In South Africa and world-wide I believe there is a decline in active church membership. (I read an article about it and quite often there are newspaper headlines to the affect). For some churches it is obvious why the members are leaving, others are less obvious. So I started looking for the reasons (what applies to me as well to others)
Finding a new community to fit into can be a frustrating experience. Staying in a place where you do not feel part of the community is deadening. Even if the sermons are Spirit filled and Godly, a church without community will not keep people. It is like going to a show every Sunday, nodding to the people around you and leaving as soon as it is over. Community tends to draw people in, to get them involved, to make them feel wanted.
People leave church because they need less drama in their lives.
Believe it or not, but churches are full of drama, church members fight with each other, pastors and congregations fight with each other and churches split. Some people just find it easier to leave the church because in the end it is less stressful.
People leave church because of unresolved conflict.
People leave church because of controlling leaders and unskilled teachers.
People leave church because they get turned off by social climbing, cliques, and nepotism.
People leave church when they feel like they need to become a carbon copy of an individual or ideal in order to be fully included and appreciated.
People leave church because they’re looking for something authentic.
People leave church because they feel lonely.
People leave church when they don’t find Jesus.
I have some issues with people from my past, and I am working on total forgiveness, but I am not there yet. Yet, when I sit in some churches I am being condemned for not forgiving outright, and that goes on Sunday after Sunday. It is easier for me and God to deal with it than to be condemned every week.
Some pastors are pastors and they should lead the "flock" and not try to preach.They can care, and council but they surely cannot get the point across to the congregation. They are not necessarily unskilled but their passion and gifting is in another area, not teaching. Others just do not know the Bible, or because of some misunderstanding just err in their message. People look at the church program who is preaching the Sunday before deciding to go to church.Other pastors come over are over-bearing and controlling, they may not actually be like that, but that is how they are perceived to be. Both these cases are off-putting and people split because of these.
People leave church because they get turned off by social climbing, cliques, and nepotism.
I grew up in a rural town and a great amount of sucking-up resulted in being elected to committees and commissions in the church. Some church leaders even elect and appoint family members and friends to positions of power. And if you are not in the right clique, you have no chance to be anything other than a pew-warmer.
People leave church when they feel like they need to become a carbon copy of an individual or ideal in order to be fully included and appreciated.
Oh my, in some churches it is the unpardonable sin to look different, to look un-Christian (whatever the definition for that congregation may be), even to wear jewelery, or have tattoos, or to go to church in shorts and a t-shirt. And heaven forbid, lest a hobo enters the church. Such are not welcome, they are different and does not fit the squeaky-clean image of a Christian. Some pastors insist that a Christian should look like the image they portray. People get fed up with being false and acting on a Sunday just to be accepted and they leave.
People leave church because they’re looking for something authentic.
People know after a while that you are false, that your smile is fake, the hug you give is calculated and practiced. You yourself become false, because you do not dare show your real feelings, that you are actually hurting or struggling with something. I mean, you have been a Christian for 10 years now, what is your problem? So you put on a smile, and instead of getting closed to God, you are building more walls. The pastor dare not admit that he is struggling with an issue, he is the pastor after all. And even to suggest that he may be less than human is unthinkable.
People are getting judged, side-stepped, pushed aside and ignored in the church. They come in and sit down, greet the people around them, long for some heart-to-heart conversation but everybody is too scared to acknowledge that they need someone to talk to (see authentic above).
People leave church when they don’t find Jesus.
I have attended a lot of sermons in the past where I did not have a clue what the pastor talked about, it rather felt like a theological dissertation. Other sermons are week-after-week hell-fire-and-brimstone, only death and destruction, none of the love of Jesus. We are being taught to fear, not about grace and love and redemption and Jesus. What we need is to be experiencing Jesus, to learn about Him, to learn about the Kingdom of God.
So people are leaving, becoming wanderers, some leave their faith, some seek Jesus on their own, longing for real, authentic, honest church.
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