What Is Easy Christianity and How Do You Spot It?

You may have never heard the term Easy Christianity. It is sometimes called Easy Believism. It often results in churches full of consumer or lukewarm Christians. Easy Christianity is a form of church leadership and evangelism that keeps the expectations on church membership simple and low-friction. At its core, it treats faith like an intellectual agreement: if you believe the facts of the gospel and pray a quick prayer, you are told you are set for heaven. In these environment, most people attend church to fellowship, feel good, and be served.

Right now you may be thanking God you do not attend such a church, and perhaps you don’t. However, Easy Christianity is at its most dangerous when a church is firmly against it in sermons and on statements of belief, but still is influenced by it.

The concept of Easy Christianity is not new, and as it is with most false doctrines, it takes Scripture out of context and ignores much of what the Bible says. Robert Sandeman wrote a work in 1757 arguing that saving faith is merely a “bare assent of the understanding” to gospel facts. Critics of his teaching were prophetic in their attack by stating the result would be people falsely believing that you can have all the benefits with very little disruption to your life.

However, the idea caught on because people will naturally prefer treating their faith as an insurance policy or a retirement plan and get back to living their lives.

The First Mega-church

By today’s standards, the church that began on the day of Pentecost with over 3,000 members would be considered a mega-church. Like the other city churches that would follow, this church broke out into house churches because of logistics. Though the apostles were excited that their rag-tag group of 120 followers had multiplied over 25 times in a single morning, this wasn’t seat-filling growth; it was people whose lives had fundamentally changed. They were thirsty to learn and share their love with each other.

“And they devoted themselves to the apostles’ teaching and the fellowship, to the breaking of bread and the prayers. And awe came upon every soul, and many wonders and signs were being done through the apostles. And all who believed were together and had all things in common. And they were selling their possessions and belongings and distributing the proceeds to all, as any had need.” Acts 2:42-45

Where Good Churches Go Easy

Thanks to the influence of Easy Christianity and Western culture on US evangelism, most churches have more unsaved or lukewarm members than people devoting themselves to biblical teaching and spiritual growth. This is not merely an impression: George Barna’s 2023 American Worldview Inventory, conducted by the Cultural Research Center at Arizona Christian University, found that only 6 percent of self-identified Christians actually hold a biblical worldview.

If a church has an average of 500 people in attendance, and 400 of them are Sunday-only members, leadership believes they need to coax them into doing more. This is often done by trying to make other events, classes, and service opportunities easier or more appealing. I have even heard it said that avoiding “too much Bible” or exegetical teaching lowers the threshold for people to attend special classes and events. They may even set up sophisticated tracking software that registers “wins” when some of the 400 increase their engagement in some way.

If leadership presses members to uphold a biblical definition of membership, many of the 400 will find a church that makes it easy for them to attend. Instead, they hope that filling the church each weekend will result in a few people taking their faith out of neutral gear.

How to Spot the Influence

In churches that specifically teach Easy Christianity, the influence is obvious and complete. It is in churches that want to follow the Bible that the influence may not be immediately obvious.

There persists this mistaken idea, found nowhere in Scripture, that a numerically growing church, by itself, is a sign of good health and sound leadership, and is favored by God. Filling a church with a high percentage of consumers is the absolute worst definition of success.

Remember that every church is teaching on two fronts. One is what they say, the other is how they operate. Unless a church is being intentionally easy, we need to look at how they operate rather than what they say.

Operational Signs a Church May Be Influenced By Easy Christianity

Institutional Focus on Numbers and Strategy

• Internal leadership dialog is focused more on Sunday morning services, event planning, and attendance than it is on discipleship.
• Leadership may publicly state that the numbers do not matter, but they may rely on sophisticated tracking software to track engagement “success.”
• Leadership may publicly state that numbers do not matter, but will often make choices that protect number retention.
• Growing a church is often done with strategies learned from other churches and consultants instead of building a foundation of fully equipped ministers who can bring others in.
• Evangelism is focused on inviting people to church services rather than direct communication.

The Absence of Systematic Discipleship

• If it exists, discipleship has no clear goals or a systematic approach to developing new believers into mature ones.
• There is little to no accountability or testing to track a disciple’s growth.
• Events and special classes are designed to be easy and appealing for immature Christians instead of feeding mature ones.

The Resulting Culture and Spiritual Immaturity

• While the church may preach against Consumer Christianity, it still provides a lot of what a consumer is looking for.
• Leadership is passive. This allow some members to remain purely consumers for years without any formal discipleship intervention.There is a distinct lack of Spiritual maturity even from members who have attended for years.
• Members who are serious about their growth seek resources outside of the church to fill the gaps.
• The concept of sacrificial living and dedicating home time to spiritual disciplines like dedicated Bible study are rarely mentioned.
• Rebuking or admonishing is typically reserved for things that impact the church directly.

The Straining of Human Resources

• Leadership is often overworked because they do not have enough people to delegate responsibilities to.
• The core group of volunteers is overworked. The common statement is that 80 percent of the work is done by 20 percent of the people.
• Filling volunteer positions is viewed through a staffing lens, not through a spiritual exercise lens.
• Since lay leaders are never fully trained and vetted, the church tries to protect itself from improper teaching by forcing group leaders to stick to pre-approved material and leader guides.

Why It Fails

Easy Christianity is basically begging human seat warmers in the church to take the most valuable thing anyone could ever offer them (Matthew 13:44-46). This devalues it and makes it seem as if they can set terms. If we look at the encounter Jesus had with the rich young man, we see Jesus making the entry point so high that the man walked away (Matthew 19:16-22). Jesus does not compromise with him, and He doesn’t say, “Follow Me until it makes sense to do what I have asked.”

When a person declares that Jesus is their Lord (Romans 10:9), they are agreeing to put Him completely in charge of their lives. This means doing everything He asks of them (Luke 6:46-49). This means you will need to learn it all, and that takes hard work.

The hard work, total surrender, and living sacrifice (Romans 12:1) send the correct message. It correctly identifies that transformation and bearing fruit must follow being born again, or it did not happen (Matthew 13:18-23). Works do not save, but they are the evidence of salvation (John 15:1-11 Matthew 25:31-46).

In Closing

The opposite of Easy Christianity is not Hard Christianity, it is Active Christianity. Easy Christianity is passive leadership and a mostly passive flock.

It is time to get biblical. We must call churches—and the consumer and lukewarm Christians within them—to repent. We do no one any favors by letting them live an unbeliever’s life with a little church thrown in. The hard truth is that many have been misled by Easy Christianity into believing they are saved when they are not.

“For am I now seeking the approval of man, or of God? Or am I trying to please man? If I were still trying to please man, I would not be a servant of Christ.” Galatians 1:10

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Related Posts:

Words that have lost their Biblical Meaning: Minister
Words that have lost their Biblical Meaning: Disciple
Guiding Questions 3: Why Church?

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Scripture used or considered in the writing of “What Is Easy Christianity and How Do You Spot It?” by RD Montgomery. All Scripture quoted is in ESV format unless otherwise specified,

• Exodus 18:13–23
• Joshua 1:8
• Judges 7:2–7
• 2 Samuel 24:1–17
• Psalm 1:1–2
• Isaiah 30:9–11
• Ezekiel 3:17–19
• Matthew 6:24
• Matthew 7:13–23
• Matthew 13:18–23
• Matthew 13:44–46
• Matthew 18:15–17
• Matthew 19:16–22
• Matthew 25:31-46
• Matthew 28:18–20
• Luke 6:40
• Luke 6:46
• Luke 9:23–24
• Luke 9:62
• Luke 13:23–24
• Luke 14:25–33
• John 3:3–7
• John 6:60–66
• John 15:1–11
• Acts 1:15
• Acts 2:37–47
• Acts 6:1–7
• Acts 8:4
• Acts 20:26–32
• Romans 9:1–3
• Romans 10:1–2
• Romans 10:9
• Romans 10:14–15
• Romans 11:1–36
• Romans 12:1–2
• Romans 12:4–8
• 1 Corinthians 3:1–3
• 1 Corinthians 5:1–13
• 1 Corinthians 12:1–31
• 2 Corinthians 5:17
• 2 Corinthians 13:5
• Galatians 1:10
• Galatians 4:19
• Galatians 5:22–23
• Galatians 6:1
• Ephesians 4:11–16
• Colossians 1:28–29
• 2 Thessalonians 3:6, 14–15
• 1 Timothy 3:1–10
• 1 Timothy 4:7–8
• 1 Timothy 5:22
• 2 Timothy 2:2
• 2 Timothy 2:15
• 2 Timothy 3:1–5
• 2 Timothy 3:16–4:4
• Hebrews 5:11–14
• James 1:22
• James 2:14–26
• 1 Peter 2:2
• 1 Peter 2:9
• 1 Peter 3:15
• 1 Peter 4:10–11
• 1 John 2:3–4
• Revelation 2:1–29
• Revelation 3:1–22

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#WalkintheTruth #ActiveChristianity #MakeDisciples #CountTheCost #BiblicalWorldview