Daphne’s Dechurched Population

Daphne’s Dechurched Population
“About 15 percent of American adults living today (around 40 million people) have effectively stopped going to church, and most of this dechurching has happened in the past twenty-five years.” -Jim Davis

 I’ve been talking, writing, and thinking a lot about the dechurched lately. If you’ve been listening to me or reading what I’ve written, you may be wondering: “How many dechurched people really live in our area?” That’s a good question. It’s a question I’ve been thinking about myself. So I pulled a demographic and psychographic survey of the area within 20 minutes driving distance of the church. I’m going to share some of what I learned this week – and more in the future.

 

This chart – pulled from the demographic and psychographic survey – shows something shocking. 63% of people within 20 minutes driving distance of the church don’t attend church regularly! The population of that same area is 108,566. So some quick, back-of-the-napkin math tells us that over 68,000 people who live within 20 minutes of Christ Presbyterian are not regularly going to church.

What should we do with that information? The way I see it, we have three options. The first option is to moan and groan about the state of our city and our culture. We could lament the fact that so many people have left the church. We could despair and gripe about the prevailing headwinds that the church faces today. The second option is to be complacent – to simply accept that “this is the way it is now” and do nothing. Or, as Jim Davis says, the third option is to “consider it the privilege of a lifetime to serve in this moment.” We can choose to look at the fields, in the words of Jesus, as “white for harvest.” Most importantly, we can choose to see ourselves as the laborers God is calling to go into those fields and bring in a great harvest for his kingdom here in Daphne.

The church has a choice to make â€“ moan and groan, be complacent, and slowly fade away; or get serious about making disciples and watch God work wonders in our midst.

Your Pastor and Friend,
John Knox Foster