Jesus Creed

Jesus Creed

Judging God, Engaging God

posted by Scot McKnight

The Baylor Survey of Religion study (What Americans Really Believe
) examined the correlation between one’s view of God and one’s commitment to religious practices. It measured American religious commitment by prayer, church attendance, religious experience, Bible reading, identification as a religious person and witnessing to strangers.

It asked questions, to begin with, to discover whether or not one’s view of God was more benevolent and engaging vs. a God who is more judging and severe. To do this, it asked questions about God’s concern with the world’s well-being, one’s own personal well-being, direct involvement in the world’s affairs, angered by human sin and angered by my sins. Here’s how I would read his conclusions:
God as distant (17%) and ever-present (85%). God as critical (26%) and punishing (38%). God as severe (26%) and wrathful (30%).
The big issue here is how one’s view of God impacts one’s religious practices. Are people, in other words, more religious out of fear or gratitude?
The answer… after the jump:

“It isn’t even close. Conceiving of God as benevolent and engaged is very highly correlated with a variety of aspects of commitment… seeing God as judgmental is only very weakly related to these aspects of commitment” (78).  
Here are some correlation numbers: prayer (.647 vs. .185), church attendance (.588 vs. .211), religious experiences (.646 vs. .176) … 
“people respond far more strongly religiously to a carrot than to a stick” (78).
Here’s the big download pastorally: One’s view of God is perhaps the most significant dimension of one’s religious practices. Get a good biblical grasp of God … 


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Comments read comments(5)
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alison

posted June 4, 2010 at 4:16 pm


Completely agree! I’m so much more inclined to do things out of love than out of fear.



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Joan Ball

posted June 4, 2010 at 6:42 pm


Wondering if pitting love and fear as opposites tells the whole story. I both love and fear God. The love softens my heart and the fear sometimes drives me to press forward and persevere when following God’s call on my life is excruciatingly difficult. Both postures are represented frequently in the scriptures and both are necessary to keep my path straight: the carrot when I am fully submitted and following without defiance and the stick when I need a supernatural rap on the knuckles to keep from falling off track. I am grateful for both.



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Wyatt Roberts

posted June 4, 2010 at 10:13 pm


I’m sorry, but I don’t understand what correlation is being presented here. The conception of God as benevolent is correlated to what, exactly? A variety of aspects of commitment? What does that mean?



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DRT

posted June 5, 2010 at 11:10 am


Wyatt, I believe the article defines commitment as prayer, church attendance, religious experience …. so it is saying there is a correlation between positive benevolence and those commitment variables. If you are to ascribe to a causal view, it would mean that people who view God as benevolent tend to pray, attend church and have more religious experiences than others. Or perhaps the reverse is true, that those with those experiences view God as benevolent. Or both. Regardless, it seems that benevolence is correlated with those aspects of commitment. does that help?



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Wyatt Roberts

posted June 5, 2010 at 11:20 am


DRT — Yes, I see that now in the first paragraph. Thank you.



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