In the last twenty-five years, about 40 million people have stopped attending church. We can’t blame this on COVID. This trend was well underway before COVID ever appeared. If this fact doesn’t wake us up to the reality Christians are facing in the Global West, I don’t know what will. To learn more about this trend, I highly recommend The Great Dechurching: Who’s Leaving, Why Are They Going, and What Will It Take to Bring Them Back? by Jim Davis and Michael Graham, with Ryan P. Burge.
More people have left the church in the last twenty-five years than all the new people who became Christians from the First Great Awakening, Second Great Awakening, and Billy Graham crusades combined. Adding to the alarm is the fact that this phenomenon has rapidly increased since the mid-1990s.
The Great Dechurching, 5.
I plan to write up a full review in Firebrand in the near future. This is a book worth reading.
David F. Watson 