With 1.2 Billion “Decisions for Christ”— Why Is Christianity Still Declining?

"Insanity is doing the same thing over and over again and expecting different results."

I can’t think of a better summary of where we’ve been in Christian ministry for the last 15+ years. I say this as a fellow Christ Follower and research leader who loves the Church: we have been stuck in a cycle of insanity. We keep doubling down on the same mass evangelism playbook—chasing huge numbers of “decisions” for Christ—while expecting a different outcome. It hasn’t worked. In fact, it’s made our problems worse.

Counting Conversions Instead of Making Disciples

For over a decade, many ministries have measured success by the count of one-time evangelistic responses. One global ministry boasts of 655 million decisions for Christ, and others claim hundreds of millions more. On paper, it sounds like we’ve nearly won the world. But look around: the math doesn’t add up. If those 1+ billion decisions were producing real disciples, our churches would be overflowing. Instead, empirical research shows the opposite. According to Pew, for every one adult in the U.S. who becomes a Christian, six others leave. And worldwide, people leaving is far worse in many cases than the U.S. (like in Italy, for every one conversion, 18 leave; in Germany, 20 leave for every conversion, and the list of those leaving goes on and on). We are losing ground. The past 15 years of record-high conversion claims worldwide have coincided with record-low retention and growth.

Here in the United States, only 63% of adults identify as Christian today, down from 78% in 2007. We’re witnessing a rapid decline in affiliation despite all those evangelistic rallies and campaigns. And the younger the generation, the deeper the slide. Among Gen Z, just 4% hold a biblical worldview – meaning almost 96% of teens and young adults do not embrace basic biblical beliefs and values. These aren’t just statistics; they represent millions of sons and daughters drifting from faith. It’s painfully clear that our transactional model of evangelism has failed to produce transformational results. We counted “decisions,” but we didn’t make disciples.

I say this with a heavy heart. For too long, we’ve treated evangelism like a spiritual sales transaction – get someone to pray a prayer or click “I accept Jesus,” and then move on to the next. We celebrate those moments (and indeed heaven rejoices over each true conversion), but we have not invested in what comes after: discipleship. The late Billy Graham estimated that only about 25% of those who came forward at his crusades actually went on to live as Christians, and follow-up studies suggest it might be as low as 6% showing any lasting change a year later. Think about that – 94 out of 100 “converts” fell away in one major crusade, and similar patterns have been recorded in other mass outreaches. We’ve been winning the war on paper while losing souls in reality. This is the honest, uncomfortable truth: a multitude of quick decisions for Christ have not yielded a multitude of lasting disciples of Christ.

When Optimistic Headlines Mask Hard Truths About Decline

Yet, if you only read our own Christian press releases, you might think everything is awesome. The Barna Group recently trumpeted a “spiritual renewal” in America, reporting that 66% of U.S. adults say they have made a personal commitment to Jesus, up from 54% in 2021. They even suggested an upswell led by young people. Around the same time, the American Bible Society’s State of the Bible report announced that 110 million Americans are now “Bible Users,” a jump of 10 million from the year before. Sounds great – until you read the fine print. Barna’s survey counted anyone who ever made a commitment to Jesus (even people who don’t call themselves Christians today), and ABS defined a “Bible User” as someone who interacts with a Bible three times a year or more. Three times a year! By that measure, if I crack a Bible at Easter and on a couple of random Sundays, I’m a model Bible user. These are classic examples of setting the bar so low that we can declare a win. Such metrics focus on outputs and self-reported sentiment, not genuine life change. They give a false sense of progress – a convenient narrative that “all is well” – while the real indicators (bible engagement, church involvement, worldview, personal behavior) continue to erode. We’ve been consoling ourselves with feel-good numbers instead of facing reality.

As a researcher, I understand the temptation. I mean, really, who wants to be a Debbie Downer? It feels good to report big increases and positive trends. But I can no longer in good conscience gloss over the truth. We need to honestly ask: What good are 110 million “Bible users” if that just means they dust off a Bible a few times a year? What does it matter if 66% say they’re “committed to Jesus” in a survey if Christianity is losing adherents five times faster than it’s gaining them? The old metrics have lied to us. We’ve been counting conversations, not conversions; decisions, not disciples.

Next week, our ministry will unveil a major initiative built on the foundation of Bible engagement, as well as a new concept we will introduce, which is the Scripture Absorption model. I couldn’t be more excited, because I believe it has the potential to rewrite the story of ministry impact. Instead of celebrating reaching the already reached and short-term sparks, we’re going to measure the long-term life transformation of the individual. Instead of touting how many hands were raised, we’re going to track how many lives are truly being changed from the inside out – and how many of those changed lives are now changing others. In other words, we’re shifting from outputs to outcomes, from hype to honest growth. It’s a daring pivot, but it’s absolutely necessary.

And what is more amazing is that we are taking Back to the Bible and our spiritual fitness workout to places where non-Christ Followers and dysfunctional Christ Followers hang out. 

I share all this with a mix of sadness and hope. Sadness, when I think of the lost years and the lost souls amid our misguided triumphalism over reaching the already reached. But also, tremendous hope as I see God opening our eyes to a better way. I feel a passion burning in me to provoke change in how we do ministry. We cannot keep lying to ourselves. If we want different results, we must do things differently. I, for one, am all in. I’m done chasing the wind of empty numbers. I want to chase real, messy, day-by-day discipleship – the kind Jesus modeled, the kind that bears fruit in season and out.

I can’t wait to tell you next week about the new day at Back to the Bible.

Standing firm in the mission,

-Arnie