Missing 20s to 30s should cause churches to act, says Kandiah

People in their twenties and thirties don’t want to hear a watered down version of the Gospel. Rather the church needs to be challenging them with the Lordship of Jesus and teaching them the Gospel can impact everything they are doing every day of their lives, says Krish Kandiah.

The popular speaker and writer is alarmed that the church is failing to attract 20s-30s at a time in their lives when they are most likely to be receptive to the radical call of following Jesus whatever the cost.

It’s not that the Gospel is powerless to attract this age group. It’s simply that the church isn’t presenting the Gospel in the right way, he argues in his latest blog.

“This should be the time of life when Christians and non-Christians are most receptive to hearing the radical call to follow Jesus whole-heartedly, whatever the cost.

“And yet often the church, instead of calling people to active discipleship often presents what it perceives to be a more palatable version of the gospel, but which is often so watered down that it is particularly unappetising.”

He points to recent research from Innovista and the UK Evangelical Alliance, which found that although 96% of church leaders rank increasing the number of 16-30-year-olds in their churches as a priority or top priority, only 11% feel “well-resourced” to do so.

The conspicuous absence or “silence” of many 20s-30s in Britain’s churches should cause the church to act, writes Kandiah.

He suggests three key challenges related to the search for destiny, direction and community that churches must address if they are to help more 20s-30s find a place in the church and ultimately in their lives.

The first he identifies as the “Sunday-Monday challenge”. However Christ and cross-centred the evangelistic preaching is, churches also need to present 20s to 30s with the “challenge of the Lordship of Jesus, the mustard seed Kingdom conspiracy, and the salt and light mission Jesus calls us to”, he writes.

“20-30’s are often switched on to issues of ecology, contemporary culture, vocation, ethics, and social transformation and they need to hear how the gospel impacts the way they approach the rest of their week and the rest of their lives.

“Unfortunately what 20-30’s often hear in church is not encouragement to take huge steps in their faith, but to take on huge responsibilities within the church. Churches can all too easily channel the drive, energy and enthusiasm of the 20-30’s into church-based activities – helping with the cleaning rota, youthwork or music – or all three.”

The result is a lack of enthusiasm within the core age group that the church is hoping to attract.

“Instead of inspiring our young adults for discipleship, we often cause them to burn out and lose all heart for discipleship and the church. What could be character-building, can also become soul-destroying,” he says.

Part of the problem, Kandiah believes, lies in not helping 20s-30s to make the connection between life and faith and a failure on the part of the church to teach people that the Christian faith is to be practised 24/7. Rather than putting the pressure on people who are already really busy, the church needs to empower Christians to live for Christ in every area of their lives, he says.

The second challenge churches need to be confronting is the common criticism from 20s-30s that the church is outdated, what Kandiah calls the “history-future challenge”.

While it is right that the church holds onto the historic tenets of evangelicalism – the authority of scripture, the need for personal repentance, the centrality of the cross and active faith – it may not be so useful to hang onto the means by which these tenets were expressed in the past, he believes.

“We effectively hold onto the baby and the bathwater,” he writes. “For a church to move forward and be accessible to today’s generation, we may need to change the water.”

Kandiah suggested some creative thinking on the part of church leaders to demonstrate to young people how the Bible speaks to every culture and generation. This could include the use of modern technology and gadgets, mixing up familiar hymns and modern worship songs, or quoting from commentators of old as well as celebrities from the present.

“As 20s-30s are struggling to find their niche, the church can provide an environment that does not pigeon-hole them into being outmoded social outcasts, but frees them to explore how they can face the future with God and the church,” he says.

The third challenge churches must grapple with is the “I-we challenge” and the question many 20s-to 30s ask themselves: ‘What am I going to do with my life?’

While many people in their 20s-30s are typically searching for a spouse, a family unit, friends and church community, fitting in in church isn’t easy if you don’t fall into the youth or family category, he admits.

“The church could be the place that helps them form those new adult networks that will last a lifetime, but many 20s-30s feel isolated in our churches – they don’t fit into the two obvious groupings of youth or families. Moreover the church is asking them to ‘not fit in’ at work as they stand up for their faiths.”

Adding to this, he believes, is the entrenched notion of the church as “service-provider” and the attendee as “client”.

He writes: “We need to stop asking what can I get out of this church, but what can I give to this church.

“In our individualistic society there is often little opportunity for genuine community and so if the church can live up to our calling as the body of Christ, God’s family, rather than focusing on the event of the Sunday service we have a lot to offer.”