How Many Christians Have Actually Read the Bible
Evangelical writer Eric Metaxas remarked on BreakPoint final week that if Americans took a theology exam, their only promise of passing would be if God graded on a curve. He's right. In knowing both the content of the Bible and the doctrinal foundations of Christianity, we Americans aren't just at the bottom of our class. We are, as Ross Douthat argues in his book, "Bad Religion," a nation of heretics.
A survey of iii,000 people conducted by LifeWay Research and commissioned by Ligonier Ministries found that although Americans however overwhelmingly identify every bit "Christian," startling percentages of the nation embrace ancient errors condemned by all major Christian traditions. These are non pocket-size points of doctrine, but cadre ideas that define Christianity itself. The really pitiful part? Fifty-fifty when nosotros're denying the divinity of Christ, we can't keep our story direct. Americans talking most theology sound about as competent equally country singers rapping.
We're an Embarrassment to Heretics Everywhere
Seven out of x respondents in LifeWay's survey affirmed the doctrine of the Trinity—that the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit are iii Persons merely ane God, and vi in 10 agreed that Jesus is both homo and divine. Their orthodoxy—and consistency—ended there. More than than half went on to signal that Jesus is "the first and greatest existence created past God," a heresy known as Arianism, which the Council of Nicaea condemned in 325 A.D.
Of course, near of these accidental blasphemers aren't preparing to revise the resulting Nicene Creed and preach a creaturely Christ. Rather, baroque contradictions like this illustrate how many Americans don't understand or even care what the Trinity means (although they say they believe in it, likely out of habits learned growing up in church).
The responses to other questions were no less heterodox or headache-inducing. Lxx percent of participants—who ranged across socioeconomic and racial backgrounds—agreed in that location's only one truthful God. Yet 60-iv percent also idea this God accepts the worship of all religions, including those that believe in many gods.
Two-thirds admitted that everyone sins a little bit, only nonetheless insisted that most people are good by nature, which straight contradicts scripture (See "All take sinned and fallen short of the glory of God," and "The centre is deceitful to a higher place all things, and badly wicked: who can know it?"). Over one-half said it'due south fair for God to exercise his wrath against sin, only seemed to waffle about which sins deserved wrath (not theirs!). Seventy-four percent said the "smallest sins" don't warrant eternal damnation, in contrast to Jesus' blood brother, who when writing at the Holy Spirit'southward inspiration taught that even ane infraction of God's law is enough to sink someone. But really, what did he know?
A full 60 percent agreed that "anybody somewhen goes to heaven," but half of those surveyed also checked the box proverb that "only those who believe in Jesus will be saved." And then either these folks are saying everyone volition eventually believe in Jesus, or they hired a monkey to accept the survey for them.
Evangelicals Didn't Fifty-fifty Study for This Test
It'south one thing for Americans in general to lack basic theological knowledge. After all, many of the 75 percent of the state who call themselves Christians don't take their faith that seriously, and the residual are either members of other religions, or take no religion. Only what nigh those who wearable their Christianity on their sleeve? Surely such a group—evangelicals, for instance—would perform much improve.
That's what the folks at LifeWay thought, too. In a similar project conducted 2 years agone, researchers asked participants to self-identify, resulting in an inflated number of professing "evangelicals. Non surprisingly, this group Christmas-treed the survey, espousing all kinds of unorthodox views.
So this year, LifeWay used more stringent criteria for evangelical faith, every bit defined by some group called the National Association of Evangelicals. Only participants who chosen the Bible their highest authority, said personal evangelism is important, and indicated that trusting in Jesus' expiry on the cantankerous is the only way of salvation, were labeled "evangelical." They totaled 586 survey-takers.
Everyone expected them to perform better than most Americans. No one expected them to perform worse. Seven in ten evangelicals—more than than the population at large—said that Jesus was the first being God created. 50-six percent agreed that "the Holy Spirit is a divine force merely not a personal beingness." They also saw a huge increment in evangelicals (28 percent, up from nine pct) who indicated that the Tertiary Person of the Trinity is not equal with God the Father or Jesus, a direct contradiction of orthodox Christianity. The Holy Spirit is, of class, used to being overlooked. But sources say he seemed bummed well-nigh these results.
As before, it's really the contradictory answers, not the outright heresies, that should virtually business organisation u.s.. Past definition, the evangelicals in this survey believed that "but those who trust in Jesus Christ alone every bit their Savior receive God'southward gratuitous gift of eternal salvation." Yet nearly half agreed that "God accepts the worship of all religions including Christianity, Judaism, and Islam."
Two-thirds of evangelicals—more than Americans in general—said heaven is a place where all people will ultimately be reunited with their loved ones. That such a high per centum of Billy Graham's camp is at present talking like Rob Bell isn't even the existent story. The most striking thing is how many of these folks plainly see no contradiction between their casual universalism and the evangelical creed that salvation comes through faith in Christ alone.
"In that location is a lot in this survey which shows that the respondents are not fifty-fifty beingness internally consistent," Timothy Larson, a professor of Christian idea at Wheaton College, told Christianity Today. He suspects the wording of the survey, itself, may take thrown off the participants.
Only could it also have something to do with the fact that two out of five evangelicals say "worshipping solitary or with family is a valid replacement for regularly attending church building"? Come to call up of it, should we marvel that so many Christians shrug off church when so few congregations teach the foundational doctrines of the faith, or fifty-fifty delve very deeply into the volume from which those doctrines come?
The Bible Own't a Lucky Rabbit's Foot
Former Newsday religion reporter Kenneth Briggs recently told Religion News Service that the faith he finds in "mega-type churches" is a "Bible-less," "culling version of Christianity." Scripture, he says, has become "a museum exhibit, hallowed as a treasure just enigmatic and untouched."
In his book, "The Invisible Bestseller: Searching for the Bible in America," he describes a 2-year pilgrimage across the country, visiting hundreds of churches to find Christians who were still literate in their own sacred text.
The Bible remains phenomenally pop, of course. Practically anybody has one in his or her dwelling house, and many families own four or five. But Briggs characterizes our honey for the Bible as love for an "artifact," a "keepsake," or a lucky "rabbit's foot." This talisman of organized religion mainly stays on the shelf or mantle next to the urn filled with granddaddy's ashes.
Briggs says it was in a prison, not a church, where he encountered the most vibrant and intimate familiarity with God's Discussion. About everywhere else, his observations confirmed a recent Barna survey conducted for the American Bible Lodge, which found that less than half the state tin can name the first five books of the Old Testament, and that a like number retrieve John the Baptist was one of Jesus'due south twelve disciples.
Why does information technology matter that we've become a nation of doctrinal dunces? What harm is there in flunking Christianity 101? Well, for Christians, the respond is obvious. If we really believe what we profess—that the incarnation, life, decease, and resurrection of Jesus Christ is the single about important fact of history and eternity—so we'd better improve our grade. Knowing who the God we merits to worship is tin can no longer exist a third priority if we want the world to take us seriously as his followers.
Remember likewise that Jesus told usa knowing the truth sets us free. Believing lies enslaves people. It should be a priority for us to continually seek truth, rather than comfort. Christ also told us the greatest commandment includes loving God with our minds. That means dusting off grandpa's Bible, and revisiting a catechism or confession.
For those who don't profess Christianity, gaining a basic understanding of the creeds and Scriptures of the religion that built our culture isn't a bad thought, either. Equally Indian Christian philosopher Vishal Mangalwadi writes, the Bible created the mod world by making the Due west a reading and thinking civilization, and by grounding this reading and thinking in the idea that truth is knowable.
In the subduction zone between a nominally Christian culture and a distinctly post-Christian one, sparks are flying—in florist's shops, bakeries, universities, legislatures, and bathrooms nationwide. Those who desire to live in peace with the however-sizeable Christian remnant need to move past lazy dismissals of religious "discrimination," and acquire why Christians have come up to the conclusions we have for 2,000 years.
The results of this survey ought to embarrass all of usa. Simply they should as well serve as a kick in the pants to re-familiarize ourselves with our own religion—or at least our ain history. In that location's no alibi to be a nation of heretics. Merely even that is preferable to being a nation of ignoramuses.
Source: https://thefederalist.com/2016/10/10/survey-finds-american-christians-actually-heretics/
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