Missional Living

The National Study of Youth and Religion, conducted from 2001 to 2005, a study on the religious and spiritual lives of American adolescents. This project resulted in a book called, Souls in Transition: The Religious and Spiritual Lives of Emerging Adults (the ages of college students --18 and 23). It is written by Christian Smith and Patricia Snell. The book deals with questions like these;
How important is religion for young people in America today?
What are the major influences on their developing spiritual lives?
How do their religious beliefs and practices change as young people enter into adulthood?

The book reveals there are six major religious types among the emerging adults:
1. Committed Traditionalists (no more than 15%)
2. Selective Adherents (perhaps 30%)
3. Spiritually Open (about 15%)
4. Religiously Indifferent (at least 25%)
5. Religiously Disconnected (no more than 5%)
6. Irreligious (no more than 10%)

Let me explained a couple of these categories. The Committed Traditionalists are the ones who accept traditional Christian beliefs. But the Selective Adherents “believe and perform certain aspects of their religions but neglect and ignore others.”
They, basically, “pick and choose what they want to accept.” Most often rejected beliefs are traditional views related to sex before marriage, hell, and select doctrines such as the Trinity and the divinity or resurrection of Christ. They pick and choose only those they want to accept. Notice, 30 % of people belong to this group.
For this group, the main idea is that “the absolute authority for every person’s beliefs or actions is his or her own sovereign self.”

The Religiously Indifferent –2nd largest group “neither care to practice religion nor oppose it. They are simply not invested in religion either way. “It just doesn’t matter that much for them.” They are simply careless about religion.

The 3rd Group “Spiritually Open” people are very willing to engage explicitly religious conversations. They are willing to talk about religion, but they are “not taking a lot of initiative in pursuit of the spiritual stuff.
So, if you look at this study, we can see the Selective Adherents (30%) and Religiously Indifferent (at least 25%) make up the majority (55 %). If you add, the Spiritually Open (15%), 75% of the people don’t really care about the truth and authority of Scripture.

This study represents a massive shift taking place in our culture that carries huge ramifications for the outreach strategy of the local church. Traditional churches are committed to events and program and invite “people to come to church.”

At AKPC EM, “Missional Living” means that we are community of believers sent by Jesus to the world to live out the mission of God incarnationally, relationally, and intentionally by integrating our faith into whole spectrum of life.

God sent us out, wherever we are, to bring this message of Christ by living the life He wants us to live. Here is the third key word. We must be intentional about how we live our lives and integrate our faith in every aspects of life to bring this message of Christ. It is not about making programs and events. It is about the people going out and building a healthy and meaningful relationship to show Christ to them through the message of words and good deeds.