Joining Jesus on His Mission - 2

Adult Bible Class

September 28, 2025

The River Moved

Church Membership Has Declined

LCMS – 1960’s there were about 2.8 million people. Today there are about 1.3 million.

ELCA – Formed in 1988 with 5.25 million members and has declined every year since to about 3.14 million people today.

Roman Catholics welcomed about 96,000 people in 1999, but only about 45,000 new members in 2020.

Worship Attendance Has Declined

Self reported statistics indicate that about 20-25% of U.S. adults attend religious services weekly. However, a study using cellphone data found that only 5% worship weekly.

The Rise of the Nones

In 2007, 16% of americans identifies as religiously unaffiliated (Nones), and in 2024 that percentage was 29%.

Decline of Confidence in Organized Religion

In 1975, 68% of those surveyed had a high level of confidence in organized religion. In 2022, 31% indicated high confidence. In 2025, that number improved to 36%.

This might be a reflection of a general distrust of authority.

Missing Young Adults

In 2014, less than 10% of adults under 30 regularly attended worship and saw the local church as unnecessary to their spiritual life. (There are signs this might be shifting in a better direction.)

“[O]ur solution as the church is not to try and make the U.S. culture move back to where it was, but to focus our prayer and planning on building the next span of bridge over where the culture is now.” – Finke, p. 41

This makes us MISSIONARIES.

What is a “neighborhood missionary”?

An Assumption

What if they won’t?

Mission –

Apostlic –

“This is the ancient rhythm of God’s people, gathering and going, coming together for worship and going back for mission, coming to church on Sunday and being the Church on Monday.” – Finke, p. 43-44

Stalling

How many books do we need to read? How many seminars to attend? How many sermons do we need to hear to be prepared to share the love of Jesus with others?

“A man who carries a cat by the tail learns something he can learn in no other way.” – Twain

“It’s better to do something imperfectly than to do nothing flawlessly.”

Consider the role of grace for the evangelist.

A Simple Paradigm

1.      Jesus does the incredibly complex work that requires the Son of God.

2.      We do the incredibly simple work that requires a little child.

What we do:

1.      Enjoy people.

2.      Seek, recognize and respond to what Jesus is already doing in the lives of the people we are enjoying.

How did Jesus model this methodology during His earthly ministry?

Is this method efficient?

Is it effective?

This is challenging for us. Our focus on time, efficiency, and busy-ness makes it difficult to slow down, hear people’s stories, see how Jesus is “messin’ with them,” and respond to what Jesus is doing.

“For busy U.S. Christians, one of the biggest challenges we have in living missionally is investing time in the process of becoming friends with people.” – Finke, p. 59

“Love your neighbor.” – A Friend

Love is not quid pro quo. We do not offer our friendship to people to bring them to Jesus.

-        Agenda-less Friendship

-        The Freedom of the Gospel in Evangelism

-        Following God’s agenda

An Essential Attribute for the Neighborhood Missionary

Attributed to Walt Witman. Maybe he said it. Maybe not. Either way –

Be curious is a great starting point!

How did Finke’s story about eating shrimp with neighborhood friends display curiosity as an important part of evangelism?

Key Takeaways?

Next Week:

We will start looking Finke’s theology of the Kingdom of God. “The kingdom of God (that is, the redemptive presence and activity of God in human lives) has come into the world to work out the mission of God (the redeeming and restoring of human lives to the kingdom of God) through the people of God (the redemptive presence and activity of God made tangible to other human beings).” – p. 72