{"id":6207,"date":"2018-03-03T13:27:17","date_gmt":"2018-03-03T19:27:17","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/tampaseo.expert\/focus\/?p=6207"},"modified":"2018-03-03T13:27:17","modified_gmt":"2018-03-03T19:27:17","slug":"the-dropouts","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/tampaseo.expert\/focus\/2018\/03\/03\/the-dropouts\/","title":{"rendered":"The Dropouts"},"content":{"rendered":"

\u00a0By Jack Wilkie<\/strong><\/span>
\nIn this series<\/i>,<\/i>\u00a0the crisis of young generations leaving the church in droves will be examined to understand what\u2019s really happening, why they\u2019re leaving, how we can bring them back, and how we can guard the next generation from the same struggles. These articles are taken from Jack\u00a0<\/i>Wilkie\u2019s<\/i>\u00a0new lesson series \u201cThe Lost Generation.\u201d To schedule a seminar at<\/i>\u00a0<\/i>your congregation, contact Jack at\u00a0<\/i>jack@tampaseo.expert<\/i><\/a>.<\/i>\u00a0<\/span>
\n\u00a0<\/span>
\n\u00a0<\/span>
\nWe\u2019ve all heard about the lost generation. For years we\u2019ve been told about the number of youth who are leaving the church, and articles,\u00a0blogs, sermons, and books have all been dedicated to addressing the problem.\u00a0When we really discuss this problem, though, what do we mean? It\u2019s easy to talk about an abstract problem, this idea that some youth are leaving their religious\u00a0habits\u00a0as they grow older, but without really breaking down the numbers it\u2019s not possible to fully understand the scope of the problem along with what changes need to take place. We need to analyze and be aware of the dropout numbers that are available, but we also need to be able to look beyond those to some of the more revealing stats, the ones that tell us why.\u00a0<\/span>
\nLet\u2019s start with\u00a0the stats the denominational world offers.\u00a0On the very highest end of the spectrum, the Southern Baptist Convention commissioned a study in 2002 that came up with 88% as the dropout rate.i<\/span>\u00a0What that would mean, in practical terms, is that for every ten brought up in the Southern Baptist church, only one would remain faithful. Lifeway announced in 2007 that they found that 70% of those reared in a denominational church stop attending for at least a year during their college-age years.ii<\/span>\u00a0The\u00a0Barna\u00a0Group (an independent research group out of\u00a0California) announced that their findings pointed to a rate of 61%\u00a0but an 80% disengagement rate by age 30.iii<\/span>\u00a0Can the numbers really be that high?\u00a0<\/span>
\nIf the denominational world believes their number to be at 61% on the\u00a0low end, what numbers do we find\u00a0outside the denominations? Dr.\u00a0Flavil\u00a0Yeakley\u00a0conducted such a study and presented his results through Freed-Hardeman University in 2008.iv<\/span>\u00a0His study suggested a 40% permanent departure rate.\u00a0He also pointed to one survey in the early 1990s that declared the number to be at 55%. One of the difficulties presented here, though, is that the denominations often have central governments that keep up with attendance statistics and regularly receive reports from their member congregations.\u00a0The Bible doesn\u2019t provide for such church government, so the groups that have\u00a0Biblical autonomy will be much harder to track. In any case, if 40% is\u00a0actually\u00a0the number, we\u2019re still in a state of disaster.\u00a0\u00a0<\/span>
\n\u201cDon\u2019t worry about it,\u201d some might say. \u201cIt\u2019s a well-known fact that many leave their religious habits in college and return later as they get married and have children.\u201d First of all, this doesn\u2019t make it any more acceptable. What about those who died while gone? What about those whose doubts grow too strong? Also, we can\u2019t just assume that they\u2019ll all return. The stats don\u2019t necessarily agree with that. The Lifeway study found that out of the 70% who leave, just over one-third of those return. As for the notion that marriage and children stabilize religious habits, it also fails to hold up under the stats.\u00a0Barna\u00a0found that only 17% of those who left were influenced to return by those facts.\u00a0There\u2019s another massive problem with this excuse that often goes ignored. Our goal should not and\u00a0cannot\u00a0be to just keep\u00a0twentysomethings\u00a0in the pews. A Christian is someone who is actively working as a member of the body. Rather than hoping they hang on, we need to be unleashing\u00a0these\u00a0young, smart, and talented\u00a0people into the world as warriors for Christ.\u00a0<\/span>
\nWith that in mind, we\u2019re beginning to get to the heart of the matter. When the youth hit the real world and our greatest hope\u00a0is\u00a0that they just keep attending \u201cchurch,\u201d we have failed them. See, the fact that they leave the church physically is the outward symptom of physical failure. We need to focus on the real numbers if we want to understand the problem.\u00a0Barna\u00a0did another study on the importance of worldview, and what they found was shocking. Unlike what we at Focus Press mean by worldview,\u00a0Barna\u00a0took a very basic definition based on six foundational principles of Christianity \u2013 Jesus\u2019 sinless life, God as ruling creator, salvation not earned by works, Satan\u2019s existence, evangelism required, and\u00a0Biblical accuracy. Only 19% of those who claim to be born again hold to all six, along with only 9% of all Americans.\u00a0The most disturbing number of all?\u00a0Only .5%\u00a0of Americans between 18-23 years old hold all 6.v<\/span>\u00a0One out of every two hundred.\u00a0Why do they leave the church?\u00a0Because they don\u2019t think like Christians.<\/b>\u00a0<\/b>\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

\u00a0By Jack Wilkie In this series,\u00a0the crisis of young generations leaving the church in droves will be examined to understand what\u2019s really happening, why they\u2019re leaving, how we can bring them back, and how we can guard the next generation from the same struggles. These articles are taken from Jack\u00a0Wilkie\u2019s\u00a0new lesson series \u201cThe Lost Generation.\u201d […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"give_campaign_id":0,"_et_pb_use_builder":"","_et_pb_old_content":"","_et_gb_content_width":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[59,32,66],"tags":[197,50,1145,180,1416,1413],"class_list":["post-6207","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-christian-living","category-church","category-think-excerpts","tag-college","tag-dropout","tag-jack-wilkie","tag-millennials","tag-missing-generation","tag-september-2013","et-doesnt-have-format-content","et_post_format-et-post-format-standard"],"yoast_head":"\nThe Dropouts - Focus Press<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/tampaseo.expert\/focus\/2018\/03\/03\/the-dropouts\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"The Dropouts - Focus Press\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"\u00a0By Jack Wilkie In this series,\u00a0the crisis of young generations leaving the church in droves will be examined to understand what\u2019s really happening, why they\u2019re leaving, how we can bring them back, and how we can guard the next generation from the same struggles. 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