Barna Says UNBELIEVERS Exist Because of CHRISTIANS?! | Pastor Reacts

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We learn that positive spiritual conversations are more likely when Christians prioritize listening, not just speaking.

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I feel like point number two is for all you boomers out there. Our research suggests, here it is, you ready?

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That the most likely reason for this disconnect is the hypocrisy non -Christians witness among Christians.

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How dare non -believers blame Christians for their non -belief? Social media, one of the worst places to engage folks for Christ.

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All right. Some of you are getting offended when you hear me say that. It is absolutely the case. A recent

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Barna article says that Christians are to blame for non -believers. Are they making excuses for non -believers, or is this a principle that actually is reinforced in the

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Bible itself? Let's find out. If you're new here, my name is Nate Sala, and this is Wise Disciple, where I'm helping you become the effective

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Check out the link in the description for the Wise Disciple exclusive discount. All right, got the article here. It says, three things to consider during spiritual conversations with non -Christians.

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All right, this is by Barna. Spiritual openness is widespread. Right now, Barna data shows that 70 % of U .S.

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adults believe in God or a higher power. 74 % would like to grow spiritually, and 44 % are more open to God today than they were before the pandemic.

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These are very interesting numbers. We've seen other surveys and studies that track church attendance as going down, what's called being in a declining trend since like the 1990s.

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There was an earlier Barna study that tracks the declining trend at around, I think it's like 36%.

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So that means 36 % fewer Americans have attended church weekly in the 2020s as opposed to the 1990s.

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But does that mean that folks have fallen away from the faith? Maybe not. You know, the numbers tracking

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Bible reading, for example, on a weekly basis has remained essentially the same as it was going all the way back to the 1990s.

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So this data that I'm referring to now, it's all from Barna, Barna studies. Maybe other surveys and things will give a slightly different number.

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The point that I'm trying to make is, there is some kind of story that these numbers tell.

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I don't know what that story is just yet. I don't know if anyone does. I sense this is something that historians will look back decades from now and make better sense of what's going on.

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So, you know, maybe this video will actually be an artifact of that time period, but we're just too close to it right now to understand what's happening, in my opinion.

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When it comes to belief in God, we know the numbers have dipped. You know,

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Gallup showed something similar. You know, the belief in God used to be at like 90 % going back to 2011, but those numbers have dipped.

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Now we see Barna's numbers have belief in God or a higher power at around 77%.

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As the holidays approach and opportunities for sharing faith abound, today's article offers some helpful insights from Barna's Spiritually Open series.

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Okay, so let's go into these major points one at a time. Number one, remember that spiritual openness often represents common ground.

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Past Barna data shows that among U .S. adults, there's a certain level of openness to central aspects of Christianity, even among many of those who don't consider themselves

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Christians. How can this be? Part of the reason may be that the U .S. is culturally

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Christian. Exposure to Christianity is high, even if affiliation has declined.

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In fact, 72 % of people in the United States say that they were raised Christian. Another 39 % of spiritually open non -Christians still profess having a commitment to Jesus that is important to them today.

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Okay, I don't know what that means. I could venture a guess, okay?

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There's like the charitable take on this and the non -charitable take, right? The non -charitable take is these folks like Jesus as some kind of human guru with some cool bumper sticker sayings, right?

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The charitable take is these folks are close to committing themselves to the

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Lord and they're on some kind of a journey to that eventual outcome, okay? This makes sense because salvation is almost never a light switch that just flips on, right?

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For folks, it's like a series of small decisions that create a path towards conversion, and that's how it worked in my case, right?

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That's typically how it goes for a lot of people. But between these sort of interpretive options, there's no way for me to confirm this.

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And I take it that even if you asked these individuals, right, that answered this question, if you asked them to explain themselves, they would explain themselves differently.

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So I would be curious to press into this metric and find out what these spiritually open non -Christians really mean by that.

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They have a commitment to Jesus, okay? So what does this mean for Christians who, or excuse me, even if they have not identified as Christian, 61 % in this spiritually open group have attended a

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Christian church or parish at some point. What does this mean for Christians who are communicating or building relationships across lines of faith?

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First, they should not assume that they will be met with combative or even contradictory opinions.

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For instance, alongside a general warmth toward God and Jesus, spiritually open non -Christians have perhaps an unexpected reverence for Scripture.

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They tend to agree the Christian Bible is both divinely inspired and completely accurate.

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Hmm. Interesting. Take a look at this chart right here. So these are people who had to interact with this particular phrase, the

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Bible is the inspired Word of God. 20 % of all non -Christians said they agree with that. 29 % of spiritually open non -Christians said they agree that the

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Bible is the inspired Word of God. 7 % of not spiritually open non -Christians said they agree with that as well.

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Interesting. Here is another statement that they were asked to engage with, the Bible is totally accurate in all of the principles it teaches.

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19 % of all non -Christians agree with this. 26 % of non -Christians but are spiritually open agree with this.

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8 % not spiritually open agree. Hmm. Additionally, Christians should expect that non -Christians take matters of faith seriously and personally.

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Okay. While some of their views may seem blurry or befuddling to someone currently practicing

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Christianity, these beliefs are revealing of non -Christians' varied backstories, many of which were connected to the

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Church at some point. That is absolutely true. That is absolutely the case.

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So, you know, if you were to line up three non -Christians and ask them what their backgrounds are, one might say,

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I grew up in church but got old enough and decided to reject the faith in college, right? That was what happened to me.

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Another might say, you know, well, I've never been to church in my entire life, you know, I'm completely unchurched,

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I've never cracked open a Bible ever, right? Zero context for the Christian faith, zero context for the teachings of Jesus.

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That's a lot of Gen Z right now. Or you could have someone who, you know, was a tragic story, they were raised in an abusive fundamentalist community where the

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Word of God was warped and distorted in order to abuse the congregation and so the person deconstructed their faith and left it all behind.

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That's a lot of people's stories, okay? But you'll never know which is which unless you put the focus on the person you're talking to and first seek to understand them.

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You with me so far? You following what I'm saying? Let's keep going. Sermons, conversations, and resources that intend to connect with a spiritually open non -Christian may be more fruitful when they search curiously for common ground rather than to root out ignorance or indifference, okay?

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I'm sure the presuppositionalists are not going to agree with point number one here in the Barna study, okay?

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They're going to say, nope, there is no common ground, there is no neutrality between a believer and a non -believer's worldview, okay?

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Whether or not that's true, I will say this, if you want to be effective at engaging folks for Christ, you should seek to find areas of agreement and affirmation with your interlocutor, okay?

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What you'll discover if you go looking for these kinds of things is non -believers often do and say things that Christians can yes and amen whether they realize the theological implications underneath them or not.

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And so to develop your conversations in rhetorically effective ways, you should absolutely find areas that you can agree with and affirm.

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Why? Well, because it's going to develop a level of trust between you and the person that you're talking to.

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And that level of trust is crucial to get someone to hear what you have to say about Jesus. Point number two, so we're getting to the controversial point, that's point number three, but point number two, there is a give -and -take required for good faith conversations to occur.

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What do Christians need to learn from churches in order to share their faith? Past experiences help shed light on some possible answers.

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People of no faith shared with Barna about previous spiritual conversations with Christians, and we compared their accounts of those conversations by whether it left them with a positive or a negative impression.

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Through this lens, we learned that positive spiritual conversations are more likely when

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Christians prioritize listening, not just speaking. I feel like point number two is for all you boomers out there.

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I think a lot of Millennials, and definitely

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Gen Z, understand point number two intuitively. They just—they get it, right?

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They've probably been on the receiving end of a lot of lectures from the older generation, so they get it, right?

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But some Millennials, a lot of Gen Xers like myself, right? And definitely boomers, we need to hear point number two, okay?

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We cannot start our conversations off with, well, here's everything that you need to hear me say, right?

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We certainly can't start off conversations with, you know what your problem is? Let me give you nine bullet points about why you're wrong, okay?

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We should be seeking to listen just as much as, if not more than, we speak.

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Actually, so now that I'm talking about it, like, the problem cuts the other way too, okay?

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So let me acknowledge the other side of this. There are a lot of good listeners out there that don't know how to say anything at all, okay?

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And so all they do is listen, and they miss out on their opportunities to speak up at the right time, to provide challenges or important pieces of information, or even, you know, just to straight -up share the gospel with non -believers.

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And so there is—let me acknowledge that—there is a problem going both ways on this, but definitely the older generation needs to wrestle with point number two, okay?

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Especially on social media, right? Which is—social media, one of the worst places to engage folks for Christ, all right?

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Some of you are getting offended when you hear me say that. It is absolutely the case, okay? Let's keep going.

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People of no faith feel more positive about spiritual conversations with Christians when the Christians share their spiritual backstory and ask about their conversation partner's own spiritual backstory.

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As you can see, the former is still more common than the latter, but both are important in having better cross -faith interactions.

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Again, the reason why this is true, the reason why this leads to effective conversations is because of trust.

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And what you should be doing if you are a Christian, and if you've seen my other videos, you know this, so it's not gonna be new information for you.

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The number one thing you should be doing right in the very beginning, especially when you're talking to somebody for the very first time, is to develop a rapport and to develop trust with the person you're talking to.

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That is absolutely crucial. Time and again, this study has shown that Christians need to understand and embrace the give -and -take required for good conversations about faith.

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Now we get to the controversial point, okay? Point number three, okay?

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Buckle up, here we go. Point number three, actions speak louder than words rings especially true when sharing faith.

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According to Barna's spiritually open data, the public tend to have a positive opinion of Jesus and his teachings.

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The traits people associate with Jesus often align with the things that they say they hope to find in their spirituality.

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Yet, if non -Christians are looking for things that Jesus provides, have a positive opinion of Jesus, and are hearing about Jesus from Christians, then why don't more people identify as Christians?

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Our research suggests, here it is, you ready? That the most likely reason for this disconnect is the hypocrisy non -Christians witness among Christians.

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Put another way, the missing ingredient to many approaches to sharing faith may actually have nothing to do with what

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Christians are saying but how Christians are living. Sadly, people of no faith or of other faiths say that the hypocrisy of religious people is the number one reason they doubt their faith.

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Perhaps even more telling is the fact that 22 % of Christians say the same thing. All right, so I'm just going to camp here for the rest of the video.

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The rest of this article is actually very helpful, so I'll leave a link for the article. You should definitely check it out. Now, hey, real quick,

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I'm so grateful that you're watching. If I've earned the right to get your sub, I'd love it if you would just click the like and subscribe button.

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It would really help me to get the video out to more and more people. I really do appreciate you. Now, if I had read this article a few years ago,

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I would have done what I think some of you are doing right now. I would have gotten upset, okay? How dare non -believers blame

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Christians for their non -belief, you know? These non -believers, they're just looking for excuses to reject

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God, and they'll come up with anything to do it, right? And also, don't forget that a lot of folks who are not

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Christians but who claim to be Christians run around and act like fools, and then Christianity gets to blame for their behavior.

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I would have been upset, okay? And it's not like any of what I just said is false either.

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It is true that non -believers want to reject the Lord, and so that's exactly what they do.

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This is taught in the Gospel of John in various places. I've talked about this in previous videos, right? The light came into the world, but the world loved the darkness rather than the light.

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That is the indictment against non -believers, okay? It's not that they haven't heard the best argumentation, it's because they love darkness, right?

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In other words, they're doing exactly what they desire to do. And it is true that a lot of people claim to be

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Christians as well, and they're not. But wait, wait, wait, wait. We have to press pause.

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Here's what gives me pause. What does the Bible say, right? So before I get all worked up, right, and you get all worked up, and we get worked up together, what does the

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Bible say? We should never lean too far away from whatever it is that the

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Bible commands and whatever it teaches. And the fact is, I'm told by the Scriptures that the

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Bible has everything for what we need to live productively as Christians in today's culture, okay?

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So here's my question, and I think this should be your question as well, and let's go discover what the answer is together. Does the

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Bible warn Christians about their behavior and link their behavior to the very message of the

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Gospel, to the very efficacy of the message of the Gospel? And the answer is yes.

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Matthew 5, 16, these are Jesus' words here. In the same way, let your light shine before others so that they may see your good works and give glory to your

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Father who is in heaven. Interesting, right? This is a very common phrase that we know of, right?

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We've heard this in the Church many times. But notice something. Jesus is not talking about the

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Gospel message right here. He's talking about good works, good deeds.

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And so the question is, why is he talking about that? Because your message should match your actions.

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Your actions should match your message. If we are a people who, for example, we proclaim the undeserving love and grace that God has given to us, right, how then are we extending that same love and grace to those around us, especially those around us who don't deserve it?

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Did we deserve the love and grace that God extended to us when he gave it to us? I mean, it's not grace if it's deserved, right?

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Are we doing the same thing? Are we mirroring our Creator in some sense?

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Are we matching the message of the grace of the Gospel to those around us who don't deserve our grace?

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That's a challenging question, right? Now, the Apostle Peter picked up this theme from Jesus, and he said it like this in 1

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Peter. 1 Peter 2, verse 12, Keep your conduct among the Gentiles honorable, so that when they speak against you as evildoers, they may see your good deeds and glorify

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God on the day of visitation. The goal is that folks glorify

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God the Father. That's exactly what Jesus just said a moment ago in Matthew, that they will glorify the

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Father in heaven. So Peter is picking up this thread, but he speaks about it in this way.

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He talks about it in terms of honoring non -believers.

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See, a lot of people read this passage and they go, well, here's what I am honoring. I'm honoring the truth, so I'm just going to hit people upside the head with it.

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Bam! How do you like them apples? Oh man, you know, let me go to this person over here. I need to destroy him with facts and logic, right?

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Bam! Got another one. Bam! No, friends, the Bible, if you pay very close attention, wants you to honor non -believers.

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Have you ever spent some time wrestling with what it means to, on the one hand, speak the truth about Jesus, speak the truth about Christianity?

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By the way, the Bible says do it in love, right? That's Ephesians 4. But doing that and also honoring non -believers at the same time.

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You see, friends, the Bible knows that non -believers are watching. The Bible knows that non -believers are going to find any old excuse to place blame upon us, and it's factored that into the message of Christianity.

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Later in 1 Peter, this is what he says. 1 Peter 3, verse 15, but in your hearts, honor

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Christ the Lord as holy, always being prepared to make a defense to anyone who asks you for a reason for the hope that is in you, yet—here it is—do it with gentleness and respect, having a good conscience, so that when you are slandered, those who revile your good behavior in Christ may be put to shame.

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Peter already knows that folks will try to do this. And guess what? If he warns

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Christians about their conduct in line with what Jesus taught earlier—by the way,

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Paul also says the same thing in 1 Timothy, right ?—well, then here's the reality.

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It's possible to fail to heed the Bible's warning. It's possible to not live up to the expectation that the

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Bible places on us as Christians in terms of our conduct, in terms of our actions that match our message.

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And if we let that sink in, then we cannot look at the statistics in this article and just immediately dismiss them all as false.

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Can't do it. The truth is that both is probably happening at the same time.

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Nonbelievers are looking for any old excuse, and a lot of us Christians are failing to live up to the expectation that the

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Bible places on us. Why? Well, because we've adopted the tribalism and the adversarial attitudes of today's culture.

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And so, I encourage all of us to not immediately dismiss point number three here, right?

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Get angry, get our dander up, but instead to take a good hard look in the mirror first and check ourselves.

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To pray and ask the Lord as David did. Psalm 139, verse 23, search me, O God, and know my heart.

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Try me and know my thoughts, and see if there be any grievous way in me, and lead me in the way everlasting.

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I'm sure this article is stirring up some emotions inside of you, right? So now it's time for you to speak into this.

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That would be the appropriate time. What are your thoughts about this article? Is Barna way off here? Was this at all convicting to you?

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Let me know in the comments below. As always, if you made it this far, you need to join my Patreon community, even just to read the

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Bible with me. We're doing it right now, doing a Bible study together on Patreon. That's free, by the way, for anyone who wants to join.

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So the link for the Patreon is below. Thank you so much for watching this video. I'm going to go away, but I'm going to return very soon with more for your consideration.