Theology Thursday: Would you consider coming back to church?

Welcome to Theology Thursday! Theology is the study of God, his relation to the world, and our relation to him. I hope these newsletters help enhance your faith and deepen your love for God and his people, the church.

Today's question:
Why are Christians becoming less Christian?

Pastor Brady's thoughts:
There are many challenges facing the American church today, especially when it comes to attracting new worshippers - sloppy and unbiblical theology and doctrine (important teachings), an oppositional post-Christian culture, inconsistent and at times hostile public policy regarding religion, an erosion of societal trust in institutions in general and the church in particular (some unwarranted, some very warranted), scandal, a confusion of identity and conflation of faith and political power, competition from technology-enabled escapist entertainment and the disassociation it leads to, the prevalence of high-demand youth sports, and so on.

But if you asked me to identify the single biggest problem facing the American church today, I would not focus on any of the external issues but an internal one. In my opinion, the biggest problem in the American church today is the spiritual apathy of those who consider themselves to be Christians.

Put another way: many, many people who claim the faith don’t seem to care about their faith.

Last week, I noted that even for those Americans who consider themselves Christians, faith is becoming less important to them over time. In 2008, 16% of self-identified evangelicals described their church attendance as "seldom" or "never." In 2024, 27% said the same, reporting that they went to church less than once a year.

From the establishment of the global church at the Pentecost event in the book of Acts, attending weekly worship services has been the primary indication and practice of faithful Christians. It’s not the only indication and practice, of course, but it’s the main one. And fewer and fewer American Christians are making regular church worship a priority in their lives.

According to data from Pew Research and The Barna Group, just 25-30% of self-identified Christians in America attend church every week or nearly every week of the year. 40% attend once or twice a month. The rest is less than that. 

Barna’s study found that churchgoers born before 1946 attended, on average, 11 fewer services in 2025 than they did in 2000. Churchgoers born between 1946 and 1964 are at church 7 fewer Sundays every year. That’s between one and a half and three months of skipping church.

All together, American churchgoers average showing up only two out of every five Sundays. “Regular” now means “consistently irregular.”

If you asked American Christians if faith was the most important thing in life, most (nearly all?) would say yes. But it’s not. At least, not by the most quantifiable measure: church attendance.

To make this specific to us, by my count there are probably 345 or so people who would say that MCC is their church. So far in 2026, we've averaged about 220 in weekly attendance.

So, why is this? What’s going on?

At one level, we could point to busyness. Life is full. Weekends are crowded. Kids have games, adults have work spillover, travel is easier than ever, and everyone is tired. But busyness has always existed in one form or another. The deeper issue isn’t that we have too much to do—it’s that we have too little desire for the things of God.

Scripture speaks directly to this condition. In Revelation 2:4, Jesus says to the church in Ephesus, “You have abandoned the love you had at first.” Notice that he doesn’t accuse them of abandoning belief, but of abandoning love. Their doctrine may have been intact and their moral lives respectable, but their hearts had cooled.

This is the essence of spiritual apathy: not outright rejection of God, but a quiet drifting away from him.

The author of Hebrews warns us, “We must pay much closer attention to what we have heard, lest we drift away from it” (Hebrews 2:1). Drift is subtle. It doesn’t happen all at once. No one wakes up one day and decides to stop caring about God. It happens gradually—one missed Sunday, one neglected prayer, one distracted heart at a time.

And over time, what was once central becomes peripheral.

Church attendance, then, is not just a statistic—it’s a symptom. It reveals what we truly value. We always make time for what matters most to us. When gathering with God’s people becomes optional, it’s often because God himself has become optional in our hearts.

But let’s be clear: the call to gather isn’t about checking a religious box. It’s about relationship—with God and with his people. Hebrews 10:24–25 urges us not to neglect meeting together, but to encourage one another. Why? Because we are forgetful people. We need reminding. We need strengthening. We need each other.

When we disengage from the body of Christ, we’re signaling to God and everyone (including our kids) that the thing we say is The Most Important Thing isn’t the most important thing to us, after all.
 
So what’s the solution?

It’s not guilt or shame. And it’s certainly not just trying harder. The solution is a renewed vision of Jesus Christ.

When we truly understand who Jesus is - his holiness, his grace, his sacrifice, his love - what he did for us, and why we need him, our hearts are stirred again. Apathy begins to give way to affection. Duty gives way to delight. Gathering with God’s people no longer feels like an obligation, but a privilege.

The early church in Acts 2:42–47 devoted themselves to teaching, fellowship, breaking bread, and prayer—not because they had to, but because they wanted to. Their hearts had been captured by the gospel.

And that’s what we need today. Church doesn’t need to be more efficient or entertaining, we need revived hearts. We need Christians who don’t just identify with Jesus, but who are truly captivated by him.

So let me ask you, if you are a fellow believer: has your love for Christ grown cold? Have you drifted into a pattern of “consistently irregular, whenever it’s not too inconvenient and I feel like it” church attendance and service?

If so, hear the compassionate but urgent call of Christ: “Remember… repent… and do the works you did at first” (Revelation 2:5).

Come back - to his word, to his people, to worship of him, to his church.
 
Because Christianity was never meant to be a casual affiliation—it is a life of wholehearted devotion to a living savior.

And when that devotion is real, everything else begins to fall back into place.

TO KNOW GOD AND TO MAKE HIM KNOWN!
- Pastor Brady

Have a question for Theology Thursday? Send an email to office@minierchristian.org and we'll respond, or we'll include in a future Theology Thursday Buffet.