Is it Possible?
Is it possible to speak to the needs (expectations) of the American Church and also be relevant at the same time?
As I sat in a campmeeting service this evening those thoughts crossed my mind. Forgive me but the message spoke to the church (with all the churchy comments and terminology) - it did not speak to the needs of our culture. I'm perplexed, can the message in churches meet the needs of the church members who attend and also meet the needs of the culture who might be visiting? Is it possible? Are they separate messages? One speaks to the needs of the already reached while excluding a message to the unreached. Is it possible to speak to the reached and a relevant message to the unreached at the same time? I know I am pushing it -but wil someone tell me I am not crazy?
I fear that we are speaking a correct "expected" message to the already reached while excluding a relevant message to our culture.
Tell me, is it even possible? Tomorrow morning I speak a message to the church that will cause wiggles in the seats as I challenge status quo. Please pray for me and I'll be back to tell you what happens if I survive.
That will be 10:30 a.m. central time. Prayer are appreciated very much.
posted by Bob Carder @ 10:39 PM
5 comments
5 Comments:
I'll be praying, brother. Whose the prophet now?!!
I'm writting here to answer another date, just in case you don't go back and check that entry. We are a congregational church; which means that we have a congregational government: the people decide the direction and the staff does the ministry. As I read the NT I do find a congregational concept, but it is the staff (elders) setting the direction and the people doing the ministry: congregational ministry. We must get them turned around. Jesus faced a similiar problem. We may face a similiar consequence: to the glory of God!
I believe the two can be accomplished, one can develop and deliver messages that reach to the churched and the unchurched/dechurched. I do however think this cannot be done from within the current cultural church setting, because the unchurched wont be present there. I believe in the right atmosphere, coupled with the right approach to the teaching this can be done. It starts with the right kind of message, not a "spiritual" type message like one on eschatology, but rather one geared towards a life application, one containing dialogue and openness.
but then again, this wont work either because it has been my experience that the churched wont be in a service like that either... maybe bridges like this one simply cannot be crossed, and this is a really good reason why it takes all kinds of churches, with all kinds of atmospheres to reach all kinds of people, or maybe, just maybe the churched need to walk in the shoes of the unchurched and get a paradigm shift in their hearts.
Well, I come from the school that you never stop speaking "the message" to even the churched...because you never know who could be sitting in your pews week after week, year after year, and not be "the churched" as we think they are.
And, as one of the churched, I certainly want the messages to be relevant to the me and the society/culture I live in because I'm living in IT too. I have a dual citizenship. I need to hear it all to remind me of Who's I am, and to remind me of what He expects of me in MY world, where I live, where I work, where I play.
If pastors are speaking, as Bob put it, a "correct and expected" message to the already reached, then the pastor is not doing his job. Easy for me to say, I'm not a pastor.
Speak to me the message God puts on your heart because that is the message He wants me to hear. All the rest is blather.
All this being said....The Church in America is self centered, uncaring, lost their vision,and have been deceived into thinking that church is the main thing. Well it is not...
If the church wants what they have...in dwindling numbers..with a shifting of the saints from place to place..it won't be this way in 20 years if we do not mobilize and take Jesus to the unreached instead of expecting them to come to us on Sunday.
When I hunt I love ot use one bullet, a slug or a rifle shell. It takes more focus and precision to hit the target. It seems to me that predominatly the church uses a shotgun blast hoping to hit a few of the unreached in the crowd.
When I focus on shooting the right thing at the right time and the right way -I bag the right ones.
We need focus on the supremacy of the Great Commission. Go and teach. We spend alott of time teaching at the expense of going. We need to mobilize the church to "Go". It's all about relationships and we need to begin discipling people way before they come to know Jesus personally and then we need to teach them to do the same with others.
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