UnChristian

Well, it's birthday week in the Freeland household. The dog celebrates her 3rd birthday today which, if you know my wife, is a big deal. They're at PetSmart picking out a birthday present right now. I'm sure it will have a squeaker. Lucky me.

Kari's birthday is tomorrow, which is just great. Actually, she's pretty easy to shop for, and I've got this new idea for dinner. One of the guys in the singles ministry just reminded me that as long as you sit down, Taco Bueno qualifies as a "sit down" restaurant. Then again, maybe that's why he's still single!

Meanwhile, back in the real world, I just finished a book by David Kinnaman and Gabe Lyons called "UnChristian." Kinnaman is the president of the Barna Group, and must be older than he looks in his picture on the inside flap of the book. Gabe Lyons works for a new venture called Fermi Project after several years as the Vice President of INJOY with John Maxwell. I've listened to Gabe's "Catalyst Podcast" for the past couple of years, and was excited to read their new book.

"UnChristian," in typical Barna fashion, is loaded to the hilt with statistics and survey results with regard to the current perceptions and thoughts of twenty-somethings when it comes to the Church. The results indicate that the vast majority of twenty-somethings, when asked whether or not the Church today reflects the Person of Jesus Christ, answer "no." The surveys span a time frame of around three years of research.

UnChristian attempts to answer why the average twentysomething believes the Church is "UnChristian." Survey says: the Church today is "hypocritical, agenda-oriented, intolerant, sheltered, out-of-touch, and judgmental."

Surprise!

Kinnaman recommends that the Church work to change the perception by responding in a Christlike fashion to criticism rather than dismissing it as heresy, developing honest connections with twenty-something people, employing creativity, serving people, and living a lifestyle of compassion. It's hard to argue with that.

Despite the provocative title, this book is all about statistics and survey results. There is very little in this book that you're going to find controversial, or even ground breaking. Basically, you'll simply find statistics that back up what you've been hearing and reading elsewhere. Nothing wrong with that.

At the end of each chapter, several Christian leaders have written brief snippets of insight on each particular issue. These short vignettes are written by everyone from Margaret Feinberg to Chuck Colson, with a slant more towards younger leaders. These are often interesting, but kill a little of the momentum in the book, and compounded with the sheer volume of statistics make this book extremely difficult to read.

Even so, if you are a person who likes to see hard evidence for opinions, it's a good book to pick up to use as a resource. But I'm not completely convinced that it moves us very much farther down the road of actually making a difference. UnChristian is a good book, with some good statistics. It just feels pretty weak on real-life solutions to me.

It is obvious that we twenty-somethings have a skewed view of the Church. Kinnaman's research shows it, and many other authors have pointed to it. The challenge is, some of the problem is with the Church; some of the problem is with we twenty-somethings.

A good deal of twenty-somethings' dissatisfaction with the church can be blamed on those in the church who are agenda-driven - who use Christianity to make political statements. Need I mention Reverend Al Sharpton, or the "Christian Right" all the politicians are sucking up to today? Some of our dissatisfaction with the church can be blamed on people who are hate-mongers and homophobes in the truest sense of the word. Those wackos in Topeka deserve every single penny of the $10.9M fine for showing up at the funerals of our servicemen and servicewomen with their "God Hates Fags" signs.

But a good deal of twenty-somethings' dissatisfaction with the church can be blamed on the fact that we as twenty-somethings tend to be a selfish, inward-focused, ungrateful bunch. And with that in mind, the real challenge isn't figuring out how to revolutionize our churches so the selfish people can have it their way - that's a pipe dream because we'll just create a new group of dissatisfied people.

Why in the world are we preaching so hard at the majority to squeeze into the mold of a selfish, misguided minority? Aren't we going about this the wrong way? We don't need to revolutionize the Church so much as we need to help twenty-somethings today begin to gain a bigger perspective about what the Church is really about. We need to be platforming the churches who are doctrinally sound, people-loving, externally-focused, multi-generational representatives of God's intention for His Body on earth, rather than continuing to allow the poor representatives to speak more clearly. We need to be inviting twenty-somethings into relationships that already exist, and helping them move beyond selfish idealism to reality and maturity.

In fairness, I think that's the purpose of Fermi Project. I think they're working to head in the right direction. But I'm craving a book that presents a balanced perspective of the issues from both ends of the spectrum rather than either (1) a book bashing the twenty-somethings as young, stupid, and uninformed, or (2) a book bashing the older generations as old, out of touch, and uninformed. There's a middle somewhere in there, and I'd love it if someone would help me figure out how to live there.