07.02.09
Why the Younger Generation isn’t Coming to Church
Hello,
I, like many other church leaders of various denominations, have wondered for a long time why my generation and the ones behind me no longer consider church to be a valid part of their lives or the lives of their families. As I was preparing for the message last Sunday, preaching my July 4th message a week early as I am leading worship at our state Family Camp this coming Sunday, I was struck by the story of Isral’s first attempt at the conquest of Ai right after the miracle at Jericho. The beginning of this is:
Why should Israel melt before the small village of Ai when they had just smashed the dominant city of the region, Jericho under the anointing of God? What was the problem? Nobody seemed to really know, they just knew something was really, really wrong. They drew lots, and the lots ended up pointing out the culprit, recorded in Josh. 7:16-26, NKJV:
16 So Joshua rose early in the morning and brought Israel by their tribes, and the tribe of Judah was taken. 17 He brought the clan of Judah, and he took the family of the Zarhites; and he brought the family of the Zarhites man by man, and Zabdi was taken. 18 Then he brought his household man by man, and Achan the son of Carmi, the son of Zabdi, the son of Zerah, of the tribe of Judah, was taken. 19 Now Joshua said to Achan, “My son, I beg you, give glory to the Lord God of Israel, and make confession to Him, and tell me now what you have done; do not hide it from me.” 20 And Achan answered Joshua and said, “Indeed I have sinned against the Lord God of Israel, and this is what I have done: 21 ”When I saw among the spoils a beautiful Babylonian garment, two hundred shekels of silver, and a wedge of gold weighing fifty shekels, I coveted them and took them. And there they are, hidden in the earth in the midst of my tent, with the silver under it.” 22 So Joshua sent messengers, and they ran to the tent; and there it was, hidden in his tent, with the silver under it. 23 And they took them from the midst of the tent, brought them to Joshua and to all the children of Israel, and laid them out before the Lord. 24 Then Joshua, and all Israel with him, took Achan the son of Zerah, the silver, the garment, the wedge of gold, his sons, his daughters, his oxen, his donkeys, his sheep, his tent, and all that he had, and they brought them to the Valley of Achor. 25 And Joshua said, “Why have you troubled us? The Lord will trouble you this day.” So all Israel stoned him with stones; and they burned them with fire after they had stoned them with stones. 26 Then they raised over him a great heap of stones, still there to this day. So the Lord turned from the fierceness of His anger. Therefore the name of that place has been called the Valley of Achor to this day.
Unknown to anyone else, Achan had sinned. His sin was hidden from the greater congregation of the people, but it still impacted others in a fatal way…about 36 innocent men died that day. As I read this story, I began to consider the amazing amount of compromise in the greater Church today. We readily accept what God abhors. We hide our sin, just as Achan did, and wonder why our church isn’t growing, wonder why our ministries are not increasing, wonder why our attempts (or our pastors attempts) are not prospering. We think, “If we could just get this anointed pastor or if this anointed speaker would come and do a week of revivals at our church…” that things would spark. We try this strategy and then another, all to no avail, and at the end of the day we end up frustrated, angry at God and man that things are not working. I believe that in the story of Achan we see the answer to this dilemma. We, the generations of the saved, have harbored sin in our hearts. We have hidden our sin and no one sees it. We think we are getting away with it, that God understands where we are, and what we are dealing with, and that somehow He is OK with it. But just as Achan’s hidden sin caused 36 innocents to die, we are doing the same. It is just showing up another way. The next generation is not filling the pews. The next generation is dying spiritually. When will we come to the realization that the next generation will not come to the church until we, The Church, come clean before God? Until we get rid of the sin in our own hearts, in the secret place, nothing we try will work. “Come, let us return to the Lord…”