George Barna > Quotes

“After all, merely believing that Jesus is God, and that He lived on earth and exists today is not enough; the Bible tells us that even Satan believes those things. Saying you’ve made a commitment to Christ and living in ways that demonstrate that commitment are two different realities. Claiming to be saved because of having said a prayer asking for forgiveness while continuing to live without a dramatic change of heart is not the same as seeking forgiveness and turning that forgiven heart over to the one who extended the forgiveness.”
― George Barna, Maximum Faith

“But a local body of believers is the only place they can meet God together with his people. What a privilege to facilitate encounters with God week after week! When it’s humble and sincere, it never gets old.”
― George Barna, Churchless: Understanding Today's Unchurched and How to Connect with Them

“All this data leads us to a direct examination of the reasons the unchurched avoid Christian churches. The biggest issue is a perceived lack of value.”
― George Barna, Churchless: Understanding Today's Unchurched and How to Connect with Them

“In the midst of the emotional and spiritual upset that occurs when a church hurts or disappoints us, we tend to lose sight of the fact that the local church is merely a collection of people on a challenging journey - a group of people that are involved in a long-term transformation process.”
― George Barna

“Our studies consistently show a large majority of people leave their church’s service without feeling as though they have connected with God. If those who regularly attend depart with such disappointment and confusion, what must it be like for those who are new to the church adventure?”
― George Barna, Churchless: Understanding Today's Unchurched and How to Connect with Them

“Notice that the unchurched show little interest in attending a church known for the quality of its worship music or even the quality of its sermons. Millions of churchless adults are very sensitive to the balance between teaching and street-level ministry; they fear getting connected to a congregation that is all talk and no action.”
― George Barna, Churchless: Understanding Today's Unchurched and How to Connect with Them

“The fact that young adults, in particular, are redefining family to include close friends, even though this is a regularly shifting group, points to the impermanence and unreliability associated with family in the minds of millions of people. Given these continuing shifts, churches may have a difficult time connecting with the unchurched if their ministries are tailored for traditional households. In particular, single and married-without-children adults have little reason to connect with a church if its resources are funneled toward children’s and family ministry.”
― George Barna, Churchless: Understanding Today's Unchurched and How to Connect with Them

“In our experience, as believers practice loving attitudes and behavior toward others inside and outside their faith community, unchurched friends and family don’t have to be talked into church participation. They seek it out, drawn by the promise of love.”
― George Barna, Churchless: Understanding Today's Unchurched and How to Connect with Them

“A visionary pastor is a successful pastor.”
― George Barna, The Power of Vision: Discover and Apply God's Plan for Your Life and Ministry

“While the churchless continue to show some openness to high-touch, relational connections—pastoral home visits (27 percent), a phone call from a church (24 percent), a survey conducted with them about their interests (21 percent)—they are also increasingly resistant to other forms of outreach.”
― George Barna, Churchless: Understanding Today's Unchurched and How to Connect with Them

“A recurrent theme throughout the history of the Church is that of creating a loving, caring community. The story of the Early Church recounted in Acts emphasizes the importance of relationships among believers. Jesus’ ministry was a model of commitment to fellow believers: He did everything with the family of faith; He ate, talked, traveled and ministered with His disciples. He did more than simply talk about love for others; Jesus personally modeled it and consistently arranged situations and opportunities for His faith-circle to deepen and demonstrate their love for each other.”
― George Barna, The Habits of Highly Effective Churches: Being Strategic in Your God-Given Ministry

“The following approaches are likely to fall flat, with less than 10 percent of the churchless reporting they might be attracted by such efforts: information about a church provided through the mail advertising for a church on TV, in a newspaper, or on the radio an unsolicited phone call from someone representing a church in the community to describe the church and offer an invitation to attend advertising for the church on a local billboard a website that describes the church and invites people to attend a sermon from the pastor on CD or podcast emphasizing that the church has multiple locations in the community providing entry to a “video church”—a ministry that has a real-time video feed of live teaching from the main location, with live music and leadership at the remote location a contemporary seeker service showing a Hollywood-quality movie at the church that deals with issues like marriage, faith, or parenting providing a book club that discusses books about faith and life offering an open-mic discussion group or online chat that focuses on questions related to faith and spirituality a celebrity guest speaker appearing at a church’s worship services”
― George Barna, Churchless: Understanding Today's Unchurched and How to Connect with Them

“But it does mean we should be wary about “using” our relationships with churchless friends as means to the end of getting them to church.”
― George Barna, Churchless: Understanding Today's Unchurched and How to Connect with Them

“Asked to identify what churches could do to contribute to the community’s common good, few mention the activities most churches major on: teaching, worship, and evangelizing. Almost all the activities they describe focus on service: feeding the needy (30 percent), providing housing for the homeless (18 percent), keeping kids off the streets (11 percent), providing counseling and support groups (11 percent), and clothing the poor (11 percent). More unchurched people recommend accepting non-Christian beliefs as legitimate (11 percent) and accepting others instead of judging them (7 percent) than recommend the activities most churches regularly engage in.”
― George Barna, Churchless: Understanding Today's Unchurched and How to Connect with Them

“Although they are good people and have been called to ministry, most senior pastors do not have an understanding of God’s vision for the ministries they are trying to lead—and, consequently, most churches have little impact in their community or in the lives of their congregants.”
― George Barna, The Power of Vision: Discover and Apply God's Plan for Your Life and Ministry

“Consequently, if the church is going to leave a permanent mark on the community through a growing body of changed lives, it must constantly expand its leadership capacity, which entails both an increased number of leaders and an enhanced quality of leaders. Also,”
― George Barna, The Habits of Highly Effective Churches: Being Strategic in Your God-Given Ministry

“live with power and energy that undeniably transcends their natural capacities and with an intensity of commitment that far exceeds anything they have previously demonstrated in their lives”
― George Barna, The Power of Vision: Discover and Apply God's Plan for Your Life and Ministry

“We’ve by far had the most success inviting people into our community life by inviting them to serve alongside us. As a matter of fact, that’s about the only thing that’s worked consistently as far as “official” church activities go. The other thing that has worked is parties—birthday parties, Super Bowl parties—where we invite churched friends and unchurched friends just to connect.”
― George Barna, Churchless: Understanding Today's Unchurched and How to Connect with Them

“Despite all the opinions churchless (and churched) people offer about musical styles, architecture, sound systems, creativity, intellectualism, and the menu of programs provided by churches, none of these is the main attraction. These elements are nice sideshows, but people don’t come to church for the carnival rides. They come to meet God. People complain about the uncomfortable seats and stale popcorn when center stage is empty of the main event.”
― George Barna, Churchless: Understanding Today's Unchurched and How to Connect with Them

“We have wandered so far from fundamental spiritual knowledge in our culture that literally tens of millions of people—many of whom have long-term ties with the Christian church—have no clue how to even describe a true spiritual experience.”
― George Barna, The Habits of Highly Effective Churches: Being Strategic in Your God-Given Ministry

“A distinguishing taste of authentic Christians is their distaste for evil.”
― George Barna

“You might define vision as foresight with insight based on hindsight.”
― George Barna, The Power of Vision: Discover and Apply God's Plan for Your Life and Ministry

“Nearly half of churchless people (46 percent) say family is their highest priority. But what does that mean? Something different, perhaps, than what you might expect. A majority of the unchurched (56 percent) are single, whereas a majority of churched people are married (55 percent). In fact, the unchurched are nearly twice as likely as the churched to never have been married, and twice as likely to cohabit. Most of the nation’s unchurched adults are not only churchless but also spouseless. So why and how is family such a big priority for so many of them? Like most other Americans, the unchurched see family as a network of relationships that provides personal support, security, belonging, purpose, comfort, and the opportunity to receive and give love. They look upon family as a natural part of a normal life, and these relationships represent a vital part of their identity. They know who they are because of their family connections and shared experiences. But that does not mean the families of the churchless mirror those of churched adults. Three out of every ten unchurched adults have children under the age of eighteen living with them. Most of these young people are in homes with two married parents, but one-fifth are in homes with a single parent who has never been married. One-seventh are in homes with cohabiting adults and a similar number are in homes with parents who are separated or divorced. Less than one out of every five unchurched households (18 percent) is a “traditional family”—that is, a married husband and wife with one or more children under eighteen.[12] Thirteen percent are “nontraditional families” that include children. One-quarter (26 percent) are married adults without children in the home, while the remaining 43 percent are single adults living without children under eighteen. Understanding these demographics can help to explain why many of the common approaches to attracting the unchurched—many of which revolve around children—fail to produce the hoped-for results.”
― George Barna, Churchless: Understanding Today's Unchurched and How to Connect with Them

“Many attenders, lacking any understanding about the content or purposes of worship, assume that the routines and rituals that occur in worship services constitute the substance of worship. Consequently,”
― George Barna, The Habits of Highly Effective Churches: Being Strategic in Your God-Given Ministry

“Most churchless people aren’t looking for a church. They’re seeking an encounter with God. And even if they’re not seeking him directly, the vast majority are seeking to experience the essence of who he is: love.”
― George Barna, Churchless: Understanding Today's Unchurched and How to Connect with Them

“Likewise, effectively incorporating a diversity of people into congregational life will demand greater flexibility and creativity on the part of faith communities. Ministry strategies and discipleship programs that were successful in the past may need to be reimagined or even scrapped for something new. Rather than spawning ever-more-segmented ministries that further silo various demographics, what would it look like if churches started with the premise that godly relationships nurtured over the long haul can transcend the science of demography? What if churches prioritized seeking and finding God together over activities and events designed to appeal to ever-shrinking slices of their constituency?”
― George Barna, Churchless: Understanding Today's Unchurched and How to Connect with Them

“Today’s churchless adults are not remarkably less favorable toward churches in their community; if anything, there is simply a growing “yawn,”
― George Barna, Churchless: Understanding Today's Unchurched and How to Connect with Them

“Pastor Larry Reichardt of South Coast Fellowship in Ventura, California, emphasizes the importance of connecting with kids where they are, instead of trying to attract them to church first: “We share Christ with kids on the streets and then we visit the kids’ families at home and pray for them. We start small groups in their area in English or Spanish and minister to their needs. We also do physical things in the neighborhood to demonstrate we care, sharing the love of God where they are and how they are. Eventually, we ask them to church.”
― George Barna, Churchless: Understanding Today's Unchurched and How to Connect with Them

“What would success look like if the church were to be comprised of true followers of Christ?”
― George Barna, Growing True Disciples: New Strategies for Producing Genuine Followers of Christ

“1. Churches seem restrictive and overprotective. Self-expression has become one of the foundations of our postmodern culture. There is less concern about truth than about freedom to express feelings, ideas, and experiences. The demand for expressive liberty has certainly threaded its way into the realm of spirituality, as well—which poses a problem for many churches, since many young adults say their experience of church feels stifling, fear-based, and risk-averse.”
― George Barna, Churchless: Understanding Today's Unchurched and How to Connect with Them