43% of Evangelicals DON'T Think Jesus is God.....What?!

Wait.....Christians definitely believe that Jesus is God, right? It's head-scratching to me, but a recent survey of American Evangelicals suggests nearly half don't believe that. We're taking a closer look...

It's also cool if you don't; thanks either way.

[TurtleHunter]

I met with a pastor for a local nondenominational church recently and we had a discussion about this. We talked about how he normally writes sermons that focus on people’s practical day to day issues and how to approach them from a Christian perspective. Meanwhile they would really delve into theology during small groups or bible studies. This sounds fine until you consider that not everybody in the church participates in those activities and this results in a portion of the congregation that hasn’t really been taught much of the meat of Christian theology.

[gk]

If someone denys the Deity of Christ, they are not a hyper-liberal Christian. They are simply not Christian.

[nathangrimley]

Political identity vs. Religious identity.

Also the reason why there's this political identity is because many religious evangelicals have sacrificed their commitment to Christ for their commitment to country/political power.

[TheRealReidMeister]

I could be way off base (for context, I am an Orthodox Christian) here but I don’t think it’s a problem of “it’s not simple enough” or “we need to teach the basics more”. It’s that the evangelical churches are not actually demanding much from their parishioners. I don’t even mean intellectually. Largely, the people have been able to just have feel good messages with no actual integration between Christianity and their home life. This causes people to not give their religion its proper thought and action because it’s just something for Sundays.

[jaredbajer]

You're more likely to hear a sermon titled "Living Your Best Life Now" rather than "Essential Christian Doctrine" in evangelical churches today. That is to our shame.

[mollysmom]

I'm Catholic. That is shocking. And heartbreaking.

[McCainenl]

There's quite a bit of political science evidence suggesting that - in the US especially - "evangelical" is now primarily a political ideology, not a religious one

[Skipsul]

You are not the only one to notice this, and it has been a growing problem for decades. The former CEO of Thomas Nelson (before they were bought out by Zondervan/Harper), had to break contracts with popular Evangelical authors because they espoused what was effectively Arianism. This was nearly 20 years ago.

[xpictos]

Convert to Holy Orthodoxy here. I am so glad they do their Christology before their Soteriology. It prevents issues like this.

[DaleBoyce]

Great video, Matt. I don't have any definite answers, but anecdotally I can tell you that the category of American Evangelical has been hijacked to some degree to define a political position. Perhaps that skews how people self-identify and could account for some of that data. I find that when I invite people to my church, the offer is often declined because they believe our congregation belongs to a political party that they wouldn't want to be part of. I'm not entirely sure when or how that happened, but that seems to be an even scarier issue. Paul might even call it a 'different gospel'.

[PreacherJimC]

I know how it happened, Biblical illiteracy in the church. Too many so-called preachers & Pastors are preaching "feel good" messages, & motivational speeches. Preachers need to get back to preaching doctrine, and exegetical preaching, without shame or apology.

[AwakeningAfrica]

It could possibly be linked to the lack of making disciples rather than just converts. Evangelicals had been focused on numbers and "bring a friend" Sundays instead of choosing to be deeply rooted in Christ and teaching new believers how to do the same. (Discipleship being 1/1 life and intentional bible study, not a classroom) I am encouraged by many of the churches I am connected with making more of an effort in discipleship! Thanks for the video Matt!

[timprovost]

1. Cultural Christians, especially for those for whom evangelical is a cultural/political label. Here in the UK, the evangelical/political identity is not really a thing, but there are still people for whom the wider Christian (especially C of E) label is more a social / cultural thing
2. I do think that Christian literacy is very poor nowadays, especially among the 'cultural Christians' / those on the fringes of churches. It's a reminder that we need to teach the basics and not assume that people know stuff

[nickme]

Matt, thanks for thinking through the possible causes here, that’s so important for this kind of discourse. I do statistics and data analysis for a living, and I work with a couple of folks who specialize in surveys that would tell you surveys are one of the hardest types of “test” to do well. In particular, it is very nearly impossible to conduct a survey with no bias. That bias comes from how questions are phrased, as you pointed out, as well as how and where the survey is administered, and how the respondents are selected (or if they select themselves via “opt in”). Another thing to be aware of is the data filtering - always keep track of how many filters you have active when looking at data like this. With each new filter, you’re looking at smaller and more niche subsets of the data, which means both that the sample size is going down (so inferring observed trends to hold for the larger population is less likely to be valid), and it’s easier to forget how specific the group you’ve filtered to is and draw too broad a conclusion. Thanks for the great work you do here!

[justjason]

I’m a 5 Solas affirming Protestant that holds to the two sacraments of Baptism and the Lord’s Supper. I don’t say this lightly… the “protest” is rooted deeply in me. But I would rather take communion with the Roman Catholic with their transubstantiation than share a church with a “Christian” that does not know who the Lord is.

Anyone can say they are Christian. But if you don’t even know the most basic fundamental truth of the faith, then it’s empty words.

A little bit of yeast leavens the whole loaf.

[RealKansasMan]

This really puts Matthew 7:13-14 into perspective:

*“Enter through the narrow gate. For wide is the gate and broad is the road that leads to destruction, and many enter through it. But small is the gate and narrow the road that leads to life, and only a few find it."*

And this also puts Matthew 7:22-29 into perspective:

*"Many will say to Me in that day, 'Lord, Lord, have we not prophesied in Your name, cast out demons in Your name, and done many wonders in Your name? ' And then I will declare to them, 'I never knew you; depart from Me, you who practice lawlessness!"*

Be really careful which pastor/church or doctrine you follow. Be in the Word of God and study the scriptures yourselves and compare them to what you are being told. There are many wolves in sheep's clothing out there with many false doctrines.

[mkshffr]

The Seeker Sensitive movement has discarded doctrine in order to attract the world. We now have a generation that identifies as evangelical Christians but have never even been taught the basics of the faith.

[jayjackson]

I absolutely love the bottom of the screen chapter layout. Something about how my mind works really appreciates seeing the points you are going to make in order on screen.

[wesleynovak]

This is all anecdotal, but I've run into a surprising number of Evangelicals who are so sola scriptura that they reject any word, any doctrine not found directly in the Bible. They will dismiss the Nicene Creed, for instance, because it's "man-made words". There was a somewhat famous e-celeb who got baptized again recently who posted on Twitter that she got baptized in the name of Jesus only because the word Trinity does not appear in the Bible. A lot of the replies were similarly rejecting the trinity, modalism and other Christological heresies.

[findingshalom]

We just ran into this surprising problem in our Bible study group a few weeks ago. 3 out of the 10 people did not believe Jesus was God.
It took me completely by surprise. We tried to pull out all the Bible verses that are so obvious that He is divine but they wouldn’t believe any of it. It was literally the most heartbreaking night.
I would love for you to do a video.
We used all these verses and passages but their eyes were closed. Please pray for our little group.
God bless you for your videos.
-Christa