Ladies, Do You Know Why There Aren't More Black Men In Church? Here's 12 suggestions as to why!

Precisely why aren’t more men in church?

Statistics:
• Church will draw an adult congregation that’s 61 percent woman, 39 percent male.
• Almost 25 percent of the married women who attend church will do so without their husbands.
• Church will attract a healthy number of single women, but few single men.
• About 90 percent of boys who are raised in church abandon it throughout their teens and twenties. Most never ever return.
• This Sunday in the united states, six million married women will certainly worship without their husbands. That’s one out of five.
• Most churchgoing guys are “lifers” who spent their childhood years in church. Men are the hardest group to reach.
• Less than 10 percent of churches can maintain a new thriving men’s ministry. The majority of men who actually show up for Sunday worship are there in body only. Their hearts just aren’t inside. Few will do anything through the week to nurture their faith.
Church is the norm in Christianity – within the U. S., and around the planet. Your church profile is most likely similar. In today’s church, women will be the participators, men… the spectators.

How did we get here?

How did a faith founded by a man and his 12 male disciples become like the worse curse to men? Why do Christian churches around the world experience a chronic shortage connected with males, when temples and mosques don’t? Why are churchgoing men so hesitant to actually live their faith, when men of other religions willingly expire for theirs? In The Church Impotent: The Feminization of Christianity, Leon Poddles  quotes from a man he spoke with for the streets: “Life is a basketball game, with the men fighting it on the gridiron, while the minister is up in the grandstand, explaining it to the ladies. “

THE EFFECTS OF THE LACK OF MEN IN THE CHURCH
An absence of male participation is not just heartbreaking; it’s strongly associated with overall church decline. Over time, a lack of men will certainly doom a congregation. The gender gap is connected with church decline, according to the most up-to-date studies. The denominations with the fewest men (per capita) are also those that have been losing members and closing churches. On the other hand, churches with robust male participation are usually growing.
The problem of criminality and drug use among inner-city black men is really a problem of the distortion connected with masculinity. The low numbers of men in the church could be not be properly positioned to aid black men attain the status they so desperately depend on.
It’s also helped to cause Christianity to be dismissed as irrelevant and insignificant.

Other effects include:
Reduced evangelistic ability as far as males are concerned
Perpetuation of confusion as it relates to defining Biblical manhood.
Reduces the mate selection pool to the females
Reduces the credibility connected with Christianity

WHAT CAN WE DO ABOUT IT?

Men are the world’s greatest unreached group. They have their very own language, culture and unique requirements. It’s clear that the church has ignored these needs way too long.

1. UNDERSTAND WHY MEN DISLIKE ATTENDING CHURCH
Look at it from a sociological perspective. What other conduct do men avoid? What additional venues make men uncomfortable?
The solution is obvious: in our modern society, men avoid any behavior (or venue) which may call their manhood into dilemma. For example, men don’t go to baby showers, fabric stores or maybe “chick flicks. ” So it can be with church: allot of men believe, deep inside their hearts, that church is a women’s thing. Men approach Christianity using the same apathy or discomfort they display when forced to view a Meg Ryan film. It just doesn’t resonate with them. We need to become learners of men. The truth is many pastors have built their ministries on the ability to interact with women of all ages. Because men are deemed useless for church work, ministers have little incentive to go recruiting them. John Eldredge says it best:  ”men are wild at heart. Though men see the goodness of the Christian faith, they are not swept up in it because church life is so soft and sweet. The cautious, sensitive culture of today’s church fails to match the adventurous spirit found in most men.”
2. Update the symbols that suggest the church building is feminine territory like the pictures of gentle Jesus meek and mild with a white dress. Stop sending men signals that church is only good for women. From the moment he walks into the sanctuary, men must sense this is something for him, not only something for his grandma, his wife and his kids. Verify everything about your church: the particular décor, the vocabulary you employ, the songs you sing, the behaviors you expect. Men will respond if met halfway.

3. Present Jesus as the real hero role model that HE is. For this to happen there needs to be more focus on the manliness connected with Jesus. The blue-eyed effeminate-looking wimpish white Jesus made famous within a painting by Michelangelo will not do. What about the Jesus who cracks the whip in the moneychangers in the temple; the Jesus who embraced martyrdom to create salvation; the Jesus who is really a winner; who spoiled principalities and properties and made a show of them openly; the Jesus who will rule the planet with justice one day; the particular kingly Jesus who proclaims in addition to demonstrates the Kingdom of God; the Jesus who spoke severely to scribes and Pharisees. Plan worship experiences that are deliberately masculine focused. Women can do masculine, but men DO NOT do feminine. This is why we need to tip the balance toward the particular masculine spirit in worship. Which is the format most likely to make everyone comfortable.

4. Helping men worship:
With men, it’s all in relation to quality. Men appreciate good music from talented musicians, played inside their vocal range. When possible, pick songs with masculine lyrics. The majority of today’s praise songs feature lovey-dovey words set with a romantic tune. Men may feel uncomfortable singing these words to Jesus, a man who certainly lives today.

5. Meet their greatest needs: Men need spiritual fathers along with a band of brothers.
A spiritual father is merely a layman who takes duty for bringing other men to maturity within the faith. It’s based on the discipleship models of Jesus and Paul (1 Cor. several: 14-15). If you really would like to bring men to life with Christ, spiritual fathering is just how it’s done.
Second, every man needs a band of brothers. Jesus began his ministry by assembling a team. They trained together, labored together, and suffered together. Men cannot succeed as followers of Jesus and not have a team surrounding them. No matter how meaty the sermons, no matter how rich their quiet times men will not likely come to maturity to Christ without the strength of a band of brothers surrounding him, and a spiritual father to steer them. Most churches offer nothing in the form of men’s ministry or small groupings. What a tragedy. Although it’s initially hard to interact with men in a small party, once they do get involved, they’re usually hooked. Their trust deepens. Their lives change.

6. We should understand the qualities of maleness in addition to femaleness.
Males and females vary and this is borne out and about by both Scripture and scientific disciplines. In his book, The Masculine Journey: Understanding the Six Stages of Manhood, Robert Hicks examines six Hebrew words which might be used to define males. These six words, he argues, form the stages of any man’s life:

a. adam describes the CREATIONAL MALE
b. zakar describes the SEXUAL MALE
c. gibbor describes the MALE AS WARRIOR
d. enosh describes the WOUNDED MAN
e. ish describes the MATURE  MALE
f. zaken describes the particular WISE MALE OR SAGE
Apart from the first word ‘adam these words are used distinctively to describe males alone.

7. We must understand the cultural context through which our youth males grow, mature and live.
Cultural practices differ from place to place and thus the impact on persons will vary. Our cultural context may be described, in part by a couple of simple phrases:
a) no fathers
b) enough mothers

These two factors have created many wounds in both males and females (the father wound and the mother wound) and a crisis with understanding themselves. The impact varies from person to person and is somewhat different for males than it can be for females.

8. We must also know how to relate to males as males.
Relating to males:
We live in a quite homophobic culture where close relationships with other males will often be suspect and where even males try the fight to relate to each other.

Suggested Guidelines:
a. be aware that males relate around what they DO together
b. males like action to conversation
c. males still find it uncomfortable to be vulnerable
 you will have to meet a man on his turf  before moving or guiding  him to where you want him to be.

9. We have to provide a context in which the typical male can release and realize his essential nature devoid of the criticism of females and where he can learn from responsible male models that can provide experiences and ceremonies which will nurture and mark their growth.

10. For churches to entice and retain men, they must intentionally develop masculine modes of doing evangelism and pastoral care.
E. g. Sports Evangelism. The church must deliberately tailor its evangelistic efforts to win men. At present are evangelistic meetings attempting to win everybody and invariably getting a handful of men at best along with a ton-load of women and young children. That is perhaps where the church is missing.

11. You must put a higher priority on developing leaders, particularly male ones. Men are not searching for theologians, teachers or facilitators. They are searching for men who will lead them to greatness. Men need good leadership. Men are drawn through vision and purpose, by achievements and power. Churches that attract enthusiastic men accomplish that by taking risks, dreaming big, and bringing a measure of adventure to the Christian life.

12. Take risks and develop ministries who have a edge factor because men are adventurous and risk takers.

Various other Considerations
Men love technology. Information conveyed through the use of technology often has a higher degree of believability than does information coming directly out of your speaker’s mouth. 
Men adore excellence and quality. Men are deterred by mediocrity, amateurish music, worn-out services, and unkempt grounds.
Men love the outside. Plan activities to be held in the outdoors if possible. 
Men love adventure. Men are transformed more by what they experience and less by what they are told.

Helping men learn.

Men’s brains are a far less verbal than women’s, so they require a different approach. Men have been trained to focus for 4 to 6 minutes (the length of TV commercials). The lengthy monologue sermon, so effective within the Victorian era, fails to get to today’s men. Rick Warren with “The Purpose Driven Church: Every Church Is Big in God’s Eyes“ may offer an answer: he frequently breaks his sermons into 5 to 7 minute chunks, with a video, drama or song between each message. And object lessons are essential: never take the pulpit with no object in hand. Jesus termed these parables, and they survive even today because men remembered them. Effective pastors and teachers draw metaphors and illustrations from  realms of sports, business, struggle and survival.

A clear mission for every single church. Most church mission phrases are rambling and non-specific. Men are interested in clarity and brevity. If they’re going to give up their weekend, they would like to know why.
High moral expectations. Family men are looking for a church that’s different from what they see on TV. This is the reason conservative churches are growing and  liberal ones are dying. Few men are interested in squishy morals. They want a church built on the firm, time-tested bedrock.
Men need help and backup enforcing morals at home. Children today are bombarded with immoral messages. Men feel weak against MTV, South Park along with the Internet. Churches should train men how to overcome these situations – how to mention no to sin in a new loving way.  Check out this article www.churchformen.com/?p=203  -Why Men Flock to Islam. Produce a culturally relevant, Biblically grounded, functional affirmation of sexuality
The church and Christian radio have not supported a married man’s dependence on regular sexual intimacy with his wife, which is insulting and a betrayal. Men are men, definitely not eunuchs.

What are your thoughts?  Men and women voice your opinions.  The stats don’t lie and there needs to be change.

Nicole Resheka Tatum author of Poetry Passion Purpose available at Amazon.com, strives to bring the "Good News" of the strides of African Americans by writing informative articles and extraordinary poetry that empowers Blacks to actualize the greatness that our forefathers fought and died for. As we discover the truth we eliminate excuse. WWW.THEPOETRYLOVE.COM

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