Learning to Speak God from Scratch: Why Sacred Words Are Vanishing-and How We Can Revive Them

by Jonathan Merritt

Terms like sin and hell have become so negative they lodge in our throats. Others, like belief and salvation have been uttered so often we don’t know what they mean anymore.

The way certain groups of people use sacred words gives the rest of us the holy heebie-jeebies.

Only 13 percent of practicing Christians had a spiritual conversation more than fifty times last year, which again, would be about once per week. That means only about one in eight self-identifying Christians speak God with regular frequency.

Younger generations are having more spiritual conversations than older generations. In fact, Millennials are having more conversations about religion or spirituality than any other generation.

When we lose our spiritual vocabulary, we lose much more than words. We lose the power of speaking grace, forgiveness, love, and justice over others.

Speaking God matters because speaking always matters.