To view the video on YouTube: https://youtu.be/vzXcOKtrswk
SHOW NOTES
This week on the Hope Rescue Podcast, Tim and Kimberly are discussing the matter of people leaving Christianity. We are seeing many people in spiritual leadership, whether it’s pastors, worship leaders, or just public figures leaving their faith behind. Why is this happening? Tim and Kimberly have come up with some reasons for why this is occurring.
Kimberly begins by explaining that this is actually a common occurrence in every generation as time goes on. The book of Hebrews was written to people who were abandoning the faith. First John was written about people who abandoned their faith and stopped confessing Jesus Christ as their savior. The Apostle Paul wrote the Letter to the Romans about the same topic. Apostasy is the abandonment or renunciation of a religious or political belief, and this is not a new phenomenon. As children grow into adults, there are always those who leave the practices their parents believed and those who discover their own faith and pursue God. Once children become adults or start developing more profound thoughts about the world around them, they begin to question everything they have been taught to believe, which can be healthy! We should question what we believe and figure out why we believe it to be true. If Christ believers actually dive in and search for answers to their questions, Jesus will always be the answer they will find. So why are Christian leaders leaving Christianity?
Recently, a well known Christian worship leader and songwriter wrote on social media, “I’m genuinely losing my faith, and it doesn’t bother me. Like, what bothers me now is nothing. I am so happy now, so at peace with the world. It’s crazy… Not the ‘I just believe it’ kind of truth. Science keeps piercing the truth of every religion. Lots of things help people change their lives, not just one version of God. Got so much more to say, but for me, I keeping it real. Unfollow if you want, I’ve never been about living my life for others... All I know is what’s true to me right now, and Christianity just seems to me like another religion at this point.”
Another leader in the Christian realm who was a megachurch pastor and author announced through social media in the last few years that he is no longer a Christian. He said, "By all the measurements that I have for defining a Christian, I am not a Christian. Many people tell me that there is a different way to practice faith and I want to remain open to this, but I'm not there now.” If you search the internet for leaders in the Church who have left their faith behind, you would find many more cases just like these two men. Why is this happening?
1. People have a false view of faith. A lot of people view faith as a leap in the dark, but that is not biblical or a solid foundation. Faith in Christ is not a blind faith, but a commitment based on evidence. Hebrews 11:1 says, "Now faith is the substance of things hoped for, the evidence of things not seen.” Romans 10:17 says, “So faith comes from hearing, and hearing through the word of Christ.”
2. People’s faith is not based on a solid foundation. People are trying to base their faith on things other than the Word of God. If we pray for faith but aren’t even opening our bibles, how can we expect to hear from God? Tim explains that we need to saturate our minds with God's Word and it will improve our faith.
3. People’s faith is based on experience theology. Experience theology is trusting and believing in God only when someone experiences God come through with something they have asked of Him. For example, if a mother asks for her child to be healed and he or she is never healed, the mother would not believe in God if her faith is based on experience theology. Tim says, “Experience theology is always weak because it's based on personal life application whereas biblical theology is based on a proper view of God and a solid foundation.”
4. People tend to follow a man or woman instead of following God. Kimberly says, “Often times it's the demise of our faith when we attach it to the failure or success of someone that we respect.” She explains that when our faith is grounded in a person we look up to instead of being grounded in the Word of God, our faith will always tremble because humans aren’t perfect. Tim says, “We cannot put our faith in man because man will always fall short. We have to anchor our faith in Jesus Christ because He is perfect and will never fail us.”
5. People think they know better than God how to love and how justice should play out. In reality, no one is more loving than God. In Job 42, Job says, “I know that you can do all things, and that no purpose of yours can be thwarted. ‘Who is this that hides counsel without knowledge?’ Therefore I have uttered what I did not understand, things too wonderful for me, which I did not know. ‘Hear, and I will speak; I will question you, and you make it known to me.’ I had heard of you by the hearing of the ear, but now my eye sees you; therefore I despise myself, and repent in dust and ashes.” God is omnipotent, omnipresent, omniscient: all powerful, all knowing, and all-present. Isaiah 55:8-9 says “For my thoughts are not your thoughts, neither are your ways my ways,” declares the Lord. “As the heavens are higher than the earth, so are my ways higher than your ways and my thoughts than your thoughts.”
6. People worship in vain or have hollow worship. 2 Timothy 4:3-4 says, “For the time is coming when people will not endure sound teaching, but having itching ears they will accumulate for themselves teachers to suit their own passions, and will turn away from listening to the truth and wander off into myths.” Instead of worshipping the way God has told us in His word, people are worshiping however they want and by saying whatever they want about God. People are worshipping for their own benefit; not because they actually love God.
Join us next week as we discuss the mass shooting epidemic that is occurring in the world today. We love you guys!
QUOTES
“It’s important that we question our faith, but don’t stop there. Pursue your answers.” -Kimberly
“Often times it's the demise of our faith when we attach it to the failure or success of someone that we respect.” -Kimberly
“Experience theology is always weak because it's based on personal life application whereas biblical theology is based on a proper view of God and a solid foundation.” -Tim
“We cannot put our faith in man because man will always fall short. We have to anchor our faith in Jesus Christ because He is perfect and will never fail us.” -Tim
REFERENCED SCRIPTURE
Hebrews 11:1 "Now faith is the substance of things hoped for, the evidence of things not seen.”
Romans 10:17 “So faith comes from hearing, and hearing through the word of Christ.”
2 Timothy 2:15 “Do your best to present yourself to God as one approved, a worker who has no need to be ashamed, rightly handling the word of truth.”
2 Timothy 3:16 “All Scripture is breathed out by God and profitable for teaching, for reproof, for correction, and for training in righteousness”
2 Timothy 4:1 “I charge you in the presence of God and of Christ Jesus, who is to judge the living and the dead, and by his appearing and his kingdom:”
2 Timothy 4:3-4 “For the time is coming when people will not endure sound teaching, but having itching ears they will accumulate for themselves teachers to suit their own passions, and will turn away from listening to the truth and wander off into myths.”
