It may be an infrequent occurrence when non-Christians stroll into the doors of a church to check it out. I get that. What is hard for me to get my mind around is why that infrequency is becoming more the case for professing followers of Christ.
In his piece entitled, “The Selfishness of Skipping Church”, Art Heinz does a good job of getting to the heart of the issue by tying it to our ever-increasing consumer mindset.
The overwhelming consumerist mentality in our nation has spilled over and saturated the thinking of Christians throughout the Church in the United States. More and more believers in America approach the concept of finding and remaining in a church the same way they would handle buying a car, shopping for the latest technological advancement, or choosing a movie to watch. An institution whose founder came not to be served, but to serve, has been tainted by a ceaseless drum beat of “what can you do for me?” The worship environment, the style of music, the dress code, the church programming, and the overall focus of the church, is no longer about the Lord and His agenda, but about the personal preferences of individual church shoppers.
The crisis of commitment and ownership in the American Church is reflected in the 2015 Pew Research Study that showed a serious decline in Americans…
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