Should have written “our congregation”, not “your congregation”. Still working on my first cup of coffee.
“Second, we have to recognize that SBC trends looked great when our neighbors gained social capital by joining our churches. They gained social status and trust within the community by joining the First Baptist Church or another evangelical congregation. That is no longer the case. Now, given secularization and the sexual and moral revolutions utterly reshaping our culture, our neighbors may well lose social capital by joining our churches. The age of cultural or nominal Christianity is fast coming to a close....
The second observation that would quickly come is that our methods of evangelism are not as effective as they once were. Honestly, that argument is beyond refute. Southern Baptist growth was largely driven by revivalism and its programs. We should not be surprised that revivalism is most effective in a context of Christian cultural dominance....
Fourth, we have to wonder if Southern Baptists still believe that people who do not know Christ are headed for hell. I have no doubt that most SBC church members would answer that question rightly, but this does not mean that they believe it fervently. We should be concerned that a form of religion rightly described by Christian Smith as “Moralistic Therapeutic Deism” [MTD] is now what is actually believed by many who consider themselves faithful Southern Baptists.....
For many children growing up with Christian parents, the priority of the family is told otherwise. Many Christian parents have bought into the larger culture’s portrait of the good childhood, complete with incessant sports activities, violin and ballet lessons, and activities perceived to boost a child’s eventual college admissions application.....”
“We should be concerned that a form of religion rightly described by Christian Smith as “Moralistic Therapeutic Deism” [MTD] is now what is actually believed by many who consider themselves faithful Southern Baptists.....”