WHAT I SEE HAPPENING TO THE CHURCH IN THE 21ST CENTURY
By
Jerry Falwell
I. INTRODUCTION
This sermon is the insight that I have about the Church and what is happening to the Church today. Not everything I will say is good, but these are the things I see happening. Many of these things will be for the good of the Church, and many things will weaken the Church. Nevertheless, here is what I see happening in the Church.
Before I begin talking about the Church, I want to remind you what the Bible says about the Church. Jesus said, “I will build my Church, and the gates of Hell shall not prevail against it” (Matthew 16:18). Therefore, I believe the Church was begun by Jesus Christ, the Church will be protected by Jesus Christ; and the true Church will not suffer what people can do to it. There are four things we can know about the Church from this reference:
· Jesus is the Church-planter, He said, ‘I will build the church.” He began the first Church and works through every church-planter to begin every one of the churches that a Liberty graduate has planted.
· Jesus promised a future to the Church because He said, “I will (future tense) build My church.”
· The church belongs to Jesus Christ. Notice Jesus called it, “My Church.” The church does not belong to the deacons, congregations or pastor, but to Jesus.
· The word church comes from the Greek word ecclesia, which means “gathering of people.” To have a church, God’s people must gather. Technically, the word comes from two Greek words. First, ek, which is “out” and kalleo, which means “to call.” God’s people are called out from the world, and called together around Jesus Christ.
The second verse that demands my love and devotion to a church is Jesus’ example. Paul tells us, "Jesus loved the church and gave Himself for the church" (Ephesians 5:25). Some churches don’t look very strong; some are not very separated; and some are not very spiritual. But if Jesus loved the Church and gave Himself for it, that means we must love the Church and give ourselves in service to Christ through the church.
The third verse that means so much to me is, "And the Lord added to the Church daily such as were being saved" (Acts 2:47). Since the Church is a live body--and bodies grow--I love growing churches. Thomas Road has grown from a handful of adults to one of the mega churches in America. After all of these years, I still believe in saturation evangelism,
"Using every available means to reach every available person at every available time." Someone recently told me that they thought I believed in marketing to build a church, and they were against using marketing in the church. Let me tell you this, I didn’t get saturation evangelism from marketing. I got “superaggressive evangelism” from the Word of God.
Listen to what the critics of the early Jerusalem church said, "Did we not straightly command you that you should not teach in this name? And, behold you have filled Jerusalem with your doctrine" (Acts 5:28). The early Church was fulfilling the purpose of a church, which is to fill its "Jerusalem" with the doctrine of the Lord Jesus Christ. That means going to every house, to every person, to every family, trying to get them saved. That means going in the morning, in the afternoon, in the evening, and in the middle of the night, trying to get them saved. That means using radio, television, bus ministry, soul-winning, mailing; i.e., every available means to reach every available person at every available time.
WHAT I SEE HAPPENING
1. I see more people attending mainline churches, but they will be worshipping less.
Paul predicted the coming of liberalism and the apostate church, “In the latter times, some shall depart from the faith, giving heed to seducing spirits, and doctrine of devils” (I Tim. 4:1).
In another place Paul said, “In the last days, perilous times shall come . . . having a form of godliness, but denying the power thereof” (II Tim. 3:1, 5).
2. I see the number of life-long missionaries going to the foreign field continuing to decline.
In 1985 there were approximately 60,000 missionaries. Today there are less than 40,000 missionaries, and that number will continue to go down. That’s because many veterans, who went to World War II, saw the world and came back to get their education; then they turned to the mission field to evangelize the world. The church is not challenging young people to go take their place.
3. I see the number of short-term lay missionaries continuing to grow in numbers.
In the early 70’s Thomas Road Baptist Church sent a busload of our young people to Mexico to help build Baptist churches. I thought that was a long way off, and that was very extraordinary at the time. Now it seems like every month young people leave Liberty University to go to the mission field to do the Lord’s work. Not only do young people go but also retired people go to the mission field. There are more people going to the mission field as short-term missionaries. I’m not criticizing, I’m always thrilled when people go to carry out the Great Commission.
But many young people have a hard time making a commitment--a commitment to marriage, family, and the ministry for the rest of their life. The positive side of these short-term missionaries, is that many see the field and get a burden for the work of God. They come home, get their support and return.
4. I see more nationals on the mission field doing the work of foreign missions.
Fewer American missionaries are doing the actual work of missionaries. If anything, I’m encouraged to see American missionaries becoming the trainers and facilitators of the nationals to get the job done; and they’re doing it better. They are doing what Paul told Timothy, “The things that thou has heard of me, among many witnesses, the same commit thou to faithful men, who shall be able to teach others also” (II Tim. 2:2).
5. I see the growth and explosion of mega churches on the mission field.
They tell me that most of the larger churches in the world are not in the United States, but are on the mission fields of the world. The largest church in the world is in Seoul, Korea. The Full Gospel Church has approximately 650,000 in attendance each week. Every Friday night they have approximately 65,000 small cell groups meeting in homes around the city--think of 65,000 Bible teachers in a living room teaching the Word of God to laymen. These small groups have produced the largest church in the world.
6. I see great revivals are happening around the world, but not in America.
We see revival sweeping native tribes in Southern Africa. We don’t see that in the United States. C. Peter Wagner wrote the book The Rising Revival to describe the growth of evangelicals in Argentina from approximately 1% in 1980 to almost 20% today. This growth is the result of great revivals going on in that nation. It is happening in charismatic and Pentecostal churches, and I praise God for all those being saved. Great revival is happening in Indonesia, Korea, and other places of the world.
7. I see a growing concern about family issues in the church, and this concern will only get larger as the family gets in more trouble.
As I look around America, I hear more preaching on the family, more books written to help the family, more seminars to teach and strengthen values, and I support them all. I believe our families will continue to be in trouble, and probably with the rise of government agencies to take authority out of the hands of our parents, I believe our families will have more serious problems in the future. So the Church will have to do more for the family than it’s ever done.
8. I see a great challenge to the Church from the growing number of blended families, men and women bringing into marriage children from a previous marriage.
While I never condone divorce, I recognize its presence among us, and the Church must step forward to minister to all involved—father, mother, and children.
This will be a growing need, and the Church will have to do more for the blended family than ever before. We will have to provide more counseling, seminars, classes, day-care centers, Mom’s day out, etc.
9. I see a growing concern about prayer, intercession, and spirituality in the Church.
Everywhere you look you see people, organizations, and those who are committed to praying for the Church. Look at the last year Bill Bright’s conference on prayer and fasting in Houston, Texas. It was carried live on 1,004 Christian television stations through downlink, on many radio stations, and the U. S. Armed Service radio around the world. There are conferences in churches on prayer and there seems to be more prayer meetings. They tell me there are more books written and prayer than ever before. Before Dr. Towns wrote a book on Praying the Lord’s Prayer, he went to a Christian book store to count the books on prayer. He counted 82 books and wondered if the Church needed more books on prayer. I say YES, both books and actual prayer.
10. I see growth of evil, demonism and worship of Satan in the United States.
When I talk about the growth of evil and the Evil One, this does not make me happy. When I began pastoring, no one talked much about any form of demonism or demon possession in the United States, at least not that I knew of. But today, I hear disturbing reports about demon possession in the United States. I see disturbing reports from police departments, where they have to deal with satanic worship and all of the abuses that go with satanic worship here in the United States.
Why is this becoming more prevalent? Because of the absence of light. When you walk out a room and switch off the light, the room suddenly is flooded with darkness. In the United States we have turned off the light of Jesus Christ by taking the Bible out of the public schools, prayer out of public life, the Christmas manger scenes out of shopping centers, and any reference to God in public places at all. When we take the light of Jesus Christ away, Satanism will flood in to fill that vacuum.
11. I see an explosion of lay ministries in America.
If you look at the Promise Keepers Movement, think of the hundreds of thousands of men who go to football stadiums to recommit their life to discipline, purity, and to be a follower of Jesus Christ.
But the lay movement is greater than that one organization. I see lay people involved in ministry everywhere and I am thrilled by it.
12. I see a growth in praise worship in the Church.
Some churches use praise bands to lead worship; others use a form of “blended worship,” where they might use a band or orchestra plus a traditional piano and organ. Some churches are blending together praise singing groups along with the church choir. Whatever is happening, these new praise choruses focus on God . . . they praise God . . . they sing to God . . . they worship God in their music.
When I was young, we sang testimony songs such as “Everyday with Jesus Is Sweeter Than the Day Before” and “Christ for Me.” While the excitement of testimony songs are great, I applaud these young people who sing choruses with scriptural phrases and sing their worship to God.
13. I see more legal restrictions coming from every level of government affecting the church, to prohibit growth, ministry, even the life of the church.
There are building size restrictions, zoning laws, laws concerning signage, the number of people that can assemble for religious purposes. Thirty people can attend an Amway meeting but if thirty attend a prayer meeting, the police are called. Government will come into our church buildings to tell us what we can do in the way of daycare and other forms of ministry to our people. Then the government will tell us what we must add to our ministry that we are not doing. As a matter of fact, I believe that more and more “Big Brother” will try to tell the Church how to do its ministry.
14. I see a return to spirituality among God’s people.
When I first became saved, the greatest thing was to get out into the streets and witness for Jesus Christ or to go fill a Sunday School bus and bring many children to church. There used to be a great passion for evangelism. But that seems to have subsided. Today I see a great passion to know God and to touch God. This passion for spirituality is found in many different ways. When I was first saved, no one talked about fasting, it’s quite common today. The same could be said with keeping journals, meditating on Bible verses, or even learning spiritual discipline. The area of meditation and thinking on God is becoming a bigger issue to Christians. As media, television, and radio penetrate more of our thought life, the Christian must be intentional in putting his thoughts on Jesus Christ.
We must learn to pray daily what David told us, “Let the words of my mouth and the meditations of my heart be acceptable in Thy sight, O Lord, my Strength and my Redeemer” (Psalm 19:14).
15. I see the Internet having a greater influence on the church.
More Christians will have a web page; more churches will have a web page. As young people go online to visit the world, they will visit churches, the web page of Liberty University, and they will go online to get my sermon outline every Sunday as I preach the gospel over the Old Time Gospel Hour.
I see Christians establishing “chat rooms” where they can witness their faith and answer the questions of those who are skeptical and/or agnostic toward Christianity. I feel that Christian web pages are like tracts that we hand out to the unsaved . . . web pages are a way to get our message out. I believe that we have only begun “to touch the hem of this garment.”
16. I see more and more people going into ministry as a second vocation in life.
Look at the Liberty Bible Institute. Over 250 people come to be re-trained in the Bible; about a third of them will go into ministry every year. But retired people are not just coming to the Liberty Bible Institute they are going in “support roles” to the mission fields. Roy and Anita Boudoin went to Bosnia in a support role to the missionaries. They were commissioned and sent by the SBC Foreign Mission Board. Two years ago, Roy was a section leader in my Sunday School class, working over by the organ. As we look around the country, there are new innovative Bible institutes/Bible colleges in local churches that are growing to train lay people for ministry. They are growing in Pentecostal churches, Independent churches, ethnic minority churches, and for the most part, in those churches which are aggressive and fundamental in evangelism. As an illustration, in 1980 there were no Korean language seminaries in the United States. Now, according to C. Peter Wagner, there are 60 Korean-speaking seminaries in the United States; they are learning in the Korean language. When liberal and Roman Catholic seminaries are dying for lack of ministerial recruits, the aggressive Koreans have begun 60 seminaries right under our noses.
17. There is a growth of foreign language churches in the United States.
Twenty or thirty years ago I would have thought that everyone in the United States wanted to speak English, and that the number of foreign language churches in our nation was declining. That happened for a while, but with the rapid influx of immigrants, we see an explosion of Korean-speaking churches. In 1980 there were 280 Korean-speaking churches, but today there are between 4,000 and 5,000 such churches within our borders. The young Nok Presbyterian Church of Anaheim, California, has between 4,000 and 5,000 worshipping every Sunday, and the steeple of that church can be seen from Disneyland of California.
Everywhere I go, I see foreign language signs on church billboards announcing services in foreign languages such as Korean, Chinese, Thai, Vietnamese, Arabic, or some other language I don’t recognize.
18. I see the continued growth of the number of small churches will continue to grow.
I don’t think the large church will ever put the small church out of business. The small church will always need the large church in a “brother’s keeper” role. The large church will be there for innovation, fighting battles, holding mass meetings and pointing the way into the future. But there will always be the small church, because many people like to be involved in a small church because of its intimacy. Don’t forget just as all of us were babies at one time, all large churches were small at one time.
19. I see the number of large churches continuing to increase in the United States.
When Dr. Towns first listed the 100 largest churches in America in 1967, only 98 of the churches had an average attendance of more than one thousand a week. Today, according to Dr. Towns and John Vaughan who keeps the figures, there are approximately 8,000 churches that have over 1,000 attendees each week. In the last thirty-three years there has been an explosion of mega churches in the United States. I don’t believe that trend has run its full course. I believe there will be many more large churches in the United States.
20. I see a growth in many churches of the small groups.
I’ve already told you how the largest church in the world has 65,000 small groups every Friday evening. I see some churches in America that are growing in evangelism through small groups. This is not in all churches, but I think as we grow into a massive society where people suffer anonymity, more people will be reached for Christ by the intimacy of small groups. Many churches will have a great evangelistic harvest through small groups, as do the Korean churches.
21. I do not see Sunday School dying.
I believe that Sunday school will always be strong, especially in Independent Baptist, Southern Baptist, and Nazarene churches. Most denominations that are committed to teaching all the Word of God to all its members on a weekly basis will continue to have strong, thriving Sunday schools. Some new churches have neglected Sunday school; I am concerned about their commitment to biblical content and doctrine. If their people are not grounded in biblical principles which come from Sunday School, will those churches have a long range healthy life?
22. I believe that revival will come from Generation X and the next young people after them.
When I go on campus at Liberty University, I see Generation X young people who seek God, learn God, know God, and love to serve Him. I see prayer meetings everywhere. These are the young people that can bring revival to America.
23. I see a growing number of churches scheduling to reach more people for Christ.
When we first started talking about going to a second service at Thomas Road, we did it because the young people at Liberty University couldn’t fit into our regular service. Then we had to have a service for them on the campus. There are some churches that have many multiple services. The Ward Presbyterian Church, Livonia, Michigan, is the biggest church in Detroit, Michigan. I always thought that the Baptists were the biggest in Detroit, such as Temple Baptist Church, Calvary Baptist Church, or Highland Park Baptist Church. But Ward Presbyterian Church recently had five morning services and at the same time, five Sunday Schools. I thought that was a lot, until I talked to the pastor of the Young Nok Presbyterian Church, in Seoul, Korea. This is the largest Presbyterian church in the world, and the largest Presbyterian church in history. Pastor Park told me that he preaches the same sermon seven times every Sunday, beginning at a 6:00 A.M. service every Sunday. I don’t think that will happen very often in the United States. Many pastors don’t get up before 6:00 A.M. But, I do see many churches going to multiple church services. They can grow without buying more property and building more buildings. It’s good stewardship of their money and building resources, plus it gives the people an option to come when it is most convenient to their schedule.
24. I see denominational walls coming down.
All I have to do is look at Liberty University. When we first began, almost all of our students came from Independent Baptist churches. Today we can say that Liberty University honestly reflects the body of Christ. Young people used to only go to Baptist schools if they came from Baptist churches. Now they choose the school which is best for them. Denomination is not even a first or second consideration. Young people are choosing Christian colleges like adults transfer their membership when moving from one city to another. They don’t always look to the denominational name, they look to the church where God is moving and souls are being saved. They go to the church that meets their needs. While I don’t like this, and I wish that our Baptist churches were stronger, I praise God for all churches that are carrying out the work of God.
25. I see doctrinal walls are coming down.
There was a time when Calvinists didn’t want anything to do with Arminianism. There was a time when every Spring I knew that arguments would come up at Liberty University on five points of Calvinism. As a matter of fact, I said those arguments came up as regularly as dandelions each Spring. But many young people don’t care about those distinctions anymore. They want to know Jesus Christ and learn He meets the needs of their life. I see doctrinal walls coming down, but at the same time I see a stronger commitment by more people to the five fundamentals of the faith. I am still a Fundamentalist, and the five fundamentals are still essential. You cannot have Christianity without the five fundamentals of the faith:
1. The verbal plenary inspiration of the Scripture because the Bible is our authority in faith and practice.
2. The virgin birth of Jesus Christ reflecting His deity.
3. The vicarious substitutionary blood atonement of Jesus Christ for sins.
4. The physical resurrection of Jesus Christ from the grave.
5. The bodily return of Jesus Christ at the end of time.
If you have never really accepted Jesus as your personal Savior, would you do it right now? Do not delay or put it off. If you would like to receive Christ by faith, pray this simple prayer in your heart:
Dear Lord, I acknowledge that I am a sinner. I believe Jesus died for my sins on the cross, and rose again the third day. I repent of my sins. By faith I receive the Lord Jesus as my Savior. You promised to save me, and I believe You, because You are God and cannot lie. I believe right now that the Lord Jesus is my personal Savior, and that all my sins are forgiven through His precious blood. I thank You, dear Lord, for saving me. In Jesus’ name, Amen.
If you prayed that prayer, God heard you and saved you. I personally want to welcome you to the family of God. Contact us and ask for a copy of The How To Book or use The How To Book Online (Falwell.com). It is a booklet that will answer many of the questions you are sure to have about living the Christian life. And when you contact us, tell us about your salvation experience so that we can rejoice with you.
