In The Master Plan for Evangelism, Robert Coleman describes the method Jesus used to proclaim the gospel and lead his disciples. Reading through the gospels, one can clearly see the simplicity and truth of the approach Coleman describes. Jesus’ approach involved prayer, calling people to repentance through the message of the gospel, living closely among those he discipled, teaching them by example and then sending them out, time and again to practice what they learned from him. This model was practiced by the early Church in Acts. In those days churches met in homes, synagogues (when possible) and town meeting halls, but buildings were very unimportant for the mission of the Church.

In contrast, churches today are centered around the buildings in which they meet. “Community,” if it exists, generally consists of once- or twice-a-week meetings generally centered around “fellowship”—which generally means a few minutes (if any) of real spiritual discussion dispersed amongst topics of political, business, or other natures. Prayer is often relegated to “prayer meetings” and prayer on Sunday mornings rather than a 24×7 way of life. The need for repentance is forgotten as we want all to feel welcome and not condemned. In other words, the Christians in churches today segregate their spiritual lives from the rest of their lives almost to the point of extinction. Of course, this statement does not define all Christians today, but it does define a vast majority.

How can the church today become the Church that Jesus wants? To understand that, we probably should go back to where things began to go wrong, and that takes us back to Constantine. That’s a bit too far to cover everything, but suffice it to say that once Christianity and the world agreed to get along, Christianity and the Church began to become little-”c”’s; they became less than what they should have been (1 John 2:15-17).

We live in a society and world that encourages working outside of the home (sometimes at distances of forty or more miles), both parents working and convenience and speed over simplicity and hard work. Our lives are generally spent with the people we work with and the nuclear families we come home to, when they haven’t been fragmented. Worst of all, most people describe themselves as “spiritual” even though they can’t quite describe what that means consistently and use it really as a way to try to shut up evangelists. This society is a poison, and we are told in scripture that we are not a part of it, but you would be hard-pressed to find many Christians who do not join in with society (John 17:16-19).

The church’s current attempt at a solution has been to try to meet people where they are and not demand the rigors of the life Jesus described of believers: “So therefore, any one of you who does not renounce all that he has cannot be my disciple” (Luke 14:25-35). Again, calls for repentance are almost unheard of today. If they do go out, they are few and far between or softened so as not to offend. Some people, both inside and outside the church, think that real believers no longer struggle with sin and thus have no need for repentance. Those who hold such a view are foolish, and we should so reveal this foolishness by openly repenting and calling one another to repentance. One need look no further than many biblical heroes for need further evidence: David and Peter, James and John, Jonah, Abraham, and countless others. We need to repent and turn again to the Lord. “A broken and contrite spirit [He] will not despise” (Psalm 51).

Most tasks in the church today have fallen to paid staff and a handful of volunteers. Most believers today are expected only to come once a week, help out financially, possibly bring a friend, and possibly contribute in some way to the many programs created to replace the original form of discipleship. All these allow us to become more and more disconnected from one another, as well as Jesus Christ, which should be our primary goal (Phil. 3:7-11). Again, this isn’t true of all believers, but the stereotype sadly fits a majority.

Programming has so permeated the minds and hearts of Christians that we can hardly think of anything else. Ask anyone who confesses they don’t like programming what we should do instead, and they will come up with more programs, though usually very different from the current curriculum. Now, programs have their place. A good many services could not be performed without some level of administration; however, these should never be the ends for which we strive to honor our Lord.

We need much more than good ideas. We need more than a man’s vision. We need more than careful planning. We need faith. We need belief. Though this may at first startle, a church with four quadriplegics with real faith and persistent prayer is worth more than ten thousand able-bodied men and women willing to fall in to listen to a sermon, shake a few hands, teach a Sunday School lesson, and maybe cook a few meals. (And who’s kidding who; very few of us could even claim that much activity in our churches.) The Lord does not want Marthas but Marys [1] (Luke 10:42).

Does this mean we should completely stop all programs and works as a church? By no means! However, we must each and everyone realize and cling to the truth that God has bought us with the price of his very own Son. We are not our own, and He has given us an example to follow: discipleship. We are to go and make disciples before all other activities. That does not mean we go and bring someone to the church. That means we go and introduce them to the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, to the Lord Jesus Christ, their only hope of salvation.

Our petty cares and concerns have overwhelmed us. Our current recession fills the minds of most. Why? What could possibly concern us? All we have has come from the Lord. He gives, and He takes away. None of your concern will do you any good. It’s been paid for, and your eternity is secure. Go and make disciples. Go and meet with the person that sits in the pew next to you. Go and meet with the person who sits down the hall from you at work. Buy the beggar on the street dinner and sit and talk with him while you eat together. Share the Lord and all the good things He’s provided you. If those people don’t go to your church, who cares? We should consider our churches less and the Church more. We belong to a kingdom that is coming and is within our hearts even now, not to the domains put in place by men.

That all sounds well and good, but how to implement it? Yes, that is an excellent question. You see, ever since becoming a believer, I have wanted someone to show me how to transform into this life I’ve described above. I found that somewhere along the way, this training and teaching was lost. We’ve moved to a primarily academic study of God via catechism and Sunday School classes with little “show and tell” of how to really be a Christian in your community. Missions training tries to prepare people for this, but often they have so little time that their methods seem a bit forced and programmed. Long-term, foreign missionaries have to learn this, but they do so as part of their integration into another culture and can’t quite adapt it when they return… or so it seems.

I believe some members of the older generations who remember what it takes, what it looks like to really love your neighbor daily. In my lifetime, I have learned how to be more and more private and to keep my comings and goings to myself and my friends. To tell me to “go and love [my] neighbor” probably looks a lot different to me than it did to my mom and dad, and the same is likely true for them. Older men and women should share and teach younger men and women. We must once again join and be apart of one another’s lives.

So here’s what I believe should happen:

1. We must begin to earnestly pray and fast (Isaiah 58). The most important in the life of believers and the body is prayer. God gave us this most wondrous gift to commune with him, and we sorely need to turn first to prayer in all things. We generally turn first to our thoughts and plans, then to prayer. We need to become a prayer-first people. Many already do this, but they should speak up more often to remind us. Everything we do should be preceded, covered over, and followed up with prayer. We should even consider a 24-hour prayer chain. We should also seek to pray for and with the lost and their needs. This is one way we can reach our community and our neighbors who might otherwise take no interest in Christ. However, prayer here is not enough. With prayer, we must provide action. We must pray, then we must act on those prayers to help all we can to find the Lord.
2. We must repent and expect revival by faith. Reading through Church history, revival always follows repentance, not the other way around. However, churches today seem to think that throwing a revival will lead to repentance. We think that “good preaching” will lead to repentance, even if the need for repentance is not preached. We must preach repentance and the need for repentance. This will be hard at first and may even require exercising church discipline, but through preaching the Word, committing to one another, sharing in humility and vulnerability, and trusting one another will get us there. Yet even getting to that point will be difficult. Our church struggles desperately with gossip. I know far more than I should and the people who should be told directly are not confronted. Pride runs rampant in the hearts of many, and false humility is sowing seeds of destruction for our fellowship.
3. We must pray over, identify, and put to use the gifts of the Holy Spirit given to every believer. Every member of the church has been given gifts with which to serve the body. In their giftings, each is a voice of authority, some for teaching, some for administration, some for prophecy, and so on. Yet how often do we ignore or try to silence those because we either don’t recognize their gift or don’t like what is said. We need to help each member discover and find a way to serve based on the gifts the Lord has given each person. We need to listen to them and give heed to their direction, which is from the Lord. Leadership positions should not be assigned because we need to fill it; leadership positions should be recognized based on what people are already doing.

Some will want to point out several things I haven’t said: how to use the building, specific tactics for reaching the community, administration, etc. Yes, I’ve left those off, and I have several reasons for doing so. I am gifted in seeing the bigger picture, not the details (most of the time). We need to use those with gifts for administration and hospitality to determine some of the specifics. But most important, before we can work on the details, we have to get our hearts right. All the best laid plans of men are worth nothing and will be burned away without hearts laid bare before the Lord and unity among his Church. I think that most of the details will work themselves out, so to speak. Yes, I have some ideas, but I think now is the wrong time to air them in light of the larger issue of the heart of believers today.

We have a mission to make disciples. We do not have a list of action steps telling us in exact detail how to do so, but we do have the wisdom and experience of godly men and women who’ve tried some things and learned some things from the Lord which they could impart to others. We’ve tried programming, but programming always feels like programming to the recipient and not like the genuine love of neighbor that is needed. We must come together in prayer and discipleship, both within and without our church, and spur each other on towards the image of Christ in us.

We still have time. If we begin to confront the pride, gossip, and other common sins publicly, we have a chance to rebuild trust and lead the body to true unity in the Spirit. This will be hard; we will lose some people of their own accord, and we will be forced to ask some to leave who refuse to repent (Luke 14:25-35). We must handle this delicately and in a spirit of love, and I wonder if we can really do this given the length of time since real church discipline has been regularly practiced. We have no choice. We are so called, and we should love our Lord and our fellowship enough to pursue true unity. We know we can expect revival to follow. Isn’t unity and revival worth the effort?

Footnotes

[1] Actually, I believe the Lord wants a Mary heart and Martha actions (James 2:14-17). ]]> http://panesofglass.org/christianity/my-thoughts-on-the-church/feed/ 4 http://panesofglass.org/christianity/faith/ http://panesofglass.org/christianity/faith/#comments Sat, 19 Apr 2008 16:07:46 +0000 Ryan http://panesofglass.org/?p=300 I was looking back through an old journal (from March, so not really that old) and found an interesting entry that I thought I would share. I had just read Luke 18:1-8 and wrote about faith. Here were my thoughts from that passage that day.

Jesus told a parable regarding how we should always pray and not lose heart. He ended by asking if the Son of Man would find faith on earth when He returned.

This makes me wonder: what does faith really look like? Obviously we must trust and believe in and on Jesus Christ, but this can’t be a statement only; it must be lived. How do we live out our faith each day? Do we go out in power believing and trusting the Lord’s will be done? Or do we go out hoping maybe today we will finally live up to our own expectations of what a “Christian” should be?

Unless we exercise the former, I don’t think we live in faith. We must move past our foolish notions of a morality, rules-based Christianity and walk humbly in the power and grace of the Holy Spirit, whom we have from God our Father (1 Corinthians 6:19). This is faith. This is that to which we must preserve to the end.

Jesus said to Simon Peter, “Simon, son of John, do you love me more than these?” He said to him, “Yes, Lord; you know that I love you.” He said to him, “Feed my lambs.”
John 21:15

We’ll be taking a slightly different approach to our text today. While most scholars tend to look at this in the context of Jesus restoring Peter, we will look at Christ’s conference of the role of shepherd on Peter, and consequently on the Church. However, our general dissociation from shepherding and ranching in the modern world can lend to our misunderstanding this text. So first we’ll examine sheep and shepherds, then dive into what this means for us today.

Of what do you first think when you think of sheep? They appear to be rather stupid animals because they are so flighty and typically stick to the flock. (Wikipedia notes that a University of Illinois study found them to be on the same level of cows in IQ.) The flocking nature also lends well to following the voice of their shepherd. Sheep are a prey species and therefore have to be tended and guarded to keep them alive. Unlike other prey species, most do not have natural defensive abilities and are already prone to ailments and infections such that even should a sheep survive an attack, the sheep would likely die from infections.

In a biblical context, sheep were historically used as food, currency and sacrifice in many cultures. Sheep were prized, and large flocks denoted great wealth. Jesus used sheep often in his teaching to refer to his true followers (e.g. Matthew 9:36, Matthew 10:16, Matthew 12:11-12, Matthew 18:12, Matthew 25:31-46). In other words, we are sheep.

Now, what image springs to mind when you think of a shepherd? My first thought is of David, the youngest of all his brothers, sitting alone with his father’s flocks and defending them against both lions and bears (1 Samuel 17:34-37). David is of course exciting, but what about Rachel? Jacob first encounters her leading Laban’s sheep to the well, so not only men but women, too, were shepherds (Genesis 29:9). During his earthly ministry, Jesus claimed to be the Good Shepherd (John 10:1-18). He was also the Lamb of God, the lamb who was slain (Genesis 22:8; Isaiah 53:7; John 1:29; 1 Peter 1:19; Revelation 5:12, 7:17). In other words, Jesus Christ is our Shepherd, because He was the lamb who was slain and was raised again to give us eternal life (1 Peter 1:19-21).

So here we’ve come to learn that we, the followers of Christ are sheep, and Christ himself is the Good Shepherd. We hear his voice and follow him. Jesus said, “As long as I am in the world, I am the light of the world” (John 9:5). But Christ has been raised and glorified, and we now anxiously await his return. He has called us to be the light of the world and the salt of the earth (Matthew 5:13-16). We are his body here on earth (1 Corinthians 12:12-31). And in our text, he has told Peter to tend and feed his sheep.

What then does this mean? Are we to be shepherds of the flock of God? Yes, but we are not The Shepherd. Jesus is the Good Shepherd, the chief shepherd whom all the flock of God hear and follow. We are to lead the flock to Jesus, and like the Good Shepherd, we are to find the lost sheep and return them to the flock (Luke 15:3-7). This command is somewhat a parallel to the command in Matthew, “Go therefore and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit, teaching them to observe all that I have commanded you. And behold, I am with you always, to the end of the age” (Matthew 28:19-20). In the pursuit of shepherding and disciple-making, it is always our job to lead people to Christ, not to us. We ourselves are also mere sheep, following the Good Shepherd.

Now the question becomes two: “Who is your flock?” and “How do you recognize the lost sheep?” These are more challenging questions, though some of us already know at least part of the answer to both. First, we know the answer is not everyone who does not yet know the Lord. Jesus spoke of sheep versus goats (Matthew 25:33) and of wheat versus weeds (Matthew 13:24-30; Luke 3:17). There are some in this world who are meant for destruction; however, we cannot know that just by looking (Jeremiah 17:10). Therefore, we must trust the Helper to whom Christ entrusted us; the Holy Spirit of God. Jesus said of the Holy Spirit, “He will teach you all things and bring to your remembrance all that I have said to you” (John 14:26). So the Spirit will speak to us of those whom we should pursue as lost sheep, but we must listen. We must love the Lord and seek him diligently, for we are his. We must abide in him, then we may ask anything and know we will receive it and in this way glorify the Father and the Son (John 15:7-11). To abide in Christ, we must keep his commandments, and we keep his commandments by trusting in his Holy Spirit and in his power to keep us for himself (John 10:28). So in our abiding, we will be able to ask and to know, but we must abide.

Finally, the last question: “What will this cost me?” Just as Jesus laid down his life, so we are to be willing to lay down our own lives. This is indeed how Christ ends his series of three questions to Peter, by telling him the kind of death he was to die (John 21:18-19). We have laid them down to death with Christ in our baptism (Romans 6:4). What prevents us from doing likewise now? There is no greater thing than to live for Christ (Philippians 1:21). He is our resurrection, our promise of eternal life (John 11:25-26). Jesus said, “The good shepherd lays down his life for the sheep” (John 10:11, 17-18) and “Greater love has no one than this, that someone lay down his life for his friends” (John 15:13). Are you willing?

Granted, in our day, we are not likely to be asked to give up our lives on a daily basis. Given this, what prevents you from reaching out to your neighbor, co-worker, family or friend? What keeps you from asking tough questions of your brothers and sisters in Christ? Are you waiting for someone to shepherd you first? We should not wait for someone else to pour into us, for we have been “equipped for every good work” (2 Timothy 3:16-17). However, we should seek someone to shepherd us, for this is good and right. We all need others to help us hold course, to stand firm (Ephesians 6:13). We are not asked to do this alone or to somehow rise above our brothers and sisters in Christ, for in Christ we are equals (1 Corinthians 12:21-22).