Sunday we had a guest speaker at church, Ron Luce of Teen Mania. This is a huge ministry that reaches out to teens and has won tens and tens of thousands for Christ. Ron has a burden and a passion for reaching the youth of America. He really brought home the point that the fate of Christianity, it's very survival and outreach depends on our teen culture. Teens, are you ready for that challenge? (No pressure or anything...)
Here are stats from Luce that got my attention.
1. Barna reports that 83 percent of teens believe that "moral truth depends on the circumstances. Only 6 percent believe that moral truth is absolute." AND only 9 percent of CHRISTIAN teens believe in moral absolutes. In other words, whether a sin is sin depends on the circumstances versus the truth of the Bible.
2. 65%of those born in 1927-1945 claimed to be Bible-based believers.
35% of those born in 1946-1964 claimed to be Bible based believers.
16% of Gen X'ers (my generation)
Only 4% of those born from 1984 or later claim to be Bible based Christians.
100 % of me is scared of that statistic. What about you?
3. There are 71 MILLION of you "Millennials" (those born 1984 or later). You are our biggest population group right now.
4. Research shows that once a child reaches 20, the odds of reaching that individual for Christ are about 10 percent. Barna Research Groups states that "what you believe by the time you are 13 is what you will die believing."
I could go on and on. Bottom line--SCARY.
Teens and Pre-teens, we have never needed you more. Your generation is operating at 96 percent claiming to be unbelievers. Who among you will stand up and spread the Word? Who among you is ready to invite friends to church, to help bring people to faith before it's too late? The current culture has never been so bombarded with media saturation, violence, graphic images, new rules for "acceptable" language, not to mention rates of damaged home lives off the charts. It's a tough world out there. It's not going to be easy. To quote a Beyonce song, "We need some soljas."
Ready to go to work?
"I looked for a man among them who would build up the wall and stand before me in the gap on behalf of the land so I would not have to destroy it, but I found none."
Ezekial 22:30
Jenny B. Jones
Check out my blog HERE.
Book reference Battle Cry for a Generation, by Ron Luce. Cook Communications Mininstries, 2005.
2 comments:
Powerful, Jenny. Gave me chills.
Love,
Julie
One of the really exciting things about this generation's teenagers and young adults is that they aren't satisfied with religious busy work, they want to take action. In the generations before this, if someone was asked to stand in the gap, he might go teach a Bible study class, sing a special on Sunday or start a Southern Gospel quartet. This generation is more extroverted and they are looking for ways to meet needs outside the four walls of the church. It's scaring their elders to death, but these kids have a greater potential to set the world ablaze for Christ than any generation in a long time.
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