We have started a series on the exciting research findings from
Teleios! A list of potential benefits is found on our home page of our website
(www.teleiosresearch.com). Today let us explore the incidence of “tares” in the church.
Christ promised in Matthew 13 that there would be tares in the
church. A
tare is a plant that resembles wheat but cannot be correctly identified until
harvest); so,
Jesus’ term means those who appear as a Christian, but really are not true
believers. Christ indicated tares would be difficult to differentiate from true
believers until the end times. Nonetheless, since the church includes
unbelievers, we should try our best to discern their identity so we might help
them come to faith (1 John 2-4).
We investigated the potential incidence and effect of tares in the
church by surveying users of the Instagram account, Instapray, often visited by
young adult Christians. In total, 1526 individuals participated and 73%
described themselves as evangelicals. Just over half had at least some college
education and the average age was 23.
We evaluated the potential incidence of tares by asking
participants how they were saved in a multiple-choice question which included no
responses indicating ‘saved by grace’. To answer the question correctly the
participant had to choose ‘other’ and supply the correct answer.
The second question then asked respondents if they were ‘saved by
grace through faith alone.’ After seeing this participants could not return to
the prior question and change their answer.
Interestingly, in the first question only 25% knew the correct
response was not available and supplied an answer under ‘other’. Of these,
approximately 60% included some statement regarding being ‘saved by grace or
faith without works’, approximately 16% of the total survey population.
In contrast, the second question, which provided the right answer
as a choice, was selected by 95% of participants. These two questions created a
spread of 16% - 95% (79% difference) between those who could express salvation by
grace without a written prompt versus having to read the correct answer.
This is important to pastors and lay teachers because, it suggests
at a minimum, a significant percent of people identifying as church attending
evangelicals do not clearly and/or confidently understand their salvation; and
might be a tare. Additional survey questions found that these potential tares
often demonstrated several other attributes:
- Reduced
adherence to the Christian faith
- Lower
levels of wellbeing
- Greater
levels of guilt
- Less
favorable opinions of church leadership
Why is this
information important? It may explain some of the difficulties in the modern church
in accomplishing efficient and effective ministry. We found through our prior
surveys that a significant minority of congregants come to church with
alternative agendas than a biblically based purpose which include reasons of especially
power and self-seeking attention.
If the church considers those with persistent
alternative agendas, may not actually be Christian, it might help the
leadership know how to help them. They need to hear the gospel! All the
attention and approbation in the world will not solve their problem. 1 John chapters 2-4 are clear that those who do not agree with the basic doctrine of Christ,
do not show love or obedience, other church membership should lovingly question
their salvation.
Thank you for joining me today. We'll discover
more about the Tare survey results in next week's blog. Please join me then.
WC Stewart
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