Many, a few years in the past I labored a brief stint proper out of graduate college at a denominational entity generally known as the Baptist Sunday College Board. It has since turn into generally known as Lifeway.
The division I used to be assigned to had developed a promotional program titled “Let’s All Go to Church.” It was hoped to stimulate attendance. It was hokey, because the title of this system would recommend, and constructed on the false premise that a complete tradition simply wanted to be reminded that going to church is what they actually ought to do. But even then, the quantity was rising of unchurched who had no curiosity or need to have something to do with church, and so it was doomed to failure and, in fact, did.
That previous expertise got here to thoughts in mild of a current research that discovered that now, even Christians don’t wish to go to church. In accordance with the State of the Bible, launched by the American Bible Society, almost half of American Christians (45%) haven’t attended church up to now six months. Nor, it could possibly be assumed, do they significantly wish to. Their reply to “Let’s All Go to Church” appears to be “Let’s Not.”
Once I planted Mecklenburg Group Church (Meck) in Charlotte, North Carolia, in 1992, I commissioned a survey by means of Barna Analysis Group to do a research of our space when it comes to the attitudes of the unchurched towards the church. I used to be bored with standard knowledge—if we have been going to really attain the unchurched, we would have liked to know why they have been unchurched. Right here have been the outcomes:
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There isn’t any worth in attending. The primary motive why individuals didn’t go to church was their notion that there was no worth in attending. There’s a “been there, completed that” mentality, ensuing within the feeling that they’ll join with God as simply, if not higher, on the golf course as they’ll by means of a weekend church service.
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Church buildings have too many issues. A second motive they gave for selecting to stay outdoors of the church was the conviction that church buildings have too many issues. The evaluation of the unchurched is that the standard church is rigid, hypocritical, judgmental, and simply plain imply. Why would anybody wish to turn into concerned with one thing that, of their thoughts, is so clearly dysfunctional? As one man quipped: “I’ve received sufficient issues in my life. Why would I’m going to church and get extra?”
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I don’t have the time. Few would argue that point has changed cash as the brand new forex in up to date American society. In consequence, many individuals declare to be unchurched as a result of they merely do not have the time to attend. We additionally know that folks find time for these issues that matter to them, so this response is a direct reflection of the profit they imagine they may obtain by attending.
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I’m merely not . A fourth motive that was given for being unchurched is a scarcity of curiosity. But then, as now, persons are concerned about non secular issues, they usually usually are asking non secular questions—but they’ve no curiosity within the church. That is just like having a rustic full of individuals concerned about discovering and experiencing a cheeseburger however driving proper previous McDonald’s every day with nothing however indifference.
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Church buildings ask for cash an excessive amount of. A fifth motive individuals gave for not desirous to go to church is that church buildings appear extra concerned about their wallets than in them as individuals.
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Church providers are normally boring. The sixth motive the unchurched gave for being unchurched was that church providers are normally boring, predictable and lifeless. There may be little throughout the service that captures and holds their consideration.
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Christian church buildings are irrelevant to the way in which I dwell. The seventh motive the unchurched gave for rejecting church was that Christian church buildings are irrelevant to the way in which they dwell—merely out of contact with life because it’s lived in the true world. The subjects, music and language make them really feel that God is buried someplace up to now or is faraway from the world wherein we dwell.
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I don’t imagine in God, or I’m not sure that God exists. The eighth and remaining reply was shocking: disbelief in God. Solely a very small share mentioned that they didn’t attend church as a result of they’d rejected God.
I decided then, now greater than 30 years in the past, that there wasn’t a single “motive” the unchurched gave for being unchurched that the church couldn’t – no, shouldn’t – take significantly. They weren’t rejecting God or asking anybody to airbrush “sin” or “Jesus” out of issues—they have been rejecting church. And extra particularly, how we have been doing church.
Since then, we’ve grown to greater than 20,000 on-line and in-person lively attenders, with greater than 70% of our whole development frequently coming from those that have been beforehand unchurched.
Sure, the dynamics of reaching the unchurched in 2025 are completely different from these in 1992,
… however why individuals don’t go to church hasn’t modified that a lot.
James Emery White
Sources
James Emery White, Rethinking the Church: A Problem to Artistic Redesign in an Age of Transition (Baker).
Diana Chandler, “Almost Half of U.S. Christians Don’t Attend Church, State of the Bible Finds,” Baptist Press, August 15, 2025, learn on-line.
