Crisis in America’s Churches:
Bible Knowledge at All-Time Low
by Michael J. Vlach, Ph.D.

A crisis of basic biblical and theological
knowledge exists in America’s churches, and
church leaders must do all they can to address
this growing problem, so say experts monitoring
the beliefs of people in Christian churches
across the United States.

“The Christian body in America is immersed in a
crisis of biblical illiteracy,” warns researcher
George Barna. “How else can you describe matters
when most churchgoing adults reject the accuracy
of the Bible, reject the existence of Satan,
claim that Jesus sinned, see no need to
evangelize, believe that good works are one of
the keys to persuading God to forgive their
sins, and describe their commitment to
Christianity as moderate or even less firm?”[1]
Other disturbing findings that document an
overall lack of knowledge among churchgoing
Christians include the following:
• The most widely known Bible verse among adult
and teen believers is “God helps those who help
themselves”—which is not actually in the Bible
and actually conflicts with the basic message of
Scripture.
• Less than one out of every ten believers
possess a biblical worldview as the basis for
his or her decision-making or behavior.
• When given thirteen basic teachings from the
Bible, only 1% of adult believers firmly
embraced all thirteen as being biblical
perspectives.[2]

Gary Burge, professor of New Testament at
Wheaton College in Wheaton, Illinois, asserts
that biblical illiteracy is at a crisis level
not just in our culture in general but in
America’s churches.
“If it is true that biblical illiteracy is
commonplace in secular culture at large, there
is ample evidence that points to similar trends
in our churches,” he says.[3]
Burge points to research at Wheaton College in
which the biblical and theological literacy of
incoming freshmen have been monitored. These
students, who represent almost every Protestant
denomination in the United States from every
state in the country, have returned some
“surprising results”:

• One-third could not put the following in
order: Abraham, the Old Testament prophets, the
death of Christ, and Pentecost.
• Half could not sequence the following: Moses
in Egypt, Isaac’s birth, Saul’s death, and
Judah’s exile.
• One-third could not identify Matthew as an
apostle from a list of New Testament names.
• When asked to locate the biblical book
supplying a given story, one-third could not
find Paul’s travels in Acts, half did not know
that the Christmas story was in Matthew, half
did not know that the Passover story was in
Exodus.[4]

Like Burge, George Lindbeck, the famous Yale
theologian, has commented on the decreasing
knowledge of Scripture from a professor’s
perspective.

“When I first arrived at Yale, even those who
came from nonreligious backgrounds knew the
Bible better than most of those now who come
from churchgoing families,” he says.[5]

This is also the view of theologian and author
David Wells.

“I have watched with growing disbelief as the
evangelical church has cheerfully plunged into
astounding theological illiteracy,” declares
Wells in his book No Place for Truth.[6]

Biblical illiteracy is not just a problem for
American churches. A scientific survey called
PISA (Program for International Student
Assessment) tested the knowledge of people in
thirty-two industrialized countries. The results
of the study show an “insidious biblical
illiteracy” even in Christian circles, says
Volker Gaeckle, dean of studies at Albrecht
Bengel Center in Tuebingen. “Churches should
heed the PISA warning that text comprehension is
a major problem.” [7]

Theological Illiteracy in Christian
Denominations
Barna has gone to the heart of the matter by
researching the beliefs of churchgoing
denominational members in America. The results
are shocking—a profound lack of belief in
essential Christian doctrines.

In his study of the beliefs of mainline
Protestants (including Methodists, Lutherans,
Presbyterians, and Episcopalians), Barna
documented a rejection of key Christian
doctrines. Only 35% of mainline Protestant
church members believe Christ was sinless; 34%
believe the Bible is totally accurate; 27% agree
that works don’t earn heaven; and 20% believe
Satan is real.[8]

Denominations which are more evangelical report
higher levels of commitment to key theological
truths than their mainline counterparts, but
large percentages of people in these more
theologically conservative churches still deny
essential Christian doctrines.

Of Baptists (any type) in America, only 34%
believe Satan is real. Only 43% believe that
works don’t earn heaven. Although most Baptists
affirm that Christ was sinless and that the
Bible is totally accurate, the majority is not
strong. Only 55% affirm that Christ was sinless,
and 66% hold that the Bible is totally
accurate.[9]

Of nondenominational Christian churches, Barna
reports that 48% believe Satan is real; 60% say
works don’t earn heaven; 63% affirm the
sinlessness of Christ; and 70% believe the Bible
is totally accurate.[10]

According to Barna, the denomination with the
highest commitment to essential Christian
doctrines is the Assembly of God denomination.
In the AOG, 77% believe the Bible is accurate;
70% believe Christ was sinless. Yet only
two-thirds (64%) affirm that works don’t earn
heaven. Only 56% believe Satan is real. So even
in the most theologically committed
denomination, large percentages of people still
deny essential Christian doctrines.[11]

Barna is particularly concerned with the number
of people in Christian churches who deny one of
the most essential of all Christian
doctrines—the sinlessness of Christ.

“Literally millions of Americans who declare
themselves to be Christians contend that Jesus
was just like the rest of us when it comes to
temptation—fallen, guilty, impure, and Himself
in need of a savior.”[12]

Whatever Happened to Theology?
Why is belief in important Christian truths and
doctrines at such a crisis level?

First, as Burge has explained, there is a
general failing of the church to transmit our
religious culture to the next generation. This
includes an overemphasis on personal experience
to the exclusion of serious Christian education.


“In short, the spiritual life has become less a
matter of learning than it is a matter of
experiencing,” he says. “This has resulted in
Christian ministries that put less premium on
education than they do on personal development
and therapeutic wholeness.”[13]

This emphasis on personal development has
affected what is coming from our pulpits,
according to Burge.

“Thus sermons become more therapeutic and less
instructional; and the validity of what we do on
Sunday morning is grounded in what we feel, not
in what we think.”[14]

Second, many Christian churches have abandoned
serious Bible exposition and theological
teaching. Burge points out that historical
exegesis is becoming a “lost art” in the pulpit.

“Rather than explaining the historical setting
of a passage, texts become springboards for
devotional reflection,” he notes. “Biblical
passages are taken out of context as the
preacher searches for those stories that evoke
the responses or attitudes desired.” As a
result, “The heart of a ‘good’ sermon is fast
becoming the ‘emotional work’ that can be done
in 20 minutes preaching time.”[15]

Burge also found that church leaders often find
it difficult to find time for serious discussion
of theology and the Bible. When asking several
youth leaders about whether they addressed solid
theological categories or Bible stories, the
typical response according to Burge was, “It is
hard to find time. But I can say that these kids
are truly learning to love God.”[16]

Burge sees this attitude as part of the problem.


“That is it in a nutshell,” he says. “Christian
faith is not being built on the firm foundation
of hard-won thoughts, ideas, history, or
theology. Spirituality is being built on private
emotional attachments.”[17]

A third reason for biblical and theological
illiteracy today is the tremendous influence
unbiblical philosophies and worldviews are
having on churchgoers. Liberalism promotes that
the Bible is a human construct and not a divine
document. In doing so, it continues to assail
the traditional Christian views of the inerrancy
of the Bible, deity of Christ, reality of Satan,
substitutionary atonement, and other key
doctrines of the Christian faith. Existentialism
and its emphasis on human experience has people
looking to themselves, not God or Scripture, for
truth. Postmodernism has convinced many that
there are no universal truths. According to
Barna, “A minority of adult and teen believers
contends that absolute moral truth exists.”[18]
Only 32% of born-again Christians still believe
in the existence of absolute moral truth.

Many Christians accept elements of these
unbiblical worldviews without even knowing it.
Because of this, Barna and Mark Hatch have noted
that “we cannot really call the faith of
American Christians a Bible-based faith. It is a
synthetic, syncretic faith.”[19] According to
Barna and Hatch, Christians today have accepted
and combined so many ideas from other worldviews
and religions that they have created their own
faith system.

“The average born-again, baptized, churchgoing
person has embraced elements of Buddhism,
Hinduism, Judaism, Islam, Mormonism,
Scientology, Unitarianism and Christian
Science—without any idea they have just created
their own faith.”[20]

What Is the Solution?
“In many ways, we are living in an age of
theological anarchy,” says Barna. “The church is
rotting from the inside out, crippled by
abiblical theology.”[21] But what can church
leaders do about this crisis?

Experts who have addressed the crisis have
suggested five solutions.

First, church leaders need to be aware of the
crisis. “Let’s acknowledge that we are in a
state of spiritual anarchy,” says Barna.[22]
Only by being alert to the problem can church
leaders seriously address the problem. Sadly,
Barna has reported a less than positive response
by church leaders with whom he has shared his
information.

“When I first conveyed this message [about
theological syncretism among church members],
most church leaders smiled and shook their
heads, rejecting the possibility that such
silliness would occur on their watch.”[23]

Second, pastors and church leaders need to
evaluate what their people know and believe.
Whether through personal interaction with the
flock or through more formal means of evaluation
such as doctrinal questionnaires, church leaders
need to find out what their people know and
believe. A questionnaire about the basics of
Bible and theology given to the people would
reveal important information. Churches need to
ask questions such as, “Do you believe Jesus
lived a sinless life?” or “Do you believe Satan
is a real person?” It can no longer be assumed
that the people in the pews “know the basics.”
Many do not.

The results of such questionnaires and personal
contacts will reveal to church leaders where
weaknesses in their congregations exist. These
findings may also help identify people who
reject or do not comprehend enough essential
Christian doctrine in order to be a Christian.
Fruitful evangelism, then, may result from such
evaluations.

Burge, who himself has created a simple
25-question test, believes such a method will
give “unparalleled insight” to church leaders
and will be helpful to the people. “It is like
taking a treadmill test and then talking about
your fitness plan,” he says.[24]

Third, church leaders must use powerful ways to
instruct their people in the truth. “It may well
be, too, that to usher in an era of theological
sanity we will have to adopt new approaches to
educating people about God’s Word and new tools
to facilitate growth,” says Barna. This includes
a well-planned systematic approach to biblical
truth.

“Rather than giving people disjointed morsels of
spiritual truth each week, we must have a
systematic method of enabling people to buy into
a biblical worldview that transforms their
life.”[25]

This systematic approach to teaching truth must
start with the pulpit. In his book, Where Is
Theology Going?, Millard Erickson notes that
decreasing literacy among people has probably
influenced many preachers in the direction of
including less biblical content in their
messages.[26] The opposite must become the case.
The lack of biblical literacy today makes
systematic Bible teaching from the pulpit even
more necessary. Perhaps more pastors should
emulate the Swiss Reformer Ulrich Zwingli who
forsook the common preaching methods of his day
to systematically teach the Bible
verse-by-verse, chapter-by-chapter, and
book-by-book, paying attention to the historical
and grammatical contexts of the passages he was
expounding.

The time has also come for pastors and church
leaders to address essential Christian doctrines
from the pulpit. If Barna is correct that
millions of people in Christian churches, even
conservative evangelical churches, do not
believe Jesus was sinless, then the time has
also come for church leaders to address the
doctrine of the person of Christ and other
doctrines from the pulpits.

Church members should also be introduced to
basic courses in Old Testament Survey, New
Testament Survey, Basic Christian Doctrines, and
How to Study the Bible. These courses are
required at most seminaries and viewed as vital
to the ministry of those who attend seminaries.
Yet, this basic understanding of Bible,
theology, and hermeneutics is often not
transmitted to the people in the pews. There is
a large gap between the important truths taught
in seminaries and what is being taught in our
churches. The time has come for these basic
truths to be conveyed to all of God’s people.

Teaching solid doctrine, though, must not stop
at the classroom level. Dr. Brant Pelphrey in
his article, “Learning the Language of God:
Overcoming Theological Literacy,” suggests that
teachers must get involved in the lives of the
learners.

“Americans will have a better chance of becoming
theologically literate when we replace the
paradigm of theological study as intellectual
exercise, with that of the worshipping community
in which students and mentors work together,” he
says.[27]

Fourth, church leaders, including pastors, must
alert their members to the unbiblical worldviews
and philosophies that have crept into the
church. False teachings have subtly infiltrated
our churches, and church leaders must combat
these destructive errors and heresies. This will
require not only a clear presentation of
Christianity but also a specific description of
how Christianity differs from the liberal,
existential, and postmodern views that are being
promoted today.

Finally, we must encourage diligent and gifted
teachers in the church. As Burge states, “We
need to identify young men and women in the
church who have gifts of teaching and intellect
and encourage them to pursue their gifts.” As we
esteem the gift of teaching and those who teach
well, we will “help bring about the rebirth of
biblical literacy and informed faith in North
America.”[28]

Long-Term Effort
Experts do not expect the trend toward biblical
illiteracy in churches to change. This does not
alter, though, the responsibility of church
leaders to do all they can to reverse this
dangerous trend. The church is called to be the
“pillar and support of the truth” (1 Tim. 3:15).
And those who are its leaders must follow the
apostle Paul in proclaiming “the whole counsel
of God” (Acts 20:27).

Turning things around will take “a massive,
concerted long-term effort,” says Barna. But we
must try. “We must pray for God’s guidance and
power to bring about the reformation that He
undoubtedly desires for America.”