What Makes the Church Grow?

God wants His church to grow. He didn’t create it as a static group of people that only consisted of a select and predetermined number of people. Isaiah 2:2,3

God created the church. It wasn’t Paul, Constantine or some conspiratorial faceless group. God, right out in the open, brought the church into existence through his own power in Christ. Matthew 16:18, Acts 20:28

God put the church into the middle of this corrupt world. He didn’t cut it off from the world. He put the church, His holy bride, right in the middle of this unholy mess called the world. Ephesians 5:25-27

God planned that His church would grow through the rescuing of people from this lost world. The future Christians will be the sinners who presently resent, oppose or ignore Him and us. 1 Corinthians 6:9-11

But what makes the church grow? Experts (I am always a little bit suspicious of people who speak as experts in the kingdom. Is that just me?) tell us there are many factors. They list them. Researchers conduct surveys and write books and explain to us why the church grows when it does grow. These are helpful but they are not the authority on this question. God is.

Here is what He says.

“ From him the whole body, joined and held together by every supporting ligament, grows and builds itself up in love, as each part does its work.” (Ephesians 4:16). The church grows as it functions together in a healthy way (love) just like our bodies. “As each part of (the church) does its work”. Hmmm. Each part.

It is up to each part to do its God ordained job (1 Corinthians 12:18). Some have strayed from this principle. They talk of some parts being more important and how that we need to hire the right people and that will make the church grow. No part is more important than any other. They all have their part. That’s why they are called parts. Is it that obvious?

It seems to be common in churches today to give the preacher all the credit for the growth of the church. I am a preacher and I wish I had that much control but it is not true. The preacher has his part but without the other parts working with him, he would be preaching to empty seats. For a church to grow preachers need to preach, deacons need to serve, inviters need to invite, encouragers need to encourage, teachers need to teacher, cooks need to cook etc. etc. Do we get the point? I don’t know, but God keeps trying to get through to us.

Paul, in considering the growth of churches reveals to us more detail of how God causes the growth.

“I planted the seed, Apollos watered it, but God made it grow. So neither he who plants nor he who waters is anything, but only God, who makes things grow.” (1 Corinthians 3:6, 7).  He goes to great lengths here to make it clear that it is not the planters of the seed that cause the growth. We may idolize teachers, scholars, preachers and authors (Paul was every one of these) but God doesn’t. He claims the power for growth of His church is God, Himself.

When we think we have come across the magic bullet of church growth we need to think twice. God is clear on this. The planters of the seed and the seed are important but the real cause for growth lies in how God brings life from human actions and words.

Too often we try to take over God’s job. We want to be the judge of the world. That’s God’s job. We want to grow the church. That’s God’s job. We want. We want. We want. God give me the humility to realize that the kingdom of Jesus is about me doing what God wants and getting out of the way. Do your part and God will do His.

http://georgelittlejourney.blogspot.com/

Football & the Kingdom of Christ

I love football. Almost any kind of football. With the exception of soccer I really think you have to be crazy to play it. Don't get me wrong. I like a good bit of orchestrated violence as much as the next man. I just don't like it when the violence is directed at me. I am willing to suffer but really don't think moving ball over a line is a worthy enough cause.

Players are so passionate. Watch them. Often putting their bodies on the line. It should be this way in the kingdom of Christ. We have a cause that matters. Moving our ball, the gospel, across the line will change people's future, improve their marriages, give people purpose. Their celebrations will not last for just a week. They will rejoice for a lifetime because they have come to faith in Christ.

Servants of Christ! Serve him with passion, enthusiasm, power and purpose. Let nothing distract you. It is God who is at work in you. Let your faith in Christ move you the "so much more" He has planned for you. Get in the game and realize it is no game at all.

http://georgelittlejourney.blogspot.com/

What Time Is Good For You

The Facebook instant message thingi popped and I was communicating with a friend of mine is Australia. I noticed he was up early, 6 am his time. I made a joke about it and he informed me that he had already delivered a truck to the repair place and done his 8 km run for the morning. Oh, is that all?

I love people who rise early and seem to get so much done before I am even thinking of lifting my head off my pillow. I am just not that sort of person. My brain really doesn't start working until 10 am. Some of my best time for studying and writing is late afternoon and evening. I rarely go to bed before midnight. I guess I am a night owl. Us night owls do feel a little intimidated by the early birds. Maybe we should call them up at 11 pm and ask them what they are doing. We won't because they are asleep. While we are working late they are sleeping.

No matter how I look at it, they look more righteous than me. Lucky I don't care that much about it. At least I don't whine about it on my blog. That boat has sailed. Us night owls are pretty messed up people but I am sure God can use us in His kingdom.

http://georgelittlejourney.blogspot.com/

Bring My Scrolls

Paul asked his friend and co-worker, Timothy for a favor. “When you come, bring ... my scrolls, especially the parchments.”,(2 Timothy 4:13). When I look at my library, which I have culled ruthlessly over the years, it covers a wall of my office. I use it a lot and I especially like the way it impresses people who visit me. Only kidding but you would be surprised how many people judge preachers on this basis. I certainly would ask a friend to bring to me when they visit me in some far away country.

Timothy wouldn't be able to lug my library to the next room let alone across the country. He could, however, lug my laptop.

It occurs to me as I get more and more into the digital world, that having one of my main resources in paper form that weighs of pounds (kilos as well), is a little too first century and is pretty impractical. "Print is dead", prophesied notable researcher, Dr. Egon Sprengler. (Okay, I know it was in Ghostbusters 1 but that's okay, isn't it?) It then occurred to me that it sure would be handy to have access to my most needed books via my ever present laptop and even my mobile phone. I carry thousands of songs, tons of videos, photos. Why not my library.

After doing a little research (euphemism for running a google search and looking at 3 pages) it appears to still be in the "too hard" basket. I am not so easily discouraged so I have come up with some ideas to transform my library from its intimidating size to small percentage of my hard drive. My ideas .....

1. Decide to not buy another paper books for my professional library
2. Determine which books I want ready digital access to. Others that I might want irregularly can be left on the wall to impress visitors or stored in Julie's sewing room. I'm sure she wouldn't mind.
3. Check Google Books to see if PDF versions are available either free or for sale. 
4. Kindle - so many books are being published in Kindle versions but this necessitates the purchase of a Kindle and the use of said Kindle when wanting to read these books. Is there software around to read Kindle files on my Macbook? Can I read Google books on the Kindle?
5. I will not spend endless hours scanning the books. If I had that much time free I would be playing golf.

Any suggestions or answers out there. 

http://georgelittlejourney.blogspot.com/

What Does God Want?

So many in the kingdom talk about their vision. That's a good thing (I think) but maybe we should also take time to consider what God's vision is for His people. After all it is His kingdom, not ours. It is His church not ours.

Literally thousands of years ago God revealed the scope and nature of His vision.
“... and all peoples on earth will be blessed through you.”” (Genesis 12:3). He wanted to touch every single person on the planet and He wanted to bless them and He was going to do it through a descendant of the man He was speaking to, Abraham. Now that's a vision. Given who Abraham was at this point, it was a crazy impossible vision

About 2500 years ago God would predict the establishment and scope of His coming kingdom in a vision to Daniel. ““In the time of those kings, the God of heaven will set up a kingdom that will never be destroyed, nor will it be left to another people. It will crush all those kingdoms and bring them to an end, but it will itself endure for ever.” (Daniel 2:44). "Those kings" refers to the Roman emperors and His kingdom would be eternal and swallow up all other kingdoms.

No one could ever accuse God have having a small vision. And I think that is the point that we should really focus on. God is concerned with the individual but we have to understand that this includes all individuals and magnifies His vision to unheard of proportions. He doesn't just want the church where you are to reach out to the disconnected and grow. He wants all of His churches to grow.

We, too often, get tunnel vision and think that God really only needs to be concerned with our neck of the woods. His vision is so far beyond that.

And we have seen part of the fulfillment of God's vision. In their day who were Abraham and Daniel? Crazy "one God" believers who really thought God spoke directly to them. And yet through both of them have come millions and millions of believers in Jesus, the King of Kings.

Yes, we have got to start somewhere. We are limited by geography. But, God isn't. At the same time as He is reaching someone in New York, He is touching the life of a barely literate woman in a desert somewhere. At the same time as He is calling one of your friends, He is calling a young man in a back water of China.

I can't help but think that if we took on more of the vision of God, we would be transformed in what we do in our little part of the world.

“The Lord is not slow in keeping his promise, as some understand slowness. He is patient with you, not wanting anyone to perish, but everyone to come to repentance.” (2 Peter 3:9)

http://georgelittlejourney.blogspot.com/

Do Christians Talk Too Much?

Christians have a habit of talking too much.

Often I am accused of talking too much. I know I can talk under wet cement  and I do love the sound of my own voice just a little too much but that is not what I am trying to talk about here.

They too often try to nail down the nuances of every teaching in scripture. They compile their discussions into ever so scholarly publications. They categorize them and do masters and doctoral theses on them. The sell each books on the latest topic and in the end get no closer to answer the questions about scripture that they have had before.

How did we end up with so much verboseness in our attempts to be disciples of Christ? I have a theory. We are going to talk to someone about something. Far too many of us (preachers included) choose not to talk to unbelievers in their lives about Jesus. Maybe it's too confrontational or just too difficult or just not that productive (at least in our eyes). Yet, they still want to talk about Jesus so they start talking with other Christians. It's a great conversation and can be quite helpful but when it comes at the sacrifice of our Christ commissioned conversation with the lost then we have paid too high a price. We have abdicated our job as ambassadors of Christ and taken on the mantel of church savior.

The dynamic of being a disciple of Jesus is simple. You don't have to make it simple. It is simple. God loves you and me despite our sin. Jesus made that love into a human form when He chose to die on the cross for our sins. God raised Him from the dead to proclaim to everyone that He has accepted the death of Jesus. Jesus has now commissioned us to proclaim this message to all people.

We can argue about subtleties of hermeneutics, and nuances of meanings in words and the interpretation of John 13-17 with respect to the Holy Spirit but in the end, if you haven't shared the love of God with the disconnected you and I have failed at the basic challenge of Jesus for our lives.

The Bible is not a book of stats to be poured over and often quoted in discussions like we do with baseball. It is the message of God to lost humanity. It is God's story of love for the unlovely. How dare we spend more time debating each other than we do teaching those who don't know Jesus in the first place.

We love taking positions and defending them just a little too much. It is so human and so unhealthy for God's kingdom. Let's spend more time sharing the story of Jesus and less time trying to explain the truth to each other.

http://georgelittlejourney.blogspot.com/

Buying & Selling Christianity

For some time now I have had a growing feeling of revulsion at the marketing of resources for the gospel enterprise of taking the message of Jesus to a lost world.

This feeling was added to by the thoughts of fellow southern Californian preacher, TIm Spivey, in his blog on September 3, 2009.

It appears to me that every seminar I go to and most Christian websites I go are trying to get me to buy something. There is a balance in all this. I know it costs money to get resources to the point where they are readily available to me if I want them. I also understand that Christian authors have a right to live off the proceeds of their ministry just as Paul had a right to receive financial support while preaching (1 Cor. 9:1-14).

However it appears to me that the balance has tipped over into over-commercialization. It appears that the bean counters and investment entrepreneurs  have entered into this Christian ministry area and have discovered you can turn a tidy profit.

We have a situation now where there is a huge and hugely successful business in selling two of the primary components of our enterprise as God's people. Worship music, and Gospel teaching.

I know I am judging people's motives here but I also know that when it comes to the Gospel we need to be very careful to not appear as mercenary. We have enough trouble with the negative image of churches as "only after my money".

I was so moved by Rick Warren, an extremely successful Christian author, when he would not accept all the proceeds (millions of dollars) of the sales of his books etc.(90% of all the profits from The Purpose Driven Life goes to our Acts of Mercy foundation) and chose to live on the same middle class income he had always lived on. More details on this.  He was preaching, writing, teaching because of a fire within him, not to make a buck and he didn't want to be perceived any other way. 

It is the slick publishing houses and other engine rooms of getting product to market that are driving this. The man of God who pens a book is not the problem. It is the one who lives for the profit of the book, rather than the prophet of the Book. Terrible puns but they make the point.

So, the next time I go to a seminar, I don't want to be accosted by marketeers trying to sell me something like those guys around the islands at the mall. No, I don't want a free sample of moisturizer. And I suppose that is what is really bothering me and I acknowledge it may just be paranoid, over sensitive me. I am starting to feel like the target of a pitch man for some product.

I have worked enough sales in my life (to support my preaching habit) to recognize when someone is trying to pitch me or close a sale to me. I also know that I would feel a little helpless without my library that came through the same channels I am know criticizing.

So, I am conflicted, and that's par for the course for me. I just want to go to a Christian seminar without it feeling like a sales showcase. Preach to me. Rebuke me. Love me. Encourage me. Just stop trying to turn a buck in your ministry to me.