After three years of extensive research and interviews, the type that Nike and other corporations do on their products. [A research study by Dave Kinnaman and Gabe Lyons] came up with a comprehensive look at what 16-29 year olds think of Christianity…
The top six perceptions of Christians
- Anti-Homosexual – this is towards the person not the deed (96%)
- Judgmental (87%)
- Hypocritical (81%)
- Sheltered
- Politically Motivated
- Insecure
(ht: think christian)
one of the things that i’ve been constantly told is “perception is everything” and is nearly impossible to change. it seems that when we come into any situation or setting the perception that others have of you is generally how they will treat you and interact with you. then it’s no wonder when faced with these statistics why it’s so hard as a christian to interact with those that are not.
as i continually think about what it’s going to be like to jump into the culture of San Francisco and attempt to break the perception of Christians and Christianity I know that right off the bat I’ll be playing catch-up in the perception game, and I do wonder how much more magnified these perceptions will be in San Francisco once we hit the ground. (I’ve been reading a lot of opinion columns in the San Francisco Chronicle and each one of these perceptions is mentioned in nearly every column as it relates to Christianity and Evangelicalism.) i wonder how much these perceptions are magnified in San Francisco and the rest of the country because of our overemphasis on proclamational ministry as opposed to incarnational ministry.
paul in 1 thessalonians says, “lead a quiet life: you should mind your own business and work with your hands, just as we told you, so that your daily life may win the respect of outsiders…” it reminds me of st. francis of assissi who said “preach the gospel always and if necessary use words.” i believe that it’s time for the church to take a step back and hold our tongue because whether we agree or not the perception is that we do not practice what we preach and as a result the church has lost the right to speak into culture—we just don’t seem to know it yet.
i think there is a shift in our approach that needs to happen whereas before it was okay to err on the side of proclamational now we must err on the side of incarnational so that in the future we can find ourselves in balance. it is only through an incarnational approach that the church can ever hope to regain that prophetic voice in our culture.
Related posts:
- Interesting perception…
- the ‘war against christians’.
- overhearing (eavesdropping) can cause immense amounts of anger…
- a million baptism march.
- christian leaders=business managers.
Thus a topic I wrote about a long time back…is it worth saving the word “Christian”? Rob Bell notes something similar to this often…..Christian is supposed to be a noun not an adjective. The money driven church has made it an adjective. I’m of the theory that the name means little in everyday life to me. Call me what you want, hopefully it matches what I live.
the point isn’t so much about changing our terminology or our lingo but rather that we need to earn the right to speak. whether you change the lingo or not the fact still remains, that one will need to earn the right to speak.
by changing the lingo all you will be doing is starting from scratch… and by starting from scratch you’ll need to earn the right to speak. so, either way you’re in the same boat. changing lingo isn’t the answer, living differently is.
I am reading this book called UnChristian that these stats are highlighted. It is by Gabe Lyons and a guy from the Barna group. Really interesting.
that’s the book that this stuff comes from. you’ll have to let me know how it turns out… i’m interested in picking it up sometime and thumbing through it, maybe you’ll have to let me borrow it!
Hey guys. Hope all is well with you.
Ahh yes….. Perception. So many ways to perceive things. I like that quote from St. Francis of Assisi.
Matt –> Sorry for the Whoopin’ I put on ya this week over at ESPN. Wait…. No I’m not!