This week I am speaking in our Sunday services about how we as Christians can be attractive to the world around us, how we can have curb appeal for Jesus Christ.

This got me thinking. When did the church stop having curb appeal? The early church had so much curb appeal that thousands became believers every time someone shared the gospel. Now many churches are lucky if they have one new follower of Christ each year.

I have many friends who use to go to church, who grew up in a Christian home but now they act as if God isn’t even on the radar. Why did these kids get turned off by church. Below are seven reason why some of my friends do not go to church anymore:

1. There was a better buzz at the club. Most of my friends found church boring and the nightclubs exciting. When the things in this world are causing more of a stir and a buzz than the local church, you know the church is not living in the power of God!
2. They saw the gospel of experience and didn’t experience the gospel of truth. When many went to university the sheer intelligence of the arguments against God reasoned with their mind. Many of them didn’t know the truth of the gospel in their hearts, it had all been about an experience. When that experience gave way to reason they turned away.
3. The church did not answer the hard questions. We never heard the real biblical answers to issues like alcohol, drugs, sex before marriage, homosexuality, gambling and so forth. Just because someone in leadership said it was wrong was not good enough for my friends, they needed real answers and did not get them.
4. All we heard was gossip. In a church that was supposed to love one another all my friends saw was gossip, hurt and regret. When the church can not even do one of the first two commandments it does not feel very real to a watching generation.
5. Leadership was never good enough. Many of my friends are no longer following Christianity because all they saw were their parents and parents friends speak of how bad the Pastor and/or leadership was. They saw their parents cause church splits because they wanted a place of leadership.
6. They did not see the power of Christ. Growing up we saw many people sick and then die, broke then go bankrupt, in a pickle and see no answer to prayer. If the power of Christ is not there it becomes religion. Religion was a put off, this is what many of my friends saw. All I’m going to say it is not the fault of Jesus Christ as to why is power was not seen!
7. Their Parents stopped praying. The weekly prayer meeting became less and less attended. Many churches replaced them with small groups that were really times of connection not times of prayer. If the church is not praying, and praying together all the above will happen. Yes prayer is hard, but it is the only certain thing we saw, then it was stopped!

I have made it my life’s calling to go get these once kids back, and reintroduce them to my real friend, the one they were looking for and wanted to see all the time.

What were some of the reasons your friends left the church? What do you think we should do to get them back?