults shows that five of the six experienced statistically significant changes during that time frame.

§ Bible reading undertaken during the course of a typical week, other than passages read while attending church events, has declined by five percentage points. Currently an estimated 40% of adults read the Bible during a typical week.

§ Church volunteerism has dropped by eight percentage points since 1991. Presently, slightly less than one out of every five adults (19%) donates some of their time in a typical week to serving at a church.

§ Adult Sunday school attendance has also diminished by eight percentage points over the past two decades. On any given Sunday, about 15% of adults can be expected to show up in a Sunday school class.

§ The most carefully watched church-related statistic is adult attendance. Since 1991, attendance has receded by nine percentage points, dropping from 49% in 1991 to 40% in 2011.

§ The most prolific change in religious behavior among those measured has been the increase in the percentage of adults categorized as unchurched. The Barna Group definition includes all adults who have not attended any religious events at a church, other than special ceremonies such as a wedding or funeral, during the prior six month period. In 1991, just one-quarter of adults (24%) were unchurched. That figure has ballooned by more than 50%, to 37% today.

The only behavior that did not experience any real change was the percentage of adults who attend a church of 600 or more people.

Religious Beliefs
The Barna summary included eight beliefs that have been tracked since 1991. Among those just three experienced statistically significant change.

§ The percentage of adults who can be classified as born again Christians, based on their belief that they will experience eternal salvation based on their commitment to Jesus Christ, personal confession of sins, and acceptance of Christ as their savior, has risen by five percentage points. In 1991, the national estimate was 35% of adults met those criteria. Currently, 40% of adults can be classified as born again.

§ When asked to choose one of several descriptions of God, the proportion who believe that God is “the all-knowing, all-powerful and perfect Creator of the universe who still rules the world today” currently stands at two-thirds of the public (67%). That represents a seven point drop from the 1991 level.

§ The biggest shift has been in people’s perceptions of the Bible. In 1991, 46% of adults strongly affirmed that “the Bible is totally accurate in all of the principles it teaches.” That has slumped to just 38% who offer the same affirmation today.

Among the religious beliefs that have remained relatively constant over the past 20 years were the percentage of adults who describe themselves as Christian (84%); those who say their religious faith is very important in their life today (56%); those who have made a “personal commitment to Jesus Christ that is still important in my life today” (65%); the proportion who agree that Satan is not a living entity but merely a symbol of evil (56%); those who strongly believe that they have a personal responsibility to share their religious beliefs with others who believe differently (25%).

George Barna commented on the significance of these trends on his blog site, www.georgebarna.com, and indicated that over the next eight days he will release five additional summaries of how the fourteen factors tracked since 1991 have shifted among regions, generations, genders, ethnicities, and religious segments. He will also continue to provide commentary after each release on his blog site.

The out-and-out Christian is a joyful Christian. The half-and-half Christian is the kind of Christian that a great many of you are little acquainted with the Lord. Why should we live halfway up the hill and swathed in the mists, when we might have an unclouded sky and a radiant sun over our heads if we would climb higher and walk in the light of His face. McClaren

And My Father is the Husbandman—John 15:1

A vine must have a husbandman to plant and watch over it, to receive and rejoice in its fruit. Jesus says: “My Father is the husbandman.” He was “the vine of God’s planting.” All He was and did, He owed to the Father; in all He only sought the Father’s will and glory. He had become man to show us what a creature ought to be to its Creator. He took our place, and the spirit of His life before the Father was ever what He seeks to make ours: “Of him, and through him, and to him are all things.” He became the true Vine, that we might be true branches. Both in regard to Christ and ourselves the words teach us the two lessons of absolute dependence and perfect confidence.

My Father is the Husbandman.—Christ ever lived in the spirit of what He once said: “The Son can do nothing of himself.” As dependent as a vine is on a husbandman for the place where it is to grow, for its fencing in and watering and pruning. Christ felt Himself entirely dependent on the Father every day for the wisdom and the strength to do the Father’s will. As He said in the previous chapter (Jn. 14:10): “The words that I say unto you, I speak not from Myself; but the Father abiding in Me doeth his works.” This absolute dependence had as its blessed counterpart the most blessed confidence that He had nothing to fear: the Father could not disappoint Him. With such a Husbandman as His Father, He could enter death and the grave. He could trust God to raise Him up. All that Christ is and has, He has, not in Himself, but from the Father.

My Father is the Husbandman.—That is as blessedly true for us as for Christ. Christ is about to teach His disciples about their being branches. Before He ever uses the word, or speaks at all of abiding in Him or bearing fruit, He turns their eyes heavenward to the Father watching over them, and working all in them. At the very root of all Christian life lies the thought that God is to do all, that our work is to give and leave ourselves in His hands, in the confession of utter helplessness and dependence, in the assured confidence that He gives all we need. The great lack of the Christian life is that, even where we trust Christ, we leave God out of the count. Christ came to bring us to God. Christ lived the life of a man exactly as we have to live it. Christ the Vine points to God the Husbandman.

As He trusted God, let us trust God, that everything we ought to be and have, as those who belong to the Vine, will be given us from above. Isaiah said: “A vineyard of red wine; I the Lord do keep it, I will water it every moment; lest any hurt it, I will keep it night and day.” Ere we begin to think of fruit or branches, let us have our heart filled with the faith: as glorious as the Vine, is the Husbandman. As high and holy as is our calling, so mighty and loving is the God who will work it all. As surely as the Husbandman made the Vine what it was to be, will He make each branch what it is to be. Our Father is our Husbandman, the Promise of our growth and fruit.