The Future of the American Church

I spend a good deal of time thinking about the church and faith on various levels. I love church history, and looking at trends, practices, and the evolution of what we call Christianity.

It’s impossible for me to remove my own personal experience from that equation, as a guy who grew up in a liturgical, United Methodist tradition; who viewed the rise of the religious right in the 1980′s and 1990′s; who was a part of the seeker-friendly, post-modern mega church movement in the early days of my own ministry; who experienced being a part of church plants and splits (better spoken, I was a part of a church split that called themselves a plant…I didn’t realize this until I had been on staff for quite a while); who had great moments of triumph and equally emotional moments of defeat as a pastor; who ran from post-modernism to historical Christianity; and who eventually wound up right where I started…In the little United Methodist Church in which I grew up.

All of those things combined together make quite of pot of hash. If you don’t know what hash is, just imagine taking all the meat you currently have in your freezer, throw in a hogs head, onions, tomatoes, and whole lot of spices, and let the mix simmer in a black cast-iron pot over an open fire until it tastes good.

That being said, I’m going to do the best I can to describe what the hash is going to taste like once you get a spoon in your hand. The aforementioned faith ingredients are all mixed up, and I wanted to take a few moments over the days to come to make my best attempt to tell you what I believe the flavor of Christianity is going to be over the next few years.

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Robert De Leon

Since the XVI Century to modern times there have been too many ingredients to conform the "American Church" and there are so many ingredients that it taste horrible, or nothing to speak the lessen.
So many "christrian, evangelical and biblical churches" in America looks like to me as same as to put in a mixer tomatoes, strawberries, sugar, salt, bananas, crackers, bread, water, beer, wine, vodka and milk. In the end? A horrible "thing".
Robert.
BRENDAN

THATS WHY MY FAMILY ARE COSERVATIVE CHRISTIAN CATHOLICS, TRYING TO LIVE OUT THE GOSPEL OF THE ONE APOSTOLIC FOUNDED BY OUR LORD -JESUS CHRIST- THE TRUTH WILL SET YOU FREE! AND WHOEVER YOU ARE I WILL KNOW YOU BY THE FRUIT YOU BARE. PRAY- HOPE AND DONT WORRY—PADRE PIO
http://www.orovalleychristianreader.com John J Flanagan

The current American churches and denominations are not dissimilar to the early churches formed by the original Apostles.. Churches and denominations have differences in doctrines and practices, but the faithful ones, as outlined in the Book of Revelation, are not lukewarm, stick to the fundamentals(i.e salvation by grace alone, belief in the need for salvation through Christ's finished work on the cross, a desire to be obedient to God's word, the Bible, a belief in the inerrancy of scripture, etc),and have a strong evangelistic approach. In all of the visible churches and denominations, there are both saved and unsaved members, pretenders and professors, true believers mixed within. We are not saved collectively by just belonging to the Catholic church, or any Protestant church. We are not saved just by the sprinkling of water as in Baptism. Baptism is important, a sacrament, but without the work of the HOly Spirit and evident proof of salvation in an individual, it remains ineffective and contributes nothing to salvation. The state of the churches in America has nothing to do with the salaries of pastors, how big the outreach is, how large the building, but it is substantive and based on the work of Christ in that church or denomination. The Christian faith must center upon Christ as Lord and Savior, period.
- Aceituna
  
  I agree with almost all you say, but your remark about not saved just by the sprinkling of water as in Baptism, "Baptims now saves us" St. Paul tells us, but spiritual neglect (not just parents of young children but also of adults who abandon their beliefs after baptism) takes us away from salvation and the state of a person who falls away from grace is much worse that the state of a person who was never saved in the first place though both are equally lost. Yes, our faith centers on Jesus as our Savior from the consequences of sin. As forgiven sinners we wish to serve God. If we put service before forgiveness we are lost.