Diluted Faith: When American Christians Believe Jesus is Not Enough

Host: Hon. Sam Rohrer

Co-host: Dr. Isaac Crockett

Guest: Dr. George Barna

Note: This transcript is taken from a Stand in the Gap Today program aired on 12/19/25. To listen to the podcast, click HERE.

Disclaimer: While reasonable efforts have been made to provide an accurate transcription, the following is a representation of a mechanical transcription and as such, may not be a word for word transcript. Please listen to the audio version for any questions concerning the following dialogue.

Sam Rohrer:

Hello and welcome to this last Friday before Christmas 2025 Stand in the Gap Today program. A lot of descriptive words in there I know, but welcome aboard. Thankful that you’re all with us today. This year is closing quickly and we’re glad that you are with us on this day. Now, each month on this program for most of this year, except for about one month or maybe two, it’s been our honor here to jointly present. I’m going to say which is the very latest and most accurate research of American values. Worldview issues, particularly produced by Dr. George Barna now serving as director of research at the Cultural Research Center at Arizona Christian University. And during this year, 2025, Dr. Barna and Cultural Research Center have been releasing monthly reports on distinct areas of beliefs and values, termed worldview, as identified as a result of a national survey done some months ago.

Now, the one today is one that was done in May. This entire broader group, and George, you’ll have to work out any details. I’m not totally correct. As part of the American Worldview Inventory, 2025, most of those that we’ve dealt with have been as part of that. And today’s focus is going to focus on the last release, I believe for this year. It’s report 11 if you go on the website at cultureresearchcenter.com. It’s number 11. But today’s program’s going to focus on an issue, a point of analysis that is, I’m going to say, as I read through them, to me, the findings are staggering. And the implications are extraordinary. And there’s far too much for us to do based on this report in one program, but we’re going to try and go as far as we can. From the pages of scripture, I think as I read it, what this research shows is rather prophetical.

Again, it’s dynamic. Today, Isaac Crockett and I are going to talk with George again, as we often do. And because of the significance and the weight of these findings, I want to move right into today’s program, which I’ve entitled Diluted Faith, not Undiluted Faith. Diluted Faith. When American Christians believe that Jesus is not enough. Hopefully that title grabs your attention. Stay with us. The details become even more grabbing. George, welcome to the program and thanks so much for being back with us.

George Barna:

I always look forward to it, Sam and Isaac. Thanks for having me.

Sam Rohrer:

George, in the last 2025 Worldview Inventory Report, you used the title in this one that we’re actually dealing with today. You use this title, Faith Without Understanding. Majority of US Christians believe good works will contribute or good works contribute to salvation. And I chose my title similar to that, but that’s why I called it diluted faith. When American Christians believe Jesus is not enough. Just as another way to add an additional consideration to the staggering findings we’re going to relate. But before we get into the details here in segments two to four, could you do this? Two things. First, review the focus of the preceding reports in this 2025 inventory. And secondly, since I know you do nothing without careful thought, why did you save the focus of this report to the last and place the proceeding reports in the order which you did because they all pretty much connect.

Anyways, you got it. Go from there.

George Barna:

Well, your first question, what have we looked at this year? I mean, there were four basic topics that I wanted to dive into related to worldview, people’s perspectives on God. So we did a series of reports based on research we conducted on that topic. Then we looked at perspectives related to truth and morality. Again, we had found in prior research that there were serious issues there. So we dug in deeper on that. Then we went into the whole matter of sin. Do Americans and Christians even believe in sin anymore? So we did some research related to that, put out several reports on that topic. And now we’re ending up the year looking at this whole issue of salvation. And then there are a number of reasons why I would want to do that. One of those is that we’re celebrating the birth of Jesus. And when we look at the perspectives of people related to sin and salvation, I think in some ways it’s imperative that we ask the question, okay, we’re celebrating the birth of Jesus Christ.

So what? What difference did he make? And then who is he? Why does he matter? And in order to answer those kind of questions, you have to have a biblical perspective on not only the existence and the nature and being of God and what is truth? Where does it come from? How does that shape our morality? But sin and salvation. These things are all in lockstep together. And so that’s really why I want to end the year up with this. As we flow through all of this research, really, it’s kind of been a mini spiritual journey for us to take with people, challenging a lot of what Americans, I guess, believe based on what they’re telling us in the surveys. It’s shocking, it’s stunning, it’s sad, it’s unfortunate, but it’s the reality. And so I’m thankful that we can do this kind of research and that we live in a country where we can share these things openly and discuss them.

But man, I hope that we’re also living in a church that is closed minded enough that it wants to tell people, “You know what? You got to go back to the Bible if you want to know what to believe. You can’t just rely on your feelings and whatever’s happening in the conditions of your day.” This is something that we as a body of believers have to know what we believe, where those beliefs come from, and why they matter. And that’s why I think this whole discussion about sin and salvation today is so critical.

Isaac Crockett:

We only have about a minute left though for a quick question here. Was there anything that was kind of like an early Christmas present kind of pleasantly surprised you and then maybe the opposite? Was there something that most alarmed you?

George Barna:

I would say maybe the best surprise this year, looking at all this research is the fact that 84% of Americans agree that there is such a thing as sin, that sin exists. Now it breaks apart once we look at what they think sin is and why it matters. Maybe the most alarming thing to me, Isaac, is just looking at the consistent deterioration of our belief in the Bible and the truth principles that it gives to us, and particularly as they relate to these things that we’ve looked at this year, our understanding of God, truth, life, death, the implications of sin, success, purpose, all of these critical, fundamental, biblical issues, we are losing touch with what the Bible says about all of these

Sam Rohrer:

Things. And ladies and gentlemen, are you losing touch with what the Bible says? I trust not. Part of our goal and our prayer always on these programs, not just with George as we are today, but all of our programs is to keep encouraging all who fear God to go back to the authority of scripture. There is no other higher authority than the word of God. And today, when we share some of these results that you’re going to hear, you’re going to be staggered as well because if these numbers are correct, and I’m going to say since they are, maybe you, maybe me, hopefully not, are involved in some of these. At least we are brought up against the challenges of them. Stay with us. We’ll be right back. Diluted faith when American Christians believe Jesus is not enough. Well, welcome back, ladies and gentlemen. And if you’re just joining us, Dr. George Barna is with Isaac and I today doing our monthly program, which we have done most months when we’ve been able, in most cases, dealing with results from what Dr. George Barna and the Cultural Research Center at Arizona Christian University have been done and been releasing information on specific parts of this research that they’ve entitled the 2025 World View Summary.

And you can go to their website at culturalresearchcenter.com and find the entire report. And they’re numbered one down through today that we’re looking at is number 11 from this year. And you can find and have access to the full data of which we’re just focusing on some essential parts and findings. There’s so much more that we could do. And if you like to read research, it’s well put together and it’s a real education, let’s put it that way. Now, the one today came off of a survey that was done in May, so it’s fresh. So keep that in mind as we share now with some of this information. But George, in the official summary of this last 2025 report, you say this, and I’m going to quote exactly what you’re saying, it’s tightly written. You say this, quote, “A new report from the Cultural Research Center at Arizona Christian University, part of the American Worldview Inventory 2025, reveals that Americans typically believe Jesus Christ’s death.” Now this Americans typically believe Jesus Christ death on the cross and his resurrection from the grave are not sufficient to secure their eternal salvation.

Instead, they believe that experiencing eternal peace and joy requires a blend of personal works in God’s grace. And it is this finding that Jesus is not enough that George to me equates to not only my diluted faith reference, but what you said, faith without understanding descriptive because it reveals the way to interpret a fatal deception. That means millions of people who think they’re on their way to heaven are in fact on their way to a Christless eternity in the lake of fire without Christ. But then George, you went on, you made this statement, which will lead to the focus of this segment. You said this, “For many, heaven may be a place of permanent peace or rest, but without the presence of God.” Ladies and gentlemen, did you hear that? May be a place of permanent rest or peace, heaven may be, but without the presence of God.

And then you’re going to say, still, more than nine out of 10, 90% of Americans who align with the Christian faith contend that they will experience that condition of never ending bliss, whether God is there or not. Now, George, this last quote, of course, refers to what people are envisioning in regard to what happens after they die. So that being said, can you share the overview of what people are believing? Because in eternal afterlife of never ending bliss that is not dependent on God, I mean, it’s bizarre.

George Barna:

Yeah. And there are a couple of trains of thought that we have to look at here. One of those is what are people thinking is most important in terms of determining what’s going to happen to them after they die. Now, on the one hand, you’ve got slightly more than half of Americans saying that their post-death experience is going to be at least partly dependent on embracing Christ as their savior, honoring and serving God, consistently demonstrating strong moral character, confessing their sins to Christ. So that’s good. The numbers aren’t high, but that’s good. But then you’ve got to add to that more than a third, moving up toward close to a half, who would say, but also where they wind up and what happens to them after they die is going to be partly dependent on how well they understood themselves, the balance of their good deeds and their bad deeds, their devotion to what was labeled as the path to perfection, which of course is an eastern mystical construct.

You’ve got a third of them saying that their participation in the sacred rights and sacraments and rituals is part of that. So you’ve got this kind of gray blend of activities that most people are piecing together of their own volition to determine what’s going to happen to them after they die. Then the other train of thought we’ve got to look at is, well, where do they think they’re going to wind up? What’s that going to be like? And you’ve got a little bit less than four out of 10 who say that they believe that they’ll live eternally in the presence of God. Then you’ve got 13% who say, “Well, I’m just going to cease to exist.” You’ve got 12% who say, “Well, I’ll have eternal peace and rest, but God won’t be present there.” Then you’ve got another 12% who say, “After I die, I’ve got to go through a period of purification and then I’ll have a time of peace and rest as a traditional Catholic view.

Mostly Catholics are behind that. ” Then you’ve got about 10%, well, 10%, yeah, who say that when they die, they will join with the universe and then add to that another 9% who say that they’ll come back in another life form, a more traditional idea of reincarnation. And then you’ve got the remaining 3% who say that they are probably going to live in a place of torment and punishment for the rest of eternity. So that’s kind of the big picture of these two trains of thought of, what do I have to do to get the kind of outcome that I want? And frankly, it’s a minority of Americans who think it’s all dependent on Jesus, them confessing their sins and embracing Christ, them repenting of their sins, changing the way they live. It’s a much greater share of people who say, “Well, I’m going to have a good experience, but it’s going to look a little different and it’s going to be based on these other things.”

Isaac Crockett:

George, as you’re talking about this, I’m thinking of a hymn that we used to sing in our home a lot. My dad used to love to sing it. Jesus paid it all, all to him I owe. Sin has left a crimson stain. He washed it wide as snow. And it’s sad that professing Christians, self-identifying born again Christians don’t get that. And this whole report is so eye-opening. If you want to see George’s whole report, we have it posted on our Facebook site. If you go to Stand in the Gap Today on Facebook, you can actually see a picture of Dr. George Barna. If you’ve been listening to him and want to see what he looks like. You could go there. If you like what he looks like, give us a thumbs up. But you can read that whole report, report number 11. It takes you right to Arizona Christian University to their website and shows you the report.

On that report though, this is so interesting, George, what you’re saying about heaven without God, which is just so just seems absent minded to me. I mean, in our family devotions just a night or two ago, our kids were reading, we’re reading some passages about Hanukkah and some passages leading up to Christmas with the advent looking forward to the second coming of Jesus. And we were focusing on light. Revelation chapter 21 makes it so clear that Jesus is the light in heaven and I just can’t imagine heaven without him, but what about something similar? If we’re talking about heaven, what does this mean about their judgment about a really popular topic right now about sin and about a literal hell if they don’t believe that heaven requires a literal God?

George Barna:

Well, again, there is so much, and the phrase that I’ve been using a lot lately, Isaac, is theological noise. There’s a lot of messages being given to us in our culture about spiritual matters, even about eternity, about judgment, about sin, about God, about truth, morality, all of these things. I mean, the media’s been barning us with messages about these things. They don’t herald it as, “Oh, pay attention. Here’s a spiritual message.” But it is. And so what we wind up with is a lot of confusion and turbulence and chaos and people’s spiritual perspectives, and that’s what’s driving the spiritual … I’m sorry, the societal turbulence and chaos that we’re experiencing. And so what’s adding to this? Well, the fact that less than two out of every three people believe that everyone will eventually be judged by God. The fact that only half of Americans believe that every person’s sins.

Even fewer people believe that they themselves are sinners. And when we look at this whole issue of sin, what we find is that people are saying, “You know what? Sin, yeah, okay, it’s real, but it’s a mistake. It’s not that big a deal. Yeah, I feel bad about it, but I got to move on. ” And so we don’t really address the issue of sin as if it’s a real serious thing, an offense against God that breaks his heart and that has eternal consequences for us. We’re not looking at it that way. And partly that’s because, check this out, only one out of every four American adults take the Bibles literally, a literal interpretation of what the scripture says, one out of four adults. And so when it comes to sin, what most people would say is, “Yeah, the Bible has some good suggestions for us to think about.

” That’s not how God intended his word to be taken. And so we’re at a place where our research finds that people say that guilt from what’s alleged sin is often worse than that alleged sin itself, which is a different way of interpreting what’s going on in our culture, different way of saying, “You know what? Our feelings matter a whole lot more than the fact of what our sin does to our relationship with God.”

Sam Rohrer:

Ladies and gentlemen, that is, as we’ve said in other programs with George, we’ve come to a point in the country where it’s more important what you feel than what the word of God says. Obviously, does not that lead to problems? Boyd does it ever and one’s eternal destiny, it’s too important to base on your feelings. All right. When you come back, we’re going to look at a category that was identified in here as born again Christians and three segments of those that came out that Georgia identified will break them out. Well, George, as we go further into this report, and again, ladies and gentlemen, if you’re just tuning in and Isaac, you can give the Facebook where they can find it there. But if you want to go to Georgia’s website directly, culturalresearchcenter.com, you can find reports. There are 11 that are there and are numbered that way, which relate to the 11 reports that have been published here in 2025.

Now, we’re dealing with one here that came out the end of November, number 11, and it was based on a May research, so it’s very, very current. But as we walk through that, George, as I’m reading your report, I was drawn to another series of analysis regarding the one group. I’m going to say that most true Christians would assume would be biblical. Anyways, you said this in part. Let me just read it. You said, “The survey discovered that even among those who are most likely to fit some description of being “born again” through Jesus Christ, there were significant differences and points of conflict with scripture. And then you want to say the study identified three uniquely defined born again segments. Now, here’s what caught my attention, which I’d like you to expand upon. When you say “significant differences” and points of conflict with scripture, I’m thinking, “Wow, now this is not something that’s minor.” And as I’m looking at it, I’m thinking, “Oh, you’re not exaggerating at all because you identified, as you said, three uniquely defined born again segments,” which is kind of unusual in itself.

If you’re born again, you ought to be born again, but there’s three groups here. The first of these three groups you say comprises a third of the American public, and then you say this about them. “This group was perhaps the most biblically confused of the three. “All right, let’s just go into there. Who is this group, this first group, and what do they believe and the point of scriptural conflict which you identified? And then we’ll work down through to the second and the third one.

George Barna:

Well, Sam, the first group are those who call themselves born again Christians. Why does that matter? Because if other researchers talk about born again Christians, usually they define it this way. They ask people, ” Hey, do you think of yourself as a born again Christian, born again or evangelical Christian? “It’s normally the way the question will be asked, pew, gallop, all the rest. And so it’s important because this is what gets reported in the media and this is what we tend to think of as born again Christians. My contention is that’s bad research, it’s bad analysis and it’s misleading the church. Why? Well, when we look at these people, I mean so many of them, we’ve dug deeper in it than I report on here, but what we found is that a lot of these people will even tell you just upfront,” Hey, I don’t have a real quote unquote relationship with Jesus Christ.

“So it’s like, well, okay, how can you call yourself born again? So anyway, this particular group represents one third of the population. Why does it matter that they get so much attention because they’re theologically confused to the hilt. We found that yes, more than four out of five of them say that they’re going to experience eternal life that has peace and security and rest associated with it, but we also found that only two out of three of them said that God is going to be present in that eternal place where they’re going to spend the rest of their time. And then most alarmingly, we discovered that only about half of them said that every person is going to be personally judged by God. Close to half of them say that good people can earn their salvation. More than a third of these alleged born again Christians say that they believe in reincarnation and that it may be something that they personally experience.

More than a third of them say that there are many viable paths to eternal salvation. Four out of 10 of them say that repentance, to repent, all you have to do is say,” I didn’t mean it. I’m sorry. I shouldn’t have done that. “Anything along those lines qualifies as repentance and one out of four of these folks also say they do not even believe that confessing their own sins is a very important component of their own salvation. So this is why I’m so alarmed about this particular group’s getting so much attention and this being who we think born again Christians are, I don’t think this is what the scriptures meant at all when they talked about being born again.

Isaac Crockett:

The second group is I think the largest one and you say that their worldview is a jumble of biblical and cultural ideas. I like that. A jumble of these two biblical ideas and cultural ideas. Could you tell us who this group is? What do they believe and what is the scriptural conflict that’s going on that you’ve identified just through this survey?

George Barna:

So this is a group of individuals who rightfully say when they die, they believe that they’ll go to heaven only because they’ve confessed their sins and accepted Jesus Christ as their savior. Good for them. That’s a good thing. I think that’s very biblical and we find that more than nine out of 10 of the people in this group believe that everyone is at some point going to be personally judged by God, but then it falls apart. I mean, there’s some other good stuff they believe, but among the noise, theological noise that they’ve bought into, part of this jumble that I’m talking about, a majority of them also say,” But if you’re a good person or you do enough good things for other people, you can earn a place in heaven. “So right away we’ve got this tension even in their own perspective of, ” Well, yeah, I’m relying on Jesus, but you don’t have to.

If you just want to be a good person or do enough good stuff, you can join me in eternity. We found that 44% of this group says that repentance is simply admitting that you’re sinful, but it has nothing to do with you changing your behavior, which of course is what biblical repentance is all about. It’s not just about saying, Oops, I made a mistake and going on and maybe making that mistake again, maybe not, but it doesn’t matter because you’re not focused on your behavior. You don’t think that matters. And we also found that half of the segments say that there are many viable paths to eternal salvation, so you can choose whichever one you want, theological, mumbo jumbo.

Sam Rohrer:

And again, you cannot hold to these things, as you said, George, and be a true believer. So we got big issues. And here’s the third group that you found out. And to me, it sounds more like a genuine born again Christian, but yet you will say, 27% I think are in this group, you say, “But even this segment was confused in their spiritual understanding of sin and salvation.” Well, that’s the whole basis for whether or not a person’s truly born again or not. So who’s this group? What do they believe and how’s it vary from the others?

George Barna:

The thing that makes this group different is that they not only have confessed their sins, embrace Christ as their savior, they’ve asked them to forgive them, and they believe that their soul will live in God’s presence eternally, but they’ve added to that true repentance. That is, they’re changing their thinking, they’re changing their behavior. Repentance meaning to turn around, go in a different direction, do something different, go in a different place, and that’s what repentance does. It takes us away from the sinful thoughts or behaviors or words and changes it. This is a group that is different from the others because of that emphasis upon repentance. But even here, I mean, it’s just shocking that even this group, 42% say you can still be a good enough person to earn a place in heaven. 38% say that repentance only takes admission of sin, not behavioral change.

Even though they’ve engaged in the behavioral change, they don’t think that that’s part of what true biblical repentance is. And then you’ve got more than a quarter of them say that there are paths to salvation that have nothing to do with Jesus Christ, absolute lie. So no matter which of these born again groups we look at, they’ve got some good stuff theologically, they’ve got some ridiculous stuff theologically. And so I think part of what we’ve got to start doing in our churches, in our homes, in our small groups, in what we do on the air, on radio or on TV, is we’ve got to continually touch base with this idea of what is sin, what does it look like, what are its personal implications, how do you address sin and what does all of that have to do with salvation because we are not getting it.

We know from another study that Pew did last year that only 10% of our Christian churches in this country even mention sin in a sermon during the course of a year. Why? Because the way that we measure our success in ministry is how many people show up, how much money they give, how many programs they participate in, how much square footage we build out on the campus, all of those things, none of which Jesus died for. We’ve got to get back to the things that matter to him that he did die for, and that has to go back to our relationship with God and understanding that we cannot have that close, personal, saving relationship with him unless we acknowledge our sins, confess them to Christ, rely on him to save us, and we show that we’re serious about this by changing the way that we live so that we do everything we can, not to break God’s heart by sinning again, but by living a life that is in the sync with the Biblical principles that he gives to us for our lives.

Sam Rohrer:

George, thank you so much for laying that. Ladies and gentlemen, if you’re following along with this, the verses that scripture talks about, broad is the way that leads to destruction. Many are on that way. Narrow is the way that leads to life. Then that passage where the Lord Jesus himself says, people will stand before him and say, “Well, didn’t we do all these things in your name?” Meaning they said they were Christians? And it says, “Depart from me, I never knew you. ” That’s in one of the most astounding verses in scripture. Doesn’t it sound like this research? George, when we come back, I’d like to talk to you Isaac about taking this information and looking at the state of the church and the nation, the implications of this. Well, as we go into our final segment, we’re going to try and bring some concluding thoughts, although there have been many concluding thoughts.

As we’ve walked through this survey again, which you can find, it’s number 11. You can find it at culturalresearchcenter.com. But the implications are the thing. The thing about research that we’ve talked about a lot here, well done research is a confrontation with the truth. If it’s truthful, if it’s well done, it is the truth. It’s a definer of reality. Now, what you do with it is a whole different issue. To some extent, I’m going to say it’s like God’s word. It’s all true. What you do with it makes all the difference. You can deny it. You can distort it. You can do all kinds of things to it, which people do. And obviously in this research, people who say they are Christians, people who say they are born again cannot be based on what they say. So the implications of that are extraordinary. Now, George, in your report’s conclusion, you make these statements, and again, I’m just going to read it because you’ve summarized it very concisely.

You say this, “There remains a shocking degree of misunderstanding among Christians regarding sin, repentance, forgiveness and salvation.” You say, “Tens of millions of people who attend Christian churches every week and who consider themselves to be followers of Christ and eternally secure do not seem to understand that repentance is necessary for salvation and that repentance demands a change in behavior.” And then you said this, the findings point to a larger issue. Millions of people, ladies and gentlemen, get that. Millions of people who regularly attend Christian churches believe that eternal salvation does not depend on the sacrifice of Christ because of our sins. They don’t understand this fundamental tenet of Christian belief. Now, George, based on the findings of the report and what we’ve talked about here, again, that’s why I’m saying it’s staggering. The implications are extraordinary. I want to hear from you, pull no punches on what the true state of our nation.

What does this mean? What does this say about the true state of our nation? Because you’ve said many times, “You do what you believe.” All right. Now, what does this say about the professing church in America here at the end of 2025 and implications that it portends as we look not the less challenges by all indications around us, but to greater challenges in 2026. I’d like you to sum it up and take the time to do that, but I’ve got to ask you this one question first. In that last segment, you had identified these three groups of people who said they were born again. Some got close, but they were all off. Here’s my question. I didn’t ask you ahead of time, but how many of those that you surveyed who said they were born again actually indicated biblically that they would be? You didn’t mention that.

Did not exist.

George Barna:

No, it exists, but I like to be really careful because I’m not God. So nobody’s asking me to pass judgment on anybody else. I’m just using research to try to estimate what’s going on and to help us maybe clean up our act a bit before the Lord returns. And so in answer to a question like that, it’s hard to say. I’m working on a book right now on discipleship and one of the things that I’ve kind of landed on, I guess, is that about 3% of adults in America are what I think Jesus might define as genuine disciples. And so they’d be born again, but they’d be committing their life to knowing, loving and serving him with all the heart, mind, strength, and soul. And we have different bits and pieces of evidence of that. So it’s a very small number and that number could be and should be a lot bigger than it is, but it’s because we’re so distracted by the culture.

We’re so deceived by Satan and in many cases, I think we’re willing to be deceived by him. I think all of us have moments like that where it feels more comfortable to accept the deception than to roll with the hard truth. So yeah, it’s a tough time for the American church.

Sam Rohrer:

All right. So where are we? What’s the state of the nation, state of the church implications if you see here based on this information? What do you

George Barna:

Say? Well, yeah, gosh. I mean, we can talk for hours about this. This is where I spend my life trying to figure out … Let me just throw out a few quick things. One is that I think after having spent this year digging deeper into some of the elements of our worldview, I think it’s indisputable that America is biblically illiterate. The church is biblically illiterate. And what we’ve got is a lack of biblical wisdom that’s destroying the church, it’s destroying our families, it’s destroying our culture, and it’s destroying our potential for the future. We desperately need to get back into God’s word. What we’ve become is a group of information collectors. I was recently with a large group of pastors and I get challenged by some of them. I said, “Well, no, it’s not as bad as you say, George, because we preach” from the Bible, and people are taking notes every week.

And my reaction was, “Well, I don’t doubt that. ” We’ve got tens of millions of people that are attending church services regularly, but they’ve become information collectors rather than people who are broken by their sin and because of that brokenness, wholly dependent, completely dependent upon Jesus Christ. That’s who we need to be. Not people who can parrot back stuff and who have copious notes about things that somebody thinks is important. I mean, we really need to get to the place where the Bible is the foundation for how we think and because we think it, then we can live it and therefore we can be imitators of Christ. That’s what we need. So number one, we’re biblically illiterate. Secondly, I’d say this is a great time of year for us to stop, take a deep breath and ask the question, “Hey, who is this Jesus Christ?

Who is he? Why did he come here? What’s so important about him? What should change because of who he is? ” Because as I look at all the day that we’ve been collecting, people don’t know the answers to that simple question. Who is Jesus? Why did he come here? What difference does he make? I’ll never forget one of the church services I attended. We had a guest singer one weekend and the chorus of the song he sang, I was just kind of bopping along with the song and then he sang the chorus, which was three words. I killed him. I’d never thought about that before. It wasn’t these Yahoo sitting around me in the church. I killed Jesus because of my sin. He had to die. My sin. How serious do we take that? I’ve never forgotten that moment, the words of that song, praise God that he sang that because I mean, that was such a slap in the face to me of, you know what?

Jesus is the holy God of the universe. He had to be sacrificed for my sin and because he loves me, he loves my soul, he wants me to be with him, but it’s not just going to happen. He can’t buy into universalism. Okay. So ask him the question about Jesus. And thirdly, I’d say that we don’t understand repentance in this country, and that is to our detriment, our deep unremitting detriment. Repentance isn’t just feeling bad or feeling regret or feeling sorrow. That’s part of it, but there’s got to be change. So I think all of this speaks to where we’re at in America today.

Sam Rohrer:

Dr. George Barna, thank you so much for being with us again today. What a blessing. Great Christmas to you and your family. Thank you for being such a vital part of this ministry. Isaac, same thing to you and your family as well as we park this time here on Friday. Ladies and gentlemen, as we enter Christmas, I pray that you would ask that question, “What am I doing? Who is the Jesus Christ’s birth that we’re celebrating? Do I really know? ”