The Missional Network

Several weeks ago I had the awesome privilege of leading a businessman to Christ.  He is a gifted young leader who was completely unchurched and had never heard the gospel before.  (I still wonder every day if we realize how common this is in our own country!)  He was as excited as anyone I have ever led to Christ.  He was hungry to begin to grow, to find a church, and to share his new faith.  

I couldn’t wait to get home to get him some discipleship material and to find churches to recommend for him.  Two things happened in the days ahead that have caused me some concern.  First, he found a Baptist church near his home to attend that first Sunday after he was saved.  He even brought his lost friend.  Now what could be wrong with that?  Well, they left the church scared to death.  My new Christian friend told me that the environment was not friendly, they felt like outsiders, and the message literally frightened them.  It has been difficult to get them to try again.  I wonder if many of our churches are almost completely centered around those who are already there – and if they really care about that?

The second thing occurred as I was looking for discipleship material.  I needed to find something suitable for a successful businessman, with an approach designed for more of a post-modern mindset.  I asked a lot of people and struggled to get a good recommendation.  I went to a Christian bookstore and asked to see their section on material for new believers.  They didn’t have one.  I asked to see their section on evangelism.  They had 3 books.  I asked to see any book in the whole store – or workbook, or course, or magazine, or anything else, for that matter – that was meant to help a new Christian grow.  They had nothing at all.  I thanked the helpful employee and then just wandered a little bit.  I saw the most incredible collection of music, much of which I buy and love – but all for Christians.  I saw two whole rows of exciting and enjoyable fiction – but all for Christians.  I saw row after row of books about how to grow deeper in our faith – but all for Christians.  I saw t-shirts, video games, computer programs and a whole array of other stuff – all for Christians.  

It dawned on me that I wasn’t really in a Christian bookstore.  I was in the club resource room.  Full of great resources.  But all designed for the enjoyment, or at best the growth, of the members.  Doesn’t that sound more like a club than a New Testament mission force to you?  And even if I buy all these great resources and learn from them, can I really grow deeper in my faith if it is all for me?  If it never takes me to others with the good news?  Sometimes I wonder if we have gone so deep we have drowned.  I sure don’t want to go deeper than Jesus.  And Jesus seemed to spend a lot of time with real people – with their raw emotions and real problems right on the surface.  It seems to me that a Christian store or a Christian church for that matter, should by the very nature of its name reflect the values and actions of Jesus.  And Jesus was always seeking to save the lost.  Isn’t it time we follow Him again?

Now I sure don’t want to be too hard on Christian bookstores.  After all, I am a voracious reader and spend a lot of time and money there myself.  But I do think it is time we examine all we do as evangelicals and ask a hard question:

Is there any evidence that we are serious about fulfilling the Great Commission as our primary reason for being on this earth?

I have to say that the evidence I see from a lot of different arenas gives me a lot of cause for concern about the answer to that question.

But hey, I am about good news!  I am not a pessimist.  All around the world God is at work.  An atheist I know says she has never seen such spiritual openness in people than right now.  The Lord is on the move and invites us to come with Him.  All we have to do is become the Church again.

When I was a pastor I ended every service by asking our people a question: “What time is it?”  They would shout back, “Time for church!”  And we would leave to go be the church, to take the good news out of a worship center where most had already heard it, into restaurants, coffee shops, sports complexes, schools, neighborhoods and marketplaces where few had heard it.  

I know I fail at this much of the time, but it is my passion to grow in this journey of following Christ on His rescue mission, to love all I get from my books, my music, my worship, and my fellowship, but to never mistake all that for the measure of my Christian life.  Jesus is on mission.  And so my measure must be His mission.

I have high hopes for the growth of my friend in his new life as a follower of Christ.  But it is my prayer that the body of Christ will love him more and help him more – and all the others like Him who God in His awesome grace is calling out of darkness and into His wonderful light.  Wouldn’t that make evangelism good news again?

As you read this I pray you have a great day, full of the joy and adventure of following the Lord of life.  I have no doubt you will – because it is time for church.

I have prepared to step into the blogosphere.  Did I even spell that right?  I admit to being technologically challenged.  I still believe that one day I will figure out how to work that darn VCR.  It still startles me when my cell phone rings and there is no cord attached to it.  I have kept my 8-track collection in hopes of a coming revival.  I can finally work my Blackberry but I don’t know what two-thirds of the icons mean.  And I hope we will stop creating new words like “blog” until I learn what all the ones we have just created mean.

 

Nevertheless, I feel compelled to boldly enter the technology of this millennium and add my stumbling efforts to the realm of cyberspace.  I have been reading blogs almost daily now for many months and trying to learn the ropes before jumping in to the mix myself.  It has been an interesting journey of discovery.  It seems to me that blogging has changed the world as we know it.  I am not sure that the power of the phenomenon can be overestimated.  Everyone with a computer can now be a commentator, a critic, or even a movement launcher, with more people having instant access to his thoughts and ideas than previous generations could have comprehended.  Everyone can now be a part of discussions and decisions once reserved for the elite few.  This can be very good news, with awesome potential for evangelism, but like every other innovation, there are also significant dangers. 

 

Fully realizing that I am a rookie at this (could “blookie” be a new word?) I thought I might offer for your consideration Ten Commandments of Blogging.  Actually since they are just my ideas off the top of my head, they could just be suggestions for you, but I hope they will function as commandments for me.  Here they are:

 

1. Thou shalt not blog as if Matthew 18 does not apply to you while online.  I have been somewhat shocked by the blatant gossip circles that many blogs have become.  If we are not careful, blogging will just become a new way to destroy each other faster and with wider-reaching results.  I have been amused to see several blog conversations that sounded like the old  game where one thing is repeated from person to person until it isn’t anything close to the original statement.  But it isn’t amusing when those are lies about you or other brothers or sisters in Christ.  It isn’t amusing to God either.  The Scriptures seem to view this kind of behavior as in the same class as sexual sin.  If you haven’t talked to the person, don’t talk negatively about the person. 
2. Thou shalt be a humble blogger.  I don’t know everything and often not much of anything and being online doesn’t make my prideful ego issues any less damaging to me or others.
3. Thou shalt not write things on a blog that you would be ashamed before God to have written in ten years.  Let’s try to remember that what we write online will be public knowledge for the rest of our lives!
4. Thou shalt be a prayer blogger.  I want to listen to the needs of people I can pray for and not just be online to speak my mind.
5. Thou shalt be a learner not a whiner.  Some of the blogging I read is overwhelmingly negative.  Is God not still at work in the world?  I want to use blogs to learn what God is doing and how I can get in on it.
6. Thou shalt not be an anglocentric blogger.  If we are serious about reaching our world, those of us who are anglos need to seriously address the issues involved in reaching ta ethna, all the people groups around us.  Much of what I read on Christian blogs seems to be mostly about reaching people like me.
7. Thou shalt not be a generationally self-centered blogger.  Much of what I have seen seems to denigrate what can be learned from an older generation.  There are a lot of heroes who have gone before us that I still have a lot to learn from.  On the other hand, I am real tired of listening to some older leaders bash a younger generation for contemporary methodology.  I expect that the Creator God has a lot of creativity to teach me and I hope to learn it from all directions.
8. Thou shalt remember that being a young blogger does not equal being a young leader. Blogging can give you a platform beyond what you are ready for.  It allows you to create an online persona of authority, wisdom and experience that may not exist.  Let’s blog about our failures and be honest about how dumb we are much of the time.  We will all learn more than if we just brag online.  (Would that be blagging?)  
9. Thou shalt not neglect evangelistic blogging (blangelism!).  What would happen if every blogger spent time not just on Christian sites but also dialoguing with seekers?  What a great opportunity!  Flood cyberspace with good news!  And be sure that if a seeker checks out your  blog, he or she doesn’t want to run and hide from Christians because of the content.
10.  Thou shalt not spend more time blogging than you spend loving, serving, and sharing Christ with people that you can touch, look at, laugh and cry with. 

 

Well, I am sure that after I have blogged for a while I will need to edit this list.  And forgive me in advance for occasionally breaking my own commandments.