Time To Harvest

Psalm 65: 9 - 13

Matthew 9: 35 – 38

October 20, 2024

It is easy to get discouraged these days as we think about the future of the church. Those that study these things tells us that only 20% of Americans report that they attend church weekly. What’s happened to us? Are all of our societal ills traceable to this decline in church participation? Thankfully, no!

Many of us have fallen prey to the unfortunate mythology that Americans have always been faithful church attendees. The reality is actually very different. Roger Finke and Rodney Starke, who wrote the seminal work on the development of church participation in our country – “The Churching of America” – describe actual church attendance in surprising ways.

Defining “regular church attendance” as twice a month, during the period of colonial America only 17% of the population met this standard. It did increase over time. In 1890, those attending worship twice a month represented 45% of the country. After WWII, when President Eisenhower begged Americans to go to church as a defense against the expansion of global communism, the number rose to 59%. We reached a highwater mark in the year 2000 of 70%, but we did so by changing the definition of regular attendance to only once a month. Today, by that standard, 41% of our neighbors are in church at least once a month.

As I said, it is easy to get discouraged by these numbers. In the last 50 years, mainline denominations have shed up to 58% of their membership. We used to think that those mainline believers – Presbyterian, Methodists, Episcopalians, Lutherans, and others were moving to more conservative traditions. After a massive study done by the Pew Research Institute, we no longer believe that to be the case. We are not losing members to spiritual conservatism; we are losing them to relaxation.

In my mind this is even worse. We aren’t losing folks to conservative, non-denominational churches. We are losing them to sleeping in, to leisure, to time with a Starbucks coffee and an iphone to scroll through social media accounts. We are losing folks to sports, to travel, to other entertainment options. At the heart of it, the church is losing members to a perceived religious irrelevancy. To the extent that we ARE institutionally religious, they may be right!

I spent time researching perceived answers to this decline, to this irrelevancy. To be honest, I found the proposals discouraging. In too many places, our spiritual dilution was solved by a political solution. As one of my mentors in seminary – Dr. Bill Pannell - once said, the institutional church is becoming more American than Christian.

A political solution to diminishing religious impact suggests that we must regain political power, this thinking goes. Demonize the enemy. Offer institutional, nationalized Christianity as the answer to what ails us. Link our opponents with Satan. Align ourselves as the only ones with God’s blessing. Generate a fearfulness that declares that somehow our ultimate survival – in this world and the next – depends on a certain mix of politics and religion. Our mix.

And yet, in the midst of all of this religious doom and gloom; in the midst of the demonstrable decline in religious participation, in the midst of a fearfulness that we trumpet and that is driving youth and adults to honestly wonder if the end of the world might actually be at hand, I stand here and say to you that we have the greatest opportunity for authentic faith impact in our world since the first century.

How can that possibly be?

People in our day are longing for meaning. In the midst of the chaos that is our individual lives how do I understand who I am and my place in the world?

People in our day are longing for purpose. Prosperity, comfort, influence and power come and go. Prestige, the ability to influence seems as near as the closest Tik Tok video and yet as lasting as the next greatest fad already appearing on our cultural horizon.

People in our day are looking for community. In a time when our world has never been smaller; when our ability to reach across the globe and touch someone is as close as our Kindle, we have never been more broken, more fractured, more alienated than we are now.

People are desperate for a relationship with someone, something, anything that is larger than themselves, larger than this tiny globe rocketing through an infinite space, larger than our thoughts and dreams locked in time. People are looking for something truly, honestly, faithfully transcendent.

People are so very, very tired of fear. People are desperate for hope.

In a world of chaos, strife, tension and warfare people are looking for peace.

Meaning. Purpose. Community. A relationship with the transcendent – with God. Hope and Peace. Transformation, love, and service.

The good news is that while only 20% of Americans are in church weekly, 39% of Millennials are in church weekly. Amongst Generation Z – those between the ages of 18 and 30 – 77.7% of non-churchgoing Gen Z individuals are reporting that they are looking for churches that help feed the poor; 74% are looking for churches that address mental health; 70% are looking for churches that provide opportunities to help others. Gen Z reports that they are looking for a connection to authentic faith and a real community. In a 2022 study, 74% of Americans across the generations say they want to grow spiritually.

I will say to you again. We – the faithful, humble, non-judgmental, authentic church has the greatest opportunity for faith impact in our world since the first century. The question remains, “How?”

Will we continue with the same old, same old and yet somehow expect a different result? Will we offer ritual and religiosity to people looking for authenticity and relevance? Will we remain as a judgmental tribe judging all others as deficient, less than, maybe even less human? Will we insist on a certain form, a certain posture, a certain voice as the only “correct” religious voice?

Or will we take a cue from the first century? Will we dare to actually believe Jesus when he tells us in Matthew chapter 16, verse 18 that, “I will build my church, and the gates of hell shall not prevail against it”

Look again at our second lesson from Matthew. What did Jesus do? He left home. He left what was known and comfortable. He left home base and went out to the cities and villages around him. Jesus went out into the world and proclaimed good news for ALL God’s people! The good news of salvation, justice, righteousness, purpose, and meaning. Jesus went out and told people that they were loved – deeply loved and cared for by the Creator of the Universe. Jesus told people in an occupied land where to find peace, people who were oppressed and beaten where to find healing, people who lived in darkness where to find hope.

Jesus looked out, at the people to whom he was sent, and was filled with compassion for the lost – for the sheep who were without a shepherd.

Friends, do we care, really care about those who are out there and lost, care for those who are struggling and seem to be flailing, those who are beaten and depressed seemingly with nowhere to turn? Do we care? Do we honestly care?

They cared in the first century. They took on the character of Jesus and went out to serve the lost. They cared in the first century and, imitating their master, they sacrificed and served. They cared in the first century and, unencumbered by the maintenance of an institution, they went out as led by the Holy Spirit and served as empowered by that same Holy Spirit.

Friends – Dear Ones – we can do the same. Just as Jesus said, the harvest is plentiful – perhaps more than ever. The harvest is plentiful, but the laborers are few, and seemingly getting smaller. But remember this. Jesus may have preached to the thousands as He offered by the Sermon on the Mount but all but a few had abandoned him at Calvary. The followers had diminished, but Calvary and those that had abandoned Jesus could not confine him. With resurrection power Jesus and his faithful followers broke out and so can we!

Compelled by love. Filled with hope. Growing into the likeness of Christ. Offering purpose, meaning, hope and peace. Offering life and service in the Kingdom of God, not a lifeless institutional religion. They did it then. We can do it now. Amen.