The Truth in the Numbers - My 16th Blog

These are the blogs of my last month in youth ministry and some lessons and things God has taught me:

The Truth in the Numbers

The Director of Missions for Beaverdam Baptist Association recently sent out an email to many of the staff members of our local Baptist Churches. My mind was blown when looking at the numbers.

They are as follows:
-Over the last 10 years there has been a 23.4% decrease in church attendance in Oconee County.
-55% of the residents of Oconee County have little to no involvement in the faith community.
-78% of SC Baptist Convention churches are either declining or have plateaued in membership.
-The SC Baptist Convention estimates that 500 of 2,100 SC Baptist Convention churches will close their doors for good over the next 10 years

In addition:
-In Oconee County 20,881 people were on the membership rolls of SCBC churches
-Of those 20,881 people, 6,801 regularly attended worship
-There were 284 total Baptisms in Oconee County in SCBC churches

First of all praise God that 284 believed and participated in believer’s baptism in 2011!

But how can you not be sad when taking this data and doing some figuring on your own? For example it took 73.5 church members to help lead one person to the point of baptism. If we just look at the active church members, it took 24 active church members to help lead one person to the point of baptism. Wow!! IT TOOK 24 ACTIVE CHURCH MEMBERS PER PERSON BEING SAVED AND BAPTIZED.

Again you call me negative if you want to I really don’t care. If these numbers don’t show that we need to change what we are doing then what is it going to take to wake the church up???? I’m afraid that 500 of them over the next 10 years aren’t going to.

The message should never change. The gospel will always preach. And there is only one way to salvation and that is through the shed blood of Jesus Christ.

But here is the example I’ve used through the years with my kids. Satan is super smart. He knows the Bible better than any human alive. He is wise, he is patient, and he is cunning. And he doesn’t give up. If one tactic doesn’t work he will use something else and if that doesn’t work he will use something else and if that doesn’t work he will use something else etc… He will change his method at the drop of a bucket. It seems however that our churches just wanna play the same game and do the same thing that we have over the years. We never change our offense or our defense. We’re playing checkers while satan is playing chess. People are not the same as they were 10, 20, 30, 40 years ago. God is the same, people are not. Families are not the same. Teenagers are not the same. Life is not the same!!

The Great Commission says GO! That is the first word…GO…and teach all nations. We don’t have mission minded churches anymore. Our idea of missions is giving a love offering at Christmas and Easter. And that is fantastic because our foreign missionaries are getting more bang for their buck than the local church is that is for sure. But the Great Commission doesn’t say give so that somebody else can go or pray so that somebody else can go it says YOU GO! We’ve lost our mission focus, which should be our primary focus. Deacons have meetings about how to make people in the church happy. Deacons should have meetings about how to make satan unhappy and how to make their church a Great Commission minded church.

We’ve also made missions seem to have to be somewhat extravagant for them to be relevant. We have to go as a youth group on a grand mission trip or the college kid has to go to Africa or China or India or wherever or the church group has to go hundreds of miles away. And praise God for that but what about the mission field in front of our face? If we’re winning the battle elsewhere and overseas but losing the war at home what do we have to come back too? What about our lost parents and siblings and neighbors and classmates and coworkers right here and right now!! There are 74,273 people in Oconee County and if 55% of them are lost we have almost 41,000 people right here within shouting distance that need to be ministered to. And I think there are plenty of empty pews available for them to sit in.

Over the last 2 weeks I have had two people come up to me and point blank say they are not a Christian. I’m praying for God’s guidance in how to speak to them more than I already have.

And I hope it doesn’t take 47 other church members to help me share Christ with them.