John Beeson

January 7, 2023

Church, Religion, Christian Living

What's Keeping You Away from Church?

John Beeson

January 7, 2023

Church, Religion, Christian Living

Not long ago, Pew Research released a survey[i] on why Americans do and do not go to church. While 73% of Americans identify as being Christian[ii], surveys say Americans who report going to church weekly is only around 35%.[iii] Our best estimates for our own city (Tucson) are that less than 3% of the population gathers in a local body of believers on any given Sunday.[iv]

I write this as an appeal to the 65% nationally and 90%+[v] in Tucson who don’t attend church regularly.

First, I want to understand you and your reasons for not attending. In a recent survey, those reasons were expressed this way[vi]:

Does that list express your reasons for why you don’t attend church? I would love to hear from you what your reason is.

I am going to walk through the reasons given for not attending and ask if you would reconsider:

“I practice my faith in other ways.”

The largest group of those who don’t attend (37%) say that they practice their faith in other ways. That is wonderful! I’m so glad that you practice your faith beyond Sunday morning. Our faith is to be expressed daily and through various means (prayer, reading the Bible, service, stewardship, etc.).

John Beeson

September 8, 2022

Recommendations, Abortion, Christian Living, Culture, Gratitude, Identity

This Week's Recommendations

John Beeson

September 8, 2022

Recommendations, Abortion, Christian Living, Culture, Gratitude, Identity

Love One Another: Local leader and life advocate Matt Merrill writes, “My encouragement for this moment is to consider not perpetuating the sin of devaluing the life of the person who is arguing contrary.”
Did Jesus Tell us to Give to Every Panhandler: John Piper handles this question with appropriate nuance. “Here’s a daily scenario. You’re sitting in your car at a stoplight. Someone approaches your window to ask for money or food. You sit facing forward, ignoring them to focus on the traffic light ahead, until you finally drive off. Every time I do this, something doesn’t feel right here, especially with regards to Luke 6:30 — we should give to everyone who asks.”
I am Just Tired! Sacha Alexandre Mendes unpacks a seemingly mundane topic with great depth, “In your life and ministry experience, you will face weariness. Therefore, it is vital to develop a biblical understanding of tiredness, its scope, and its impact on your life and ministry.”
5 New Stats You Should Know about Teens and Social Media: Chris Martin shares some enlightening information. For instance, “It’s not hyperbolic to say that YouTube is the most influential—and, therefore, the most important—website in the world. It’s used by almost every single teen in the country, and as of Pew’s latest research of U.S. adults in 2021, it’s also used by 81 percent of all adults. YouTube is king of the social media world…”
The Bible Tells Us the Rest of the Story About Who We Are: David Mobley shares a Francis Schaeffer analogy: “Now, imagine having that set of page fragments, and then finding the remaining portion of all of the pages from the book somewhere, perhaps in the attic. By taking the newly discovered set of page fragments and placing them together with the pages you already have, you would be able to complete the book. It would be easy to tell that the remaining portions match the fragments, because taken together they complete the story. And once the story is completed, you could read the whole story and finally make sense of the whole book.”

John Beeson

June 18, 2020

Recommendations, Christian Living, Racism, Leadership

This Week's Recommendations

John Beeson

June 18, 2020

Recommendations, Christian Living, Racism, Leadership

1. Are We Seeing the First Non-Christian Generation? Aaron Earls shares recent findings, "In America, at least two-thirds of Generation X (67%), Baby Boomers (76%), and the Silent Generation (84%) say they’re Christian, according to new analysis from Pew Research. Among millennials, however, slightly less than half (49%) identify as Christian. A similar number say they’re not Christian."

2. Christians, Please Stop Labeling One Another: Shai Linne urges Christians, “These days, the labels are flying around like crazy, often used pejoratively and almost always unhelpful. ‘SJW [Social Justice Warrior], ‘Woke,’ ‘Marcist,’ etc. or from the other standpoint, ‘Karen,’ ‘White Evangelical,’ ‘Trumpers,’ etc.”

3. The Three Hardest People to Disciple—and How to Reach Them: Ken Braddy gives some excellent advice on how to disciple the “know-it-all,” the “time-compressed,” and the “spiritually myopic.” Super helpful stuff here! He concludes this way, “The one thing I’ll always want to remind myself is this: I am most likely someone’s difficult person, so I must be quick to extend grace for I need it as well.”

4. A Compassionate, Counter-Cultural Christian Response to Racial Division: Kevin Huang with a nuanced and well thought out response to the current racial turmoil. He concludes, “The Gospel addresses sin. Sin is at the heart of all of society’s problems. Therefore, addressing sin with the Gospel is not a superficial answer. Rather, addressing society’s problems without the Gospel is a superficial answer. May we not be ashamed of the Gospel as God’s all-sufficient tool of salvation for all ethnicities, both Jew and Greek.”

5. Redeeming Pastoral Ambition: My friend Benjamin Vrbicek reflects on the current fires in Arizona and the dangerous fires of ambition in pastors’ hearts. He shares, “Notice the exact phrasing: “servant of all,” not just servant of the greats, like servant of a famous pastor or a seminary president. His point is that the greatness of our service is enhanced not diminished by the lack of greatness of those we serve.”

John Beeson

May 21, 2020

Recommendations, Christian Living, Church

This Week's Recommendations

John Beeson

May 21, 2020

Recommendations, Christian Living, Church

1. Americans Aren't Sure They Can Trust Pastors: Aaron Earls begins, "In a Pew Research study of Americans’ views on institutional leaders, religious leaders are often in the middle of the pack among groups like police officers, public school principals, journalists, and leaders of tech companies. Almost 7 in 10 U.S. adults (69%) say religious leaders act unethically at least some of the time, with 10% saying they do so most of the time."

2. When Self-Preservation Becomes Our God: My friend Benjamin Vrbicek reflects on Peter and an issue that is ever-present for us all.

3. The Day the Phone Rang Out: Seth Lewis with a simple but powerful story.

4. The Beauty and Abuse of Empathy: We don’t typically think about empathy as something that can be misused. Abigail Dodds offers valuable insight for those with the gift of empathy and warns us of its potential misuse through isolation, cowardice, and manipulation.

5. How the Chair You See Everywhere Came to Be: I had never thought about the ubiquity of this plastic chair and why that was.

John Beeson

April 30, 2020

Recommendations, Heaven, Sexuality, Christian Living

This Week's Recommendations

John Beeson

April 30, 2020

Recommendations, Heaven, Sexuality, Christian Living

1. Will We Remember Our Life in Heaven? Even the Trauma? Wyatt Graham answers this question well. He begins, "Imagine entering into heaven. Joy fills your soul. But you see some object that triggers a traumatic memory from your life. What happens to that joy now? Or say you had lived a life without trauma, yet your loved one did not share your faith. Can you rightly enjoy heaven when your spouse, child, or loved one perdures in eternal perdition?"

2. The Pornography Pandemic: Rosie Makinney reports on a much quieter spiritual pandemic sweeping the world. On just one porn site, traffic increased between 21.5%-95.3% worldwide.

3. Gaining Victory Over Temptation: H.B. Charles Jr. offers ten pieces of sound advice on how to be victorious over temptation in your life.

4. Religion and Households Around the World: Pew Research provides an interesting look at the difference of households around the world. The report begins, "Worldwide, Muslims live in the biggest households, with the average Muslim individual residing in a home of 6.4 people, followed by Hindus at 5.7. Christians fall in the middle (4.5), forming relatively large families in sub-Saharan Africa and smaller ones in Europe. Buddhists (3.9), Jews (3.7) and the religiously unaffiliated (3.7) – defined as those who do not identify with an organized religion, also known as “nones” – live in smaller households, on average."

5. How to Stack Playing Cards: I dare you to not want to try to stack cards after watching Wired’s profile of Guinness Record holder Bryan Berg.

John Beeson

December 6, 2018

Recommendations, Culture, Marriage, Christian Living

This Week's Recommendations

John Beeson

December 6, 2018

Recommendations, Culture, Marriage, Christian Living

1. How the West Became Self-Obsessed: An intriguing interview with William Storr, a book on the history of Western Individualism: "This tendency to focus on the self, on the individual, runs deep in our cultural history, and it’s not something we can easily escape."

2. Americans Believe in God, Psychics, and Crystals: In Pew Research's recent study, they found, "Four in 10 Americans (42 percent) believe spiritual powers rest in physical objects like mountains, trees, and crystals... A similar number (41 percent) believe in psychics. A third (33 percent) believe in reincarnation, while 29 percent believe in astrology."

3. 6 No-No's for Relating to Your Husband: The whole of Robert Lewis's list is good, but I particularly appreciate #6: "Never fall more in love with your kids than with your husband. That’s easy to do as the years go by. I call it “the great swap.” You get caught up in all the things the kids are doing, often seeing more of them than you do your husband. What you don’t notice is the growing distance developing between you and the man you vowed years ago to give your life to."

4. 6 No-No's for Relating to Your Wife: Mary May Larmoyeaux's list is also good, especially #2: "Don't tell your wife how to feel: ...please don’t say, “You shouldn’t be afraid or worried about that.” The fact is, we are afraid or worried about that. Just acknowledge our feelings. Tell us that you will pray for us. Ask us what you can do to help us not be afraid/worried, etc."

5. Dealing with Your Anger: Ed Welch is my favorite writer on the topic of anger. He reflects, "Some counselors notice that people get tied up in knots when they hide or stuff their anger. They will tell you to deal with your anger by getting in touch with how you feel and then expressing it. “Get it off your chest. Say exactly what you think. Give ‘em a piece of your mind.” Other counselors have noticed how destructive people become when they express anger. They will counsel you to control your anger. Psychotherapy, medication, exercise, and meditation are just some of the different ways they recommend for defusing your anger and calming yourself down. So which is it, venting or calming? Actually, God has a different way for you to deal with your anger."