I'm gonna do a few series kind of interacting with and starting discussions about themes in some books on church planting. This first series comes out of the The Multiplying Church.
I love what Bob writes about the difference between a church planting movement and a Jesus movement. He notes that a Jesus movement is not about technique but instead intimacy with the living God. They are driven by the Holy Spirit rather than human ingenuity.
I agree. I desperately want my ministry to flow out of an intense relationship with God. I want my ministry to be bigger than me and for it to be crazy and out of control.
Do you think there’s a bit of tension here? I feel it. On one hand I want to be totally dependent on God, but I also want to grow in my knowledge, increase my skills, improve my techniques. I’d like to think that that second “want” doesn’t diminish the first, but … well, does it? As I’m better prepared to do ministry, how do I continue to rely on God to the same degree as when I knew nothing and had crappy skills?
Bob also mentions something I’ve never heard. He explains that “there is no historical evidence that after the gospel first invades a country, it does so a second time. The initial movement of the gospel is powerful in a specific place,” (p 60). Maybe this is part of the reason why. Maybe when people first introduce the gospel into a new nation they are God-dependent to the extreme. Then when it “works” they decide that they’ve gotten it figured out and can continue to do what they’ve been doing (“only we can do it even better!”) They then focus on keeping up the momentum, developing their techniques, and the Holy Spirit moves into the passenger seat.
So what do you think? Let’s try to avoid the clichés and just be honest. How do we grow in knowledge, increase skills, improve techniques AND rely on God radically?
- featured on newchurches.com
Tuesday, April 15, 2008
The Multiplying Church 4: Jesus Movement
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2 comments:
Holy crap, dude. Everyone seems either scared or stumped to answer this one (I think I'm a little of both).
I think the risk factor comes into play here. Think about Jesus--he chose a bunch of blue collar fishermen, a crooked tax dude, a "religious right" political extremist who probably hated the tax dude at first, and other nobodies to start the church. What a HUGE risk! He used a crazy naked dude who lived in a cemetary to tell 10 cities about Him--another massive risk. And both those risks paid off.
For those of us who've already planted, think about those first months before and after your launch--crazy depending on God! Why? It was a massive risk--we had no clue if we'd be around from week-to-week at first. We had no skills, and (like Vince said) we had no choice but to depend on God.
Maybe as we seek to improve our skills, we keep in mind that God may use our improved skills to set us up to take even bigger risks... which, like those first days, will lead us to rely completely on God regardless of those skills. In the process of taking bigger risks, we may just find that God has something much bigger in mind for us than what we're thinking (look at Paul in Acts 16:6-10. Paul wanted to plant more churches in the province of Asia... God wanted the European continent to know Jesus).
This was my favorite part of the book, too. Jesus Movements.
I guess the obvious answer is "and everything you do do it as unto the Lord" but beyond that I guess my thought is 'who cares.'
A Jesus movement is exactly what it is and some people will chose to be a part and some will not. And then, some will fight against it either consciously or unconsciously. And really it's all about Jesus.
If we are moved to be in the movement than we go after it with a holy diligence to be more and get better. Yet, in the middle of that our sin gets in the way and then we're moving against the movement. But again, if it's a Jesus movement, who cares. The movement will continue with or without us. God will continue to make his name famous, will continue to protect his name, will continue to shine through the junk, will continue to reveal himself through nature or people or the Scriptures or even an ass. (I'm being biblical here...not crude)
So...like a river goes where it will all the way to its destination...so will the movement of Jesus. We either let go and move with it or fight it and drown.
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