Many High School Grads Have Left the Church…But They Didn’t Mean To

We’ve all heard it, especially recently. It’s the conversation framed with the terms “exvangelical” and “deconstruction.” College students and young adults who grew up in church, attended youth group religiously (no pun intended) and were active at camps, mission trips, and other events have now walked away. It gets really personal when speaking of these formerly faithful students when the children are no longer unnamed statistics, but relatives, sons, daughters, and friends.

Sadly, there is an exodus occurring. Years ago, a statistic began to be shared among pastors and student ministry leaders that stated a very high number (80 percent) of churched teenagers leave the church upon graduation. The percentage was shared at youth conferences, quoted in books, referenced in sermons, and more…primarily as a negative motivator to do more programming for students and emphasize more ministry activities. However, once researchers began delving into the oft-quoted number, it became clear that there was no research available. Though quoted for years with most listeners affirming the statistic, it seems that the genesis of the number was simply a youth evangelist who was sharing from the stage what he believed to be true. In other words, he thought 80 percent were leaving, so he said it and everyone agreed…with no empirical data at all.

Ultimately, what was believed to be true was just an evangelical version of “fake news” that began to be shared over and over and ultimately took on a life of its own because it felt true.

You can do your own Google search and you will discover that while these oft-quoted numbers end up based on supposition, there are some numbers out there that have been gathered via research that are not very encouraging. Depending on what you read, the numbers remain over 50 percent for students exiting church.

This is not a new phenomenon. People have left the church for generations. Depending on the church, the culture, the theology, and the personalities, there are varied reasons. This has always been true.

Certainly, as we sadly know, there are stories of abuse (physical, sexual, emotional, and even spiritual) from leaders that have robbed young people of their joy and more. In these cases, leaving the church sadly seems like the logical escape. Sometimes, it has been.

Then, you have the long-term research from people such as Christian Smith, Melinda Lundquist Denton, Kenda Creasy Dean, and others who have tracked the religious lives of young people from teenage years into adulthood over decades.

It is Smith and Denton who coined the phrase “moralistic therapeutic deism” as the driving force of many young people when it comes to their understanding of God. That phrase frightens some, but it clearly reveals the abandonment (if every held) of biblical theology when it comes to the doctrine of God and the acceptance of a God made in our image who is simply a divine therapist.

Smith and Denton define it this way…

The creed of this religion, as codified from what emerged from our interviews, sounds something like this:

- A God exists who created and orders the world and watches over human life on earth.

- God wants people to be good, nice, and fair to each other, as taught in the Bible and by most world religions.

- The central goal of life is to be happy and to feel good about oneself.

- God does not need to be particularly involved in one’s life except when God is needed to resolve a problem.

- Good people go to heaven when they die.[1]

Now, if you just read those points and think “I don’t see what’s wrong with that?” then…well…that’s the problem. The God of the Bible is not the god defined in those points. Yet, some families worship that empty version of god well and their children grow up believing the “fake news” that God is their personal therapist intent on them “being good.” Sadly, this turns many people into functional universalists, also known as neighborly heretics.

Kenda Creasy Dean states that “Without access to new cultural tools…we capitulate to the gravitational pull of the familiar, replicating the world we know best.[2] Dean is not speaking specifically of the moralistic therapeutic deism that has grown in recent generations, but her statement about the gravitational pull of the familiar is connected and rings true for all of us, in most every aspect of life.

So, How Many Students Are Leaving the Church?

With those nuggets of reality within our brains, what are some real numbers related to graduates and the church exodus. According to recent surveys by Lifeway Research as shared in Ben Trueblood’s book Within Reach, we actually are tracking that 66 percent of high school graduates leave the church during their college years (or their early adulthood-workforce years.)[3] I guess that is better than 80 percent, but since that number was never real to begin with, I do not find contentment with the 66.  

Here is something of note, however. Of the 66 percent who left the church, 71 percent did not plan to do so. What does this mean? It means that based on interviews, conversations, and data collected in research that the vast majority of students (our students…our children) who left the church did not plan to do so. Seven out of ten actually planned to remain in the church. They were not unhappy with church. In fact, most say they loved going to the church as a teenager. Most were active in their respective churches. They were going to camp, volunteering in children’s ministry, serving on mission trips, and more.

Surely some declared a shift in their worldviews that differed from their family’s and church’s. Some stated that legalism drove them away, inconsistencies made them leave, mean-spirited church members, and politically-divided realities were the final nails in the coffin for them. Those are real stories and they have always played a role, BUT the vast majority stated nothing of the sort led them to leave.

By and large, the shift in schedules, the exposure to adulthood, the loss of the Lord’s Day, either through work or school planning groups, or simply sleep, became the norm. In other words, the spiritual habits that had been developed as a child and teenager were abandoned. Soon, they were replaced.

In some cases, their parents had already begun to shift allegiances to their respective local church. The regular attending family was in the building maybe twice a month. Many only made it once a month. What one generation abandons every now and then, the next will abandon regularly. Thus, if mom and dad began to value the gathering with the church as optional as “me-time,” “family-time,” theme parks, travel ball tournaments, or other such events moved to the front burner, their now adult children begin to view the gathering of the church as not just optional, but irrelevant. Let us not ignore Hebrews 10:25.

One revelation in Trueblood’s book is that many students have only attended one church throughout their lives. Honestly, I think that is great. Apart from a work-based transfer or relocation, as long as the church is sound, having only one church family is not an issue. Yet, when a student packs up the car, heads away to college and is expected to find a new church, they are embarking on a path they have never experienced before. In many cases, no one has ever taught them how to find a good church. If they are in a family that had to change churches, even for good reasons, it was most likely their parents who made the call. Thus, college freshman John Doe already who is overwhelmed with the newness of university culture may not dare to go into a new, established church where everyone seems to know everything about the building, schedule, and order (they don’t know, but it seems that way.) This fear leaves John alone in the dorm and maybe (just maybe) watching his old church online. By the way…watching online does not count. His parents then lament that he has left the church. He has, but he didn’t mean to.

There is much to consider here. Much more than I can put in this article, but rest assured, our church is seeking to prepare students and their parents for the launch into adulthood and we’re not planning this preparation during May of their senior year. It actually begins in junior high as students become disciples of Jesus Christ, understanding the Kingdom realities of the mission, the nature of God, the person of Christ, the beauty of his church, and the wisdom to discern solid, biblical teaching. Then, whether they’re at the university, in boot camp, at trade school, or at home trying to figure out what to do now that they’re not allowed in the youth room at church, they will equipped as fully-devoted followers of Christ, and not “moralistic, therapeutic deists” just looking for a group nearby that seems good.

There Is Good News Here

Numbers are our friends. Real numbers are our friends. Even if the numbers reveal troubling realities. We should never fear truth. So, now that we know, is there an encouraging word? Certainly. Be encouraged that while many are walking away for reasons, the majority are just doing what has been modeled for years. They’re following in the steps of busyness and are not walking away intentionally, but drifting away. That is encouraging. Now, there is no quick fix, but there is a fix. The gospel remains the answer. Christ remains the savior. God remains sovereign and the church does not have to create new “relevant” ministries to keep the next generation. Ultimately, we simply must surrender totally to our sovereign God daily, rest in him and prioritize that which he has told us in his Word. I am grateful that the answer to reaching, or keeping the young adults is not another program. This is good news.

Maybe if we pray for this, plan for this, and strategically make disciples as scripture commands, we won’t cringe when we see the next research numbers relating to the “formerly churched.” May the revealed numbers give us hope and move us to personal repentance. Sadly, some who left will never come back. Truly, most of those who will never come back were never really here (in the church family) anyway. This is a freeing statement, though perhaps not as encouraging as we would hope.

What if the answer to all this is not “do things to get young people back in the church” but “be who God has called you to be”? What if it really isn’t about them…but me? May God continue to mold me and make me into the disciple, the child, the redeemed son he has called me to be. May he do the same for you.

In the meantime, pray for your children and grandchildren and encourage them to find a church, come back to church, and love the church…without demeaning them for sleeping in on Sundays for the past three years.
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[1] Smith, Christian and Martha Lundquist Denton. Soul Searching: The Religious and Spiritual Lives of American Teenagers (New York: Oxford University Press, 2005), 162-163.

[2] Dean, Kenda Creasy. Almost Christian: What the Faith of Our Teenagers Is Telling the American Church (New York: Oxford University Press, 2010), 49.

[3] Trueblood, Ben. Within Reach: The Power of Small Changes in Keeping Students Connected (Nashville, TN: Lifeway Press, 2018), 14.