Last weekend while twisting through the mountains of West Virginia on my Yamaha I thought how neat it would be if we could custom design our own stimulus package. Mine would include reversing my vacation and work time. Yep, I think working four weeks and vacationing 48 would be sweet while still being paid for 52! Oh well, that's enough "pie-in-the-sky" day dreaming for now. Back to reality.
It seems like everyone is talking "stimulus" these days and it appears the Church is really no different unfortunately. I just read where one in California is giving away a Harley-Davidson motorcycle this year to the person that brings the most visitors in on Sundays. Now that is a church desperate for growth! To be fair, WHFC has tried similar tactics in the past. The last administration employed anything from tele-marketing schemes to "put a pastor on the roof" campaign in an attempt to put people in the pews and coins in the coffer.
Is that the goal of the Church? Should church leaders be lending their energy to thinking up ways to gather a crowd or spending their lives fulfilling the mission of Jesus? When Jesus fashioned the Church He created us to be a community of devoted, selfless servants seeking to model our lives after His selflessness and service.
At WHFC we want our attendees to be about Kingdom business as modeled through the life of Christ. He is our Guide, our Lord, our Master. These are the "numbers" most important to WHFC. As we work His plan He will provide the increase and we will become bound to each other with the bonds of a common cause. Hum ... now isn't that stimulating?
Thanks for stopping by!
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Adrian
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Work, action, service, do we really think the attendee is looking for something to do?
ReplyDeleteI believe the majority of non-member attendees who come to our meetinghouse are ‘seekers’ looking for something they think God has. I believe they are compelled by Jesus. What do we do for these people? Certainly as they listen to Greg they will hear; The story of Jesus coming, the testimonies found in scripture, and the personal story coming from Greg’s heart, but the introduction to Jesus is critical. It is after relationship with Him is established that He puts the compulsion of His choosing on the heart.
I believe our ‘listening time’ during service could be two fold, teaching and testimony. I think in hearing how Jesus has delivered freedom, healing and life into the lives of others, and how they subsequently heard and recognized the passion discovered within them, the seeker may learn to recognize the longing they must feel, that being God in their life. We did something similar with the neighbor hood network project but that alone is limited in scope and testimony. What about the personal entering into a life by Jesus? Sunday evenings used to be a time for this but I always wondered why it was limited to ‘church family time’. While it certainly encouraged us, it’s the seeker who needs to hear the testimony more (and I’m not coming Sunday nights anyway).
Jesus began His public ministry saying He was bringing freedom and healing, He later said He was bringing life that was found in Him and by having life in Him, a life will look like this or that. It is in living with Him that life is found, and it is within that life that the commissioning takes place. Jesus first; He’ll do the sending, and then we provide the community, advice and encouragement.
Also to be fair, Greg does introduce Jesus as mentioned above. The context of my statement is related to the three year plan and purpose of a 'church'. Thank you.
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