Prosperity Gospel is Neither
John Piper on “Prosperity Gospel”
Archive for 'Christian Living'
How Not to Build Community at Church
It seems that 10 Ways to Keep Me From Discovering Your Church inspired Adam at AskingY to take a look at ways in which individuals keep from building community in the church. While my article focused on ways the church thwarts visitors, Adam’s takes on ways that individuals thwart making connections.
Regrettably, I think at different times I’ve been guilty of every single item on this list. Are you holding back community?
Here’s the first five…
- Keep Conversations Short
- Always sit in your “assigned” seat
- Avoid New People
- Come in Late
- Leave immediately after the service (or early)
See the rest of the list and Adam’s commentary at 10 Ways to Avoid Building Community Within the Church .
Can you love a mess? A life depends on it.
I’m a messy individual. Both figuratively and literally. I miss hosting a small group for various reasons, one of which is that it required me to thoroughly clean my apartment on a weekly basis. Now the wrath of my roommate/landlord helps to motivate me, except he’s not all that scary. My life is also messy and my past is even messier.
I want to let you in on a little secret; I’m a sinner. I know, you’re shocked. It indeed pains me to shatter your pristine perception of me, but it’s true. I sin frequently; daily; probably hourly. Most days I break the law by
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10 Ways to Draw Me to Your Church
In response to my 10 Ways to Keep Me from Discovering Your Church, Church Redone reader Andy Raffalski sent in a list of 10 ways to draw someone to a church. I’ve included his list below (in bold) along with my comments.
- Pursue me : Being pursued by a church can be either helpful or scary. The helpful form is for a church to be responsive and to make a genuine effort to connect. The scary form of pursuit is when it turns into stalking. Churches will spend thousands of dollars to send a missionary around the world or for a local marketing campaign, but don’t return an email from a seeker or follow-up with an attender who’s absent from activities. If someone shows interest in Christ and the church, go after them. If someone is already part of your church, don’t let them fall to the wayside.
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A Distant and Diplomatic Love
In Matthew 25 Jesus lays down the mandate for His followers to feed, hydrate, welcome, clothe, nurse and visit the poor, afflicted and imprisoned.
“Then the King will say to those on his right, ‘Come, you who are blessed by my Father; take your inheritance, the kingdom prepared for you since the creation of the world. For I was hungry and you gave me something to eat, I was thirsty and you gave me something to drink, I was a stranger and you invited me in, I needed clothes and you clothed me, I was sick and you looked after me, I was in prison and you came to visit me.‘
“Then the righteous will answer him, ‘Lord, when did we see you hungry and feed you, or thirsty and give you something to drink? When did we see you a stranger and invite you in, or needing clothes and clothe you? When did we see you sick or in prison and go to visit you?’
“The King will reply, ‘I tell you the truth, whatever you did for one of the least of these brothers of mine, you did for me.’
Jesus goes on to tell the “righteous” who call him “Lord“, but do none of these things, they “are cursed, into the eternal fire prepared for the devil and his angels.” Up until recently the thing that was most striking to me about this story was that the cursed proclaimed Jesus as Lord. They are even called “the righteous”. We see this clearly explained to us in James 2 and the mantra that “faith without works is dead“.
But what may be even more striking is the personal nature of the mandate.
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From Contempt to Compassion
More often than not, my growth in Christ-likeness has been a slow, almost indiscernible process. It is like losing weight in that the day-to-day or even week-to-week changes are not really noticeable, but then a year down the road you look into the mirror and a different person is looking back. Sometimes realization just smacks you in the face about how your heart has changed. I had one such moment this past week.
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Doing what is right
Two years ago I was faced with a situation where a teenage friend realized he was being groomed for sexual exploitation by an adult. For those of you not familiar with “grooming” in this context, it’s a process by which a predator gives affection and builds trust with a child (or parent) in order to increase access and decrease discovery. The teen looked to me for counsel and I took the burden of responsibility to do what was right. However, it was a very complex scenario that involved internet chats, an international component, the state department, foriegn law enforcement and a predator who was a youth minister, that had acted inappropriately with sleeping children under his care. Plus it honestly didn’t help my stress level that I considered this guy a friend.
During this period, James 4:17 was my mantra. “Anyone, then, who knows the good he ought to do and doesn’t do it, sins.”
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Knowing when to change
My life is replete with change. I move apartments just about every year and have made several state-to-state moves. Even within ministry I have experienced numerous changes as God has grown me and moved me about to different opportunities. However, having change thrust upon you and independently recognizing the need for change are two very different things.
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The 8 Levels of Church Ownership / Involvement
Recently while speaking with other leaders I came up with what I call the “Levels of Ownership”. With most volunteer ventures, and especially in churches, there are things left undone because there simply aren’t people willing to do them. Every church I’ve visited or been a part of seems to have a large percentage of pew-sitters who rarely serve or engage and a very small percentage of people that feel ownership within the church and give of their time and gifts. Then there are a bunch of different levels in between. So let’s take a look at them…
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