Seven Times a Day?

I am reading "The Crisis of Islamic Civilization" by Ali Allawi and "Inside the Revolution" by Joel Rosenberg. I have many thoughts, but right now I wonder what would happen to Christianity and the church if we prayed seven times a day. Daniel only prayed three times a day and prophecy still revolves around his revelations.

Galyn Wiemers
http://www.generationword.com

The Boys are Back

Jacob, Zac, Ben, Galyn, Justin, Hawkeye, Paul

My boys were all back for Hawkeye's graduation. Justin came back from Ft. Mead before he leaves for 2 years in Japan with the Marines. Paul was back from Colorado after his third winter as a snow board coach. He works at Steamboat. Ben was back from college and his Air Force training in computer engineering before he leaves for training in North Carolina. Hawkeye graduated from Valley High School and is headed to UNI with a Jazz trumpet scholarship to major in economics and real estate. He was voted best dancer in a class of 550 seniors. (Shawn Johnson, gold medalist and Dancing with the Stars winner, is a junior at the same Valley High School so she was not included in the voting.) Zac is just finishing his sophomore year and Jacob has finished seventh grade. It was a lot of fun to have them home and a great honor to be able to tell them each how proud I am of them.

Galyn Wiemers
http://www.generationword.com

Biblical Illiteracy: Pastor's Excuse #1

Biblical Illiteracy: Pastor's Excuse #1 -

"The people who attend my church are not ready for in depth Bible teaching. They would not understand the details since they do not have a biblical background."

Fallacy of Pastor's Excuse #1 -

The above response (or, excuse) for biblical illiteracy in a church gives the impression that there are many new people attending the Sunday morning church services who have not yet been orientated to the Scriptures. This answer is camouflage since statistics show that church attendance is down nationally (21% of people ages 21-45 attend church in 2009, down from 33% in the early 1970's, WallStreet Journal 3/13/09) and the number of self-professing Christians has declined from 86% to 76% since 1990 (Newsweek, "The End of Christian America", April 13, 2009).

This means that the vast majority of people in church have been there for years. So, why are the people still biblically illiterate? The pastors failed to teach the Bible for many years. Maybe the pastors don't believe the Bible? Maybe the pastors don't know the Bible? Maybe the pastors are afraid the people will leave? We do know that is true - the people are leaving but it is not because the pastors are teaching too much Bible.

Even if a church is receiving large numbers of new people each week the statistics still show they are people who are simply moving from another church. This week they will be in this church, but soon they will be moving on to an other church. It is almost as if they are looking for something.

So, the reason people are biblically illiterate is NOT because:
1. The church is being flooded with new converts.
2. The church has not had time to teach the basics.

The pastors have had years to cover the basics of Bible and theology from the pulpit but have almost universally and across denominations decided not to. The people have been sitting there in the pews for years available for Bible teaching, but they have received so little that it is easy to label Christians of today as biblically illiterate.

In a wide variety of Christian circles I have heard pastors ridicule the public school's performance on standardized tests or mock the test performance of United State's students when compared to other nations. It is time to turn the focus on the utter failure of the educational ability of the modern church itself. I do not want to hear the sickening excuses, explanations and justifications of pastors when they have to face the fact that standardized testing of basic Bible literacy in their congregations would show they are this generation's educational failures.

Our Christian generation inherited a large percentage lead over any other religion in the world. In our nation Christians (76%, down from 86% in 1990) still have a large lead over atheists (4%), Judiasm (1.2%) and Muslims (0.6%). Imagine going into a baseball game as a pitcher with a lead of 76-4 and losing the game!? Today's pastors are walking the bases full and then throwing the high, hanging curve ball out over the plate time after time. (That means they are giving up four-run homers Sunday after Sunday. Which is not good if you want to win.) This pitcher needs to start throwing good, low strikes or be replaced.

Pastor, how much time do you need before your people are ready to handle the Word of Truth? Is 5 years long enough? 10 years? 20 years? You have had some people sitting in your churches their entire life who are still "not ready to handle Bible teaching." In the ancient world, when the sheep starved, the shepherds were called "worthless" and fired. When sheep starve in modern USA the farmer is fined and could get jail time for neglegence and animal abuse.

Galyn Wiemers
http://www.generationword.com

First, We Need More People to Leave the Church

15% of Americans now claim no religious affiliation. (Newsweek: The Decline and Fall of Christian America - April 13, 2009 )This is an increase from 8% in 1990. You can wring your hands and ask, "What are we going to do," or you can face the facts that churches ignored in Barna's 2001 research that indicated the lack of biblical literacy. The lack of Christian knowledge proclaimed from the pulpit and taught in churches was destined to result in a decline in religious affiliation.

Understand and remember this:

Biblical illiteracy is the disease that results in the symptoms our churches and our society are now trying to deal with.

You can fix a civil symptom (gay marriage) with legislation and you can fix a church symptom (low church attendance) with a program (free doughnuts), but the disease of biblical illiteracy will still be eating away at the soul of your churches and society.

In 2001 researcher George Barna told us that America was immersed in a crisis of biblical illiteracy. At that time half of incoming freshman in college who called themselves Protestants could not list Moses, Isaac, King Saul and the Babylonian exile in chronological order. It was at this same time the most familiar Bible verse was:

God helps those who help themselves.

The above "Bible verse" is not a Bible verse. Here are some examples from Barna's 2001 research that flashed the big yellow warning lights telling us people would soon consider our religion irrelevant:

• Mainline denominational churches: 35% believe Jesus was sinless and 34% believe the Bible is totally accurate.
• Conservative churches: 55% believe Jesus was sinless and 66% believe the Bible is totally accurate.
• Non-denominational churches: 63% believe Jesus was sinless and 70% believe the Bible is totally accurate.
  

Here is an interesting thought. If pastors would start teaching the Word of God those numbers would go up. Guaranteed!

1. First, if the people heard the truth they could then believe the truth which would increase the percentage of people in the church who believe that Jesus was sinless and the Bible is accurate.
   
2. Or, second, if the people heard the truth they could reject the truth and leave the church which would also increase the percentage of people in the church who believe that Jesus was sinless and the Bible is accurate.

In other words, we do not have enough people leaving the church yet! Let's get started!!

Galyn Wiemers
http://www.generationword.com