The state of our church family at Mooresville Church of God is:
1) Growing - Numerically and Spiritually!
2) Hungry - We are getting hungry for community impact, healthy relationships with each other and to experience the manifest presence of God in our lives and ministry!
3) Getting Focused - We are steadily getting focused spiritually, in our ministry plan, and on God's call to us as a congregation!
Because of these truths we can say that the state of our church family is:
1) Strong!
2) Good!
3) Forward Moving!
So if this is all true, then some natural questions arise:
1) Where do we go from here?
I believe we stay focused on the major calls of God, including:
- The Great Commission (Matt. 28:19-20) - This is the heart of what God is trying to do in the world through His church!
- The Great Commandment (Mark 12:30-31) - This is at the heart of HOW we accomplish the Great Commission; by loving God with all that we are and then loving others in the same way!
- The Early Church Model (Acts 2:42-47) - If this happened once...it can happen again! The passion, determination, power and effectveness of the 1st Century Church can be ours today!
2) What should we be doing?
I believe Jesus' words to His disciples in Acts 1:4-14 detail what we should be doing immediately...Wait...Pray...Prepare! Wait on God to empower, equip and direct us! Pray daily, moment by moment, every chance we get, for this to happen SOON! And prepare our hearts and minds so that when God pours our His Holy Spirit in a new, fresh way, empowering us to do new ministry with new effectiveness, we are ready to act!
3) What are the keys to effective ministry that will change the world?
There are many things we could list: Faith, love, patience, all the fruits of the Spirit and many other godly traits and practices! However, from a "big picture" perspective there are two primary keys:
- Prayer - Jesus said that His house should be called a "house of prayer". We should be crying out to God in prayer, asking Him to empower, equip, resource and lead His church in such an obvious way that we can't miss it, that we will do it, and that we will succeed in it! If we don't ask, seek and knock...God will not answer! We must labor in prayer until God moves and acts on our behalf!
- The Holy Spirit - In his book "Fresh Power", Jim Cymbala says, "The degree to which we understand and experience the Spirit of God will be the exact degree to which God's plan for our churches will be accomplished". God then says in Zechariah 4:6, "Not by might, nor by power, but by my Spirit says the Lord Almighty"! We can try every invention of humanity, but until God's Spirit moves in a fresh, empowering way, we will not succeed in our efforts to change the world!
4) What will inspire God to send a fresh outpouring of His Holy Spirit?
We are planning a preaching series about these things in the next few months (that's how important we believe an understanding of these godly actions are!):
- Brokenness - This is allowing ourselves to be humbled before the Lord. To be broken open so His Spirit can flow out of us!
- Repentance - This is consciously choosing to turn and live differently than we presently are in order to be better used by God for His purposes! Repentance is a key to knowing and following Jesus Christ effectively!
- Surrender - This is choosing selflessness. This is following in Jesus footsteps by saying, "not my will, Father, but Yours be done!"
- Holiness - This is growing in Christlikeness; being set apart for God's purposes; conforming every aspect of who we are and how we live to God's will and desires for us as His children! And it springs from brokenness, repentance and surrender!
- Praise - Everything we are about, everything we do, everything we are should lead to glorifying and praisinng God! Only He is worthy of praise! Everything should eventually, always lead to us praising Him!
Let's begin with prayer and call out to God for Him to give us a fresh empowering of His Spirit and then let's change the world as we act in obedience on His call for His church to make disciples! As we do that together, a beautiful community of faith continues to develop and God is glorified! Let's get praying together...
In His Grip,
Pastor John
3 comments:
Now that's a state of our church kind of speech. But what are we lacking? There are a lot of positives, but with each "state" speech shouldn't there be some admonishment. I liked the future planning communication and the "where we are going from here" stuff.
Are we not doing anything wrong?
Bruce wants to know
Bruce,
Intersting thought: Are we doing anything wrong?
I'm not sure I would say we're doing anything "wrong" as much as I would ask the question, "are we being effective?" Every church would answer that question, "Yes and No". Yes, we're being effective in some areas...No, we're not being effective in other areas. But none of the ineffectivness is due to us being wrong. We just need to recognize what's not working and then make changes as soon as possible. If we don't make necessary changes, then we would be doing "wrong" in my opinion. But maybe I'm equating "wrong" with "bad" too much, what do you think?
I accept your premise of effective as opposed to wrong-my apologies. These changes I believe take place behind the scenes for the most part. Only noticeable externally when they no longer exist or major changes take place. I've been privy to Godly interventions where nothing is said but results occur. It is really inspirational to watch the organism work within the realm of the will of God and the direction of the Holy Spirit. The opposite is also true when *areas* and ministries are effective for a time they are blessed by God until effective changes need to be made.
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