 When I was in college and grad school, people would often ask what I wanted to do with my Bible degree. At the time, I would tell them, “Youth pastor.” They would normally then ask, “Interesting. So why do you think we’re losing the next generation?” It’s a common question—one that I’ve given a fair amount of thought to. It’s a personal question—I have names and faces of people who grew up in the same Christian environment I did who have taken very different paths. And it’s a critical question: Why are we losing the future of Christianity?
In all my time pondering this question, I have come up with what, in my mind, are two primary reasons we are losing the next generation. There are no doubt other factors, and I might be overstating my case, but I want to take a minute and share with you why I think I see why my friends leaving Christianity.
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 A troubling reality that the church faces today is the alarming number of young adults who forsake the faith, despite their Christian upbringing. If you were raised in church or attended a Christian school, I’m sure you can think of some examples (I know I can). We could spend a lot of time considering all the contributing factors for this troubling trend, but I want to focus on one factor specifically: the way we describe the world to our youth.
 Christians have idols that we love to hate, at least superficially, like materialism or pride. For some reason these are the idols that are the ones that typically get the “amens” and “that’ll preach” comments when the pastor serves up a message about them. But for some reason, there are certain idols that we just love to love. Were the pastor to preach on an inordinate love of conservative politics, or the American dream, or the nuclear family I’d venture a guess that we wouldn’t hear as many “amens” during that sermon. Yet, even the good and well-intentioned things that we do as Christ-followers can become idols if we allow them become so prominent that Christ loses His preeminence in our lives.
 We tend to associate the highest godliness with the lowliest service. This is perhaps why most of our discussions on Christian leadership focus on “servant leadership” and we do need this kind of leadership. We need leaders who do something. But I would suggest to you that Scripture teaches leaders lead by both doing and delegating, and it’s the latter we struggle with the most.
We use the word “love” in many different ways—from the trivial to the profound. I “love” Taco Bell, and I “love” my wife. One of those is a trivial love and the other is a profound love...and it better be clear which one is which! The real test of your love for any given person or thing is what it takes to lose that love. I love Taco Bell, but if they start using dog meat in their tacos or replace all their tortillas with lettuce wraps, I won’t love Taco Bell anymore. Why? Because I love Taco Bell for what they give me. If their food goes bad, I won’t love Taco Bell anymore—it’s a trivial love. My love for my wife should be much more profound than that. It should be deeper than any disagreement or obstacle that might come between us. In fact, my profound love for my wife should motivate me to resolve any disagreement or remove any obstacle that might hurt our relationship. If my love for my wife was like my love for Taco Bell, it wouldn’t take much to lose that love.
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