What is Scripture? That's a question that we've all asked at some point in our lives. It may be easy for us to answer "God's word" which it is, but let's analyze this a bit more and see a common view others have toward it.

"It's just a book that's sometimes opened at church"

That's what we're competing against. Ignorance. And we can see the end result of said ignorance quite easily. There is a noticeable lack of scriptural wisdom today... not that people care. In the 50's and 60's people knew their bibles. They not only had ready answers to the questions people asked, they got EXCITED about talking about it. As such their depth increased. They were challenged, and studied subjects further and gained much from it.

In today's churches, the bible is opened as little as possible in lieu of stories and feel-good sermons that don't challenge anyone. What's more, such simple lessons [if I can call them that] don't promote further study at home.  If the parents aren't studying, are the kids? What if the kids have a difficult question about something?

This causes 2 dangers that we can easily see today. First, a lack of respect for the bible leads to a lack of respect at church. Furthermore, a lack of respect at church shows your lack of respect for the bible. If you don't care at services, people know. GOD knows. If you aren't putting forth your best effort at church, you also aren't doing so during your study.

The second is a falling away of our young people. This is happening in every church. Children don't have the respect for the bible because their parents don't either. They don't have the wisdom they need to gain from the bible, and the services they do attend are only done for fun. And only because their parents make them.

If people go to services simply to gather socially, why go? Why not go to the mall? If worship isn't done in a scriptural manner, it's done wrong. But what do people care if they don't know what the scriptural manner is?

Here is where we come in. Because we have to.

The only way to deal with this ignorance is getting out and bearing fruit. Let's take the analogy Jesus has given us of the fig tree in Matthew 21: 18. So we study, worship regularly, and strive to live a good life. Is that enough? No. Those things are simply the foundation. The soil, if you will. The reason Jesus condemned this tree was NOT because of the ground, but because of its lack of fruit. If we aren't going out of our way to bear fruit, Jesus will do the same for us. Study, worship, living spiritually? Those are manure, BUT WE HAVE TO BEAR THE FRUIT OURSELVES. Even with the best soil, a flower that doesn't try to grow, won't. Or won't for long.

WE have to get our hands dirty. WE have to take the seeds that we have [the bible] and plant it in the hearts of those we see. The parable of the sower [Matthew 13] does teach that there are those who will not listen, but we have to try anyway.  If worse comes to worse and no one is gained to the bible, we could still benefit from further study.

The reason religion is in the state that it's in is BECAUSE we stopped doing as the bible commands us. We simply allow those who worship in different churches to continue doing as they've done before, and more people are being lost to the world because of it.

People have misconceptions about scripture [or were given an man-made interpretation of the bible based on an agenda] And unless we try to give them a better understanding, do we really love them?

The lack of study in the home is the primary reason religion's in the troubled state it's in!

The fact is, Christians just aren't studying with ANY regularity any more. They think learning a bit here and there from church is enough. The bible is the foundation of the church. Without it, worship is in vain, or worse...

We aren't taking what we hear during services and reading further on it. Worse than that, we also aren't studying with our kids any more. We're much too busy for that now. Kids have computers, gaming systems, and cell phones in their rooms, and the family itself is fractured. The bible is the least of their worries, right? Wrong.

In the 50's and 60's those things didn't exist. The end result? The family was a very tightly knit unit. They ate together, worked together, and studied together. What was discussed at services was scriptural because if it wasn't, the preacher there didn't preach there for long. Families took what they were taught and studied deeper on it. Because of that, the entire family benefited!

What happens today? The adults may pay attention, but the kids don't. They may not grasp the depth of the sermon, but the parents don't try to teach it in a way they can understand, so why SHOULD the kids listen? Their homework is given the importance of a simple public school assignment, done last minute and no time is spent on it otherwise. [The simplicity of the material {and worse, the questions!} don't do much to promote further study, but I digress]

Kids don't like studying. It's a chore. If they don't learn from an early age the importance of that study, why would we expect them to learn it later in life when they have the comprehension necessary for the meat of God's word?

The sad thing is, these are all taking the assumption that the church they worship at is a Godly one. There are so many others that teach that church should be about them. Fun, exciting games and shows that may have the most basic of ideas scriptural, but does nothing for their further growth as Christians.

We have people my age that believe that every Christian is the same! And what's worse, when we try to show them the truth, they attack us! They believe that the bible is open to multiple interpretations [or simply incomprehensible] As such they won't listen to us. They don't have to. THEIR God accepts them for who they are.

And whose fault is that? Godly Christians. We stopped being the bible-beating, fire-and-brimstone preaching Christians. We started being more about love-and-peace, so we let church devolve into this. It may be more popular, but what's popular isn't always [in fact, it's almost never] right.

So the family has broken apart, study is done with extreme irregularity, there is no respect for worship, and kids are leaving the church at an alarming rate. People have no respect for Jesus, have incorrect views of the Holy Spirit, think we can perform miracles today. And humanized God.

Welcome to modern religion.