Let me start by clarifying the title of today’s message. A rolling stone gathers no moss is an old proverb, credited to Publilius Syrus, a writer of the 1st century B.C. who in his Sententiae states, People who are always moving, with no roots in one place, avoid responsibilities and cares. As such, the proverb is often interpreted as referring to figurative nomads who avoid taking on responsibilities or cultivating or advancing their own knowledge, experience, or culture. Another interpretation equates "moss" to "stagnation"; as such the proverb can also refer to those who keep moving as never lacking for fresh ideas or creativity. To my knowledge, Publilius Syrus was not a Christian.
Variations of the proverbs use has been made famous in various songs and ballads such as Don McLean’s American Pie... "… moss grows fat on a rolling stone, but that's not how it used to be." Or, Hank Williams 1952 hit "Lost Highway" which begins "I'm a rollin stone, all alone and lost, for a life of sin I've paid the cost."
Now, how can we apply this old proverb to the Church of our Lord, Jesus Christ? As you read today’s message, think of what God expects of each member of His Church... to grow in knowledge and wisdom; to change one’s self-centered attitudes, to abandon carnal desires, to literally change the course and direction of your life; to avoid stagnation, to care for others; to proclaim in word, deed and actions the gospel of Jesus Christ. That’s a brief synopsis of what God expects from anyone who claims His free gift of salvation.
There are two useful applications of the proverb to the Church: the first would be, “no moss” grows on a body of believers doing what God expects of His people, heading in the right direction – growing in Christ-likeness, being the salt and light of the world, standing firmly for holiness in Christian living… moving, doing, growing, avoiding the “moss-like” staining effects of a sin-filled world. Now, if we equate “moss” to be akin to the things of the world –– then sinfulness is infiltrating the Church. Infiltration happens because worldliness [moss-like sins] is firmly rooted in a person’s life. So, the second application would be “moss” does grow on the Church that is not adhering to the absolute truths of God’s Word – not moving, not doing, not growing in spiritual health and maturity. Moss-covered congregants look and act no different than the moss-covered unbelievers of any other secular institution in the world today. What does the Bible say about this?
“They are from the world; therefore they speak as from the world, and the world listens to them. We are from God; he who knows God listens to us; he who is not from God does not listen to us. By this we know the spirit of truth and the spirit of error.” (1John 4:5, 6)
John was talking about people within the Church who acted no different than the people of the non-christian world.
Now, consider the challenge of growing the Church. Everyone seems to think that’s what must be done... grow the Church in numbers. Surely if the Church is bigger, then it means it’s more blessed. Listen to this viewpoint from a well known church leader... “It is my deep conviction that anybody can be won to Christ if you discover the key to his or her heart. It may take some time to identify it. But the most likely place to start is with the person’s felt needs.” (opinion of megachurchmeister Rick Warren)
If we evaluate what the Apostle John said with what well know Church Growth advocates say, we encounter a problem. A very serious problem.
John says that the world will not listen to a true, unsullied Christian message. Rick Warren says that anybody can be won to Christ if we discover a message that will interest them through promising to meet their emotional needs. These concepts are contradictory and frankly dangerous.
The Biblical idea is straight-forward: we must speak God’s unchanging message of the gospel whether the world hates the messengers or not: “If you were of the world, the world would love its own; but because you are not of the world, but I chose you out of the world, therefore the world hates you” (John 15:19). The Church Growth idea is that we must study man (using the latest sociological, psychological, and anthropological insights) to determine how to create a church that will grow and a message that will be popular through appealing to a target audience. Someone is desperately wrong here and I do not think it is the inspired Apostle John.
Whatever good the Church Growth Movement has done, if any, it has convinced the majority of church leaders that if their local congregation is not growing, this is a sure sign they are “unhealthy” and failing. Again megachurchmeister Rick Warren says... “Forget church growth, Church health is the key to church growth. All living things grow if they’re healthy. You don’t have to make them grow -- it’s just natural for living organisms.” So, according to this thinking, failure to grow is a sign of disease or sickness. These pontifications by Warren and others Church growth proponents have convinced other church leaders that they are failing, leaving them desperate for a solution. Moss grows fat on a rolling stone...?
So, what’s the real story in America’s Church? In that past fifty years, weekly church attendance in America has not risen in terms of the percentage of the population. Church growth advocates often cite the figure that 80% of churches are declining or are in a state of plateau. Seminaries use that figure to support the need to learn church growth concepts. Since the movement has yet to reverse the trends, another way of interpreting these figures is to know that if you accept the definitions of the Church Growth Movement, 80% of all those going into the ministry are failing to grow their congregations.
Okay, now for the other marketing spin... we could say that the Church is in the midst of a global revival. All around us we are seeing the phenomenal rise of megachurches with congregations in the tens of thousands; pockets of revival have sprung up in the United States and other parts of the world; and we have heard and read reports of millions of people in Russia, China, and Africa coming to Christ. (this article will not debate the validity of how those millions came to Christ, and whether the conversions are aligned with Biblical Salvation.)
One evangelist, for example, claims that his worldwide tour has led nearly 1 million people to make decisions for Christ since 2007. A denomination reported nearly 2.5 million decisions for Christ in 2008. One international organization reported over 10 million decisions for Christ in 2009, and another ministry has seen an incredible “45 million documented salvations” worldwide in just six years.
It would seem Jesus is really popular! These are indeed incredible numbers, if they’re true and real. Or, maybe they’re a false illusion based on flawed growth strategies and unbiblical assumptions about what constitutes a true devoted follower of Jesus Christ. More moss on a rolling stone???
With all the excitement about the growth of the contemporary Church, it seems that many have overlooked a few statistical inconsistencies. Before we look at these, I want to remind you of that doctor who said to his patient, “I have some very bad news for you. Your heart is extremely weak, and any bad news could kill you.” So, how is your heart? Here comes some really bad news about the Church today. It’s about your congregation. It’s a profile of people you know. Maybe even you, who call themselves Christians. As you hear it, please be consoled that there is light at the end of this long dark tunnel.
An October 2003 survey conducted by the Barna Group found that 45 percent of those who profess to be born-again Christians believed that gambling was morally acceptable. According to the survey, 49 percent believed that “living with someone of the opposite sex without being married” was morally okay. Just under half of those questioned (49 percent) were comfortable with “enjoying sexual thoughts or fantasies about someone,” while one third (33 percent) of those professing to be born again thought that it was okay to kill a baby while it is still in the womb.
In 2001, a survey conducted by the Alan Guttmacher Institute in New York found that “13 percent of abortion patients describe themselves as born-again evangelical Christians.” That is, of all those who actually murdered their own unborn children, nearly one in eight professed faith in Jesus Christ. That is difficult to reconcile with the fact that Christians are supposed to love God and love others as much as they love themselves. Yeah, this IS moss growing fat on a rolling stone!
According to an article titled “Porn Nation” in World Magazine, of the men belonging to the Christian organization Promise Keepers (who make a promise to be “committed to practicing spiritual, moral, ethical, and sexual purity”), 53 percent visit porn sites every week. This alarming finding is not confined to the pews. An Internet survey of 6,000 pastors conducted in 2002 found that 30 percent of pastors had viewed Internet porn in the last 30 days. This is despite the fact that these men are to be the spiritual leaders of their flocks and their families.
In 2009, the Barna Group found further evidence that all is not well in the contemporary Church:
Among individuals who describe themselves as Christian... close to half believe that Satan does not exist, one-third contend that Jesus sinned while He was on earth, two-fifths say they do not have a responsibility to share the Christian faith with others, and one-quarter dismiss the idea that the Bible is accurate in all of the principles it teaches.
Think for a moment of the implications of such moss-laden theology. Here we have millions of “believers” who supposedly confess that Jesus is Lord, and yet they think He sinned??? They either don’t know what the Bible teaches about the Son of God or they believe it is inaccurate when it says that Jesus “knew no sin” (2 Corinthians 5:21), that He was “in all points tempted as we are, yet without sin” (Hebrews 4:15), and that He “committed no sin, nor was deceit found in His mouth” (1 Peter 2:22).
Furthermore, if Jesus sinned, it would mean that He was not the spotless Lamb of God the Scriptures say He was (see 1 Peter 1:19); that His sacrifice was not perfect; and that when God accepted Jesus’ death as an atonement for our sins, He sanctioned a “contaminated payment” and is therefore corrupt by nature. Sadly, the multitudes who profess faith in Jesus, yet deny His sinless perfection, appear to be strangers to true spiritual regeneration. The Jesus they believe in isn’t capable of saving anyone. Moss, lots of moss growing on a stagnant stone!
In addition, 41 percent of self-proclaimed Christians believe that “the Bible, the Koran and the Book of Mormon are all different expressions of the same spiritual truths”— despite the books’ vastly contradictory teachings on truth, salvation, and the nature of God. And only 46 percent of born-again Christian adults believe in the existence of absolute moral truth. So that means the other 54 percent don’t think that God has moral absolutes, which perhaps explains why so many live their lives as though there is no moral accountability at all.
Pollster George Barna, in observing these troubling trends, noted, “Although most Americans consider themselves to be Christian and say they know the content of the Bible, less than one out of ten Americans demonstrate such knowledge through their attitudes and actions. ”With over 173 million Christians in the U.S., there are tens of millions who say that they love God and yet they are liars, thieves, fornicators, adulterers, and child-murderers.
Paul’s warning to Titus seems to be true of much of the modern Church: “They profess to know God, but in works they deny Him” (Titus 1:16). Neither their beliefs nor their behavior aligns with biblical Christianity.
Prolific author and pastor A.W. Tozer writes, “It is my opinion that tens of thousands of people, if not millions, have been brought into some kind of religious experience by accepting Christ, and they have not been saved.” Tozer is not alone in his conclusion. The late preacher D. James Kennedy, of Coral Ridge Ministries, made a similar observation: “The vast majority of people who are members of churches in America today are not Christians. I say that without the slightest fear of contradiction. I base it on empirical evidence of twenty-four years of examining thousands of people.”
How could this tragic situation have happened? How could vast numbers of people have been led to believe that they are Christians when they are not? I am convinced that one major reason "the Church" and Christianity have failed miserably to have a positive impact on American culture, and to represent Christ as "salt and light", is that most who claim to follow Jesus are little more than "fans" of Jesus. We enjoy the “outward appearance” of being churched, we like the entertaining and cheer-leading services on Sunday, but the rest of the week we live an ungodly, unholy, self-centered lifestyle that belies what we have professed. Obviously many so-called Christians either don’t understand what it means to be a Christian or just don’t care. Behavior and conduct certainly suggest that such people do not take God seriously. Moss indeed, grows fat on this rolling stone –– a sin-infected Church rolling towards confrontation with and rejection by Christ, if changes are not made now!
What an awful example for the generation coming of age in today’s Church. Sadly, young people today are exhibiting the same theological confusion as their parents and the preceding generation. Despite 8 out of 10 teens describing themselves as Christian, 61 percent believe a place in Heaven can be earned through good works; 63 percent believe Muslims, Buddhists, Christians, Jews, and all other people pray to the same God; and 58 percent believe all religious faiths teach equally valid truths.
As with adults, the behavior of youth who describe themselves as Christian is virtually indistinguishable from that of non-Christians. An “Ethics of American Youth Survey” found that in the prior 12 months 74 percent of Christian teens cheated on a test, 93 percent lied to a parent, and 63 percent physically hurt someone when angered. The Barna Group also found that teens who profess to be born again and attend church regularly were just as likely as secular teens to engage in Internet theft of music and to illegally copy CDs (77 percent to 81 percent, respectively).
In a joint statement, youth specialists Josh McDowell and Ron Luce made a sobering announcement: “Incredible as it may seem, ‘accepting Christ’ and making a profession of faith makes little to no difference in a young person’s attitudes and behaviors. The majority of our churched young people are adopting ‘a form of Christianity’ but it is not true Christianity.” While this is a shocking admission, McDowell and Luce are not alone in their conclusion. Ninety-eight percent of youth ministers and leaders like McDowell surveyed, agree with that assessment.
More moss on the rolling stone... if everything you’ve read so far isn’t alarming enough, another trend is helping to further paint a bleak picture of the state of the American Church.
In researching families in the U.S., the Southern Baptist Council on Family Life discovered a gut-wrenching statistic: “88 percent of the children raised in evangelical homes leave church at the age of 18, never to return.”18 This mass exodus is seen not just among Southern Baptist churches, but across denominational lines.
In an interview on a popular national radio program, a Christian youth leader spoke with great concern about how young people were “leaving the church in droves.” He had taken a survey to find out why these teenagers were turning their backs on God, and he cited the number one reason as “a lack of opportunity in the church”— implying that the Church should get its act together and give young people more opportunities.
Ask any preacher or elder/pastor, if there are opportunities to serve within their congregation, and they will no doubt tell you of the lack of people willing to teach Sunday school, visit the sick and the elderly, go out with the evangelism team, clean the church building, etc.
Perhaps there is another reason that young people are leaving the Church in droves. As these statistics show, there are many today who name the name of Christ, but who have failed to “depart from iniquity [lawlessness, ungodliness]” (2 Timothy 2:19). They are false converts who have failed to calculate the cost of discipleship and remain unconverted because they have never truly repented and changed their life course.
What can you say to this evidence? Is is not truly heartbreaking to know and see so many spurious converts who have left the Church, and the multitudes of false converts who stay within the Church.
Why is there is so much “spiritual apathy” in the Church today? The cause cannot be avoided or ignored... it is due to the vast numbers of “unregenerate members.” If you decide to accept the research validated statistics offered in this article, then you have to come face-to-face with the church you attend, your fellow congregants... and yourself. What does it say? Moss is firmly rooted on the rolling stone of the stagnant Church... and the reality is heart-breaking... this publicly available research approximates that nearly one-half, 50% of all church members are most likely not true Christians.
Maybe you are in what seems to be the minority of devoted passionate Christians. If you have struggled to understand why a loved one who made a “decision for Christ” has no desire for the things of God, or why so many church members show little to no evidence for their faith, there is an explanation.
There is something you can do to change the situation. Next week we’ll probe solutions to the problem. Be warned... all solutions come with a “free will” option. You can embrace what God wants from a professing Christian, or you can blow it off and continue living for yourself, attending a church that will welcome you right along with your carnal thoughts and evil desires.
