I wanted to share some numbers this morning that has me thinking. According to Christianity Today, the United States sent 127,000 missionaries to other countries (making us the largest sending nation) while receiving over 32,400 missionaries from other countries (making us the largest receiving country). On February 29th of this year, USA Today reported that during the last ten years (2000-2010) Islam increased 74% and Time reported on March 12th that 16% of the US population consider themselves unattached to any religion.

While many conclusions from these numbers can be drawn, here is my take. America is definitely a post-Christian nation where the churches have failed to even keep up with the population growth. While we have championed going out into the “lost world”, we have lost our own country. Perhaps we should treat the US as a foreign country and adopt the same strategies here to reach our own lost. We also must repent of the arrogance of believing that we have the answers for everyone else when we are losing our own people. Maybe, just maybe, we need to look at other countries where Christianity is growing, not shrinking, and ask them to teach us how to reach our own people. While I am grateful for those 32,400 missionaries coming here to help us, I am ashamed that we are losing so much ground.

Perhaps its time to admit that Christianity in America is cultural and not transformational. Until we repent of that and the churches get busy making disciples, we will continue to see us losing ground. We have the truth, the training, the resources – what I question is if we have the commitment, the desire, the love for Christ that will compel us to reaching the lost for Him.

What about you? When is the last time you were involved in bringing a person to faith in Jesus Christ and discipling them in the faith?