Save America Ministries

Guest (Male): This is Viewpoint with attorney and author Chuck Crismier. Viewpoint is a one-hour talk show confronting the issues of America's heart and home. And now, with today's edition of Viewpoint, here is Chuck Crismier.

Chuck Crismier: The year was 1963. In 1963, America experienced the Cuban Missile Crisis with John F. Kennedy being the President of the United States. At that time, yours truly was a senior at Lakeland High School in Lakeland, Florida. Because of that and because of the proximity to Cuba, we were forced or called during that period of time to attend special classes at 6:30 in the morning at the city hall or city auditorium for Americanism versus communism classes.

At that time, I happened to also be employed part-time at the first large Publix Super Market in America on South Lakeland Florida Avenue. Also at that time, my father was the pastor in a home mission church on South Lakeland Florida Avenue there in Lakeland, Florida. Today, 63 years later, it appears that a revival is going on at Southeastern University in Lakeland, Florida, on the campus.

Students at a Christian university in Florida have continued to gather for worship and prayer several days after an annual three-day conference concluded. The conference started last Monday featuring speaker Jennie Allen, and as the event concluded, many students stayed to pray and worship and the band continued to play. In fact, the president said in video remarks that the students' hunger for worship was both beautiful and humbling to witness.

So, what did Jennie Allen have to say that called the students to repentance? Well, everything changed. What she did was ask students to confess sin publicly as loud as possible. At first, they were kind of like, "We don't know how this is going to look or where it's going to go," and students literally leaned in completely and started shouting as loud as they could, confessing sin, burdens, issues, all kinds of stuff.

After that happened, something shifted in the room, something undeniable happened that we all felt. That's the report coming from Lakeland, Florida. And so today on Viewpoint, we take a look at that happening among Generation Z, administration responding by making Bush Chapel available for uninterrupted use so participants could remain in prayer and worship. Activity in the chapel continued throughout the day and night. In fact, for over 72 hours, as I understand, and it was as if there was a fire that was lit during the five sessions of the conference.

So today on Viewpoint, we take a look at that among other things related to the status of the church in America. To take a look at that amid analysis of where we stand with regard to the Bible, where we stand with regard to our beliefs in God, about God, and broken down by various demographics, age groups, and so on. So I'm glad that you've joined us in this conversation as always with ever-increasing conviction, talk that transforms.

We've heard reports of several of these. Remember back a couple of years, Wheaton College had a similar type of event, and one can be very excited about this. I do not recall any such event as having happened in my alma mater there in Southern California. And it's unfortunate that that has not happened, but to my knowledge, that has not happened. No such reports have come through.

But it is good to hear that some of these kinds of events have taken place and you don't want to demean them, you don't want to poo-poo them, you don't want to say, "Well, this doesn't really mean anything," because it means something for those that are there. They name their sin and bondage so bravely and they genuinely believe Jesus had set them free. That's exactly what was said. And 72 hours later, they were still continuing and classes had been canceled.

Well, when God moves, things change. When God moves in our minds and our hearts, things change. They really do. But unfortunately, we haven't seen enough change in America to say that we've had revival in America. Not even close. Not even close. And so we continue to pray for that. The prayers for revival in America have been going up for at least 50 years now.

Certainly not at the time when I was in Lakeland, Florida. At that time, I don't recall that the nation was engaged in any particular focus on revival. That was in the early 1960s before the great rebellion that came in the Western world—rebellion, the sexual revolution, rebellion against all authority. And the precursors for that were being laid in the early 1960s and exploded in the middle 1960s and on into the early 1970s.

But today, where do we stand today? That's what we want to take a look at, and I'm glad that you've joined us. It's always conversation with conviction, talk that transforms. So what were they repenting of? Well, according to Jennie Allen, they were repenting of their abortions, lying, pride, pornography, suicide, complacency, disobedience, anxiety, idolatry, lust, and envy. Well, that's a pretty good starter, isn't it?

Pretty comprehensive. If we were all to repent of those things, America would change, wouldn't it? America would change from the church house to the White House to the schoolhouse to the courthouse. It would change everybody, including Congress. But those things aren't happening everywhere. Maybe one of the problems is we're not willing to name sin as sin.

Back in the late 1950s and early 1960s, the founder of the Crystal Cathedral before he ever founded the Crystal Cathedral was supposedly a Protestant Christian evangelical leader. And he said in writing his book on sin, he said it's an abomination, it's abuse to tell people that they're sinners. They just need more self-esteem. So he wrote a book on self-esteem. It was the new gospel that Dr. Schuller promoted in those days.

And apparently, it didn't continue to be as powerful as he thought because the Crystal Cathedral was sold off eventually to the Roman Catholic Church. But in any event, that gives us a little bit of history on the church in America in the last two generations. So here we are now on the near edge of the second coming. How near we do not know, but we do know, we should know that we're in the latter stages of the latter days, of the last days, before the coming of the Lord.

So what would the Lord have to say to us today as professing Christians here on Viewpoint? That's what we want to take a look at. And again, we're going to take a look at some statistics that have come out, and these statistics are very telling. In addition to that, we're going to make available to you a wonderful book called "The Return: An End Time Epistle to the Church in America." I hope you'll stay tuned, friends. You're not going to want to miss this wonderful book. We'll be right back.

Guest (Male): Once upon a time, children could pray and read their bibles in school. Divorces were practically unknown, as was child abuse. In our once great America, virginity and chastity were popular virtues and homosexuality was an abomination. So what happened in just one generation?

Chuck Crismier: Hi, I'm Chuck Crismier and I urge you to join me daily on Viewpoint where we discuss the most challenging issues touching our hearts and homes. Could America's moral slide really relate to the fourth commandment? Listen to Viewpoint on this radio station or anytime at saveus.org.

"The Return: An End Time Epistle to the Church in America." One wrote, "The time of the last great shaking has begun and God is both wooing and warning his church to return to him." With the heart of a shepherd and the unction of a prophet, Matthew Casey offers this loving but urgent call for genuine biblical revival in the American church. From pulpit to pew, he shows the pattern of return to our first love for Christ, to the purity and power of the spirit in our lives and fellowships, and to our God-ordained place of authority and righteousness, influence in our nation and throughout the world.

A book that would rekindle your passion for Christ, refresh your love for his church, renew your burden for the lost and revive your vision for how you can be a vessel of God's love and power in these last days. Expect to be changed. It's a $12 book, yours for your gift of $8 or more to Save America Ministries. I actually wrote the foreword for this book and was so thrilled to do so. "The Return: An End Time Epistle to the Church in America."

God says, "Return unto me and I will return unto you," and he meant it. He didn't say, "I'm chasing you down." He said, "I already extended my hand to you, now you return unto me and I will return unto you." Your gift of $8 or more to Save America Ministries will put this $12 book in your hands. Easily read, you can read it in a day or two, maybe a whole night if you want. It's not that long, but it's powerful. It's about 125 pages long and you'll be blessed.

You can write to us at Save America Ministries, PO Box 70879, Richmond, Virginia 23255, add $6 for postage and handling, or you can go to the website saveus.org, saveus.org, or call us at 1-800-SAVE-USA. By the way, if you are interested in multiple copies of this book because you want to make it available, you want to be God's hand extended in your small group or otherwise, we might be able to make it available to you in a special way. So if you're interested in that, please give us a call at 1-800-SAVE-USA, 1-800-SAVE-USA. This is a very, very important book, very important book. It's going to inspire you, and it'll inspire all who read it if they have a heart for the Lord.

So we now move from there to a look at the statistics that are telling us about who we are, giving us a picture of professing Christians in America. First of all, fewer than a third of churchgoers read the Bible daily. This is the latest report came out February 13th. 31% of Protestant churchgoers read the Bible every day, while 30% do so just a few times a week. In other words, the Bible isn't perceived to be by most people as essential reading. In fact, they don't really consider it, as David did or as Jeremiah did: "Thy words were found and I did eat them; and thy word was unto me the joy and rejoicing of my heart, for I am called by your name, O Lord of hosts."

But this is the way it is. 9% of professing Christians say they never read the Bible. The Bible reading rates have gone up compared to past years, though, believe it or not. The number of daily Bible readers has remained fairly steady since 2019, however. A lower percentage of Americans attend a Protestant church once a month today than when this series of studies began concerning the church in America. Clearly, the remnant of Americans attending church each month are more willing to regularly read the Bible on their own than when churches were more populated.

Now, isn't that interesting? So church attendance is down, therefore, those who are in the church are actually more likely to read their Bibles because the people that are remaining, the remnant, actually were the Bible readers. Isn't that interesting? So those who were not Bible readers are dropping out. What do you call it? What does the Bible call it when you drop out? It's called apostasy, falling away. The Apostle Paul wrote about that, didn't he?

He wrote about that saying that before the identity of the Antichrist is determined, is observed, is recognized, that there will be a great falling away among professing Christians. Now, you can't fall away from a position you've never been in, right? For instance, you can't say that you fall if you never have been at a higher position. You can't say I fell down the stairs if you haven't been up on the stairs. You can't say I fell off the roof unless you've been on the roof. You can't say I fell into promiscuity unless you've been walking in righteousness and holiness and purity, right?

So when you fall, you fall from a place that you were to a place that you're not. It's called apostasy in spiritual terms. That's what the Apostle Paul called it, the falling away. So these figures show that there is a falling away. Those who don't read their Bible are more likely to fall away. And the more they become disenchanted with gathering together with the saints and reading their Bibles, the more they become part of a disassociated group of people who lose their faith, who lose their commitment to Christ, who become more and more part of the world. And this is what's happening in the church in America.

The report also found that 74% of Protestant churchgoers said the Bible has authority over every area of their life, while 15% said they weren't sure. But you would never know that by the way they conduct themselves. 72% said they found themselves thinking about biblical truths throughout the day. But you would never know that by how they conduct themselves because study after study over the past 25 years has concluded, both secular and Christian study has concluded, that there's virtually no real identifiable difference between people who profess to be followers of Christ and those in the secular world.

Now, obviously, there are exceptions with those who, the more Bible reading they do, the more belief they have in the authority of Scripture, the more likely they are to obey what the Scripture says. If they don't, they won't. So these are some of the aspects. The growing churches in America right now aren't the ones with the flashiest worship teams or trendiest branding. They're the ones that open the Bible and teach it line by line. Isn't that interesting?

Next, and I think this is directly connected with what we just saw with regard to the previous report: nearly half of American adults don't believe the Bible is literally true. Nearly half. That's amazing, isn't it? On the other hand, we had a statistic that said that 72% say that the Bible is very important and they take it seriously in their lives. Or 74% said the Bible has authority over every area of our lives. I wonder, maybe these were actually different polls, I'm not sure. I don't think so, but the results seem to be incongruent, they're not matching.

A majority of Americans believe worshipping at home alone or with their family is a good and acceptable replacement for being involved in attending church services or in worshipping with other brethren. Significant minorities don't believe in the resurrection or that Jesus is even God. Try to get a hold of this. This is among so-called professing Christians. Some 3,000 American adults were surveyed last month. Their responses revealed more nuanced and syncretic beliefs about God than previous generations, most of whom viewed the Bible as the literal word of God in previous generations.

Now they're saying the beliefs are syncretic. What does that mean? They're synchronized with other beliefs. So what's happening today is that within the church, within professing Christians in our churches, even by the way within many pastors in the pulpits, there is a meshing, a merging together of beliefs from other religions and even the secular world into the Christian faith. Sort of an amalgamation. It's called syncretism. Kind of like, well, if you can't beat them, join them. In other words, can't we all get along? Let's just take the good that we have from every religion and blend it all together and have a nice kumbaya service.

A collective 48% of Americans either strongly agree or somewhat agree that the Bible, like all sacred writings, contains helpful accounts of ancient myths but is not literally true. 48% of Americans. Now, when we say and have a motto "In God We Trust," this is putting some definition to those words. What is it about God that we trust? What God is it that we trust in? Americans in the South, evangelicals, and those who attend church at least once or twice per month were among the groups found to be the most likely to disagree with the statement that the Bible is a myth.

In other words, most likely to believe that the Bible is not a myth, that it's true. Well, that's understandable. The Bible Belt, the South is known as the Bible Belt for that very reason. On the other hand, we have a hard time understanding why for the past 20-plus years, the divorce rate in the Bible Belt has exceeded the nation as a whole by 50%. How can the belief in the Bible be so strong and yet disagreement with what the Bible says about the most fundamental relationship that the Bible teaches about, talks about, and that is marriage?

It's the second creation ordinance in Genesis chapter 2 after the Sabbath. Of course, the Sabbath is rejected, and so marriage can be rejected because well, we just decide we don't believe in it, or we believe in marriage but we just don't believe that what God hath joined together, man must not put asunder and has no right to put asunder. You see our problem. Our problem is that we pick and choose. We've developed a cafeteria plan of Bible reading and belief.

We line up at the buffet table of biblical belief and we pick and choose what we want to believe, what we want to teach, what we want to believe, what we want to practice, all the while claiming we believe the Bible from cover to cover and the cover too. Isn't that amazing? It just goes to show you how easily deceived we are. Self-deceived. The very same thing that Satan tested and tempted Adam and Eve with in the garden is going on today.

When Satan asked the question "Hath God said?", basically what he was doing was setting up the stage for everything that human beings have been saying ever since. "Hath God said?" So Satan is whispering in your ear, "Hath God said?", and we're responding exactly the same way Eve and Adam did. "Yes, but..." In other words, we put a spin on what God has said so we can enjoy and believe what we want to believe about what God has said.

In other words, we line up at the buffet table of what God has stated in his word and pick and choose what we want to believe and how we want to live. When asked to respond to the statement "There is one true God in three persons: God the Father, God the Son, and God the Holy Spirit," only 55% of respondents in America strongly agreed with it. Significant minorities of American adults also do not see God as a perfect being. Only 53% of Americans strongly agreed that God was a perfect being. Well, what kind of a God is it that we think God is then? Some sort of a myth?

Desperate times call for desperate measures, and that's the such a time for the American church. I wrote in the foreword to this book "The Return: An End Time Epistle to the Church in America." The world sees that something is desperately wrong in our nation but doesn't know how to fix it. This is because the answer can't be found by worldly means or wisdom. America's only hope lies in a wholehearted return to the God who made her great in a genuine revival of biblical proportions.

Revival is a word often used in the church today and perhaps more misused. So what is revival? Well, a revival as demonstrated in the history of God's people, both in Scripture and in the church, is a sovereign move of the Most High God, orchestrated by God, not man, not worked up but prayed down. We don't create or earn a revival. It's a return of God's people to himself through repentance, a return of God's power and presence to his church, resulting in God's name being glorified, God's people being revitalized in love, faith, and obedience, and the lost being brought to a relationship with God through Jesus Christ.

Genuine revival will and must include conviction of sin, leading to the cleansing of our lives and a heart's desire to please God, a rekindling of love for Christ, lukewarmness destroyed, passion restored, a burden for souls leading to salvation. A true revival not only revives the saved but saves the lost. Restored hunger for and experience of the Spirit's power and presence in our lives and churches. Societal transformation: genuine revival of the magnitude to which we refer and which we so desperately need must bear the fruit of godly change in the society around us.

Cleansing the altar of God's church, this invites the Spirit to fall, the fire to fall and induce God's people with his power once again. Such a church is impossible for the world to ignore or explain away. For true spiritual power demands a response, whether love or hatred. So revival is a return to our first love, to faith-filled fellowship with Christ, to the power of the Spirit, and to our intended place of authority and godly influence. Such a return is America's only hope. It's time to seek the Lord.

That was my introduction to this book and I hope, friends, that you will get a copy of it because it is very important. If God should speak to the church in America at this momentous hour of human history, what would he say? Would he deliver commendation, bring conviction, or perhaps warn of impending condemnation and judgment? Our viewpoint may well determine our destiny. So we're living in a historic and prophetic moment. A new world order has already been declared. A new order of the ages is ushering in global government. We see it happening. It's all around us.

So at this propitious moment of history in America and particularly the church in America, we sit at a crossroads, don't we? It may well be the same crossroads that Israel, God's chosen people, faced in the days of Elijah when he asked the question, "How long will you halt between two opinions? If the Lord be God, then follow him. If not, do what you want, but you're going to suffer the consequences." "The Return." What a helpful and encouraging book this is, really.

It's a $12 book, yours for $8 on our website, saveus.org. Call us 1-800-SAVE-USA, write to us at Save America Ministries, PO Box 70879, Richmond, Virginia 23255, add a check for $6 for postage and handling. If you'd like to get a number of copies for a small group or some larger group, give us a call and we'll see what we can do to help you out with that.

Is the church really seeing a revival in attendance among Generation Z? That's the latest coming from the Christian Post today, or actually last week. Is the church really seeing a revival in attendance among Generation Z? We hear a whole lot of talk about this. So many people are like wannabe revivalists. They so much want to see revival, they so much want to see hope that they're willing to say things that aren't necessarily true, to see things that aren't necessarily there, to take certain small anecdotal experiences and make them generalized over the country.

And that's what's been happening over the past couple of years with regard to Generation Z, the youngest generation that is said to be the most godless generation in American history and also the largest generation in American history. So let's take a look at what this study comes up with. 62% of US adults identify as Christian, with 34% attending religious services monthly. Younger adults exhibit higher religious engagement than slightly older peers.

While data points to positive signs, researchers say no clear signs of religious resurgence exist. Figures have remained largely unchanged since 2020, suggesting a halt to the decades-long drop in Christian affiliation. Based on anecdotal evidence, many have purported that young adults are experiencing a religious revival like what we reported there in Lakeland, Florida, this just been going on. While the Pew Research allows that some changes may be taking place that have yet to be captured in national surveys, they say there is no clear evidence that this kind of nationwide religious resurgence is underway.

Among Generation Z, those born from 2003 to 2007 report higher levels of religious engagement than slightly older peers born between 1995 and 2002, in other words, Millennials, pointing to a possible shift. In this younger group, 61% identify with a religion, 35% pray daily, 37% say religion is very important in their lives, and 41% attend services at least monthly. Because the youngest age group includes adults who may still live at home with their parents, this may make them more likely to attend religious services.

The data shows that the gender gap in religiosity is narrower among younger adults: 58% of men, 57% of women under 30 identifying with a religion. Young adults continue to lag behind older generations in nearly every measure of religious commitment, including belief in God, daily prayer and the role of religion in daily life. Only 57% of adults under 30 identify with a religion compared to over 80% of Americans age 60 and above.

Conversion patterns show more young adults leaving Christianity than joining it. Now this is fascinating. Conversion patterns show more young adults leaving Christianity than joining it. Among 18 to 34-year-olds, 5% have become Christians after not being raised in the faith, while 25% left Christianity after being raised in it. That's not exactly a favorable report. These trends differ slightly from those born in the 1990s. In that group only 3% converted to Christianity while 31% left the faith. What group is that? The Millennials.

The youngest adults are slightly more likely to include new Christian converts. So what we're looking at here is a hope, a glimmer of hope that maybe, maybe there's a move among Generation Z, those born between 2003 to 2007, to be seeking the Lord. But then again, a lot of it's based upon feelings. Is there really a genuine faith and what is it based upon? Given the fact that the teaching that's available is often so milk-toast?

It's all about more trying to seduce people into our churches than to create disciples that will obey Christ no matter what the cost. And therein lies the issue. And so here we are in America, perhaps on the near edge of the second coming. The battle lines are drawn. There's been a large abandoning of the trustworthiness of the Bible, abandoning the belief in hell, increasing acceptance of divorce, immodesty in dress, premarital sex, homosexuality, transgenderism, bestiality, pederasty, and just about every other thing that's contrary to the word, will, and ways of God as long as it lines up with your feelings.

So this politically correct embracing mindset toward things that God says he disapproves of is actually preventing us from having spiritual revival. And believe it or not, the popular new gospel that avoids telling sinners about sin seems to overlook the fact that the goodness of God is what leads men and women to repentance. The argument is often made that all sin is the same, so the church only focuses on homosexuality because it's always easier to throw stones at someone else's sin than deal with our own.

But when you look at the fact that the divorce rate in the Bible Belt of America exceeds the nation's whole by 50% and has for a very long time, that the divorce rate according to a seminary study among pastors shows the divorce rate to be equal that as the nation of their constituents, you can see we've got a real problem. Our problem is that we're in deep, deep trouble and disagreement from God with God and his word and will. So you would think then that we would do something about it.

Why don't we? Where is the return to God's authority in his own house? You see we used to say that Father knows best, that Father knows best in the household of faith. Not so much anymore, right? So we're actually in rebellion against God's authority while claiming his blessings. It's a novel idea. It's like a child in a household that wants to claim the blessings of the parents while refusing to obey the precepts of the parents.

The child that expects to be provided for by the will or trust of the parents upon death but refuses to live according to the ways of the parents during their life. It's a novel idea and we're living in perilous times. Paul said we were going to live in perilous times and we do. So where do we fit? And God is calling his people to victory through conflict, both personal and corporate. It's time. It's time to seek the Lord while he may be found.

And this is that time, I believe. I'm convinced of it. We need return to fellowship, we need return to biblical expectancy, return to kingdom values, return to the family, return to our first love. Isn't that what we need to do? We need to return to the old paths. As saith the Lord, stand in the ways and see and ask for the old paths where the good way is and walk in it. Then you will find rest for your souls.

I don't know about you, but I don't see a whole lot of rest out there. I really don't. I don't see a whole lot of rest among professing Christians. I see fear, I see a lot of anxiety, but I don't see a whole lot of rest. Maybe there's a reason for that. Jesus is returning. He's returning for a bride, the Bible says, without spot, wrinkle, or any such thing. Is he returning for you? He's returning for a bride without spot, wrinkle, or any such thing.

Friends, that's why from pulpit to pew, we all need to come clean with God and repent. Right? The fear of the Lord is the foundation of wisdom in this regard. Do we want to be accepted by God or accepted by man? There will become a moment of truth in the valley of decision. As Joshua said, "Choose you this day whom you will serve." As for me and my house, we've decided to serve the Lord, come what may, including seeking him to search our hearts.

"Search my heart, O God. See if there be any wicked in me and lead me in the way everlasting." That's our prayer, isn't it? Thanks for joining us again. Get the book, "The Return: An End Time Epistle to the Church in America," as God said, "Return to me and I will return to you." $8 will put this $12 book in your hands. It's on the website, saveus.org, call us 1-800-SAVE-USA, write to us, $6 postage and handling, and seriously consider becoming a partner, friends.

Really, you can be part of a great outreach ministry to prepare the way of the Lord. That's what you can do by becoming a partner. I hope you'll do it. Ask God what he would have you to do and then follow suit. God bless you, you be blessed.

Guest (Male): You've been listening to Viewpoint with Chuck Crismier. Viewpoint is supported by the faithful gifts of our listeners. Let me urge you to become a partner with Chuck as a voice to the church, declaring vision for the nation. Join us again next time on Viewpoint as we confront the issues of America's heart and home.