As we continue to experience The Word of the Lord together, Let us Pray. Prepare our heats, O God, to accept your Word. Silence in us any voice but your own, that, hearing, we may also obey your will; through Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen.

Last Sunday I gave the precursor to this sermon series. The scholars say, and I agree, that we have moved from one time period, commonly called the modern age, to something past that, currently called the post-modern age. I tried as best as I could to describe the modern age and how the post modern age has come through those understandings to emerge into something new. Today we start the meat of this series. I am going to give my opinion on why 70% of the population does not come to church, not even once per year. Next week, Chris will preach and give his opinion. The week after that, we will take a break from this series and worship outside. But then we will come back, and Chris will preach on the 14th of September on what we can do to get people, including the lost generation under 40 years old people to come to church. And then I will respond with my opinion on September 21st. The back and forth rhythm of the preaching, with the opportunities for you to respond on Wednesday nights, are on purpose to show that the more conversational a sermon experience is, the more it will be accepted in the post-modern era. You all in this congregation know this well. You regularly comment during sermons, banter with them even during the sermon. Many of the audios that Ken puts on the web are riddled with your retorts during the sermons. So, Chris and I going back and forth, with opportunities on Wednesday nights for your response, all of that is part of the series on purpose.

Hear now The Word of the Lord as it comes again to us in Jeremiah. Listen for God’s Word for you today. Jeremiah 31.15-17.

15 Thus says the LORD:
A voice is heard in Ramah,
lamentation and bitter weeping.
Rachel is weeping for her children;
she refuses to be comforted for her children,
because they are no more.

16 Thus says the LORD:
Keep your voice from weeping,
and your eyes from tears;
for there is a reward for your work,

says the LORD:
they shall come back from the land of the enemy;
17 there is hope for your future,

I’ve gone back to that scripture. The gospel of Matthew references this passage in the second chapter, at the death of the innocents. I guess I go to this scripture because I think this issue is exactly that important, and exactly that grave. Mainline church, including Presbyterianism, has to take this issue seriously. Otherwise, our congregations will get older and older, and be less and less relevant, with nothing to say to the world. And I’m willing to fight to make sure that doesn’t happen. Because what goes on in church, the community that you can find here, is life affirming grace. And I don’t want my children and grandchildren to live in a world that has lost community like we mainline congregations have to offer. This is important stuff. I feel like Rachel, weeping for her children, my people, of my age, who describe themselves as spiritual but want nothing to do with the community of church. I am very nervous about the future. I want to show the vision of the church as it can be, and then live into that glorious future, the future I believe that God wants for us, to be the beautiful bride of Christ that the church is called to be.

To get to that vision, let me tell you what post-modern people, people you see everyday, people you are, let me tell you what I hear and read about why they don’t come to church.¹ There are six main reasons, some of them will surprise you maybe. Some of them may upset you. Some of them you are bound to think, “That’s not my experience of church at all.” And that is a large part of the point. We’ve got some PR work to do, where the image of who the church is does not match who the church really is.

One: The church is viewed as organized religion with a political agenda. One of the reasons folks don’t come to church is that some people don’t like being told what to think, or spoon fed what to think, what to do, who to vote for, what policy to support, or that kind of stuff. Many people believe strongly in separation of church and state, and when the church tries to blur those lines, there are many many people who don’t like that. The reaction they have is negative feelings and thoughts toward the church.

This year is an election year. I’m not sure if you’ve heard, but this year is a Presidential election year. In case you hadn’t heard. Maybe you’ve been under a rock. As we get close, we will have a litany for the election, where we will pray for the process and justice and all of that. I will say what I did in October 2004, that millions of well minded Christians will vote for a Republican, and millions of well minded Christians will vote for a Democrat. Numbers of well minded Christians will certainly also vote for a various number of Independents, or Green Party candidates, or Libertarians. The church has an interest in justice and mercy and ethical governments and even policy that effects the people. But we are supposed to realize that people can disagree on how to go about those things. And the strength of the Presbyterian Church is that we are politically diverse.

In January, when the folks from the Atlanta Freethought Society were here, on the things they did was repeatedly presume that since we are Christians, we are all Republicans. And it felt to me like they were saying we were evangelical about that supposed Republican leaning. Then George says that he is a card carrying Democrat, and about 1/3rd of the room clapped. Another 1/3rd the Republican third, sat on their hands, and looked around wondering “Can we admit to voting Rebuplican anymore?” And the last third of the room noticed all of this and really laughed. We need to make sure that we recognize what a gift we have with our diversity, and that we each make room for each other to disagree with our theology and our politics. And we need to make sure to project that here first, and then out in the world, because people stay away from church over the misconception that he church is an organized religion with a political agenda. We aren’t that.

Now on the 2, the second reason why so many people don’t come to church, why on your way to church this morning you passed several houses where the folks weren’t going to any church, is that the church is perceived as judgmental and negative. We can understand how being judgmental is not good. We may struggle with this, but we understand it. But the other conception is that the church and its people are negative. To wit, I can’t tell you how many waitrons I’ve talked to, especially when I was one or when I was a host, who hated working Sundays because that meant the church people would come, and the church people complained 10 fold more than the Friday night and Saturday night crowds combined.

And I’ve mentioned this before, but I was at Home Depot years ago trying to buy some paint…. Christians are known as negative and complainers. Who would want to join a group of folks like that? We’ve got some PR work to do to improve that image.

Number 3, this is not a problem for us as Presbyterians, nor at Norcross Presbyterian, but most folks out there thing that the church is dominated by males and that it oppresses females. Though, a female pastor friend is looking, and she is noticing that it is harder for a woman to get interest from churches than for her male counterparts. There is still work to do.

Number 4. Many people that I have talked to, and the books I have read report the same thing, people especially under the age of 45 don’t come to church because it is one of the last places that is homophobic, and sometimes is prejudiced against homosexuals. I’m not going to go into a debate on homosexuality. Wherever you stand on homosexuality, the least we can do is welcome people, no matter where they are in their lives, and not be afraid of them, and not judge them.

I think we do pretty well on that here at Norcross Presbyterian. In fact, within the last 6 months, no fewer than 6 of you have said to me, “When someone who is homosexual comes into our church, I think we treat them the same as anyone else.” And I’d agree. Good for us. But that isn’t how all churches are. And it certainly isn’t how churches are viewed by folks who don’t come to church. Again, we’ve got some PR work to do.

Number 5. Folks don’t come because the church arrogantly claims that all other religions are wrong. I’m not saying that other religions are the same as Christianity. They aren’t. But there are ways to listen to people whose religion differs from ours without calling them bound for hell, or wrong, or evil. Those really aren’t our distinctions to make. And when Christians do that, we project an image to a world that is uncomfortable with judgment claims like that. We would do well to learn how to positively say things like, “This is where our religions are both beautiful, but they differ here, and these are important distinctions to us.” There are ways to point out where we are different without being arrogant.

Lastly, number 6. The last conception of why folks aren’t coming to church. The conception is that the church is full of fundamentalists who take the Bible literally. Here’s the thing; even if you think you take the Bible literally, you don’t. You don’t boil a kid in its mother’s milk. Most of you haven’t left your parents, as Jesus said to do. None of you in here seems to be wearing head coverings. We don’t seem to have stoned anyone for working or driving yesterday.

Granted, there are places to take it literally. I literally believe that Jesus rose from the dead and appeared to the disciples. I believe that the Jews were slaves in Egypt for many years, and escaped and then wandered in the desert. And many other things and stories that are clearly written as historical account. But many aren’t written like that. Much of the bible is written as poetry or allegory, or parable.

What folks complain about is that we as the church don’t hold beliefs with humility, or that we check our brains at the door when we open the Bible. Our goal should be to use the minds that God gave us to be thoughtful theologians who understand our limitations. We claim to be human and not God. Therefore, we would do well to also never claim to know the mind of God, or how everything works. We don’t know those kinds of things. And this Bible would have us believe nothing else. When we have no humility about our beliefs and how we read the Bible, we turn people off to the message within the Bible of love and grace. And that is a shame.

Let us move from these 6 things. Let us move from an organized religion with a political agenda to an organized community with a heart to serve others. Let us move from being judgmental and negative to a positive agent of change, loving others as Jesus would. Let us move from being dominated by males to a church that holds women in the highest respect and includes women as equals in leadership areas of the church. I know, some of these aren’t for us specifically. When that is the case, let us do good work at spreading the word that these are not battles in our church. Let us move beyond homophobia into a loving and welcoming community. Let us move from arrogant claims that all other religions are wrong to being respectful of other people’s beliefs and faiths, and knowing where the differences are. And let us move from a church full of fundamentalists who take the whole Bible literally to a church that holds beliefs with humility and strives to be thoughtful theologians.

Remember how I told you last week that I thought we were close. I think we really are. And that is why I think we can do so much good in this world, in this culture, at this time. We can be a wonderful gift to a lost generation. May we have the strength and courage so to do. Amen.

1These are borne out of my talking to people about religion and spirituality and church, but are reinforced by Dan Kimball’s book, They Like Jesus, but not the Church.