Change Carefully

We must be careful in our love/or hate of the Church (a lover's quarrel?) and see to it that we love the brothers and sisters, whatever may be their faults - and not take on the task of accusing the brothers, which the Evil One has taken on as his primary task. We may critique and seek to correct - to protest and to reform, but we must do it very gently, very carefully.

When thinking about the old and the new, and of attitudes within the emergent community, with whose frustration and critique with regard to the established church, I often tend to agree, I think of the following needful corrective and warning of Paul Johnson, in his book, 'The Recovery of Freedom.' "The study of history is a powerful antidote to contemporary arrogance. It is humbling to discover how many of our glib assumptions, which seem to us novel and plausible, have been tested before, not once but many times and in innumerable guises; and discovered to be, at great human cost, wholly false."

Doing Church

 

We know how to ‘do church’ but we have not yet learned, perhaps, how to ‘do mission’ – here at home, here in our own contexts with our own neighbours and realities. 

We know about running churches, about ‘church work’ – but we have forgotten what it means to be the People of God on mission.

We know how to ‘run our churches,’ perhaps, but in some cases we’ve run them into the ground, run out of stream, run out of creativity and fresh ideas - run out of people (or run people out). We know how to run our churches; do we know how to be missionaries? - for indeed we must discover or rediscover the missional impulse and enterprise for which Christ called and calls His Church.  

There is a difference between ‘church work’ and the work of the church which, in the latter, has to do with what happens when the Holy Spirit flows in and through us. When that happens – we can’t get enough of ministry. Oh, we get tired, yes – but it’s different somehow – not as exhausting as trying to do church work.  
A lot of things we use to take for granted and do as a matter of course, in ‘normal’ church life and ministry, now seems no longer to be effective, to be working. Faster, further, harder, more of the same doesn’t seem to ‘cut it.’ (We remember the definition of insanity - of doing the same thing(s) over and over while, somehow, expecting different outcomes and results.)

What Kind of Church is Needed?

Before ever I want to invite my neighbor to church, I want my local church to be a place that helps me be missional in the everyday contexts and contours of my life, with my neighbour, in my neighbourhood – where I work and where I work out.

And what if, in addition, as a Christian father, husband, neighbor, I was responsible somehow to help raise the sense of community  (through just plain neighbourliness)? And given the privilege of helping my neighbour find his or her destiny (or sense of true fulfillment and purpose in being alive) – with compelling reason to get up each morning.

What kind of church might help me do that? What kind of denomination would help that church be that kind of church?

Incredible Privilege

We have been called into the almost incredible privilege of being God’s agents of grace, love and mercy, His servants of reconciliation, peace and hope? 

We are called to get in on the blessing. We are called to obedience and to live out and to share with others what God is doing in our lives, in and through us. As we overflow with that and intentionally and sacrificially share our lives so that others ‘get in on the blessing’ then we will get a ‘kick-back’ so to speak. 

We will get blessing all over us when we join in God’s plans and purposes and in his desire that the whole world (at least those who will have Him) will be set right through us, weak vessels and conduits as we are.

If We Are Not Missional

‘If we are not missional, our churches will die? I think that’s true. We will simply miss out, set aside as not able to discern and appreciate and live out God’s purpose in and through our lives. Jesus will simply remove the candlesticks where the flames have gone out. They are no longer doing their job, each in their small corner.