Commitment. A very common word that is thrown around loosely in day to day conversations. What does it truly mean to be committed to something. In the world of sports to not fully commit to an action or decision is always detrimental to what the result or outcome may be. No matter what, he must be faithful to the decision he has made in order to experience any sort of success. I've recently been reading a book by Ed
Stetzer titled
Breaking the Missional Code. He has some interesting statistics which I would like to share:
- "The percentage of Christians in the U.S. population dropped 9 percent from 1990 to 2001"
- "The American Religious Identification Survey 2001, released by the Graduate Center of the City University of New York (CUNY) showed that the percentage proportion of Christians in the U.S. has declined from 86 percent in 1990 to 77 percent in 2001."
- "The number of unchurched has doubled from 1991 to 2004."
- "A Barna Group study explained that since 1991, the adult population in the U.S. has grown by 15%. During that same period, the number of adults who do not attend church has nearly doubled, rising from 39 million to 75 million--a 92% increase!"
To quote
Stetzer, "
Among evangelicals, true spiritual commitment seems to be lagging. For example, born-again
Church members divorce at a
higher rate than the
unchurched." This is staggering. When it comes to the second most important commitment one could ever make, we as the church are the leading example of breaking commitments or promises. Why is this? I feel that believers today have a very warped view of what it means to be committed. Commitment is ultimately a choice one makes. It's looking at a given situation and knowing that even though it may require sacrifice, heartache, or trials, I will choose to remain committed to who I am. Commitment is an identity as well. Take marriage for instance. When you commit to your spouse, you take on their identity as well as your own. Thus the name change. I will go out on limb here, but I truly believe that some believers are more in love with the thought or concept of being married than to the person they actually marry. Dating in our society
doesn't help the cause either. We grow up with the idea that we date just to "have" someone rather than thinking about the bigger picture of marriage and the person we are marrying. After all, divorce is merely a crutch to fall back on just as if we can just "break up" in a dating relationship. I believe that if believers took a more serious approach to even dating, we would learn a lot more of what it means to be committed to someone. Ultimately, however, I feel a lot of the problems with
commitment fall back on a non-existent
commitment to God. Think about the cost of
commitment. God has bestowed upon us a new name. We have a new identity when we truly commit to him. Being committed to God is choice we must make on a day to day basis. It requires sacrifice. Sacrifice of our time and money. Sometimes it may even require giving up our sleep on occasion or food. Lack of
commitment is by far one of the most deadly weapons that has infiltrated the church.
"According to
Christianity Today, 'The
Barna Research Group reports that in the United States about 10 million self proclaimed, born-again Christians have not been to church in the last six months, apart from Christmas or Easter." WOW! What are you committed to? In Luke 14, Jesus says three different times that you cannot, cannot, cannot be my disciple if....You love people more than me; if you place priorities ahead of me; if you place possessions ahead of me; and even if you make your plans apart from me. I understand that we all have
commitments ranging from work, school, family, and even friends and spouses. But ultimately are you committed to Jesus first? I am
soo convicted as I even write this article because I know that I have fallen short in all of these categories at some point. May we choose to remain committed disciples of Jesus even when it requires sacrifice.
