Why Church #2: In the Meanwhile

In the Meanwhile

"I do not set aside the grace of God; for if righteousness comes through the law (traditions of men), then Christ died in vain.” - Galatians 2:21 (brackets added)

     The bible is clear on a few things when it comes to church; firstly it makes it clear that we should never forsake the gathering of the saints (Heb 10:24-25). Living the Christian life is hard enough, but living it in isolation is spiritual suicide. The strengthening, support, council and wisdom that we receive from fellow believers play a vital part in us living the victorious Christian life and running the race until the end. The gifts of the Spirit should flow freely when the saints get together, that is prophecy, healing, miracles, words of knowledge and wisdom, thus encouraging the body of believers to perform the great commission.

     Secondly, when the saints get together, it is an ideal opportunity for the Christians to take advantage of the so-called fivefold ministry (Eph 4:11-15). That is individuals who are anointed (gifted) in certain areas of ministry, for the benefit of the church. These gifts include that of the prophet, the apostle, the teacher, the evangelist and the pastor; all of which are needed in their entirety in order to have a healthy and effective church.

     So, for all intense and purposes, as our culture has evolved, so has our definition of church. As our culture and way of doing life has started picking up pace and demanding more of our time, so Christians have become spiritually lazy, not wanting to take responsibility for their own spiritual growth. They thus make time once a week to get to a church building where a person stands in front telling them what God wants to tell them for the week. They may even sing a few songs, maybe some favourites, thus constituting the church-goers outward expression of worship for the week.

     This self-centred Christianity from believers has created a demand for spiritual leaders who just feed the people what they want to hear, knowing full well that the majority of people attending a church service are there for reasons other than wanting to be confronted with the truth of the gospel. This position that many spiritual leaders are placed in allows them to control and manipulate the saints as they see fit, because the saints never mature and don’t know any better. They have no idea that they are nowhere near the potential that God created them to reach.

     Thus, rather than blaming church institutions and leaders, for the current state of the church, I blame Christians. If enough Christians bothered to read their bibles and allowed God to speak to them in their personal times of worship and prayer, they would slowly begin to mature; they would start to ask mature questions that demand straight answers. A situation such as this would force church leaders to keep the main thing, the main thing – Jesus. It would stop the nonsense of placing pastors on pedestals, as super-humans, and the allowing o money to determine what God has called the body of Christ to do.

     If more Christians started seeing themselves as the church and understanding the responsibility that comes with it, then modern churches would look and operate a lot more differently. The manipulation, pressure and expectation that is created in a church environment, is unnatural and not what God intended for it to be. Churches would rather become places of gathering, where the fivefold ministry can equip and mature the saints into influencing the world. Church would not be seen as an impotent institution but rather as an effective and vibrant lifestyle, one that will catch the attention of the world and allow us to proclaim the good news of God’s love and grace to those who so badly need it.

     For those of you, who have become disorientated with church, don’t give up. Church is God’s plan A; you are God’s plan A. He is coming back for His bride, not a critical, cynical bride, but a pure and spotless one. Your mandate thus remains the same as always; tell the world how much Jesus loves them.

     I encourage those of you who have never questioned your church or the church in general on some of the issues I’ve alluded to above, start looking at what the bible says about the stuff that goes on, on a typical Sunday morning (or evening), does it fit with scripture? Are the traditions of men making the sacrifice of Christ a vain one?

"You think your truth is better than ours"

    "You think your truth is better than ours ..." the lyrics from a popular Indy-rock band. This line depicts an element of truth within the psyche of people who are sensitive and insecure around other people's beliefs. This got me thinking, in a previous post, Why is it important to hear from God?, I suggested that if we didn't hear from God regularly, we would be insecure believers. This is true and very important. But I want to put forth another view, how as believers, we can still be immature and insecure, even while having been a church for a long time and hearing from God ocassionaly.

    "How?", you may ask, let's take a look. Going to church does not make you a Christian anymore than going to watch the Olympics makes you an elite athlete. However, most Christians don't see it this way, they don't seek God for themselves nor take responsibility for their own spiritual maturity, they expect the pastor to do all the hearing-from-God and all the reading-from-the word for them and so never end up growing, maturing and becoming effective believers.

    Ephesians 4:14 - 15  " ... that we should no longer be children ... but, speaking the truth in love, may grow up in all things into Him who is the head—Christ ..."

    Paul, writing to the Ephesians, makes a point of how important it is to be mature, to not be swung by any wind of doctrine, by the deception, trickery and deceit of people trying to lead you astray. He says this after he instructs those with the gifts of teaching, prophecy and apostleship to equip the saints for the works of ministry (v12). Why does Paul place so much emphasise on the teaching of anointed people?

   

     For the simple fact that we all need great, insightful teaching; apostolic impartation and prophetic guidance. Sometimes we need people to explain the bible to us. However, even with all of this in place, we still may not here the truth. For whatever reason the vast number of churches and ministries today, don't always teach and preach what the word actually says. There is a lot of speculation as to why this happens, reasons ranging from 'keeping the people happy', 'not wanting to create waves' and 'doing what's expected', are all thrown about as excuses for not teaching the pure gospel of Jesus Christ. These people are regularly grouped into a category we like to call seeker sensitive. It's impossible to preach Jesus and not be controversial, because Jesus was and still is controversial.

    The point that I am trying to make is this: We are sitting with immature Christians in churches for years, because they don't hear the truth. We can't lay the blame purely at the feet of the clergy though, because YOU ARE RESPONSIBLE FOR YOUR OWN SPIRITUAL GROWTH. Speaking and seeking the truth in love, should be the responsibility of every believer, and every preacher. Holding back and pandering to expectation does more harm than good in the long-run, Christians will be (and have been) seen as the most gullible people on the face of the earth.

    We must hold our leaders responsible to teach the truth in love, to bring the people to a level of maturity. We must also take initiative and look for challenging and thought-provoking teaching for ourselves. Teaching that is based on the truth of the word, not post-modern philosophy. Teaching where the teacher has nothing to gain, financially or for fame, where they live what they preach. Teachers who are held accountable by others for what they preach.

    I know for me, that I had to make a deliberate attempt to find teaching that challenged me. I talk to many people who are frustrated with the teaching they receive and they repeatedly say the same thing, 'I am just not growing ... I'm getting over the milk I'm being fed' My answer to you is the same answer I give them, YOU NEED TO MAKE AN EFFORT. So, I am going to make the search a bit easier and give you links to the various teachings that have changed my life. People that have helped me transition to a gospel that has made me into a mature, world-changing believer. You may also like some of them, but there are others out there, you just need to make an effort because immaturity is not an option. The truth you find will be the the one that sets you free.

Andrew Wommack Ministries: http://www.awmi.net/

Bill Johnson (Bethel Church): http://www.ibethel.org/

Arthur Meintjes: http://www.kingdomlifeministries.com/

Rob Rufus (City Church International): http://www.ccihk.com/

Why is it important to hear from God?

Pic by Chloe Lewis

Maturity

     Most people do not go through the effort of seeking God and the truth of His word, on their own. The majority of church-goers prefer to get told what to believe. This is both the fault of the church leadership and the individual too. But why is this a problem? Can't the pastor just hear from God and tell the people what he thinks God wants them to know?
     No, this makes for a vast segment of believers who don't know why they believe what they believe, making it impossible for them to replicate these beliefs in others. Our mandate on earth is to 'make disciples of all nations', insinuating that we should teach others and train them up in the faith. We can't do this if we don't have our own understanding on why we believe and why it is important to tell others about what we believe. It's not the paid pastors job, it is the responsibility of every mature believer to spread the good news.
     Immature Christians are ineffective for the kingdom of God, as their beliefs and revelations are from the outside in and not from the inside out, often causing more damage than good! We must allow God to speak to us, His words are truth and life, setting us free from the desception of immaturity.

Insecurity

     If you don't hear God’s voice on a regular basis, our only option is to be insecure. If you never hear God’s voice, there is no way you can confidently be about God’s business. No way you can know if you are in His will and no way of knowing whether the decisions you are making are the right ones. You are constantly in doubt, easily offended and easily swayed. Not the place you want to be. The church is rife with insecure Christians, always worried about popular opinion, happily letting their destinies slip through their hands due to the fear of rejection, which is at the root of insecurity.
     One word from God and everyone else's opinions seem trivial. Regularly hearing from Him will catapult your life into a life of passion and purpose. Knowing His heart for your life, in every situation, is when we really start to live!
    
    Practise hearing His voice, make it a priority in your life. Read His word as though it is Him speaking to you; ask the Holy Spirit to drop thoughts, ideas and unctions in your heart about situations, both present and future. Listen to your spirit-filled friends and leaders, open your heart and see what the Lord is saying through them! We can't afford to not hear His voice, we can't afford to be average: You were born for greatness!
His grace is sufficient for us!

#2: Discipleship Under Grace: An Outline

This is the second part in a series on Discipleship Under Grace: An outline. The previous post was an introduction to the idea of discipleship through love and grace. In this post we define a disciple and see where the confusion has come in over the years in the church, between disciples and converts and the effects of this. Enjoy!

What is a disciple?

For us to fully grasp what Jesus was saying (in Matthew 28:19), it is important to understand and settle on, what a disciple really is:

The King James version of Matthew 28:19 says: “Go ye therefore, and teach all nations …”, the word 'teach’ here, is the Greek word ‘matheteuo’, which literally means to be a disciple of or to follow precepts and instructions. Other synonyms could be to instruct or to lead by example, as found in more modern bible translations.

In other areas in the New Testament, the word used for disciple in the Greek, is 'matetes' (noun), which literally means to be a learner or pupil. It is derived from the root word 'manthano' (verb), which means to learn by use and practice or to increase ones knowledge.

Thus, by implication, in a holistic sense means that, we are to make disciples of all nations (tribe and tongue) by teaching them in the ways they should go and they should in turn put those teaching to use and increase in knowledge and maturity.

Note: Think in terms of a learner at school. A teacher would not expect a year-one student to be able to read whole books and also expect them to be able to teach others to do the same, in the first class of the year. Instead the teacher would conscientiously teach the child the building blocks of the ABC, then teach the child to build words and from that, show them sentence structure and how to build sentences. Similarly, spiritual maturity can only be obtained by laying core foundations of salvation, grace, righteousness and faith; helping the convert to mature in these areas until they are at a point where they can construct their own sentences and lead other people into similar spiritual growth.

What a disciple is not:

The key concept here is, that there is a definite growth and maturing process involved with being and making a disciple. This is quite clear. A disciple is, therefore, not a recent convert or someone who has prayed the sinner’s prayer in a mass crusade. The church today has often made synonymous the concepts of conversion and discipleship, this is, however, not biblical.

Due to this misconception, we sit with a group of believers who are still immature. They struggle to become a strong and growing body of believers, who are able to reproduce and replicate their faith in other believers, because they have never been taught how to. They have never gained their own revelation and insight of foundational biblical concepts, in order to feel compelled enough to share this good news with others.

Immaturity is a cancer that has the ability to render the church useless in a world that needs a vibrant influential body of believers. Discipleship is the vehicle of change, the antidote to this sickness and a vital cog in the grace revolution.



He gives grace to the humble! (James 4:6)