Why should someone join
The United Methodist Church anyway?

The decline of membership and worship attendance in The United Methodist Church and other mainline denominations is unmistakable. Even in areas where the UMC is growing, membership isn’t keeping pace with population growth.
This trend has elicited lots of finger pointing, some at huge bureaucracies, some at bureaucrats who seem out of touch with the membership, some at decreasing numbers of foreign missionaries, some at the itinerancy, some at the financial burden of apportionments.
While there are certainly reasons to discuss those things, it might be fruitful to ask one simple question: Why should someone become a United Methodist (or fill in the blank of any other mainline denomination)?
We often hear that all religions worship the same God. So why choose Christianity?
We like the idea that everybody goes to heaven. Since nothing eternal is at stake, there is no desire to lead others to the cross of Christ.
In the interest of tolerance and pluralism, we speak of Jesus as one among many religious teachers and moral examples, and it’s arrogant to suggest he is superior to others in any way.
As a result, all the urgency is drained from our evangelism efforts.
Rather than speak of Truth, we speak of “what’s true for me,” and ask “Who am I to say my truth is better than yours?”
So we speak of no truth at all.
Morality and lifestyle choices aren’t right and wrong. They are boiled down to niceness, not upsetting anyone and perhaps a particular political affiliation. So why not just be nice and have your political affiliation, rather than be a follower of Jesus?
Church membership demands no more than walking down the aisle and giving the right answer to a handful of questions. If you don’t really mean it, if you don’t fulfill your promises, that’s OK. No one will hold you accountable or take you off the membership roll.
But if membership means so little, why join? If these are the things we believe, why should we worry about declining numbers at all?
On the other hand, if there are real and significant differences between religions, if eternity is at stake, if Jesus is the one and only son of God, if there is Truth, if morality and lifestyle are matters of right and wrong and if church membership really means something, then there is nothing more important than making disciples.
Declining numbers are seriously important, and we’ve got to turn things around.
“Choose for yourself this day whom you will serve. But as for me and my household, we will serve the Lord” (Joshua 24:15).