Are We Actually Making Disciples? | Aaron Earls
How do you know if your church is actually making disciples? Lifeway Research writer Aaron Earls joins Mike Glenn to unpack what the data reveals about discipleship, church health, and Gen Z, and how pastors can use research to better understand the people they're called to reach.
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Mike Glenn: [00:00:00] Aaron Earls from, uh, Lifeway has joined us today on the podcast. We're glad you're here. So, so you and I are, are- have South Carolina in common, huh? We, we do. We do. You grew up in Blacksburg?
Aaron Earls: Blacksburg, South Carolina. Yes, sir.
Mike Glenn: Yeah.
Aaron Earls: Yeah.
Mike Glenn: And, uh-
Aaron Earls: Small, small town ... I,
Mike Glenn: I actually know where that is, so.
Aaron Earls: Which is unusual for somebody in Tennessee to know
Mike Glenn: where it's at.
That's crazy. So, well, I pastored in Edgefield, and I was Strom Th- uh, Thurmond's pastor when I
was there. Oh, wow. Yeah.
Aaron Earls: Okay. Yeah.
Mike Glenn: And, uh, and then from there we moved to Mauldin, so the Greenville area. Greenville, yeah. So all of those areas.
Aaron Earls: That's right.
Mike Glenn: I, I was in South Carolina long enough to think the Upstate was better than the Lowcountry.
Aaron Earls: Uh, I
Mike Glenn: grew up- So, you know.
Aaron Earls: I grew up in the Upstate. I, I don't wanna say that because my wife grew up in the Lowcountry.
Mike Glenn: Oh, well, see- So I, I don't wanna start that discussion ... yeah, you better, you better mix marriage there. But But those familiar with South Carolina will know that, that, uh-
Aaron Earls: Yeah ...
Mike Glenn: that is a real kind of, uh, rivalry between the Upstate and, and, and the Lowcountry, as, as they call it. [00:01:00] Okay. Uh, w- we have read lots of numbers and lots of statistics- Sure
about what's going on. Yeah. So how does a nice guy like you end up in stats- ... of all things?
Aaron Earls: Yeah. I... If you'd have told me growing up I was gonna be doing anything with math, I would've laughed in your face. Mm-hmm. There's no way. I'm not a math person. I hated, hated math in school. Just wanted to, always wanted to spend my time in literature and English and reading and writing and those things.
I, I, I loved that. And so my undergrad that I graduated with North Greenville, uh, is in journalism, and so I wanted to write. Mm-hmm. Um, obviously, you know, newspapers aren't exactly blowing at the seams right now hiring a lot of people, so, you know, how, how do you apply journalism to, you know, a career? I knew God had really called me to serve the church with those writing gifts, and so I graduated with a Master of Divinity from, uh- Southeastern Theological Seminary in Wake Forest and, and felt God call us to LifeWay and started serving at LifeWay and just kind of fell into writing more and more about research.
And it, it connected- Yeah, but you
Mike Glenn: also got a degree in [00:02:00] apologetics,
Aaron Earls: right?
Mike Glenn: Uh, yes, sir. Mm-hmm. That's the- The, the, the focus of, of the MDiv was apologetics. It
Aaron Earls: was, yeah.
Mike Glenn: Which is also about making the faith make sense.
Aaron Earls: Yeah.
Mike Glenn: Communicate, bridging what we know on one side- Right ... to, to those who, who do not understand on the other side.
Aaron Earls: It, I- it's interesting you say that. Again, like I ... So it comes out that way, that, that my degrees and my passions are to help people understand things they may not understand to start with- Yeah ... and to serve as a bridge. Mm-hmm. And so I see that with, with the research is that it's an avenue to connect people with something that may be abstract.
Mm-hmm. Maybe it, it, it's difficult to understand, difficult to put into, to practice what that means. But then you can take those numbers and say, "Okay, what does this mean? How is ... How can I apply this
Mike Glenn: to my life and ministry?" Yeah, so you're, you're the, you're the walking example of what we preach real hard around here-
at the Eng- Engaged Church Network, in that all of us have gifts, all of us have passions- Yeah ... and we serve the church, we serve the Lord best when we find a way to connect that passion to the service of God's kingdom.
Aaron Earls: Yeah, that's-
Mike Glenn: And, and your [00:03:00] ability- Absolutely ... to one, understand what the stats are saying, because w- we remember, uh, Mark Twain's quote about stats.
Okay? Very true. Uh, to understand what they're ... And then to help a, uh, a, a leader of a local congregation understand what those mean, what, what those stats mean and how they can be applied to bringing about real change- Yeah ... is, is a gift. Uh- Yeah. And it, it certainly is to me, because I read all that stuff, and most of the time I'm going, "Huh?"
Aaron Earls: Now, I, I definitely do have to, to go back sometimes and, and ask our statisticians- Mm-hmm ... and, and the guys that do the research, uh, "Help me understand this, and let's, let's break this down a bit." 'Cause they have their own language. They talk in, you know, math nerd, and they have that- Mm-hmm ... conversation. And so, but, so, but, you know, helping them to help me understand it and then getting there from, again, okay, how can I then help church, church leaders- Translate it to, to the guy on the street
if, so, so they can take and apply it. Okay. That'd be good if it's just numbers sitting out there. What has ...
Mike Glenn: Yeah. What, what, what's been the most surprising thing you've learned? [00:04:00]
Aaron Earls: Ag- I think just how much research can help and benefit. Um, i- in- in a lot of ways, we can have different pictures or ideas of what the church is, or what culture is- Mm-hmm
or what pastors are doing. And, and those may be good and helpful, and they may be right in our context, but they not, may not give us a full picture of it. I- i- in general, I'm a positive person. Mm-hmm. Like, I, I generally kind of think people are doing the right thing and good stuff, and I want to assume the best of somebody else.
Mm-hmm. And so I may go into a situation and think, "Okay, everybody's doing this." You know, like, growing up, I thought everybody followed Jesus. Right, right. That's just what you did.
Mike Glenn: Well, yeah, I grew up in the same kind of neighborhood,
Aaron Earls: right. Uh, but then you go out and look at them. Well, that's not always the case.
And, and I think research can help serve that. And, and I discovered that for me, you know, looking at this research and, and you may think everybody really knows Jesus and they wanna follow him. Mm-hmm. And some people do, but some people don't. And I think research gives us a clearer picture of the reality of what's happening, the reality of what's happening in God's creation, in the, in the world, the b- the how he's working and what he's doing.
Mm-hmm. Y- research gives us that fuller picture. It doesn't negate [00:05:00] what you and I see in our church or in our context. Right. But it does give us a fuller picture of what all is happening around us. And so i- it's been, you know, encouraging and challenging for me to kind of see bo- both sides of that. I think sometimes research gives us a, a, a better picture.
We may come into it thinking, "Oh, things are better." Mm-hmm. Or sometimes it may give us, you know, a, a, a sobering look at it. "Oh, this is... I thought it was way better than this, but it's not." Right. Yeah. Giving us that.
Mike Glenn: Mm-hmm. Aaron, for our listeners, explain to us exactly what a writer at the research division of Lifeway, Lifeway Research does.
Mm-hmm. You're not the math guy.
Aaron Earls: No, absolutely not. I d- I'm, I'm definitely not the math person, and our math people would not want me to claim I'm the math person at all. Um, but I, I, I see my role a bit like a translator or a bridge builder. Um, you know, just to be able to take the information that's over there, this, this raw, and the numbers and, you know, can kind of seem intimidating for a lot of people.
And it is for me, kind of w- when I first look at it. You know, it, [00:06:00] they send me a report, and it's got all this stuff on there, and it- Mm-hmm ... it's a lot, um, to kind of take in. But I, I, you know, I see my job, my role, as to take all of that information and then kind of translate it to w- what does the pastor need to know about this?
Mm-hmm. And that, that's really my, my lens when I go to write a article or, you know, the what is it church leader need to take away from this that can help empower and encourage them in their ministry? Or that can inform them about their ministry. Maybe sometimes it may be bad news, but taking that information so that it can go to them and they can see, how can we apply this?
What does this mean for us? And so, you know, a lot of times people think about numbers, and they, they, their heads get squirrely. Mm-hmm. And again, I understand that. Um, so I, so I view my, my position, my role there, as just to encourage them that it's not always the case, and to, and to be that bridge over to- Here's the numbers, but here's how that m- what that means for your ministry and your li- in, in your context.
Mike Glenn: Okay. Now, for the poor little pastor who just heard that, [00:07:00] who said, "Listen, I've already had to learn Greek, Hebrew." Now you're telling me I- Now you gotta do numbers too. ... now, now you're telling me I gotta do maths. Okay. Why would it be important for a pastor of a local church, you know, Four Way Stop Baptist Church, to understand these kind of stats?
Aaron Earls: Yeah. I mean, that's the church I grew up in. Mm-hmm. So, you know, my, my, my background is, uh, you know, we were triple digits on a great Sunday on a- Mm-hmm ... dead end road in South Carolina. You know, I, I, I didn't grow up in a big church that had lots of staff. We had one pastor, and it's... For a while there I served as, like, a volunteer youth pastor there.
So I understand- Right ... kind of that context and those things. Mm-hmm. I, I would just say, I, I don't, you don't necessarily have to know the numbers. Hopefully I'm doing my job, and you don't have to translate that. But hopefully I'm translating it for you to help you understand those things. Mm-hmm. But I think what I would want to tell them, what I would want them to understand is this gives you a clearer picture of the things that are happening.
You see lots of things happening in your church, and you read the news. Mm-hmm. We all know, like, those don't give you [00:08:00] the full picture. The news is coming from their own perspective, and even your context is limited. You see what happens in your town, in your church, in your community- Mm-hmm ... but you don't even see what happens in the town over, or the state over, or across the country.
And so hopefully what this research can n- can do is give you a fuller picture of this is the context of the church as a whole in our country. I mean, you can look at regions or different- Mm-hmm ... areas or, or different church sizes. You know, uh, when we, we do our research, we break it down by church size.
And so maybe it may not benefit you to see what a pastor of a 500- Right ... church-
Mike Glenn: Mm-hmm ...
Aaron Earls: is doing. But part of the breakout is, is it different for churches under 50?
Mike Glenn: Mm-hmm.
Aaron Earls: And so you can look at that part of the research- Right ... and say, "Okay, well, what's happening for small churches- Mm-hmm ... or, or normal sized churches?
What's happening in those congregations?" Yeah, one size
Mike Glenn: does not fit all.
Aaron Earls: Right. And so the good thing about our research is we, we'll go and take those significant differences and say, "It's this case in a large church- Mm-hmm ... but in a one pastor, 49 member church, this is what's happening in their context."
This is what's happening in this context. And so we're trying to give a full [00:09:00] picture of that- So that those pastors in those church can see this is what's happening everywhere, and hopefully they can see, "I'm not alone in this." Mm-hmm. It can give the... Maybe they're- Right ... experiencing some, some, some troubles and some struggles, man, and really struggling to- Turnover.
Yeah. Yeah. We're really struggling in this area. Mm-hmm. And, and, you, the enemy can lie to them and say, "Man, you're all alone in this." That's right. Yeah. "You're a failure." You're the only one that can't do this. You, you can't... Yeah, you can't get this right. Yeah. And hopefully the research in that way can help them to say, "I'm not alone in this.
You know, obviously God is walking with me, and my identity's in Christ- Yeah ... not in, not in ministry success." Right. "But I'm not the only pastor struggling with this." Mm-hmm. "I'm not the only church that's going through this issue. This is happening to lots of people in lots of areas and, but there are ways I can improve in this."
Mm-hmm. And so hopefully the, the, the research can encourage them that way, but also then give them the equipment and the direction to move forward and grow in that.
Mike Glenn: Okay. All right. Now, you know what you've done. You have given the local pastor a hammer. [00:10:00] Okay? And once you get a hammer-
Aaron Earls: Everything's a nail
Mike Glenn: everything looks like a nail. Okay? Right. So I get on the, the, the Lifeway Research website and I, oh, this is cool, this is cool. Yeah, yeah. All this stuff. And now I'm running my church by research.
Aaron Earls: Yeah.
Mike Glenn: Probably not the best way.
Aaron Earls: Absolutely not. Yeah. I- 'Cause if you look at, at the early church- Mm-hmm ... how it was founded, you know, statistically they were a tiny, tiny- Yeah, very tiny
segment in a tiny part of the backwater of the- Yeah ... Roman Empire. Yeah. That's not gonna do anything. Mm-hmm. But you know what, what did they say? You know, these are the men that come in, they've turned the world upside down- Turned it, right ... 'cause their commitment to Christ. Statistics should not ever be used to downplay or diminish the work of the Holy Spirit.
Mm-hmm. Like, God is working and moving and things. And, and statistics may or may not pick those things up- Mm-hmm ... to start off with. And so the church should not ever say, "Well, we can't do this," or, "We can't do what God's called us to do 'cause the stats say we shouldn't do it that way." Right. [00:11:00] You're not running a business.
You're not running an organization based on stockholder- Mm-hmm ... portfolio return. You're run- you're, you're shepherding the church of Christ. And so you're, you're not answering to what the stats say. You're answering- You have an
Mike Glenn: audience of one ...
Aaron Earls: right, what- Yeah ... what's God called you to do in the, in that- Mm-hmm
local congregation. Now hopefully the research can inform you of this is the context we're in, and maybe you decide, "Man, I really feel like God is leading us to do something that the statistics don't back up." That's
Mike Glenn: right.
Aaron Earls: Man, then follow Jesus. Mm-hmm. Don't follow the numbers. Mm-hmm. But maybe the numbers are saying, "Hey, this is more likely to reach men," or, "This is more likely to help- Right
you reach the next generation." Have we tried it that way? You know- Mm-hmm ... maybe the statistics bump you out of a rut of ministry, but you don't wanna, you don't want the statistics to stop you from doing what God's called you to do. Now that would be a horrible danger, and I think we've seen probably some of the outcomes of those dangers of people trying to run it like a- Well, and one of
Mike Glenn: the things that stats do-
business meeting ... is it allows you to learn from the, the, the trial and error of others.
Aaron Earls: Yeah.
Mike Glenn: You know? If, if we get a stat that says, "30% do this"-
Aaron Earls: Yeah ... [00:12:00]
Mike Glenn: then we know that there's been a lot of 70% out there. Right. And, and maybe you don't have to learn what we call experiential learning- Yeah ... where truth just beats you in the head till you get it.
Aaron Earls: Right.
Mike Glenn: Uh. Hopefully
Aaron Earls: the numbers let you skip past that and not- Right ... get beat in the head with it. That, that's the hope. But again, man, if God calls you to do something- That's right ... don't let the numbers stop you from doing what God called you to do. Mm-hmm. Absolutely.
Mike Glenn: Don't use any exc- uh, stats for a excuse for disobedience.
Aaron Earls: Right, yeah. Yeah, absolutely. Yeah. That, that's a great word. Mm-hmm. The stat should not be used as, as an excuse for the disobedience of, of, of a pastor of the church or anybody. Mm-hmm. You should be following the, the Holy Spirit working in your life regardless of what numbers may or may not say.
Mike Glenn: What the stats are telling about discipleship.
Aaron Earls: Yeah. Uh, one of the big studies we've, we've done and kind of j- uh, are still releasing even now, um, has been called the State of Discipleship study. Mm-hmm. And so it's a significant study. We're studying-
Mike Glenn: And this is available on the LifeWay website ...
Aaron Earls: LifeWayResearch.com. Okay. If you go to LifeWayResearch.com/discipleship- Okay
you can see all of this that I'll quote here. So you, you don't feel like you need to write all these numbers down to get, like, all that data is there- Mm-hmm ... [00:13:00] even more than I'm, uh, than I can even mention here. A- and so we talked to, you know, hundreds if not thousand pastors, thousands of churchgoers to get a look at what pastors think is happening, and then look at churchgoers and what, what they see happening kind of in their own lives- Mm-hmm
and what they're experiencing discipleship-wise. And so we found that, that pastors- generally think discipleship is going okay in their church. They're not confident, but around half say it's going pretty good in their church. Mm-hmm. And so, uh, o- okay, it's a mixed bag, but that's where they're at. And around seven, seven in 10 think that you can measure discipleship.
They think there's something we can do to look at our church and see how people are growing in their faith. But then we ask, "Well, are you doing that?" Only 29% are actually doing something about measuring discipleship in their congregation. And so there's a gap there between, again, it's something discipleship or th- the research about discipleship reveals for us- Mm-hmm
that pastors have this idea, we think discipleship's happening, but they don't [00:14:00] really know- We couldn't- ... because they're not doing anything- We couldn't prove it, yeah ...
Mike Glenn: to find it But, but besides a couple of anecdotal stories. Yeah,
Aaron Earls: yeah.
Mike Glenn: We've all got our favorite story about-
Aaron Earls: Right ...
Mike Glenn: you know, Brother Bob who did this and now- Yeah
is doing that, yeah. So.
Aaron Earls: And so then w- we also then looked at churchgoers. Okay, so this is what pastors think they're doing, what they think is happening in their churches. Mm-hmm. What are churchgoers actually doing? And so we, we asked them, it's hundreds of questions. I mean, the research is, is just extensive, um, about just both their beliefs, you know, what they believe about things- Mm-hmm
their practices, how they're actually living this out, what, what they do on a daily basis with their faith, what they do at church with their faith. All these questions kind of give, get an idea. And so again, this gets into the stat nerd stuff that I couldn't even begin to understand, but they kind of look at all that data and say, "Okay, these are the, the issues and the things that kind of- These are the
Mike Glenn: trends that are coming out of the research,
Aaron Earls: okay
and, and the buckets that, that say these things, these characteristics show up in people who are growing- Mm ... in their faith. And so then kind of, you not put a full number on it, but give us a little bit of an idea of [00:15:00] this- Mm ... is what discipleship looks like in our church. This is how people are or are not growing.
And so-
Mike Glenn: Yeah, my guess is that most people are bored to death in church. Mo- most, most church members are bored because they're simply asked to attend, and if you're a really good church member, you give. But they're never asked to fully engage- Yeah ... their gifts for the cause of the kingdom.
Aaron Earls: And, and we can kind of see that- Yeah
uh, in, in some of the ways they're living their faith out. Right. Um, so when we look at those signposts, are what we call them, 'cause again, we're not saying, "These things prove you're a disciple. These things..." Or, or, "You're a disciple now- Right ... if you do these things." Mm-hmm. But they're saying, "You're moving in the right direction.
You're growing in- Mm ... Christ-likeness if these eight things show up in your life." Mm-hmm. And so when we look at all the questions from those- And there are things, Mike. Yeah. And I,
Mike Glenn: I don't expect you to pull
Aaron Earls: all eight. Oh, no. No, so, so I'm, I was, I was, like, going through. I wrote them down, but I was trying to remember them all in my head to make sure I got these down.
Yeah. I usually
Mike Glenn: get six out of eight-
Aaron Earls: Yeah, yeah ... seven out of eight, yeah. But it's, it's seeking God-
Mike Glenn: Mm-hmm ...
Aaron Earls: it's obeying God, denying [00:16:00] self, serving God and others, exercising faith, building relationships, Bible engagement, living unashamed, and sharing Christ. Mm-hmm. There are lots of things that kind of make up each of those sections- Right
but those are the, the bigger buckets- Those are the big headlines, yeah ... that go. And so when you look at those different buckets and you kinda average out the scores, the average churchgoer has a 68. Uh, if we're going zero to 100, they score 68, which is a D.
Mike Glenn: A D.
Aaron Earls: I mean, you know, a D in discipleship, but not in a good way.
Mike Glenn: Well, and, and honestly, most people would be okay with that. If a D gets me into heaven- It's- ... then I'm okay
Aaron Earls: with that. Which may be part of the problem, is that we're, that's where we're at on some of that. That's right, yeah. Yeah. That's right, yeah. As, as, as long as I pass, I'm good. I don't,
Mike Glenn: yeah, that's right.
I don't need, I don't need to be the top student here, yeah.
Aaron Earls: But h- yeah, hopefully if, if you're a, a pastor, hopefully if you're a churchgoer, you're thinking, "I wanna do better than that." Right. You know, th- this is my... This is demonstrating how I'm following Christ- Mm-hmm ... what it looks like for me to love Jesus and walk with him, and walk with other believers in the church.
[00:17:00] I wanna do better than a D. And a pastor, hopefully as a pastor- Right ... you say, "I want my church to do better than a D." Right. "I want them to grow in all these things." Again, they're just, they're just signs that you're growing in Christ-likeness. They're, they're demonstrations of the Holy Spirit working in your life.
Mm-hmm. Th- they're just, these are the actions. It's Bible reading. Are you reading your Bible? Are you praying? Are you sharing Christ? Mm-hmm. Do people around you even know that you're a Christian? Th- those kind of things, not, we're not asking you giant things.
Mike Glenn: You know, a- a- and, and you, you know, you say w- well, cer- certainly everybody does that.
You know, I- I'm kinda known for asking my staff or team members that I work with two questions: what are you reading in scripture-
Aaron Earls: Mm ...
Mike Glenn: for you? Not are you, what are you reading to preach or teach- Right, yeah ... what are you reading for you? Yeah. And two, what's Jesus teaching you? Mm, yeah. Our rabbi is alive.
Yeah. The number of people, pastors, leaders I have caught that will look at me blank face, can't tell me what they have read in scripture. And well, you need to go home. You ne- you ne- you don't need- Yeah ... to be anywhere- Yeah ... near what the church is doing because you're dangerous.
Aaron Earls: Yeah. [00:18:00] That, that's really been, even for me, like a- as I go through these things, I'm thinking through my own self.
Yeah. Like, how am I following Jesus in that way? And it's funny you a- you asked those questions. That's something I've tried to start doing in my own home with, with, uh, with our kids. Mm-hmm. Like, we, we go through at night, and I've got a little wheel that, like, they hit and they spin on my phone. And it pulls up a random question.
Right. So we don't, we don't know what, everybody doesn't know what the question is. And a lot, and one of them is, like, what did, what did y- how did you see God in your Bible reading today? Okay. Yeah. And how have you seen God work in day? Mm-hmm. One's like, how are you praying? Another's like, how'd you see God in a family member?
'Cause I want them to be looking at the rest of us in the family and then looking for Jesus in us, too. Okay. And so it's, it's good for them. So, so let
Mike Glenn: me just grab this just to catch you. What you saw in the stats caused you to go home and rethink
Aaron Earls: what- Yeah. I, 'cause I, you know, it, it's- You were
Mike Glenn: kind of caught in your
Aaron Earls: own research there, huh?
Yeah. Yeah. It's part of the stats and part of just God come working in my heart as a, as a father. Okay. Like, you know, how am I leading my family in discipleship? I wanna grow as a disciple- Right ... but how am I leading my family to grow in discipleship? Exactly. Yeah, whole different. So that they're not just going to church and [00:19:00] checking off the boxes and doing the things.
Mm-hmm. But the faith is real to them on a daily basis. Yeah. That they're seeing their faith lived out, and they're, they're not just... You know, I could ask them, "Did you read your Bible today?" "Yeah, I read my Bible today." Mm-hmm. And it makes, and it's in their brain and out the next minute. Right. But how did you see God in what you read today?
Mm-hmm. Like, that's a different question. Yeah, what did you
Mike Glenn: do with what you
Aaron Earls: read kind of thing. Yeah. And how do you apply those things? Mm-hmm. Yeah. It's, it's a different question. It helps them to think through, hopefully build those habits in their life- Mm-hmm ... where they're thinking through those things, you know, when they're in my home and when they leave my home.
Mike Glenn: Why should a pastor fool with research?
Aaron Earls: Yeah, 'cause they're, they're busy. Yeah. Yeah.
Mike Glenn: They have a- And I got 100 things to do- 100 things ... and now, Mike, I'm watching your podcast- Yeah ... it's sheesh. Now you're telling me I gotta get on lifewayresearch.com- Yeah ... and I gotta figure out that 68% of my people are doing- Right, right
you know.
Aaron Earls: Yeah, yeah. Why,
Mike Glenn: why, why should- Yeah ... why should. But, but because listen, you're, you, you, you know, you're preaching to the choir here. Uh, th- this things fires me up. But I know, listen, a lot of my friends out there, they're, you know, they're right here.
Aaron Earls: Yeah.
Mike Glenn: They're treading, you know- Right ... and right now we're gonna throw, [00:20:00] we're gonna throw this brick in their little boat here.
Aaron Earls: Yeah.
Mike Glenn: Um.
Aaron Earls: What I, I hope is it's not a brick. What I hope is- Yeah ... i- is it's a buoy. Mm-hmm. I, I hope that it helps them think through their ministry. You know, what, what we think through this Everyday Life for Research, you know, we're not, none of us are pastors on staff, but all of us are church people- Mm-hmm
that love our church and love our pastors, and want to encourage them in, in their walk and their ministry. And so we're thinking like, we're not trying to come up with more weight to, "Pastor, you gotta do a better job." Right. "You're not, you're, you're, you're failing at your job. You gotta do better." That's not, that's not our heart at all from this.
Our heart is to say, "Pastors, we want to give you the reality of what's happening in- Right ... in church and culture- Mm-hmm ... so then God can use the information like He did with me- Mm-hmm ... to apply that to your ministry. And so most of our articles are not, "Here's all the research." A lot of them are, but most of them aren't.
Most of them are, "Here's the research, and here's how that applies to your ministry." Mm-hmm. "Here's what you can [00:21:00] take and how you, how you can flesh this out for your men's ministry or to reach the next generation." Most of the, most of the, the, uh, the articles we're trying to get out there is, is to help pastors- Right
encourage them to practically apply the research. And, and
Mike Glenn: folks don't realize that one of the best things about stats, at least that I have found is that it helps you stop doing things that aren't working.
Aaron Earls: Yeah.
Mike Glenn: Okay. You know they're not working, your stuff, but you have a couple of dear saints, and the stats can say, "Hey, reaching men doesn't work this way anymore."
Right. "Here's what's happening- Yeah. Yeah ... to the men's ministry." And it gives you some kind of- Weight behind- Yeah ... rent is, is more than just, just your opinion.
Aaron Earls: Yeah, absolutely. I, I, one thing we've tried to do, and hopefully pastors can use this, is that with that research, we did all the research and we developed the...
You know, we, we saw these eight characteristics standing out- Mm-hmm ... and we talked about those. Is that we then at Lifeway took those things and developed a, a free tool online. It's lifeway.com/disciplespath. [00:22:00] And so any pastor anywhere can take that and then go to their church, and all the questions that we asked- Mm-hmm
churchgoers to get the information to come up with the study- Mm-hmm ... they can ask their churchgoers that. And so the, the, the pastor then go and say, "Uh, well, here's the grade for my church." So it's n- it's not- Yeah ... but it-
Mike Glenn: Here's what, here's what we found out in reality.
Aaron Earls: Yeah. Right. And so, but then also take it, okay, here's the areas where they, your church needs some growth.
Mm-hmm. Here's how you can apply that and grow them. Not so that you sit back and think, "Oh, I'm doing such a horrible job." But no, here's how I can grow. Right. 'Cause then knowledge should lead us to growth. You know, Jesus, he's the way, the truth, the life. Yeah. We wanna know the truth. Well, we- It helps us to live like
Mike Glenn: that
Aaron Earls: we
Mike Glenn: were talking earlier about just because it's working in one area-
Aaron Earls: Yeah ...
Mike Glenn: doesn't necessarily define the national trends. Right. And, and it's not unusual to talk to somebody in a certain small group or a certain Sunday school class, that Sunday school class has helped them through some kind- Yeah ... of tough time.
They love the church. They love the Sunday school. Yeah. They love their teacher. Yeah. And it's all because of, of that experience. Mm-hmm. But that experience doesn't [00:23:00] necessarily translate to a, a church-wide trend- Right ... and certainly not a national trend.
Aaron Earls: Yeah. And so, so hopefully the, you know, taking this, you know, hopefully pastors can look at the research on a whole and say, can think through, "Well, how would my church score?"
But then they can take that assessment tool- Mm-hmm ... for free. You know, it's part of the, the goal. Like when we, we developed it, there, there was a commitment. We want this to be a service tool for the church. They can use it for free. We're not asking for any money in there. Mm-hmm. It's just they can take it, so it's to equip churches to use that.
And so pastors can then take that and say, "Okay, what is actually happening within the bulk of my congregation?" Mm-hmm. Not what they... 'Cause again, people wanna please their pastors. They'll go and tell them all the good stories. Yeah. Right. Right. They won't tell them, "Man, I, you know, I hadn't read my Bible at home in a month," you know.
Like they, they
Mike Glenn: won't- Yeah. Well, I tell people all the time, here's one thing we know about religious surveys, people lie.
Aaron Earls: Well, that's also true.
Mike Glenn: Yeah. You know it. Yeah. And
Aaron Earls: so we- So- You, there is the limitation for that for stuff. Yeah. Like you, you're not, you, you're, you're hoping the people will be honest, but even then you're still getting a, a general idea of- Mm-hmm
this is kinda [00:24:00] where we're at, and maybe some areas that are weakness. Mm-hmm. Obviously for, for, across the board, the, the lowest score kind of every time we do this is always sharing Christ. Evangelism is always one of the weakest ones. Mm-hmm. Um, but, but you, it, it can give pastors, you know, like you say, the ammunition for change of, "Hey, our, our church is really, we're great in this area."
Yeah. "We wanna, we wanna strengthen the area, but w- we're, we're struggling in this spot." Right. "How, what can we do? How can we change our ministry, change our focus- Mm-hmm ... change our priorities to make, to strengthen this area that's, that's been weak for our church when we saw that in the assessment?"
Mike Glenn: Right.
Okay. Don't wanna go any further until we talk about the magical Gen Z. Every, every, every, every conversation is Gen Z's doing this- Yeah ... Gen Z's doing that. So-
Aaron Earls: Yeah ...
Mike Glenn: what have you found out about Gen Z?
Aaron Earls: Yeah. It's complicated, and I, I, I think that's the first thing to be said because we're-
Mike Glenn: Now, we're talking to Baptist preachers.
We want three points in a point, and, and you can't say complicated
Aaron Earls: to us. Right. And that's what... Nobody, nobody likes that. We, we like the headlines that are, you know, "Gen Z's in [00:25:00] Revival." Yeah, right. Yeah. Or the, or some of us may not l- may like the headline of "Gen Z's the Worst Generation Ever"- Right ... 'cause it makes us feel good about our generation.
A- and so but it's c- it's complicated. It's, it's not one or the other.
Mike Glenn: Mm-hmm.
Aaron Earls: There, there are good things happening among Gen Z, and we want to encourage that, and lots of churches are seeing things happening. And so we talked about this earlier, about how anecdotes and statistics, how they work together.
They don't discount one another. Right. You know, the, the statistics that may say Gen Z's the least religious generation ever, and that's still the case, doesn't discount your church having- Right ... seen tons of college kids come there. Mm-hmm. But your church that's near a college campus, that has a great college ministry, that's reaching Gen Z or even Gen Alpha at this point, is not the same thing for the church like that I grew up on a dead-end road in a shrinking small town- Right
that doesn't have- Yeah ... any young families in the area. Right. Like, they're not reaching young people- Mm-hmm ... 'cause there's none around there to reach. Yeah.
Mike Glenn: As soon as they got... Went to college, they left-
Aaron Earls: Yeah ... and never came back. A- and so, you know, the, the statistic kind of paint this broad [00:26:00] picture of, of what's happening kind of nationally.
And so again, they don't discount the anecdotes of good things happening- Mm-hmm ... among there, but they do kinda give a better reality of what's happening all around. And so you can, you can look at the anecdotes and say, "I, I, I pray God's blessing on it, that it continues." Yes. Right. "Pray that it spreads."
Mm-hmm. But that's not the case f- for nationally. You know, when- Mm ... we look at Gen Z, like, they're, they s- they're starting off from the least religious standpoint of any generation before them. More of them were raised in a non-religious home than any other generation before them. Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. And so when you're calling Gen Z to Christ or to church, you're not calling them back to church like you were previous generations.
You know, when, when I grew up- Right ... there, there a lot of like, "Let's get them all back to church." Back slide. Yeah, right. Mm-hmm. You, you wanna get the backsliders. Mm-hmm. You wanna get them back to church. Mm-hmm. It's, it's back to church Sunday. Invite all the people that used to come- Right ... back to church.
Well, that's not, that's not gonna reach them if they never grew up in church. But there are some that are coming to Christ, and there are some that are raised in the church, that are committed to it, and we're seeing significant strength of that commitment. If they're there, they're there bought in. Mm-hmm.
[00:27:00] It's just the point of getting them there and having them to, to decide to follow Christ is, is the sticking point some more.
Mike Glenn: Right. One of the... What's the point of connection between, uh, between the unreached Gen Z and reengaging them with church?
Aaron Earls: It's always relationships.
Mike Glenn: Okay.
Aaron Earls: It's always, do they know somebody that's following Jesus, and can they see it in their lives?
Wow. That's always the case.
Mike Glenn: Nothing has changed.
Aaron Earls: No, it's, it's, it's- Nothing has changed. Yeah ... if anything, it's, it's deepening, but yeah, I mean, that, that's always been the case. Right. Do you, do you know somebody that knows Jesus- Mm-hmm ... and, and can they introduce you to him? You know, that was the disciples.
Right. Like, they went and introduced somebody to Jesus. Well, the old joke,
Mike Glenn: the old joke is there's two ways to get into a Baptist church, friendship and kinship.
Aaron Earls: Yeah.
Mike Glenn: Right?
Aaron Earls: Yeah.
Mike Glenn: And it's, I, I, I w- "What are you doing in this church?" Yeah. "Well, I'm, well, I'm Mike's friend." Or that's where my m- my mama went My, my mama went here, you know?
Right. That's, that's the way you get- Yeah ... that's the way it, it happens.
Aaron Earls: Yeah. But that, that's, and that's the case with them. You, th- they're ... Again, and because some of them don't [00:28:00] have parents that grew up in the church- Right ... or parents that either, their parents may have grown up in the church, they've stopped attending.
Mm-hmm. And so when they came along, they, they haven't been to church. A lot of it's gonna be those friends and relationships. It's gonna take the church being intentional about going out and ministering and serving and connecting with- Mm-hmm ... the next generation if they wanna see them grow. Mm-hmm. Again, now if you start getting them in your church, there can be that kind of s- flywheel effect that there's more- Right
as you get more, they can, you can expand- Mm-hmm ... and get more and more and more after that. But that, that first group of young adults, if you don't any kind of have that em- embedded in your church, it's gonna be difficult. Not that ... But again, I mean, the Ho- the Holy Spirit work, God does the impossible.
There's no- Right ... but it's going to take intentionality and purpose from- Mm-hmm ... the church, and really following the Holy Spirit's lead to, to go out and be intentional about ministering to and forming relationships with. Not just like, you know, uh, throw a tract at them through the drive-through window and head out the door.
Like, that's not gonna reach them. It, [00:29:00] but forming relationships with them- Mm-hmm ... developing, you know, one-on-one conversations, being open to their c- their, you know, conversations. I, y- right now one of the things I, I'm doing kind of as, as outreach ... 'Cause I work at LifeWay, so I'm- Mm-hmm ... uh, you know, and I work from home.
Mm-hmm. So, like, I, I'm s- uh, all I see is, is believers all the time. It's, it's my family and our dog, um, who may not be saved. I don't know about him. But, um, so one of the things I try to do to, like, get to know some, some lost people is, is we do basketball. Mm-hmm. Um, you know, I grew up loving basketball, so, so we play basketball on Tuesday nights, and it's mostly community guys.
And so we, if they come, we take prayer requests, and I do a quick, quick Bible study with them, five minutes, you tops. Mm-hmm. You know, I'm not trying to preach a whole sermon on there. A- and we've seen some of them start coming to church, and one of them just recently got baptized. And because we've ... And that's been years of relationship building.
Mm-hmm. And so th- you know, that's what it's going to take to reach new people with the gospel that, that didn't grow up in churches. It's going to take you, you committing months and years-
Mike Glenn: Yeah ...
Aaron Earls: of
Mike Glenn: getting to [00:30:00] know them. You know, I, I tell people that, you know, when I, when I started evangelism, I was given a pamphlet.
You walk through the four spiritual laws. Yeah. After the end of that pamphlet, somebody made a decision.
Aaron Earls: Right.
Mike Glenn: Now, uh, it's months- Yeah ... if not years. Yeah. I, it's not unusual for someone to say, "Okay, I'm gonna go think about that." Yeah. And then they'll go away f- for months, two or three months- Yeah ... come back and say, "You know, I've been thinking about what you said."
Aaron Earls: Yeah. Which is hard. You know, like, for us, we w- we want the instantaneous response. Mm-hmm. But I think, you know, and God's been teaching this to me, you know, with, with some of those relationships, other relationships, a- about trusting His Holy Spirit, that He's working even when we're not involved. I, I-
Mike Glenn: There's a lot of reasons Jesus taught about agriculture.
Aaron Earls: Yeah. You
Mike Glenn: plant
Aaron Earls: the seed- Can't see it. Yeah ...
Mike Glenn: and you wait-
Aaron Earls: Yeah ...
Mike Glenn: but you have no idea whether that seed can do it. Right. You know? And,
Aaron Earls: and, and I mean, I, I, and I want, I want it to be about me. Mm-hmm. I want, I want me to have said the right words and done the right thing and get the right result- Mm-hmm ... and all these things.
Instead of, [00:31:00] "Well, I said that, and maybe I said it wrong, or maybe I didn't- Yeah. Yeah ... and the Holy Spirit's working it out." I don't, I don't know. Not about you. Right. Exactly. No,
Mike Glenn: it's-
Aaron Earls: Yeah.
Mike Glenn: Tell me the one statistic that excites you.
Aaron Earls: Oh.
Mike Glenn: I wish everybody knew this.
Aaron Earls: I, I think the discipleship stuff. Like I-
Mike Glenn: Okay ...
Aaron Earls: I, just that Pastors think that it's happening, but it's, but they don't know that it's happening Okay I, that, that's just surprising to me Okay. That it,
Mike Glenn: that, that, that we can, we can measure something with some kind of concrete effectiveness and see how you folks are doing and your church is doing.
A-
Aaron Earls: but even if they, they think that it's happening- Yeah ... and they think you can measure it-
Mike Glenn: They don't
Aaron Earls: follow through ... but they're not actually measuring it. Mm-hmm. I, that's, that's just surprising to me that, that, you know. And again, I'm speaking as a layman. I'm speaking on the outside. Mm-hmm. I'm speaking as a churchgoer, not a, not a, not a pastor.
You know, I've served as a deacon and it, but that's a different thing than serving as a pastor. Right. And so having that ministry. And again, I d- I don't want to heap a burden of shame on a pastor for [00:32:00] not doing this. They, we, we talked about it earlier, they have thousands of things they're trying to do.
Well, this was so,
Mike Glenn: we were never trained in this.
Aaron Earls: Right, yeah. We were never
Mike Glenn: taught- Yeah, yeah ... to, to, to, to use these kind of, of materials. We're not even told about LifeWay Research most of the time. Yeah. You gotta be kind of a little, a little bit of nerd- ... to just go find the organization. Right. Yeah, yeah.
But, but you know what I'm saying? Yeah. We're taught, w- you know, we're, we're taught how to run a business. I mean, these kind of things.
Aaron Earls: Yeah.
Mike Glenn: Not, not, not, not these kind of really helpful stuff.
Aaron Earls: Right.
Mike Glenn: So what's the sta- stat that, uh, concerns you?
Aaron Earls: That concerns me. I, I, I think w- if we go back to Gen Z, just the fact they weren't raised in the church.
Mm-hmm. Uh, and w- we'll, we're coming up on a, on another time of doing this research. One of the things we, we do regular at LifeWay Research is survey the church dropout rate.
Mike Glenn: Mm-hmm.
Aaron Earls: How many people grew up in church and then leave.
Mike Glenn: Mm-hmm.
Aaron Earls: The most recent one we have, we're doing another one I think next year.
So the most recent one we have was about six years ago, but it's 66% of peop- of people who grew up in the church, at [00:33:00] some point as a young adult, leave.
Mike Glenn: Mm-hmm.
Aaron Earls: Now, some come back-
Mike Glenn: Mm-hmm ...
Aaron Earls: but some never come
Mike Glenn: back. Mm-hmm. Yeah, the traditional pattern was when I was growing up, you went out to college, you stopped going to church- Yeah
while you were in college. When you got out of college and got serious about life, you went back to church. Yeah. And everybody said, you know, that there's that four years of wilderness-
Aaron Earls: Yeah ...
Mike Glenn: where everybody wanders around. But now they're not coming back.
Aaron Earls: Yeah. Not all of them are coming back. Mm-hmm. And so, you know, again, as a dad- Mm-hmm
you know, as a dad and, and as, you know, someone that, that cares about seeing the next generation of this happen and grow, like- It, I, I worry or, or just wonder like what, what, what do we need to do as a church to help them not even have those four years? Like how- Mm-hmm ... can we empower them, encourage them to s- as we send them off to college or send them off into young adulthood so they don't even have those four years, so there's not even a time in their life where they're, they have to rebuild the habit of- Right, right
church attendance. Yeah, yeah. That it's always something consistent. Yeah, they don't lose their momentum. Yeah. Mm-hmm. And so, you know, j- just that, that, that's [00:34:00] always hanging over my head to think about of, of how can we help, you know, youth ministries and, and pastors and, and, and church leaders and, and small group teachers, how can we help them to equip and engage?
Like you sa- you said earlier, you know, like to call them to something more. Mm-hmm. To not just... Church isn't just you coming and sitting in a pew every week. No, no, no. But, but it's, it's the adventure of following Jesus, and so how can we equip them- Mm-hmm ... to recognize those things and, and, and to call them to do more than just show up- Mm-hmm
to church, but to be plugged in and be part of a church- Yeah ... part of a body.
Mike Glenn: Yeah. Remind me again, remind our listeners, lifewayresearch.com and Lifeway Research/disciple. Lifewayresearch.com/discipleship-
Aaron Earls: Okay ... will give you all of this research. Will give you all
Mike Glenn: the T-shirt. Okay.
Aaron Earls: If you want the tool for your church, the Disciple's Path, you can find that at lifeway.com/disciplespath. Okay. It's all one word, you know, together there, disciplespath. [00:35:00] And so that gives you the free assessment that we talked about that, that was all the research we did.
Right. That's the assessment churches can, can take for their members and kind of figure out where they're at and kind of evaluate discipleship happening in their congregation.
Mike Glenn: And this, this is q- high quality, good stuff.
Aaron Earls: No claim.
Mike Glenn: Aaron, thank you for being with us today. Thank you. Thank you, Mike.
Appreciate it. Appreciate all you brought.
Aaron Earls: Thank
Mike Glenn: you.
