Snippet: Good, True, and Beautiful

Snip·pet | ˈsnipit | noun a small piece or brief extract.

Jim Davis and Michael Graham have conducted what they say is “the largest and most comprehensive study of dechurching ever commissioned.” They published their findings in a book, The Great Dechurching. This snippet is from a Gospel Coalition article (September 5, 2023), “5 Misconceptions About Dechurching in America.”

“The reasons why [most of the dechurched] willing to come back vary from group to group, but on the whole, people are looking for two things: healthy relationships and a local church that actively demonstrates how the gospel is true, good, and beautiful. Those two factors are almost entirely within our control. Church leaders can grow in their ability to exercise relational wisdom and build healthy communities. Our local churches can grow institutionally to be bolder and clearer with our doctrine, religious affection, and cultural engagement.”

Of course, this is what we should be doing anyway, but it speaks to the potential power of a simple invitation to this kind of church.

In case you’re wondering, here’s the 5 misconceptions::

Misconception #1: People leave primarily because of negative experiences with the church.

Misconception #2: Young people are leaving the church after attending secular universities.

Misconception #3: People leave the church because they’ve left the faith.

Misconception #4: The people leaving are primarily on the secular left.

Misconception #5: They aren’t willing to come back.

Photo by Kimson Doan on Unsplash

Snippet: History's Most Prolific Justice Movement

Snip·pet | ˈsnipit | noun a small piece or brief extract.

Here’s one from Jonathan Tremaine in a recent Lectio 365 devotional:

“This week we’re exploring the person and work of Jesus as the leader of history’s most prolific justice movement.”

I know this, but the way he put it just struck me.

According to some historians and social scientists (thinking of Jonathan Haidt and Tom Holland, both atheists), there have been no other comprehensive justice and compassion movements inspired by any other ideology or religion outside of Christianity and Judaism.

A few years ago, Tom Hollard wrote an article titled “Why I was wrong about Christianity: It took me a long time to realise my morals are not Greek or Roman, but thoroughly, and proudly, Christian.” The title is the article in a nutshell. He writes that after years of study, “the founding conviction of the Enlightenment – that it owed nothing to the faith into which most of its greatest figures had been born – increasingly came to seem to me unsustainable.”

He continues, “Today, even as belief in God fades across the West, the countries that were once collectively known as Christendom continue to bear the stamp of the two-millennia-old revolution that Christianity represents.”

As others have put it, Western society, in its pursuit of justice and the practice of compassion for the poor and powerless, is still living off the fumes of Christianity.