The "New" Apostates: Why My Generation is Falling From Grace

I have been utterly broken this past week over a handful of friends and acquaintances who have fled their evangelical roots into the hopeless abyss of agnosticism. This sanctuary of confusion is altogether heartbreaking. Hundreds of theories abound to answer the “Why” question for these new evangelical apostates; my immediate hunch for their “fall” goes back to my previous blog entitled “Preaching: Psychological Manipulation or Spirit Driven.”

These apparent apostates have “never” taken ownership of their faith; there is no authenticity to inherited faith. Inherited faith is an apparent and external "easy-believism" faith accepted merely by the familial, ecclesiastical, or social institution. Faith ownership happens only after individualized regeneration. Young Americans who recall the sinner’s prayer while being sheltered from higher reasoning skills may later grow up asking tough theological questions that will easily destroy their childish faith.

As I have said before, the aim of the church should be discipleship not conversion. Why churches often differentiate between evangelism and discipleship baffles me; the Bible surly doesn’t. Much of the American gospel has demeaned the costs of Christianity in such a way that we have opted for easy believism. The horrifying results are coming in from years of the church creating spoon-fed Christians who were “saved” by scare tactics for the purpose of dodging hell.

Evangelical apostates are also on the rise because of their enlightening realization that much of the American gospel has been highly influenced by partisan politics, modernity’s reasoning, and hedonistic pursuits more than scripture itself; I agree to a large extent. However, many agnostics blame God undeservingly rather than the “men” who claim to act on behalf of God. We should never construct our conception of God through social portrayals. One of my agnostic friends finally understands this dichotomy; he no longer places the blame on God for “religious wars” but rather, man’s false interpretation of God and holy scripture. As the church, we have to confront our laity with the hard questions and get them to think for themselves rather than uploading objective information into their cpu databases. Transferable information makes robots not biblical apologists.

Before going to college, students need to be resourced with the proper theological and philosophical tools for a strong Biblical foundation rather than pizza and concerts. After youth group, when kidults tap into their logical thought processes and begin asking the tough questions of life, they often run away from God. Why is this? Most of these “God-fleeters” use an anti-god philosophy in order to extinguish a sin-ridden conscience from God as they fall into fleshly desires.

Two friends imparticularly have left the faith due to world suffering and “so-called” Biblical discrepancies. These are the same ole arguments we all hear in Philosophy 101. I’m not completely convinced these fleeting reasons are authentic because they could be weighed down in guilt from personal sin issues. Humanity has to choose between two options for a guilty conscience; we either repent or change our belief altogether. It's more convenient to change our belief in order to justify sin. However, If they do have authentic reservations for believing in the divine, they at least deserve a reasonable response.

I would like to begin discussing these agnostic issues using ex-Christian, indie-rock artist, Dave Bazan. His new record, “Curse Your Branches” is his “so-called” divorce to God. My plan is to use his agnostic-driven lyrics and answer his sincerely authentic questions about the biblical and social portrayal of God. My hope is that this endeavor will strengthen my faith and provide answers for sincere doubters.