Last week my father-in-law sent me an article with the title, “Studies Show Approximately 30% of U.S. Adults Have Given Up on Religion, and Those Numbers Are Increasing.”. Often dad will send me the usual assortment of jokes, gag videos and an occasional political rant, but I’ve found when he sends an article on faith, it’s usually a good read.

The article provides links to solid statistical data on Christianity in America. It’s general knowledge that Christianity as a cultural institution and civic religion has been in steep decline in the west for several generations.  If you ask the average person on the street today if they’re a Christian, they likely will say “no”, whereas in 1950, they’d likely say “yes.”

On some levels, I think that’s actually good.  Cultural or nominal religion has been a noose around the neck of true biblical Christianity ever since Constantine issued the Edict of Milan in 313 AD and Christianity became the official religion of the Roman Empire.  All of a sudden, “everyone” became a Christian and instead of a life-giving relationship with Jesus, Christianity became a way to get ahead, a system of rules and requirements or a means to acquire power.  Unscrupulous politicians and clergy alike committed unthinkable atrocities in the name of Christianity to maintain power (think, the Crusades and Inquisition).  Somehow, Jesus’ followers forgot His words to Pilate on the eve of his crucifixion:

Jesus answered, “My Kingdom is not an earthly kingdom. If it were, my followers would fight to keep me from being handed over to the Jewish leaders. But my Kingdom is not of this world.” (John 18:36 NLT)

Ironically, it seems like we’ve been fighting ever since.

The article my father-in-law sent essentially confirms that modern day western Christians have made the same mistake today.  We’ve misunderstood the fundamental nature of Jesus’ kingdom by aligning with worldly power. And instead of modeling and proclaiming the gospel, we’ve diluted the good news that Jesus came to give us life and restore us to God with calls for Christian behavior from people who don’t even acknowledge Jesus as Lord.  No wonder Christianity is dying.  What we’re offering this world isn’t what Jesus came to give.

But is Christianity really on the decline?

Recently one of our BGF Missionaries, Wendell Stoltzfus came and shared a ministry update with our church.  He serves with Equipping Leaders International and seeks to equip under resourced pastors and Christian ministries around the world.  He explained to us that while Christianity may be on the decline in the Global North (blue area of the map), it’s exponentially growing in the Global South (red area of the map). In fact, in the last 50 years, the percentage of Christians has flipflopped, so that now the majority of Christians live outside the “West” (bar graph).

And then he dropped a bombshell, at least to me… an average of 79,000 people convert to Christianity world-wide each day.

WHAT?

That statistic came from the Center for the Study of Global Christianity at Gordon-Conwell Theological Seminary. I have no idea how those statistics are tabulated or how they take into account restricted access countries in the middle east, northern Africa, and China.  I’m sure there’s some algorithm that takes some reliable base data and extrapolates it.  I’m not quibbling with the numbers or methodology. I’m just saying, any way you slice it, it’s a remarkable number.

So, maybe Christianity isn’t dying.  Maybe it’s just moving to more fertile ground. Christianity is thriving among Christians who actually share the gospel to people who know they need it; non-western people without the self-sufficiency caused by prosperity and comfort.

I hope we can learn our lesson.  Christianity isn’t a moral code to impose by force on others, nor is it a standard by which we measure people as friend or foe. It’s an invitation to repent of our sin and find forgiveness, grace and life through the finished work of Jesus on the cross and to join a family and a kingdom, not rooted in the values and vanities of this world. Maybe if we as the church would return to our first love (Revelation 2:4), we’d find that we have something to offer lost and hurting people.

What do you think?