By
Pastor Clarence Blair
(Miles Bethel Memorial C.M.E. Church, LaCrosse, VA)
In the not too distant past, I had the opportunity to witness to a young Muslim man. I was very thorough and convincing, but he did not immediately yield to my pleadings to accept Jesus Christ as his Lord and Savior. His main objection was a wrongful perception that Christianity emasculates males. Of course, I corrected him. Then he said something else that caught my ear. He said that he noticed that the “church boys”[1] always seemed to be the most successful, best dressed and well-rounded ones in school.
We also talked about the fact that Islam is one of the fastest growing religions in America today and that many Muslims are former Christians who converted to that faith. That started me to thinking about how we take for granted the presence of young boys in our church and how unaffected we seem about their absence as if it is de rigueur or to be expected and commonplace. It should not be so! It’s time to flip the script and turn the term “church boy” into a term of honor and worthy of respect.
Try this. The next time you go to Sunday worship service look around you and take notice of who is sitting in the pews. Most likely you’ll see faces of the young and old that you’ve seen time and time again. Occasional new faces will show up. Take a mental note. Is somethings going on that will entice them to return? Then, take note of who is not sitting in the pews. If your church is like most other American churches, you will notice that there are two missing generations: Millenials and Gen Z. The Millenials are youngs adults aged between 30-45 years and Gen Z are young adults aged between14-29 years). One would not be alone in questioning whether they have stopped going to church or whether they have stopped going to our traditional black churches?
The authors of an article entitled “Why Do People Leave Church?”[2] cited a recent survey, by Life Way Research,[3] of de-churched individuals. Their findings were cause for both worry and encouragement. They defined the magnitude of the decline in church attendance numbers as staggering. They wrote, “Of the 300 million people in the United States, fewer than 20% regularly attend church. And our research suggests that close to 7.9 million people may be leaving churches annually. Do the math and you realize that our churches are probably seeing more than 150,000 people walk away each week![4] The survey also indicated that 70% of young adults between the ages of 18 and 22 years completely.[5] This is not a wake-up call, it’s the signal of a 5-alarm fire except the temperature has dropped significantly.
The good news is that young people are still “kinda” going to church. Turn on your television sets and notice who is warming the pews of the “word-centered” mega-churches. The not-so-good news is that those faces being shown on camera are the young adults missing from many of our traditional black churches. Many of these young people may be the same ones who went looking for a fulfilling experience but left out through the revolving door within the first few months after joining.
So, why do they leave? There are several compelling reasons. Among them is a change in their life situation meaning they may have moved away geographically, or otherwise became too busy to go to church regularly. Another reason often cited was disenchantment with the church. Some of those surveyed perceived the church to be unloving, judgmental, and hypocritical. They were not mad. They say they just felt unconnected to the church. Some others held unfavorable views of church leadership. Another cause for consideration is the fact that many of these young people were never fully committed Christians in the first place. You see sitting in the garage does not make one a mechanic nor does walking through a hospital make one a doctor. Just sitting in the pew doesn’t make one a Christian. Making the decision to follow Christ often involves a change in lifestyle, behavior, and motivation.
The church cannot move from being good to being great if we continue to ignore the enormity of this issue. One of the biggest mission fields may be the young boys sitting in our churches every week. Young men don’t usually turn 18 years old and suddenly decide overnight that the church is no longer a viable option for them. The decision and move toward backsliding is usually progressive, long, and slow.
The church must begin to realize that there is a war being waged and the spoils being sought are the minds of our young boys and men. For example, Sundays -unlike in the days of old- are now open game. The sanctity of the Sunday Sabbath motif has been violated. So, now the church has to compete with shopping malls, home entertainment options including video rentals and games, professional sporting events, musical concerts, involvement in the cultural wars, etc.
Don’t know what culture wars are? Just turn on the medium that serves you current news and listen to the talking points that excite people politically leaning to the right. To be fair, the politically left leaning party had better ideas but seem to lack in the will power and motivation to get them accomplished. A jaundiced individual might seem two wings of the same bird.
I digress. Many of our young boys are just plain burnt out from the demands of the school week and the many burdensome extra-curricular activities foisted upon them by well-meaning parents. These boys would much rather be at home sleeping than having to sit through an uninspired worship service or meeting. Add to that the natural tendency of rebellion that often accompanies puberty and you have a pretty good reason why we’re losing them. Then there is a ubiquitous peer pressure that fosters their tendency to zone out of most things associated with adults. Add to that the fact that some of them may have been diagnosed or under diagnosed with attention deficit disorder.[6]
Any combination of these makes it difficult for a boy to plug in and remain plugged in being fully present in a worship service. It should be noted that a child’s attention span while watching TV is not an accurate measure of his or her attention span.[7] Bear in mind that the pace of many television shows offer solutions to world threatening crises in 30 minutes with a commercial break every 10 minutes. So, a two-hour worship experience might amount to little more than an extended period of tedium or even torture for many boys.
Let’s take a look at the differences between how boys and girls are socialized. Little girls often like to talk to each other and play games like “House” and “Nurse” in which cooperation, connection, and intimacy are the goals. Their brains are hot-wired for fine motor skills which means that they are better at listening, empathizing and sitting still. These skills make the whole church thing easy for them.
Boys, on other hand, are hot-wired for the gross motor skills which makes them better at competing, jumping, running, and throwing things. Their childhood play often includes such games as “King of the Hill” and “Cowboys and Indians” which demand clearly defined leaders, followers, winners, and losers. These games tend to reward boys for rough housing. So, you can understand why having to sit quietly in church -while listening to someone who was chosen as the leader without having had to compete for it- may be a turn off for them. Not only that but they reject -maybe, unknowingly- the notion of someone else who is not their father or mother telling them what to do.
“The church is the only institution that has access to the entire family.”[8] The church may be missing out on an excellent opportunity to solidify its base by nurturing and holding on to its young boys. The author did not forget to include girls. It’s pretty much a given that the girls will find out where the boys are. It does not have to be said that it would be better to hold on to them than having to mount programs that will bring them back in.
It has been said that boys need to know a few things such as 1) who is in charge, 2) the rules, and 3) what happens if the rules are broken. This provides a very good foundation on which to teach theology. Namely, that God is in charge (I Chron. 29:11, etc.), and we gain access through the atoning and vicarious sacrifice of Jesus, the Christ, His only begotten Son (see John 3:16, Romans 5:11, II Cor.5:21, Eph. 2:16-22, etc.), and if we sin by rejecting Him then there is no other option available (see Heb. 10:26, etc.).
There are three things that most boys like to do: eat, play, and sleep. Most successful activities for boys in the church should include some kind of action with food prominently featured.[9] Most boys like surprises and come to prefer routine as they age. They also like to feel that they are needed. Something as simple as having them set out and stack up chairs, or set up and move microphones, etc., can provide an enormous boost to their egos and foster a sense of belonging and purpose. In my accompanying workbook to my self-published book entitled, “The Seven Spiritual Seasons of Manhood” I provide several bonding activities for each level of spiritual maturity.[10] Boys who feel that they belong bring along other boys. And, girls seem to naturally gravitate toward the gathering of boys.
The traditional placement of boys in the choir and on the Usher Board is a good thing, but it can be made much better by providing them with outlets for their testosterone laced energy and drive outside of the physical confines of the church building. Boys need an outlet that can provide them with opportunities for friendly competition and bragging rights.[11] The church must find a way to make herself become more appealing to young boys. We must fish in our own back yards and use the bait they’ll bite. We can start by employing younger energetic individuals as youth ministry leaders who understand and appreciate a boy’s need for action, exploit, and adventure. Then we can take it from there by engaging them in conversation in relaxed environments where they feel safe to expose their vulnerabilities. Once they’re comfortable enough to start talking, they will inevitably tell us what they need. Voila! With that information, in hand, we can implement programs that speak to their hearts and minds.
The bottom line is that not only are our boys leaving the church when they become of age, but many of our young boys are coming in and out of our doors without actually meeting Jesus, the Christ. Inevitably, some will simply refuse to accept the tenets of Christianity no matter how evangelistically healthy a church might be. These young men can be reached, and reach them we must!
Oh, by the way, there is more good news as it relates to attracting the young adults back to church. The article lists some other considerations that might be useful in seeking to allay the numbers problem. First and foremost, many young adults would consider returning if we simply invited them to come back. We should not underestimate the power of the invite. Also, many of the de-churched survey takers said that they wanted to belong to a congregation that makes a difference in the world, that dialogues, and deals with current day situations. Lastly, they want to belong to a place where -to quote a popular television theme song- “everybody knows your name.”
It seems that the second visit is crucial among those returning to the church. Almost two-thirds of de-churched individuals maintained that they would like to remain anonymous until their second visit if they were to return. While our churches should remain amiable and open to all guests, perhaps we should focus on second and third-time guests as much as first-time visitors.
The present reality is that too many people are walking away from our churches. But we can become optimistic about the future as we seek to stem that tide. We’ve got to use what’s in our hands. That’s what God indicated to Moses in the 4th chapter of Exodus: use what’s in our hands.
Many young boys are forced to attend church by their well-meaning parents. Since they are there and available it behooves us to take advantage of the situation. We can cement the bonds between them and the local church by giving them what they cannot find elsewhere. “Church boys” don’t usually leave the place where their needs are being met. With the proper nurture and guidance “church boys” grow up to become Mighty Men of God.
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[1] When this author was growing up the “church boy” might have been meant as fighting words by other boys. This author believes that we can and must put a new spin on the word so that is brings about positive images of wholesome young men who love the Lord and are striving able to become mighty men of God.
[2] Thom S. Ranier and Sam S. Ranier, “Why Do People Leave Church?”, Outreach magazine, July/August 2007
[3] Staff writer, “Reasons 18 to 22 Year Olds Drop Out of Church,” LifeWay Research, last accessed 11/2007 and available at www.lifeway.com
[4] Ibid
[5] Ibid
[6] Also called ADD, ADHD, or hyperactivity, a short attention span occurs in 3% to 5% of children, most of them males.
[7] B.D. Schmitt, M.D., “Your Child’s Health,” Bantam Books, New York, NY: 1999 Clinical Reference Systems, last accessed 11/2007 and available at http://www.kidsgrowth.com/resources/articledetail.cfm?id=1007
[8] Clarence Blair, “The Seven Spiritual Seasons of Manhood,” Philadelphia, PA: Cornerstone Publishers, 2007, available at www.cornerstonepublishers.com.
[9] Ibid
[10] Clarence Blair, “The Seven Spiritual Seasons of Manhood Workbook,” Philadelphia, PA: Cornerstone Publishers, 2007, available at www.cornerstonepublishers.com.
[11] Clarence Blair, “The Seven Spiritual Seasons of Manhood,” Philadelphia, PA: Cornerstone Publishers, 2007, available at www.cornerstonepublishers.com.