State of the Church...2024

Every two years Ligonier Ministries, in conjunction with LifeWay Research, conducts a survey of Americans on what they "believe about God, salvation, ethics, and the Bible".  The results of this survey are compiled into a report entitled "The State of Theology".  These results can be seen by going to www.thestateoftheology.com.  They offer an interesting, dare I say disturbing, peek into the visible "church" in America.  

The results of this survey are from 2022 as the results from the 2024 survey have yet to be published.

The survey is not limited to only people who identify themselves as "religious" or "spiritual" or "Christian" or "evangelical".  However, for the purpose of this little series we are embarking upon, we are going to focus on the responses of those participants who identified themselves as "evangelical".  "Evangelicals" were defined by LifeWay Research as people who strongly agreed with these 4 statements in the survey:

1---The Bible is the highest authority for what I believe.

2---It is very important for me personally to encourage non-Christians to trust Jesus Christ as their Savior.

3---Jesus Christ’s death on the cross is the only sacrifice that could remove the penalty of my sin.

4---Only those who trust in Jesus Christ alone as their Savior receive God’s free gift of eternal salvation.

This post, and subsequent follow-up posts, will take a look at responses that were given to survey statements.  This post is merely going to list statements in the survey and the corresponding percentage of "evangelicals" that either agreed or disagreed with said statement.  In the follow-up posts, we will dissect each response and do some biblical evaluation.

The total number of respondents to this survey was 3011.  The number of respondents that identified as "evangelical", according to the parameters set above, was 711.  That is just a shade less than 25% who considered themselves to be Christians.  

Again, keep in mind that the responses to the statements we are focusing upon were given by people that, first and foremost, stated the Bible was the highest authority for what they believe.  Also, keep in mind that we are only listing statements and responses in this post.  Merely seeing these statements and percentages will give you something to chew on for a little while.  We will get into specifics in later follow-up posts.  Let's dive in.

-----God accepts the worship of all religions, including Christianity, Judaism, and Islam.

56% of evangelicals either strongly or somewhat agree with this statement...46% strongly, 10% somewhat.

-----God learns and adapts to different circumstances.

48% of evangelicals either strongly or somewhat agree with this statement...43% strongly, 5% somewhat.

-----Jesus is the first and greatest being created by God.

73% of evangelicals either strongly or somewhat agree with this statement...70% strongly, 3% somewhat.

-----Jesus was a great teacher, but he was not God.

43% of evangelicals either strongly or somewhat agree with this statement...38% strongly, 5% somewhat.

-----The Holy Spirit is a force but is not a personal being.

60% of evangelicals either strongly or somewhat agree with this statement...51% strongly, 9% somewhat.

-----The Holy Spirit can tell me to do something which is forbidden in the Bible.

27% of evangelicals either strongly or somewhat agree with this statement...25% strongly, 2% somewhat.

-----Everyone sins a little, but most people are good by nature.

57% of evangelicals either strongly or somewhat agree with this statement...36% strongly, 21% somewhat.

-----Even the smallest sin deserves eternal damnation.

55% of evangelicals either strongly or somewhat agree with this statement...48% strongly, 7% somewhat.

-----Everyone is born innocent in the eyes of God.

65% of evangelicals either strongly or somewhat agree with this statement...61% strongly, 4% somewhat.

-----Gender identity is a matter of choice.

37% of evangelicals either strongly or somewhat agree with this statement...32% strongly, 5% somewhat

This is just a sampling of 10 statements found in this survey.  There are others that I could have included but these 10 are the ones that stood out to me as being the most disturbing.  I could probably sum up the problem we see here in just one post because the nonsense and, quite honestly heresy, evident here boils down to a common denominator.  But there are shades of nuance in the responses that we can unpack a little to provide a better understanding.

I pray you will stick around as we go forward with this series and, hopefully, together, we will be edified and educated in the process.