Pew Research, a reputable polling group, recently published the following about the church in America.  52% of American Christians believe that other non-Christian religions can lead to heaven.  This number is troubling and it only gets worse as you look at more of the details.  Only around 40% - 45% of evangelical Protestants believe that Jesus is the only way to heaven.

Where is the scripture?  Where are the fundamentals of our Christian Faith?  Where are the preachers?

They are still there (there are two at the Mission), but they seem to be fading.  We must do all we can to guard against this new kind of spiritual, all-inclusive, make you feel good religion.  It is tempting, but we must be vigilant and stand for the Truth.

How can we do that?

Be sure you are going to a Bible-preaching church.  Too many churches don’t even use the bibles and, if they do, they don’t really believe the Bible is what it says it is.  The Bible claims to be the infallible Word of God, literally breathed by God and the authority on all things.  Do you really believe that?  I hope so.  Go to a church with a pastor that believes that and preaches that way (again, the Mission would be one of those churches.  I’ll stop, I promise.  Just sayin’).

Second, if you really believe that about the Bible, then Sunday Morning preaching is not enough.  If you really want to learn from this Awesome Book, then you need Sunday School!  What an amazingly easy opportunity to learn more about God’s Word.  Every Sunday, we have a Sunday School.  Part of the reason, aside from weak preaching, that the church today is Biblically ignorant, is the lack of Christian Education.

Now, I don’t mean private Christian grade schools for our children, or even college or university education.  I mean the education opportunities that are available through the church, such as, Sunday School and Bible Studies.  We must take advantage of these things and the teaching must be just as biblical as the preaching.  The Sunday School at the Mission is wholly biblical and is a great step toward growing in the knowledge of our Lord.

Third, something we talk about every Sunday, you must study the Bible personally.  This is of utmost importance.  There is not an amount of church, college, Sunday school, or anything else that will be enough.  There must be a personal Bible reading and studying for the Christian to grow and mature to the place that God wants them.

The state of the church in our country is not good.  Many are straying.  Many are mixing components of Christianity and other religions or philosophies to come up with some new pseudo-Christianity.  This is a sad, but expected turn of events.  We may not be able to turn the whole church back to God.  We can pray for that.  But, what we absolutely can do is make sure that we are not Biblically ignorant.  The Bible is the ultimate authority on all matters of all areas of life.  But, if we don’t know what the Bible teaches, how can we make biblical decisions about anything?  We can’t.  Make efforts to not be Biblically ignorant.  Come to church.  Come to Sunday School.  Study your bibles.  Start a bible study.  Use the resources on this, and other, websites. 

Oh, and just to settle the issue in the poll above, the Bible is clear.

“I am the way, the truth, the life, no one comes to the Father except by me.”

                                    -Jesus (John 14:6)