East Leake Evangelical Church

When we look at the news each week and see the moral decline in the nation, the growing antagonism and open prejudice against Christianity, and the moves to force everyone in the country to accept things that are unacceptable to true followers of Jesus Christ, we can become very discouraged and believe the claim that “Christianity is finished.”

But that is far from true. Even within our own country there are many instances of Churches growing and people of all ages and backgrounds coming to faith in Jesus Christ. Having said that we have to recognise that in the UK Christianity is not as vibrant and influential as it once was. And that same situation applies to much of Western Europe and to some degree in Australia and Canada.

Yet we have to see things on the wider screen. Across the rest of the world the situation is very different. In South America, Africa and Asia, and even in the USA, Christianity is growing and spreading at an amazing rate. The predictions of the intelligentsia in the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries of the eventual demise of Christianity have been found to be wrong. Over the last two centuries a great debate has gone on between what is called modernity and Christianity, and to many people’s surprise Christianity has won the argument. This is the claim of a book published by Penguin called “God is Back: How the Global Revival of Faith is Changing the World”. It is written by John Micklethwait (editor-in-chief of the Economist) and Adrian Woodbridge (Washington correspondent for the Economist).

What evidence can be sighted to support this claim? Newsweek recently published some statistics to show that the number of atheists in the USA had jumped by 10 percent to 16 percent, but at the same time there was a substantial rise in those who described themselves as committed Evangelicals and Pentecostals. Indeed 75 percent of people in the USA describe themselves as Christian. Statistics can, of course, be misleading and do not tell what sort of faith these people would really have. Nonetheless the evidence is clear that there is a strong Christian element within the most advanced country in the world.

That same evidence can be found across the rest of the world. So Micklethwait and Woodbridge claim that “everywhere in the developing world fiery preachers are preaching a faith that teaches: Live your life according to God’s law, read the Bible as the literal word of Truth, treat your neighbour as yourself.” That is the Gospel we preach and what the Bible teaches. What is being described is the Gospel having its normal effect in the lives of people who hear it. As the writers acknowledge this message provides life with meaning and purpose. Lives are being powerfully changed and those people are having a significant influence in their communities. This was also what the Times columnist, and leading anti-Christian and pro-gay writer, Matthew Parris had to report after returning to Africa where he was born for a few months trip. He recognised the entirely beneficial impacts of the lives of Christians throughout that continent.

So it is Christians who are at the forefront of meeting the needs of people in so many parts of the earth. There are a “million villages around the world that don’t have a school, a clinic, a hospital, a fire department or a post office, but they have got a church.” And the believers are showing practical care to those in need. That would be the situation in China where the growth of the Church is awesome and soon that nation will have the most Christians of any nation on earth.

But the influence and value of Christian faith is seen more widely than even that. These authors observe that “there is considerable evidence that, regardless of wealth, Christians are healthier and happier than their secular brethren.” One American doctor maintains that weekly church attendance can add two or three years to your life. A more structured research by Duke University of 7,000 older people found that religious observance might enhance immune systems and lower blood pressure. It is certainly well accepted that people with ‘faith’ recover from serious illness more quickly and live longer. Similar studies have also shown that there is a correlation between happiness and church attendance.

The influence of a real faith in Christ is also seen in the reduction of bad behaviour and unacceptable lifestyles. A study in the USA by Richard Freeman of Harvard University found that black young people who professed Christ were less likely to commit crimes or take drugs. Similar studies have also shown that girls from Christian homes are less likely to become pregnant as teenagers. (That research was seriously misrepresented by a Government Minister recently when Beverly Hughes dismissed the value of teaching abstinence from sexual behaviour, even though it can clearly be shown that children from Christian homes are far, far less likely to become pregnant in their teenage years and outside marriage).

It is refreshing to see a book actually telling us what we really know. Jesus Christ does change lives and faith in Him produces lifestyles that are wholesome and beneficial. That is exactly what the Bible promises.

But it raises a serious question for us in the UK. Why do we not see the Gospel having that effect in our country? As I have already pointed out there are numbers of Churches throughout the UK that are seeing people converted and having their lives changed. But we must recognise that overall the Gospel is not having the dramatic effect in the UK that it is elsewhere. There are factors that impede the growth of the Gospel in our own land. Let me just list a few -

•  The Media in Britain are set against the Gospel of Jesus Christ. The evidence for this is extensive and the attitude of the Director of the BBC is typical - Mark Thompson has stated quite clearly that he believes Christianity should get a less favourable presentation than any other religion or viewpoint. This same anti-Christian bias is seen in every branch of the Media.
  
• Within education children are given a very biased understanding of the world itself and especially of Christianity. The place given to evolutionary thinking and philosophy amounts to a form of indoctrination. Similarly on moral issues the stance taken is destructive. The SEAL programme (the social and emotional effects of learning) has been shown to be very damaging to true education (“The Rise of Therapeutic Education” by Kathryn Ecclestone and Dennis Hayes published by Routledge). It has produced a focus on self that is unhelpful to children and antagonistic to the Gospel.
  
• Material prosperity and physical well-being have diverted people’s attention from spiritual realities. Added to this, the prevailing humanistic mindset which has been dominant for the last 100 years has caused people to think that this life is everything. The challenge of the Gospel to be right with God has not resonated in people’s minds and experiences.
  
• The presentation of the Truth of the Gospel by the Church has been extremely muddled and confused. Spokesmen for the Church in the public arena are often unbelievers themselves. The problems of the Anglican Church are the primary image that many people have of Christianity. Evangelical Churches, for too much of the last century, have been preoccupied with a siege mentality.
  
•  We have seen in Britain over a hundred years of decline in the Church as all sorts of false teaching and heresies have gripped her, and the Gospel has become submerged under a morass of error and departure from truth. There is a need for a clear voice and a revival of true preaching that will awaken people, but instead we tend to be too comfortable and too accepting of where we are.
  
• Christians themselves have to carry much of the responsibility for the decline of influence. We are not as distinctive in our living as we ought to be and our testimony is inhibited because of this. And in the matter of prayer we have failed to wrestle with God as we ought to. How little time we spend in praying compared to watching television or engaging in our relaxation and pleasures. Are we not ourselves far too materialistic?

Those are some of the reasons for the ineffectiveness of the Gospel in our own land. There are others, and not the least is the sovereign will and holiness of God. How then should we react? We should firstly examine ourselves both corporately and individually. Then we should give ourselves to prayer and seeking God in repentance (I read of a Church in the USA that has 16 prayer meetings a week - and unsurprisingly has grown at an amazing rate). We should also be more earnest and determined in our Gospel witness. If God is blessing in so many parts of the earth as He is, why should we not know that same blessing? He is able - do we believe it?