This is in reference to the passage in Joshua (3-4) where the ark and all Israel crossed the Jordan on dry ground and setup stones on the other side as a reminder for generations of what God had done.
He told us that there are 400,000 churches in America, there are organizations, and products, and "Christian everything". But, are we getting more or getting less Christian as a nation? The answer, 'less Christian'. Carl shared some statistics to reinforce that conclusion.
He shared the Barna Research survey results indicating between 70-88% of Christian youth leave the church after age 18.
He shared much other information, but this got me to thinking about the math and population genetics approach similar to what I recently read in "Genetic Entropy and the Mystery of the Genome" by Dr. John Sanford. Assuming all Christians marry other Christians, and have two kids who grow up to be Christians (to keep pace/replace themselves) and the failure rate of 88%, each Christian family would need to have 15-17 children. Once you factor in all the other issues, such as fertility, population growth rate, marriage age, age of death, etc... you quickly realize that this is an impossible, loosing battle statistically. It's a good thing God doesn't play by 'statistics' or there would be no hope.
Carl also shared that there is a failure rate of 70% within 5 years for those in ministry.
Things may look bleak, but we are reminded by these stones, that
He did this so that all the peoples of the earth might know that the hand of the LORD is powerful and so that you might always fear the LORD your God. -Joshua 4:24
He is always faithful.
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