9 out of 10 of us say it matters. Why aren’t we acting like it?

Bottom line upfront: Something vital is missing in too many of our churches, and I think the Holy Spirit has already been whispering it to you. Mature believers who love Jesus, hold fast to the gospel, and carry decades of hard-won stories have grown strangely quiet. I need your wisdom as we ask the Lord why this is happening, and what real obedience looks like for us now.

Let me start with a confession.

When I sold my companies at forty-five and pointed my boat toward Alaska, I figured I'd earned the right to step back. Freedom. Adventure. No more alarm clocks. Just open water and the good life I'd worked for. I'd given. I'd served. It was time for somebody else to carry the ball.

Then the storm hit. The kind where you're staring up at a 75-foot wave and every assumption you ever had about "the good life" washes overboard in thirty seconds flat. That day I made a promise to God: If You just get me home, I'll follow You with whatever time I've got left and do whatever You ask.

He took me up on it.

What came next was this deep sense that I still mattered. That my best years weren't behind me. That all the experiences, the failures, the lessons carved out of real life — God wasn't done with any of it.

At the time I thought that feeling was just personal. Turns out, it's a crisis across the body of Christ.

Our research at Back to the Bible shook me.  The State of Christianity in America, a national study of more than 6,000 Americans, revealed that nearly nine in ten of the most theologically grounded believers — folks like us who say we're saved by grace through faith, who believe in the resurrection — affirm that sharing our faith is important. But fewer than two in three are actually even looking for opportunities to do it.

Let that sink in.

Nine in ten of us say it matters. Only about two in three are even looking for opportunities to share, and far fewer than that admit to mentoring or discipling anyone. And for those of us over fifty? That gap isn’t getting any better.

Here’s the part that keeps me up at night. When we older believers step back and we stop sharing our stories, stop mentoring, and stop stepping into the moments God gives us, we don’t just fail the people around us. We quietly lose the very thing that makes these later years rich and meaningful: the deep sense that we still matter, that we’re still needed, that our lives are still bearing fruit for the Kingdom.

Scripture is full of men and women God used powerfully in their later seasons. Think of Caleb at eighty-five, still asking to be given the hard hill country because he knew the Lord was with him (Joshua 14). Or Paul, writing some of his strongest letters from prison in his final years.

Jesus Himself warned that to whom much is given, much will be required (Luke 12:48). Those of us over 50 have been given decades of grace, along with redeemed failures and the wisdom that comes from it. If we bury that like the servant with the single mina, we rob the next generation, and we rob ourselves of the joy of seeing God still at work through us.

So here’s what I’m asking you, two simple things.

First, let me put my new book in your hands — completely free. It’s called The Over-50 Advantage, written with Rick Lawrence for folks just like us who sometimes wonder quietly if our best days are behind us. The research I mentioned? We unpack it in the book, along with a clear path forward, grounded in God’s Word. Go to bttb.org/over50 and claim your copy. No strings attached.

Second ... well, I'll talk more about that next week, so stay tuned.

Today though, go to bttb.org/over50, grab the free book and be thinking about what it is that keeps this generation frozen and what it would take to mobilize them again.

All in, eyes up! 

P.S. If this stirred something in you, share this article with another believer over fifty who needs to hear it. And be sure to join me on the Spiritually Fit Today podcast this coming week. There’s more of this conversation waiting there.