Behind The Decreasing Number Of Church Goers in Africa

Have you ever asked yourself why we are surrounded by many Christians in our neighborhood, work places, relatives, friends of which many of these proudly say are Christians but the numbers in the church attendance doesn’t reflect what we see in society.

Let us get to the point, early this year i was listening t a christian radio here in Nairobi called Hope FM, the presenter paused a question to her listeners why what we see in society in regards to Christians is not what we see in church, thank God each called in with a different opinion.

A new survey finds the reason people avoid going to church is more often for practical or personal reasons, rather than lack of belief.

I once the same question to some of my friends in my circles and indeed if am to go by what they said, i can confirm many reasons can form a basic of this topic of discussion.

A new Pew Research Center survey asked Americans why they do or do not regularly go to church, synagogue, mosque or another house of worship. The overwhelming reason why people attend such services is to feel closer to God. But their reasons for staying away are more complicated.

Less than one-third (28 percent) say they don’t go because they are unbelievers. Among self-identified Christians, the predominant reason that non-churchgoers offer for not attending worship services is that they practice their faith in other ways. Almost half of evangelicals in this category (46 percent) say this is a very important reason for not going to church more often. The next most common reason evangelicals give for not attending services is that they haven’t found a church or house of worship they like (33 percent).

One-in-five evangelicals says they dislike the sermons, and a little more than one-in-ten (11 percent) says they do not feel welcome at religious services. About one in four (26 percent) cites logistical reasons for not going to religious services, such as not having the time or being in poor health.

It’s however important to note that there will be many people in heaven who were not affiliated with any particular denomination or for some reasons could not make it to church regularly. But one of the foremost principles of Christianity is that we are saved into the body of Christ, which is another name for the church as sighted in Ephesians 1:22-23.

Perhaps we should also ask this question in other way: Why would a person say he or she loves God but doesn’t want to fellowship with others. One of the major reasons God wants us in Church is because it has people with similar beliefs. It helps us bolster our faith and makes us accountable to one another.

To me when a person says “I believe in God and want to be baptized but i don’t want to go to church” is like a man saying to his Bride “I love you: I want to marry you but i don’t want to stay with you”, he literally wish to be called a married person but when in real sense is pretending.

Never the less my friend Onyacha Denis who subscribes to the SDA faith attributes this to upbringing and life engagements.

“You find a person is identified as a christian because he/she holds a christian name but didn’t grow up in faith or even is ever busy to make it to church to fellowship with others”-Said Onyacha

As the Bible says in Hebrews 10:25, we need to be firmly committed to corporate worship and assembly especially” so much more as ye see the approaching;”