Jonathan,

More importantly, don't you think Mark should use my hipster (for the mid-90's) pop culture reference in his talk next week at The Whiteboard Sessions? Of course, this would require him to watch the movie, which would in turn require convincing him that PG Wodehouse wrote the screen play.

But to your first question, I think that our collective failure of nerve when it comes to trusting the Bible has a lot to do with bad theology that leads to improper expectations. Bad theology teaches us that we control the fruitfulness of our ministry and that fruit can be immediately judged and quantified. When the Bible does not meet our wrong-headed expectations, we abandon it for other things that will.

As for what to do about it, I really don't know. I don't have a great optimism that things will change, apart from the Lord's gracious intervention. I think the best thing to do is to plant and pastor churches that will proclaim the Word faithfully. The Lord will take it from there.