In the modern American culture, the question of whether or not Christianity even works seems like a valid question. Thirty years ago, at least 80% of Americans would identify as Christian although only a small percentage of that would go to church and an even smaller percentage of those going to church would be involved. The saying that ‘10% of the church does 90% of the work’ is still pretty accurate.

Yet, whether a person helps out in the nursery or teaches Sunday school has little to do with the original question. The point is that the number of Americans who would identify as Christian has been gradually declining. What used to be 80-90% a few decades ago is now around 65% and since the population of the country has gone up, this means there are more people who do not identify as Christian. This decline in Christianity is not from death, but from decision. And as the majority of the population who does claim Christianity is in the older two generations, the numbers will continue to decline as those generations decrease. People in America who grew up in Christian homes, going to church, and considering themselves Christian in the past no longer would call themselves that now and the best answer for that decision is somewhere along the line those people decided that Christianity was not living up to the expectations they had for it.

In others words, Christianity wasn’t working for them.

Now there is probably much that could be said about those who leave and their interactions with others who identify as Christian as well as polarizing political opinions in the church on hot topic current events, but the fact that a person can decide not to associate with Christ or do things like gathering that He commanded His followers to do because another person rubs them the wrong way is strange. It’s like a happily married couple deciding to get a divorce all because of something Uncle Marty or Great Aunt Vera says at every family reunion.

In going back to the original question, does Christianity work? We now have a rising portion of the population who would answer that question in the negative. “No, it doesn’t work,” they might say, “And I have tons of proof.” Then they would lay out their list of grievances, but if we took away all of the exterior issues, issues that come from other Christians not doing what some people think Christians should do, and only focused on the interior questions, it would be interesting to see some of the answers because we’d have to ask a slightly different question. When does a relationship with God NOT work?

Perhaps the only time a relationship with God does not seem to work centers around pain and death and misinformation about God. There are many people who say thoughtless things about God and God’s character. Those words can be mistaken for truth because God works in such a way that He allows us to face challenges in our relationship with Him so that we can choose Him and then we have to keep choosing Him. If we do persevere in choosing Him, then our faith will have the deep roots that it needs to survive eternity with Him.

But a relationship with God, one that is not one-sided, grows into the most beautiful of relationships so much so that life without God would be lonely, dull, and hopeless. Because the more we seek God, the more we will see God, the more we will know God, and the more He will be involved in our lives. Not because He was not involved in our lives before, but because now we want Him to be in our lives and we see what He is doing rather than being blind to how He is always working. And there is something precious and glorious about working with God and doing things with Him each day. It’s how we were meant to live.

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