Church attendance is easy... and hard
God blew me away recently (in several ways, but I will only bore you with one today). After our church's recent excellent Easter worship, I ran across a news article with some disturbing and yet not surprising statistics. Apparently, 9 out of 10 American homes have a Bible in them. However, only 16 percent of American churchgoers read the Bible daily and 25 percent of churchgoers don't read the Bible at all.
The mental picture of the dusty Bible on the shelves of most American homes is not surprising in the least to me. It is, however, a grave concern of mine. It is most especially disconcerting when I notice that elsewhere on planet Earth, believers are using their Bible to stand up for their right to worship. Hundreds of believers were arrested in China on Easter Sunday (this link is working as of 04/29/2011)during a government crackdown on an unregistered church. The pastor's response is straight from God's Word. Read this for yourself, and be amazed. While we in the Bible belt attend church most frequently when we feel the pressure to do so from society or our spouse or our kid, we more often than not feel like staying home. Perhaps now that a tornado has demolished my community's park, some families will feel the freedom to worship for a Sunday or two at the altar of the Lord instead of at the baseball diamond.
Please don't misunderstand me. God does not hate baseball, and neither do I. And the tornado that struck here on April 27 was a tragedy, not a good thing. But I have seen with my own eyes in Burkina Faso, Africa, believers who walk for miles every week to worship with their brothers and sisters. When I see American apathy about church attendance (which is not the equivalent of worship), I see two perspectives that are way too drastically different. One perspective desires to worship because it is needed and commanded. The other desires to attend church because it is enjoyable and/or convenient and/or socially required.
Even in the midst of this discrepancy, there is hope for the American church. On Good Friday, 50,000 people gathered via simulcast to hear Bible teaching for six hours straight. We believers are hungry for the Word, so why don't we feed ourselves? Possibly because it is easier to let someone else feed us.
May we, brothers and sisters, pray to "hunger and thirst for righteousness" and find ourselves feasting on everything that comes from the mouth of God through His Word. Pick up that Bible, dust it off, and read it. Turn off the TV and read it. But be careful, it may change you!
The mental picture of the dusty Bible on the shelves of most American homes is not surprising in the least to me. It is, however, a grave concern of mine. It is most especially disconcerting when I notice that elsewhere on planet Earth, believers are using their Bible to stand up for their right to worship. Hundreds of believers were arrested in China on Easter Sunday (this link is working as of 04/29/2011)during a government crackdown on an unregistered church. The pastor's response is straight from God's Word. Read this for yourself, and be amazed. While we in the Bible belt attend church most frequently when we feel the pressure to do so from society or our spouse or our kid, we more often than not feel like staying home. Perhaps now that a tornado has demolished my community's park, some families will feel the freedom to worship for a Sunday or two at the altar of the Lord instead of at the baseball diamond.
Please don't misunderstand me. God does not hate baseball, and neither do I. And the tornado that struck here on April 27 was a tragedy, not a good thing. But I have seen with my own eyes in Burkina Faso, Africa, believers who walk for miles every week to worship with their brothers and sisters. When I see American apathy about church attendance (which is not the equivalent of worship), I see two perspectives that are way too drastically different. One perspective desires to worship because it is needed and commanded. The other desires to attend church because it is enjoyable and/or convenient and/or socially required.
Even in the midst of this discrepancy, there is hope for the American church. On Good Friday, 50,000 people gathered via simulcast to hear Bible teaching for six hours straight. We believers are hungry for the Word, so why don't we feed ourselves? Possibly because it is easier to let someone else feed us.
May we, brothers and sisters, pray to "hunger and thirst for righteousness" and find ourselves feasting on everything that comes from the mouth of God through His Word. Pick up that Bible, dust it off, and read it. Turn off the TV and read it. But be careful, it may change you!
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