In a May 28, 2024 article for Mere Orthodoxy, Matthew Loftus mourned the precipitous decline in church attendance among historic mainline denominations (read historically modernist denominations). Church attendance for mainline denominations has now dropped to 9% of the population. For the sake of clarity, historically mainline churches while not all theologically liberal, aligned themselves with theological liberal denominations—denying the inspiration of scripture, miracles, the blood atonement, the resurrection, and more. They denied the fundamentals of the faith. His explanation for what has happened is that as the culture has moved away from Christian values, the attendees of these churches have just moved on to other priorities in their busy lives.

He understands that some Christian conservatives (read theologically conservative as in evangelical or biblical fundamentalists) might offer an “I told you so.”

While some conservatives may feel the temptation to smugly remark about the results of theological liberalism, that feels about as appropriate as a lecture about the dangers of drug addiction during the funeral of a young person who died of an overdose.

Really? Is it like that? Absolutely not. We should not mourn the decline of ministries that preach a false gospel. …

Read the rest of this article here: Don’t Mourn the Decline of Churches that Preach a False Gospel – Proclaim & Defend (proclaimanddefend.org) — or just listen to the podcast.

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