I just read two very interesting surveys done by George Barna. You can read them at www.barna.org. One suggests that tithing is down hugely in churches across the board, yet up in evangelical churches. The other says that over 40 percent of Americans participate in religious discussions sometime during their week. Again, evangelicals top the list of people who share their faith and the relationship between faith and the declining morals of our country.

Surprisingly, it is the younger people who talk about faith. Even more surprising was the fact that college graduates spend more time talking about faith than do people who are not as well educated. Not so surprising is the fact that people in larger churches (over 100 in attendance) performed better in this category.

Teaching Tithing
Well that brings a question: “What are you teaching your people?” Every year, I do a series on tithing. Sometimes, I preach on it for four weeks. We include testimonies from people who God has blessed after they became tithers. We do this during the tithing messages and also sprinkle them throughout the year. We used to do them on video, but found live testimonies touch hearts better than the same words run through a projector.

The people do not resent this teaching. They look forward to it. Oh sure, I’ve had a few people walk out when I announced that I was speaking on tithing. But, who cares. They are robbers of God, according to Malachi. I would rather they found another church, anyway.

The tithers never tire of hearing the message that has so blessed their lives. They will support you when you teach on it. I once mailed the 200 top givers in our church and asked them to pray for me during the weeks I taught the series. I never told them how I chose their names, but they were certainly pleased to know that I considered them important to my prayer team at this time.

We recently went through the book, “Purpose Driven Life” in a modified “Forty Days of Purpose” campaign. When we hit discipleship, I hit on tithing—a lot harder than the book did. Because the people are used to the message, they applauded the teaching. My point is, you get what you preach.

Talking About God
Last year, I noticed that we were falling behind in evangelism. So, this year I scheduled three teaching series on how to do it. The best was the simplest. We discussed “prayer, care, share.” This came out of Jim Montgomery’s book, “A Million Lighthouses to Go.” The teaching got the people motivated to pray for people. To show them love. And finally, to talk about God whenever they got the chance. It took the pressure off them to “lead someone to Christ.”

I think our teaching about evangelism should lead people to “gossip about God.” In other words, bring answered prayer into normal conversations. End conversations with a simple “God bless you.” Tell people that you will pray for them when they tell you their problems. I even teach people to 1. Tell their friends that they are Christians and that they pray every morning, evening, etc. 2. Ask permission from that friend to pray for their problem during their daily prayer time. This is easy to do. It puts the burden on God to answer and it places the non-Christian’s attention on God. Will he deliver or not. This kind of behavior often brings people into church where they surrender their lives to Jesus.

You Get What You Teach
My point here is that you get what you teach. If you discuss the miserable state of the world in your messages, you will get miserable and worrisome people. If you only talk about apologetics you will have a church full of well educated arguers. If you teach evangelism in its simplest form you will pastor a bunch of people who are not afraid to share their faith. If you teach tithing and generosity as a norm, you will soon find the people joyously giving to the Lord.

Teach Them Young
We run our high school ministry as a church service (Sunday evenings at 7 P.M.). The pastor teaches the same message as I do in the other services. The result is that we are teaching these principles to the future adults of our church while they are young. We see their offerings and their efforts at evangelism as the future lifeblood of our church.

Teach them young. Many churches only entertain youth. It is your responsibility to disciple them while you can.

Be A Victor, Not A Victim
We don’t have to be victims of surveys. It is too easy to get depressed over the latest Barna data. Instead of letting it get you down, let it get you going. Realize that you are the greatest counselor your people have. Your pulpit is your place of authority to change their lives in a positive manner. What you do in preaching is more important than anything else that goes on in your church. Do it with passion and a positive attitude and you will see things going the way God intended. Keep the faith, stand firm and see the deliverance of the Lord.