LAUNCH TEAM SCHEDULE READING PG
WHEN
WHERE
SESSION ONE
22
April 26 - 11:15 a.m.
Downtown
SESSION TWO
47
May 3 - 11:15 a.m.
Downtown
SESSION THREE
57
May 10 - 9:30 a.m.
Downtown
SESSION FOUR
63
May 17 - 9:30 a.m.
Downtown
May 24
SESSION FIVE
84
May 31 - 9:30 a.m.
19th St. & Peoria
May 31 - 9:30 a.m.
Downtown
June 7 - 10:30 a.m.
Pilsen
SESSION SEVEN
June 21 - 9:30 a.m.
Downtown
SESSION EIGHT
June 28 - 9:30 a.m.
Downtown
SESSION SIX
July 5
SESSION NINE
89
July 12 - 9:30 a.m.
Downtown
July 19 - 10:30 a.m.
Pilsen
SESSION TEN
July 26 - 9:30 a.m.
Downtown
SESSION ELEVEN
August 2 - 9:30 a.m.
Downtown
SESSION TWELVE
August 9 - 9:30 a.m.
Downtown
August 16 - 10:30 a.m.
Pilsen
SESSION THIRTEEN
August 23 - 9:30 a.m.
Downtown
SESSION FOURTEEN
August 30 - 9:30 a.m.
18th Pl. & Paulina
SESSION FIFTEEN
September 6 - 9:30 a.m.
Downtown
September 13 - 10:30 a.m.
Pilsen
BIBLE
VISION
PRAYER
Acts 2:22–41
Gospel Renewal
Kingdom Prayer
Acts 3:13–4:4
Engaging Latino Culture Jorge Melendez— Hispanic Church Planting Catalyst
Kingdom Prayer
Acts 4:8–22
Gospel Renewal
Personal Prayer
Acts 5:29–42
Leadership & Church Size Dynamics
Kingdom Prayer
N O MEETIN G— M EM OR I A L DAY W EEKEN D Acts 6
Being a Missional Church
Small Group Prayer
Acts 7
Mercy & Justice in Pilsen—Sarah Flagel
Kingdom Prayer
1ST P UBLIC P R EV I EW SERV I C E Acts 8:4–8
Mercy & Justice at HTC—Ben Anderson
Personal Prayer
Acts 8:9–25
Discipling the Marginalized —Hector Escalera
Personal Prayer
N O MEETIN G— I N D EP EN D EN C E DAY W EE K E N D Acts 8:26–40
Theology of Work
Kingdom Prayer
2 ND P UBLIC PR EV I EW SERV I C E Acts 10:34–48
Service Review
Personal Prayer
Acts 13:16–52
Church Planting
Small Group Prayer
Acts 17:22–34
Understanding the Pilsen Art Culture
Kingdom Prayer
3RD P UBLIC P R EV I EW SERV I C E Acts 18:1–11
Service Review
Personal Prayer
Acts 26:2–23
Leadership Structure
Small Group Prayer
Acts 28.17–30
Launch Preparations
Kingdom Prayer
P UBLIC LAUNC H SERV I C E
INTRODUCTION The journey to plant a church is no little excursion. There are both joys and trials in preparing to plant a church. But whatever the road may be, church planting is natural! The biblical account describes the unstoppable growth of the early church in the book of Acts. The portrayal of the early Christians is one of enduring faith and hope amidst great adversity. Their tenacity is one that inspires our resolve to plant strong churches today. Holy Trinity Church longs to see the city of Chicago transformed by the power of the gospel of Jesus Christ. This vision is catapulted when we plant congregations in distinct neighborhoods. It is our hope that disciples of Jesus will multiply for the growth of the gospel in the city. So, to that end, we are excited to plant a new congregation in Pilsen!
HOW TO USE THIS MANUAL This manual is intended to lay the groundwork for planting a strong seniorlevel congregation. Through the course of this training we will discover tools that will equip us to become cultural creators and innovators of doing good for the flourishing of the city. Each training session will include a direct exposition on a passage from the book of Acts. The manual provides space for note-taking on the sermons. You will also find articles from various church practitioners about various topics. Please read the article that corresponds to each particular topic prior to our session in order to engage in a healthy discussion. Lastly, each session will conclude with prayer. We will rotate kingdom-centered, personal, and small-group prayer in each session.
WHY PILSEN? Pilsen is a community that is steeped in Mexican tradition and Roman Catholic influence. Pilsen is a historically Latino neighborhood that is undergoing significant revitalization and gentrification. Due to the changing demographics of the neighborhood, Pilsen needs new churches that can be a place of reconciliation in this increasingly diverse neighborhood. There are only 5 gospel evangelical churches; this means that there is a “gospel void� and we want to be used by the Lord to help fill it. Every other surrounding neighborhood has over 50! To address these needs, a long-term vision for holistic gospel ministry is necessary. As a church in Pilsen we will both demonstrate and dialogue about grace, mercy and justice. We are committed to reaching Pilsen with the gospel of Jesus for the next generation. We are on an incredible journey, let us give ourselves to this mission and be determined, under the power of the Holy Spirit, to triumph in this undertaking.
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SESSION ONE GOS P EL RENEWAL April 26, 2015 11:15 a.m. Time in the Word Text: Acts 2:22–41 Theme: Outline:
1.
2.
3.
Application:
Reflections from “Grace Renewal” Overview:
Insights:
Takeaways:
Time in Prayer: Kingdom-Centered Prayers
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SESSION TWO ENGAGI N G LATINO CU LTU RE May 3, 2015 11:15 a.m. Time in the Word Text: Acts 3:13–4:4 Theme: Outline:
1.
2.
3.
Application:
Reflections from “Vivan Los Evangelicos!” Overview:
Insights:
Takeaways:
Time in Prayer: Kingdom-Centered Prayers
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SESSION THREE C H RI ST I AN FORM ATION May 10, 2015 9:30 a.m. Time in the Word Text: Acts 4:8–22 Theme: Outline:
1.
2.
3.
Application:
Reflections from “Churchly Piety and Ecclesial Revivalism” Overview:
Insights:
Takeaways:
Time in Prayer: Personal Prayers
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SESSION FOUR LE ADE R SHIP AND CHU RCH SIZE DYN A M I CS May 17, 2015 9:30 a.m. Time in the Word Text: Acts 5:29–42 Theme: Outline:
1.
2.
3.
Application:
Reflections from “Leadership and Church Size Dynamics” Overview:
Insights:
Takeaways:
Time in Prayer: Kingdom-Centered Prayers
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SESSION FIVE BEI NG A M ISSIONAL CHU RCH May 31, 2015 9:30 a.m. Time in the Word Text: Acts 6 Theme: Outline:
1.
2.
3.
Application:
Reflections from “The Missional Church” Overview:
Insights:
Takeaways:
Time in Prayer: Small Group Prayer
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SESSION SIX ME R CY AND JU STICE IN PILSEN June 7, 2015 9:30 a.m. Time in the Word Text: Acts 7 Theme: Outline:
1.
2.
3.
Application:
Reflections from the Presentation—Sarah Flagel Overview:
Insights:
Takeaways:
Time in Prayer: Kingdom-Centered Prayers
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SESSION SEVEN ME R CY AND JU STICE AT HTC June 21, 2015 9:30 a.m. Time in the Word Text: Acts 8:4–8 Theme: Outline:
1.
2.
3.
Application:
Reflections from the Presentation—Ben Anderson Overview:
Insights:
Takeaways:
Time in Prayer: Personal Prayer
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SESSION EIGHT DI S C I P LI N G THE M ARG INALIZED June 28, 2015 9:30 a.m. Time in the Word Text: Acts 8:9–25 Theme: Outline:
1.
2.
3.
Application:
Reflections from the Presentation—Hector Escalera Overview:
Insights:
Takeaways:
Time in Prayer: Small Group Prayer
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SESSION NINE T H EO LO GY OF WORK July 12, 2015 9:30 a.m. Time in the Word Text: Acts 8:26–40 Theme: Outline:
1.
2.
3.
Application:
Reflections from”Vocation in Contemporary Society” Overview:
Insights:
Takeaways:
Time in Prayer: Kingdom Centered Prayers
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SESSION TEN Service Review July 26, 2015 9:30 a.m. Time in the Word Text: Acts 10:34–48 Theme: Outline:
1.
2.
3.
Application:
Reflections from the Preview Service Overview:
Insights/Things to Improve/Things to Change:
Takeaways:
Time in Prayer: Personal Prayers
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SESSION ELEVEN C H UR C H PLANTING August 2, 2015 11:15 a.m. Time in the Word Text: Acts 13:16–52 Theme: Outline:
1.
2.
3.
Application:
Reflections from the Presentation—Oscar Leiva Overview:
Insights:
Takeaways:
Time in Prayer: Small Group Prayer
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SESSION TWELVE UNDERSTAND ING THE PILSEN ART CU LT U RE August 9, 2015 9:30 a.m. Time in the Word Text: Acts 17:22–34 Theme: Outline:
1.
2.
3.
Application:
Reflections from the Presentation Overview:
Insights:
Takeaways:
Time in Prayer: Kingdom Centered Prayers
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SESSION THIRTEEN S E RVI C E REVIEW August 23, 2015 9:30 a.m. Time in the Word Text: Acts 18:1–11 Theme: Outline:
1.
2.
3.
Application:
Reflections from the Preview Service Overview:
Insights/Things to Improve/Things to Change:
Takeaways:
Time in Prayer: Personal Prayer
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SESSION FOURTEEN LE ADE R SHIP STRU CTU RE August 30, 2015 9:30 a.m. Time in the Word Text: Acts 26:2–23 Theme: Outline:
1.
2.
3.
Application:
Reflections from the Presentation—Oscar Leiva Overview:
Insights:
Takeaways:
Time in Prayer: Small Group Prayer
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SESSION FIFTEEN S E RVI C E PREPARATION September 6, 2015 9:30 a.m. Time in the Word Text: Acts 28:17–30 Theme: Outline:
1.
2.
3.
Application:
Ministry Breakout Team Time Overview:
Insights:
Takeaways:
Time in Prayer: Personal Prayers
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SESSION READINGS
SESSION ONE READING GR AC E RENEWAL BY TIM KELLER During the early seventeenth century, many Christians emigrated from Europe to North America with hopes of practicing their faith in the New World without the opposition they had encountered in the Old. They established hundreds of new churches, filled with devoted believers. After two generations, however, it was evident that many of their children did not exhibit signs of spiritual vitality. Many subscribed to sound doctrine, lived ethical lives, were baptized and received the Lord’s Supper, but did not show the marks of Spirit-regenerated character in their lives. Though baptized church members, they needed to be converted. In response, many ministers in New England began calling church members to selfexamination and renewal. During the seasons of revival and “soul harvests” that followed, many townspeople testified that they had been spiritually awakened out of sleep and embraced Christ. In the eighteenth century, this ministry was carried forth on both sides of the Atlantic by itinerant preachers. Its leaders included John and Charles Wesley and George Whitefield, while in North America, revival and renewal were championed by Jonathan Edwards. Not all churches and pastors supported this emphasis on conversion and renewal. Many said if someone was a church member and was participating in the sacraments, that person was a Christian, by definition. Critics today point out that the evangelical idea—that church membership is not sufficient without a personal encounter and conversion—is inherently individualistic. It implies that church involvement is optional and unnecessary. Others complain it suggests that what is important is solely an individual, personal relationship to God, not the renewal of the human community through doing justice and producing culture. Properly understood, however, evangelical ministry seeking spiritual renewal supports the building of Christian community and the doing of justice. True conversion and authentic holiness should transform Christians’ public as well as their private lives. While revivalism’s practices can lead to unhealthy individualism and subjectivism, its basic insights—that salvation is a matter of the heart, and that understanding grace brings about conversion and renewal—have plenty of grounding in biblical teaching, beginning with the prophets’ appeal for circumcised hearts rather than only formal, circumcised flesh (see Jer. 9:25–26 and below) and Jesus’ appeal to Nicodemus: “You should not be surprised at my saying ‘You must be born again’” (John 3:7). Martin Luther and John Calvin taught us that the default mode of the human heart is to trust in moral effort or religious pedigree rather than in the finished work of Christ for justification. Why? Because, they explained, the gospel doctrines themselves are so contrary and offensive to human nature that our hearts find ways of either rejecting
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or re-engineering them (as in liberal theology) or subscribing to them without functionally trusting and resting in them (as in dead orthodoxy). Revival, then, is a recovery of the gospel. Personal revival is recovering both the deeper sense of sin and the greater wonder of grace that come whenever you find and shed another layer of self-justification and self-righteousness. Church revivals are times when a larger body comes to recover the gospel in both theological and practical ways. This chapter aims at helping church leaders ignite gospel renewal dynamics in individuals and churches, because without a proper application of the gospel, mere teaching, preaching, baptizing, and catechizing are not sufficient. The thesis is that the church tends to lose sight of the gospel and to fall into practices more in conformity with other religions. Revival or renewal is a work of God that beautifies and empowers the church as the normal operations of the Holy Spirit (conviction of sin, enjoyment of grace, access to the presence of God) are intensified. It is an outpouring of the Spirit on and within the congregation, so that God’s presence among his people becomes evident and palpable. The chapter is organized under four practical, gospel-focused topics that revolve around renewal through God’s grace. If you are a church leader who wants to see renewal in people, you must first put Gospel Communication into practice by distinguishing between religion and the gospel in your teaching. Second, help your people toward Gospel Transformation—spiritual growth through applying the gospel to the heart rather than just “trying harder.” Third, instill a mindset of Gospel Centrality, a vision for shaping the entire life with the gospel, not just a merely pietistic posture. Fourth, prayerfully reflect on the ideas outlined in Gospel Implementation to see what it takes to apply these approaches to the life of an entire congregation, what the results might be, and how you can best implement them in your own setting. GOSPEL COMMUNICATION Three Ways to Live the Operating Principles
The basic operating principle of “religion” in the world is, “I obey; therefore, I am accepted by God.” The basic operating principle of the gospel is, “I am accepted by God through Christ; therefore, I obey.” Two people basing their lives on these two different principles sit right beside one another in the church pew. Although both strive to obey the law of God, to pray, to give generously, and to be good family members, they do so out of radically different motives, in radically different spirits, resulting in radically different personal character. Luther’s fundamental insight that religion is the basic default mode of the human heart extends to secular people, as well. They earn their sense of acceptability and worth by living up to their set of values. Moreover, the effects of “works-religion” 31
persist so stubbornly in the heart that even Christians who believe the gospel at one level will continually revert to it, operating at deeper levels as if they are saved by their works. Richard F. Lovelace develops this train of thought: Only a fraction of the present body of professing Christians are solidly appropriating the justifying work of Christ in their lives. Many...have a theoretical commitment to this doctrine, but in their day-to-day existence they rely on their sanctification for justification...drawing their assurance of acceptance with God from their sincerity, their past experience of conversion, their recent religious performance or the relative infrequency of their conscious, willful disobedience. Few know enough to start each day with a thoroughgoing stand upon Luther’s platform: you are accepted, looking outward in faith and claiming the wholly alien righteousness of Christ as the only ground for acceptance, relaxing in that quality of trust which will produce increasing sanctification as faith is active in love and gratitude. Lovelace continues: Much that we have interpreted as a defect of sanctification in church people is really an outgrowth of their loss of bearing with respect to justification. Christians who are no longer sure that God loves and accepts them in Jesus, apart from their present spiritual achievements, are subconsciously radically insecure persons.... Their insecurity shows itself in pride, a fierce defensive assertion of their own righteousness and defensive criticism of others. They come naturally to hate other cultural styles and other races in order to bolster their own security and discharge their suppressed anger. In commenting on “the truth of the gospel” (Gal. 2:5), Luther says the gospel is “the principal article of all Christian doctrine....Most necessary it is, therefore, that we should know this article well, teach it unto others, and beat it into their heads continually.” Three Ways to Live in the Old Testament
Christians typically think there are two ways to respond to God: follow him and do his will, or reject him and do your own thing. Ultimately that is true, but there are also two ways to reject God, and they must be distinguished from one another. You can reject God by rejecting his law and living any way you see fit. You can also functionally reject God by embracing and obeying God’s law so as to earn your salvation. The problem is that people in this last group—who reject the gospel in favor of moralism—look as if they are trying to do God’s will. Consequently, there are not two ways to respond to God, but three: irreligion, religion, and the gospel. Irreligion is avoiding God as Lord and Savior by ignoring him altogether. “Religion,” or moralism, is avoiding God as Lord and Savior by developing a moral righteousness and then presenting it to God so that he “owes” you. The gospel, however, is not developing a righteousness that we give God so that he owes us; it is God developing 32
and giving us his own righteousness through Jesus Christ (1 Cor. 1:30; 2 Cor. 5:21). The gospel differs from both religion and irreligion, from both moralism and relativism. This distinction debuts at the very beginning of the Bible. Cain and Abel both brought offerings to God (Gen. 4:3–16)—but Abel’s was acceptable because he did it in faith (Heb. 11:4). Throughout Genesis, God repeatedly chooses the younger son (Abel, not Cain; Isaac, not Ishmael; Jacob, not Esau) and the unwanted or barren woman (Sarah, not Hagar; Leah, not Rachel), through whom the messianic line is to come. He always selects the person weaker in the eyes of the world to show that his salvation is not by pedigree or performance, but by grace (cf. 1 Cor. 1:27). When God saves the Israelites from slavery in Egypt, he first leads them out and then gives them the law to obey. Law-obedience is the result of their deliverance and election, not the cause of it (Ex. 19:4–5; Deut. 10:16). When God makes a covenant with Abraham, he establishes circumcision as the sign that his posterity have entered this covenant (Gen. 17:1–11) and submitted to his law (Gal. 5:3). God later warns Israel, however, not to harbor uncircumcised hearts while they comply with all the laws, observances, and rituals of worship (Lev. 26:41; Deut. 10:16; 30:6; Jer. 4:4). Being circumcised in the flesh but “uncircumcised in heart” (Jer. 9:26) signified careful attention to the letter of God’s law—obedient and diligent to keep the commands—yet not being attuned to the spirit of the law, the vertical and horizontal component of Torah and thus not being in right relationship with God and others (cf. 2 Cor. 3:6). Paul follows this logic in arguing that the significance of circumcision was fully expressed Christologically: “For it is we who are the circumcision, we who worship by the Spirit of God, who glory in Christ Jesus, and who put no confidence in the flesh” (Phil. 3:3). The circumcised in heart do not rely on their law-keeping for confidence before God. Instead, they seek only to “be found in him, not having a righteousness of [their] own that comes from the law, but that which is through faith in Christ—the righteousness that comes from God and is by faith” (Phil. 3:9). Paul thus explains what was evident throughout the Old Testament; namely, that are three ways to live: 1. Be literally uncircumcised (pagans and nonbelievers do not submit to God’s laws). 2. Be circumcised only in the flesh (submit to God’s law but also rely on it for salvation). 3. Be circumcised in heart (submit to God’s law in response to the saving grace of God). The problem Paul and the prophets of old saw in those who were circumcised in the flesh but did have circumcised hearts was in their confusion of “sign” and “the thing signified.” Though God commanded circumcision (Gen. 17:10; Lev. 12:3) and would punish those who disobeyed his command (e.g., Exod. 4:24–26) it was not 33
circumcision qua circumcision that saved Israel. Circumcision was the sign of God’s saving of Israel—the sign of his covenant relationship with them. In this sense, the sign of circumcision both signified everything and nothing. Perhaps an illustration will help. Suppose a colleague showed up to work one day without his wedding ring on. It would be foolish to think that something was wrong in his marriage based upon the symbol or sign of his covenant not being on his finger. He probably simply forgot it or is having it repaired or cleaned. The symbol (and its absence) here means nothing. Now suppose on another occasion while out for lunch with this colleague at a local pub, a group of women walked in and one of them gave him a welcoming smile. And in an inconspicuous move, he slowly removed the wedding ring, hiding it away into his pocket. At that instant, that ring, that sign and symbol of his covenant with his wife, means absolutely everything. The ring means everything and it means nothing. Under the old covenant, circumcision meant everything. It was a demonstration of one’s obedience to the commands of God. But it also meant nothing. Circumcision was a mere sign, and the holy God who didn’t require costly atonement to reconcile us and whose love, therefore, does not require or provoke life change. In actuality, the gospel is distinct from both “cheap grace” and religion. Presence of the sign did not necessarily demonstrate the presence of the thing signified: viz., right relationship with God. Three Ways to Live in the New Testament
The New Testament as a whole spells out the three ways in much more detail than Paul provided in the brief passage found in Philippians 3. The classic statement of these three ways to live appears in Romans 1–4. Beginning in Romans 1:18–32, Paul shows how the immoral, pagan Gentiles are lost and alienated from God. In Romans 2:1–3:20, Paul counterintuitively says that the moral, Biblebelieving Jews are also lost and alienated from God. “What shall we conclude then? Are we any better? Not at all! We have already made the charge that Jews and Gentiles alike are all under sin. As it is written: ‘There is no one righteous, not even one; there is no one...who seeks God’” (Rom. 3:9–11). The last part of this statement is particularly shocking, since Paul concludes that thousands of men and women who were diligently obeying and believing the Bible were not even seeking God in all their religion. The reason is that if you seek to be right with God through your morality and religion, you are not seeking God for your salvation; you are using God as a means to achieve your own salvation. Paul proceeds in the rest of Romans to explain the gospel as seeking God in Christ for salvation, through grace alone and through faith alone. The Sermon on the Mount at first glance seems to be saying there are only two ways to live. In Matthew 7:13–27, Jesus thrusts on his listeners a choice between two gates, 34
two roads, two trees, and two foundations. Preachers have traditionally taught that Jesus is contrasting living God’s way (i.e., according to the principles of the Sermon) or living immorally in disobedience. Is that interpretation right? If Jesus had been summarizing his message by saying, “Now in conclusion, there are two ways to live,” we could expect to see two ways treated within the sermon—and indeed there are. A review of Matthew 5–7 shows us two ways, but not of the Disobedient and the Obedient. The contrast is between Jesus’ way and the Pharisees’ way. Jesus begins the Sermon by saying, “I tell you that unless your righteousness surpasses that of the Pharisees and the teachers of the law, you will certainly not enter the kingdom of heaven” (Matt. 5:20). The problem with the religious leaders is that they did not go far enough. In chapters 5 and 6, he contrasts the Pharisees’ way of obeying God’s commandments—with minimum, external compliance— and his own way, which is generated in believers by an inward, thorough change in the heart’s motivation. When the Pharisees give to the poor (Matt. 6:1–4), they do it for acclaim, applause, and reward. When they pray, “they think they will be heard because of their many words” (Matt. 6:7). They feel superior and believe they have leverage over others and over God because of their spiritual performance. In chapter 7, Jesus goes on to warn against being judgmental and condemning (Matt. 7:1–2) and against being quicker to give criticism than to take it (Matt. 7:3–5). In short, the Sermon on the Mount does not contrast people who fail to obey the law, give alms, and pray with those who succeed. Both groups of people in the Sermon obey the law. Both give to the poor. Both pray—but all for profoundly different reasons. The “works-righteousness” group acts out of a desire to gain leverage over others and over God, which produces a sense of superiority, pride, inability to take criticism, and minimal, external obedience without inner changes in holiness and character. The criticism of Jesus toward the religious leaders was that they turned the good and lovely law (Ps. 119; Rom. 7:22) into an idol by not following its goal, its telos (Matt. 5:17; Lk. 24:44; John 5:46; cf. Rom. 10:4). The distinction Jesus draws is between the religious, on the one hand, and those who believe the gospel on the other. Perhaps the most vivid depiction of the three ways to live appears in the parable of the lost sons in Luke 15. Both sons are alienated from the father and the feast of salvation. The father must go out to each of them to invite them in. Both try to control the father’s wealth—the younger son with overt rebellion and immorality, and the elder son with absolute compliance and obedience. This parallels the two ways we to try to become our own savior and lord. One way is by disobeying the law of God. The other is by obeying the law of God in an attempt to earn our way to heaven and gain leverage over God. At the shocking end of the parable, Jesus leaves us with the younger son “saved”—since he has repented and gone in to the Father’s feast—and the older son still lost and alienated from the Father’s heart. The 35
“good son” is alienated not in spite of his goodness but because of his goodness. In verse 29 he explains the reason for his anger with the father: “I’ve...never disobeyed your orders” (this is similar to the response of the rich young ruler in Mark 10:20). His self-righteousness makes him furious at the grace shown to the younger brother, and blinds him to the grace that he himself needs from his father (cf. Matt. 20:1–16 where the workers in the vineyard all get the same wage regardless of when they start or what they did before “working”). The parable ends with him still lost and angry, like the Pharisees Jesus is addressing (Luke 15:1–2). It may be that Jesus leaves the older son in a lost state to convey the seriousness of this spiritual condition. Or it may be left “open” in order to summon hearers and readers to respond. Lost younger brothers know they are not right with God, but obedient, morally fastidious older brothers do not. This devastating depiction of religion is by no means the only example in the ministry of Jesus. Throughout the gospels these three ways—religion, irreligion, and the gospel—are repeatedly portrayed in Jesus’ encounters. Whether it is a Pharisee and a tax collector (Luke 18), a Pharisee and a fallen woman (Luke 7), or a respectable crowd and a demoniac (Mark 5), in every instance the less moral, less religious person connects more readily to Jesus. Even in John 3 and 4, where a similar contrast occurs between a Pharisee and an immoral Samaritan woman, the woman receives the gospel with joy, while Nicodemus the Pharisee evidently has to go home and think about it—though there appears to be a return assumed in his reappearance in 19:39. Here we have the New Testament version of what we saw at the beginning of the Bible, that God chooses the foolish things to shame the wise and the weak things to shame the strong, to show that his salvation is by grace (1 Cor. 1:26–31). The epistle to the Hebrews explains the crucial difference between religion and the gospel of grace. We can summarize the epistle’s teaching by imagining early Christians talking to their neighbors in the Roman Empire. Ah, the neighbor says, I hear you are religious! Great! Religion is a good thing. Where is your temple or holy place? We don’t have a temple, replies the Christian. Jesus is our temple. No temple? But where do your priests work and do their rituals? We don’t have priests to mediate the presence of God, replies the Christian. Jesus is our priest. No priests? But where do you offer your sacrifices to acquire the favor of your God? We don’t need a sacrifice, replies the Christian. Jesus is our sacrifice. What kind of religion IS this? sputters the pagan neighbor. The answer is that the Christian faith is so utterly different from the way every other religion functions that it does not really qualify as a religion.
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A Comparison of Religion and Gospel
Religion
Gospel
“I obey, therefore I’m accepted.”
“I’m accepted; therefore I obey.”
Motivation is based on fear and insecurity.
Motivation is based on grateful joy.
I obey God in order to get things from God.
I obey God to get God—to delight and resemble him.
When circumstances in my life go wrong, I am angry at God or myself, since I believe, like Job’s friends, that anyone who is good deserves a comfortable life.
When circumstances in my life go wrong, I struggle, but I know that while God may allow this for my training, he will exercise his fatherly love within my trial.
When I am criticized, I am furious or devastated because it is essential for me to think of myself as a “good person.” Threats to that self-image must be destroyed at all costs.
When I am criticized, I struggle, but it is not essential for me to think of myself as a “good person.” My identity is not built on my performance but on God’s love for me in Christ.
My prayer life consists largely of petition and only heats up when I am in need. My main purpose in prayer is to control circumstances.
My prayer life consists of generous stretches of praise and adoration. My main purpose is fellowship with him.
The Importance of Preaching Three Approaches to God, Not Just Two
One of the most important ways to gain a hearing from postmodern people and to wake up nominal Christians (Christians in name only) or “sleepy” Christians is to preach the gospel as a third approach to God, distinct from both irreligion and religion. As described earlier, religion is, “If I obey, I will be accepted.” Irreligion is, “I don’t really have to obey anyone but myself.” The gospel is, “Since I am accepted in Christ, I will obey.” The legalist, who trusts in religion, says, “The good people are in and the bad are out.” The secular relativist, who claims no religion, says, “The tolerant are in and the bigots are out.” The gospel says, “The humble are in and the proud are out.” Those who realize they are not good are on the right way, at least. Speaking in such ways is crucial for helping your hearers distinguish all three approaches from each other. Why? First, many professed Christians are not believers—they are pure “elder brothers” (Luke 15:11–32), and only making this distinction can help to convert
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them. Secondly, many genuine Christians are elder-brotherish—angry, mechanical, superior, insecure—and only making this distinction can help to renew them. Postmodern people have been raised in or near churches that were heavily “religious”—either in a conservative, moralistic way or in a liberal, “do-gooder” way. When they rejected religion and its fruits, they were sure they had rejected Christianity. Unless you show them that you are offering them something different, they won’t stay to listen to you. Also, if “religion” is the default mode of the human heart, then nonbelievers who hear you calling them to follow Christ will automatically believe you are calling them into the “elder brother” moralistic approach to God. It doesn’t matter if you use biblical language, such as “receive Christ and you will be adopted into his family” (see John 1:12–13). They will still think you are inviting them to try hard to live according to Christ’s example. Unless you are extremely clear and are constantly contrasting religion with the gospel, they will believe you are calling them to “get religion.” Modern and postmodern people have observed how self-righteous religious people are. Religious people who don’t understand the gospel have to bolster their own sense of worthiness by convincing themselves they are better than other people. This leads them to exclude and condemn others. In center cities, the majority of modern and postmodern people who are hostile to Christianity do not know any other kinds of churches. Only if you show them there’s a difference—that what they rejected isn’t real Christianity—will they even begin to think and listen again and give it “one more look.” Some claim that to constantly strike a note of “grace, grace, grace” in our sermons is not helpful. The objection goes like this: “Surely Phariseeism and moralism are not the current problem in our culture. Rather, our problem is license and antinomianism. People lack a sense of right or wrong. It’s redundant to talk about grace all the time to postmodern people.” I don’t believe that is the case. First, unless you point to the “good news” of grace, people won’t even be able to bear the “bad news” of God’s judgment. Second, unless you critique moralism, many irreligious people will not grasp the difference between moralism and what you are offering in the gospel. A deep grasp of the gospel is the antidote to license and antinomianism—it cuts them both off at the pass. GOSPEL TRANSFORMATION – Gracious Virtue Moralistic Behavior Change
People ordinarily try to instill honesty in others this way: “If you lie, you’ll get in trouble with God and other people,” or, “If you lie, you’ll be like those terrible people, those liars confined to the fourth zone in the tenth pouch of the eighth circle of Dante’s hell, and you are better than that!” Think about these statements. 38
The motivations brought to bear on them to change their behavior are fear of punishment (“You’ll get in trouble”) and pride (“You’ll be like a dirty liar. You wouldn’t want to be like one of them”). Both fear of punishment and pride are essentially self-centered. The motivation is to be honest because it will pay off for you. That is moralistic behavior change. It puts pressure on the will and stirs up the ego to more selfishness to force a person to curb his or her inclinations to do wrong. This approach has a fatal flaw, however. Stirring up self-centeredness to motivate someone to do the right thing does not get at the fundamental self-regard and self-absorption that are the main problem of the human heart. Moralistic behavior change simply manipulates the radical selfishness. It may restrain the heart’s selfcenteredness, but it does not change it. Moralism bends a person into a different pattern through fear of consequences and pride, rather than melting the person into a new shape through a new joy, love, and gratitude that replace the deadly self-regard and self-concentration. To extend the metaphor, if you try to bend a piece of metal without heat’s softening effect, the metal tends to snap back to its former position. This is why people who are trying to change through moralistic behaviorism find themselves lapsing into sins of which they thought themselves incapable. They can’t believe they embezzled, or lied, or committed adultery, or felt so much blind hate that they lashed out. Appalled at themselves, they say, “I wasn’t raised that way!” But they were, because moralistic behaviorism nurtures the “ruthless, sleepless, unsmiling concentration upon self which is the mark of Hell.” It is the reason people embezzle, lie, murder, and break promises. This explains why churches are plagued with gossip and fighting. Underneath the seeming unselfishness is great self-centeredness. To complete the illustration, unsoftened metal can also break if you try to bend it. Many people, after years of moralistic behaviorism, abandon the faith altogether, complaining that they are exhausted and they “can’t keep it up.” Behavior might be altered by putting pressure on the will, but the heart’s basic posture of selfcenteredness and insecurity are not dealt with apart from the gospel. Common Morality and True Virtue
In works such as The Nature of True Virtue and The Religious Affections, Jonathan Edwards explored the difference between genuine heart-change and moralistic compliance with his characteristic depth and thoroughness. Moral behavior exists in two kinds: “common morality” and “true virtue.” Edwards believed that the great majority of people live moral lives not out of love for God but out of some form of self-centeredness. People who act morally primarily to escape punishment, or to win self-respect and salvation, are being moral to serve themselves. At one level, they may be kind to others and helpful to the poor, yet at a deeper level they are behaving this way so God will bless them (the religious 39
version) or so they can think of themselves as virtuous, charitable persons (the secular version). They “do good” not for God’s sake or for goodness’ sake, but for their own sake. Edwards reasons that if our highest love is our family, we will ultimately choose our family’s good over the good of other families. If our highest love is our nation, we will choose our nation’s interests and ignore those of other countries. If our highest love is our own individual comfort and happiness, we will choose to serve ourselves over the needs of others. Only if our highest love is God himself can we love and serve all people, families, classes, and races. How then can we be brought to make God our highest love? It cannot happen through moralistic religion, as we have seen. If you tell the truth because you believe it will get God to bless you and answer your prayers, you are not loving God in your obedience. You are merely loving yourself and using God to get things you want. Here is what must happen. Edwards concludes that true virtue is being faithful and honest not because it profits you or makes you feel better about yourself. Instead it grows out of love for the One who died for you, keeping a promise he made despite the unfathomable suffering it brought him. True virtue is doing the right thing not for your sake, but for God’s sake, out of a desire to know, resemble, please, and love the One who saved you. That kind of motivation can only grow in a heart deeply touched by grace. Think of the motivations driving common morality—pride and fearfulness. The gospel destroys pride, because it tells me I am so lost that he had to die for me. On the other hand it destroys fearfulness, because it tells me that nothing I can do will wear out his love for me. When I deeply embrace these truths, my heart is not merely restrained but changed. Its fundamental orientation is transformed. How the Bible Moves Us Toward Change
In light of all this, let’s look further in the Bible and see how it calls us to change. In 2 Corinthians 8 and 9, Paul wants the believers to give an offering to the poor, but without ordering them to do so. He does not want them simply to respond to a demand. Rather than put pressure directly on the will by saying, “I’m an apostle and this is your duty to me,” or on the emotions by telling them stories about how greatly the poor are suffering and how much more the Corinthians have than the sufferers, Paul vividly and unforgettably says, “You know the grace of our Lord Jesus Christ, that though he was rich, yet for your sakes he became poor, so that you through his poverty might become rich” (2 Cor. 8:9). When he says, “You know the grace,” he is reminding them of that grace by means of a powerful image that brings Jesus’ salvation into the realm of wealth and poverty. He moves them by a spiritual
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recollection of the gospel. Paul is saying, in essence, “Think on his costly grace, until the gospel changes you—from the heart—into generous people.” In Ephesians 5, Paul is speaking to spouses but especially, it seems, to husbands. Many of them, perhaps, had brought attitudes toward marriage from their pagan backgrounds where marriage primarily represented a business relationship that entailed marrying as “well” as they could. Paul not only wants to encourage husbands to be sexually faithful, but also to cherish and honor their wives. Here in Ephesians 5 (as in 2 Corinthians 8 and 9), Paul exhorts not with a moral example but by showing unloving husbands the salvation of Jesus, our ultimate Bridegroom in the gospel, who showed sacrificial love toward us, his “bride.” He did not love us because we were lovely, but to make us lovely (5:25–27). Edwards did not disdain common morality. He believed it to be the main way God restrains evil in the world, for it leads most people to tell the truth, refrain from stealing, keep their promises, and so on. Nevertheless, Edwards did not want Christians to settle for less than the development of true virtue. Edwards tackles the idea of common morality and true virtue in his Miscellanies and also in his moral philosophy works—The Nature of True Virtue, Charity and Its Fruits, and Concerning the End for Which God Created the World, as well as in The Religious Affections. In Titus 2, Paul calls his listeners to “say ‘No’ to ungodliness and worldly passions, and to live self-controlled, upright and godly lives” (Titus 2:12). Think of all the ways you can tell yourself “No” to ungodly behavior. You can say • “No—because I’ll look bad!” • “No—because I’ll be excluded from the social circles I want to belong to.” • “No—because then God will not give me health, wealth, and happiness.” • “No—because God will send me to hell.” • “No—because I’ll hate myself in the morning and disappoint myself and lose my self-respect.” First, the church at Corinth has been sanctified; viz., they have been made holy. The passive form communicates that they themselves did not make themselves holy, but that they have been made holy. But in any case, their status is one of “holy” or “sanctified.” Second, this status, this identity is in Christ. Third, they are called to be holy! How can we make sense of these three elements? Paul’s thought is: those who have been made holy in Christ are called to live in accordance to what they have become. They are to become what they already are in Christ! If one of these elements is out of whack with each other, the gospel is skewed. Behavioral compliance to rules without heart-change will be superficial and fleeting. If we only talk about heart-change without discussing the effects of that heart41
change—if we don’t call for holy lives—“heart-change” will be just as superficial and fleeting. And if we lose the in Christ element, the gospel deteriorates into tawdry self-help. The purpose of preaching, and indeed the paradox of preaching, is therefore to show people these practical implications of faith in the gospel, to call the people of God to become what they already are in Christ. Idolatry and the Gospel
In his A Treatise on Good Works, an exposition of the Ten Commandments, Luther says the call to “have no other gods before me” (Ex. 20:3) and the call to believe in Jesus alone for your justification (Romans 3–4) are, in essence, the same thing. To say you must have no other gods but God and to say you must not try to achieve your salvation without Christ are one and the same. Now this is the work of the First Commandment, which commands: “Thou shalt have no other gods,” which means: “Since I alone am God, thou shalt place all thy confidence, trust, and faith on Me alone, and on no one else.” Luther’s teaching is this: anything you look to more than you look to Christ for your sense of acceptability, joy, significance, hope, and security is by definition your god—something you adore and serve with your whole life and heart. If you try to achieve your sense of self by a performance, as I have often done with my work and ministry, you are putting something in the place of Christ as a Savior. That is an idol, by definition. The sign of idolatry is always inordinate anxiety, inordinate anger, or inordinate discouragement. Generally, idols are good things (family, achievement, work and career, romance, talent, etc.) that we turn into ultimate things to give us the significance and joy we need. “Idolatry is the elevation of preliminary concern to ultimacy.” Then they drive us into the ground because we must have them. If we lose a good thing, it makes us sad. If we lose an idol, it devastates us. Luther concludes from his study of the commandments that you never break one of the other commandments unless you are also breaking the first. Idolatry, then, is the fundamental root of our sins and problems. Luther observes that you do not lie, commit adultery, or steal unless you first make something more fundamental to your hope and joy and identity than God. When you lie, for example, your reputation (or money or whatever) is more foundational to your sense of self and happiness than the love of Christ. We sin because we trust something besides Jesus to be our real, functional savior. Why, then, do we sin in the particular circumstances and ways that we do? Why do we fail to forgive, lose our temper, tell lies, or lash out in the specific instances that we do? If a person cheats on his income tax form, for example, you might say they are deceptive because they are a sinner. But why does their sin take this particular form? Luther would answer that somehow money and possessions—and the status
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or comfort from having more of them—are more important to their heart’s sense of significance and security than what they have in Christ. In short, we sin because we are not, at that place and moment, believing the gospel. The solution is not simply to force ourselves or scare ourselves into doing the right thing, but to apply the gospel on our hearts’ idols, which are always an alternate form of self-salvation apart from Jesus. The gospel is far more than an elementary principle that we grasp when we are saved and then go on to discover and live by more advanced biblical principles. Since all sin is rooted in idolatrous attitudes, and idols are always pseudo-saviors—something we trust more than Christ for our significance and security—then unbelief in the gospel of Christ is always a major root of every actual sin. The gospel is that I am saved not by my own righteousness and behavior, but because I am counted righteous in Christ. All our failures in righteousness in the flesh, then, come from a failure to rejoice in our righteousness in Christ. All our failures in sanctification (living a Christ-like, godly life) come from a lack of orientation to our justification. We will never change unless we come to grips with the particular, characteristic ways our hearts resist the gospel and continue their self-salvation projects through idolatry. This does not mean that Christians should not use every possible means to exercise self-control in the crucial moment. If you feel an impulse to hit someone with a rock, take any measure needed to stop yourself! Tell yourself, “I’ll go to jail! I’ll disgrace my family!” Anything. Perhaps an illustration would help here. Imagine a baby eagle falls from its nest in the sightlines of a hungry fox. The little chick cannot yet fly (hence the fall!), but there is a small protective hole at the base of the tree that is within a scurry’s reach. The fox pounces and sets after the little chick. What should the eaglet do? Should it wait to become what it is, a regal bird of flight? Of course not! It should scamper into the hole to get out of the immediate danger of the fox. But if all the eaglet ever does is scamper, it will never learn to do, to be, what it is meant to do and be: a regal bird of flight! There’s no reason why in the short run a Christian can’t simply use will power to rein in behavior. In the long run, however, change will only come from transforming the heart’s deepest affections with the melting, moving grace of God. The ultimate way to shape the life is by moving the heart with the gospel. This also does not mean that change is a simple matter. Idolatrous patterns in our lives run extremely deeply. They did not arise in us through individual choice alone but are also a product of our social surroundings and of what has been done to us. Getting the gospel “in deep” takes far more than personal prayer and resolutions. Counseling, community, intimate friendships, and accountability—all are crucial 43
for personal change! Nonetheless, if you want a pattern in your life to change in any lasting way, it will not be enough to simply have friends exhort you or even to uncover influences, such as childhood patterns of insecurity, through self-reflection. You must apply the gospel to your heart at the point of your idols. Identifying and Replacing Idols
In preaching and counseling for grace renewal, you should constantly speak about underlying idols, which show us our heart’s particular, characteristic ways of failing to believe the gospel. This keeps the focus on the gospel and the work of Christ. It prevents people from trying to solve all problems and make all changes through moralistic behaviorism, which leads to insecurity, suppressed anger and guilt, and spiritual deadness. Always look for ways to help people identify their heart’s idols. One method is to use “problem emotions.” If someone is excessively angry and bitter, lead the person to ask, “Is something too important to me? Is there something I am telling myself I have to have? Is that why I am angry, because I am being blocked from having something I consider a necessity, when it is not?” If someone is excessively anxious or worried, lead the person to ask, “Is something too important to me? Is there something I am telling myself I have to have? Is that why I am so scared, because of a threat to something that I consider a necessity, when it is not?” If someone “cannot forgive” himself or herself, lead the person to ask, “Is something more important to me than God’s regard toward me? Is there something I failed at that I consider a necessity, when it is not?” You may help people think of ways that they disbelieve the gospel and the kinds of idols in their lives through the following diagnostic questions: • What is my greatest nightmare? What do I worry about most? • What (if I failed or lost it) would cause me to feel I did not even want to live? What keeps me going? • What do I rely on or comfort myself with when things go badly or get difficult? • What do I think most easily about? Where does my mind go when I am free? What preoccupies me? • What prayer, unanswered, would make me seriously think about turning away from God? • What makes me feel the most self-worth? What am I the proudest of? • What do I really want and expect out of life? What would really make me happy? Additionally, help people weaken and replace their idols by learning to rest in and rejoice in the work of Christ for them. It is not enough simply to intellectually figure out your idols and say, “I must not make this so important.” Your heart will still 44
cling to your idols. You can’t just say, “Jesus gives me peace that this idol cannot.” You must actually receive the peace that Jesus gives, and that only comes as you worship. Praise and rejoicing in what Jesus has given you in the gospel must be inscribed on your heart by the Spirit. The Spirit must make these abstract ideas into spiritual realities (Eph. 1:18–23; 3:15–21). Through the Spirit you have to “pray them in.” That takes time. It is a process (Phil 1:6). GOSPEL CENTRALITY Not Just Heart But Whole Life Acting “In Line” with the Gospel
One of the most intriguing passages in the New Testament is Paul’s confrontation with Peter in Galatians 2. We know from Acts 10–11 that the apostle Peter was Jewish. Raised to consider Gentiles as spiritually “unclean,” he was not even to eat with them, because table fellowship in ancient cultures was so significant that eating together symbolized a measure of acceptance. The Pharisees believed they could make themselves more acceptable to God by separating themselves from unclean people, places, and objects, which is why Jesus’ eating with “sinners” was so outrageous to them. After Peter (re)learns the gospel—that Jesus alone can make us clean and acceptable and presentable to God—he begins to eat with Gentiles. He had seen this demonstrated on numerous occasions during Jesus’ earthly ministry where he would eat with the marginalized. In Galatians 2, however, Peter’s older, ingrained sense of racial superiority reasserts itself. He again refuses to eat with Gentiles, including Gentile Christian brothers and sisters. When Paul confronts Peter about this in Galatians 2:11–16, he does not simply say, “Racism is against God’s will.” That is true, of course, but instead Paul tells Peter he is “not acting in line with the truth of the gospel” (v. 14). The phrase “acting in line” is based on the Greek orthopodeô, which means to walk in a straight line. Literally, he is saying that Peter and his companions are not walking straight “in line” with the truth of the gospel. According to Paul, the truth of the gospel is not just a set of doctrines by which you “get saved,” but something that guides the way Christians live and act in every area of life (Phil. 1:27; 1 Cor. 5:7). Here’s how Paul applies the gospel to racism. He shows it to be a failure to believe the gospel deep down, a failure to think out the implications of the gospel of salvation by grace. Paul doesn’t state simply, “Stop being a racist,” although that is his goal. He confronts Peter’s practice of exclusivity by reminding him that both Jews and Gentiles are saved in the same way, by grace alone (Gal. 2:14–16). The gospel says that “all are sons of God through faith in Christ Jesus” (Gal. 3:26), that “there is neither Jew nor Greek, slave nor free, male nor female,” for all are “one in Christ” (Gal. 3:28). Paul is beseeching Peter, like Kent did to King Lear, to “See better,” “Put on the spectacles of faith,” “Use the gospel on your heart!” Peter, of course, knew the gospel at one level, but he was not walking “in line” with it or being controlled by it in his depths. 45
Walking “straight” according to the gospel implies that it is possible to stray off to one side or the other. The image indicates there is a unique, gospel-guided or gospelshaped approach to everything. In every area of life, Paul’s example in Galatians 2:14 presses us to ask not simply, “What is the moral way to act?” but, “What is the way that is in line with the gospel?” “How do we walk worthy of the gospel?” (Eph. 4:1–7; 1 Thess. 2:12). The renewed church is the place where we work to bring every area of life in line with the gospel. The Gospel Affects Everything
In “The Gospel of Jesus Christ (1 Corinthians 15:1–19),” Donald A. Carson draws two broad inferences from 1 Corinthians 15. The first is that the gospel is normally disseminated through proclamation. The overwhelming majority of New Testament references to the gospel speak of communicating the gospel through words. As a steward of the gospel, however, Paul’s responsibility was not exhausted simply by disseminating it to nonbelievers. Paul also “found it necessary to hammer away at the outworking of the gospel in every domain of the lives of the Corinthians.” Carson then draws a second inference from I Corinthians 15. This chapter comes at the end of a book that repeatedly shows how the gospel rightly works out in the massive transformation of attitudes, morals, relationships, and cultural interactions.... [J]ustification is by faith alone, but genuine faith is never alone; we might add that the gospel focuses on a message of what God has done and is doing, and must be cast in cognitive truths to be believed and obeyed, but this gospel never properly remains exclusively cognitive. The rest of the Corinthian letters demonstrate this over and over. In 1 Corinthians, Paul denounces the Corinthians’ divisions and party spirit (1:10–17). He attributes their attitudes to pride and boasting, which betray the gospel of sovereign grace (1:26–31). When Paul deals with the issue of sexual sin and discipline in chapters 5–6, he gives directions for behavior and grounds his appeal in the gospel of justification (6:11) and their ransom by the death of Christ (6:19–20). In chapter 7, the questions of singleness, divorce, and remarriage “are worked out in the context of the priorities of the gospel and the transformed vision brought about by the dawning of the eschatological age and the anticipation of the end.” In 2 Corinthians 8 and 9, Paul eloquently appeals for financial generosity on the basis of the gospel. He links radical, humble generosity with “the obedience that accompanies your confession of the gospel” (2 Cor. 9:13). Materialism, then, is a failure to take the gospel of Christ’s sacrificial death seriously. The gospel must also transform the business practices and priorities of Christians in commerce, the priorities of young men steeped in indecisive but relentless narcissism, the lonely anguish and often the guilty pleasures of single folk who pursue pleasure but who cannot find happiness, the tired despair of those living on 46
the margins, and much more. And this must be done, not by attempting to abstract social principles from the gospel, still less by endless focus on the periphery in a vain effort to sound prophetic, but precisely by preaching and teaching and living out in our churches the glorious gospel of our blessed Redeemer. What does it mean to be committed to the centrality or primacy of the gospel? It means proclaiming and preaching the gospel to the world. But it also means the gospel forms the basis and wellspring for Christian practice, individually and corporately, inside the church and outside. Gospel ministry is not only proclaiming it to nonbelievers so they will embrace and believe it, but also teaching and shepherding believers with it so it shapes the entirety of their lives in a way that they can “live it out.” In the Old Testament, the repeated emphasis to “remember” the Lord (e.g., Deut. 8:18), were calls for reorientation, calls to live the God-centered life. The gospel, then, is the way that anything is renewed and transformed by Christ, whether a heart, a relationship, a church, or a community. It is the key to all doctrine and to our view of our lives in this world. All our problems, therefore, come from a lack of orientation to the gospel, a living according to the wrong framework. Put positively, the gospel transforms our hearts, our thinking, and our approaches to absolutely everything. The gospel is the blazing center, the brilliant sun whose light reaches the furthest hinterlands of human existence with its transformative power. GOSPEL IMPLEMENTATION Grace Renewal in the Church The Means of Grace Renewal
The ultimate source of a revival is the Holy Spirit, but the Holy Spirit ordinarily uses three “instrumental,” or penultimate, means to produce revival. 1. Recovery of the Gospel. Many people try to place churches along a spectrum from “liberal” and relativistic to “conservative” and moralistic. Relativism and moralism are not really opposite things, however. I don’t just mean that relativism and moralism are equally bad and wrong—I mean they are fundamentally the same thing. Each one simply offers different strategies for “self-salvation” built on human effort. Local church ministries that wink at disobedience and sin and are loose about doctrine as well as ministries that feature scolding and doctrinal “tightness” both lack spiritual power, authority, and joy that bring people into life change. The only way into a ministry that transforms people’s lives—that brings joy and power and electricity without authoritarianism—is a preaching of the gospel that deconstructs both license and legalism equally. Recovering the gospel is what is crucial to revival. To cite Lovelace’s brilliant insight again, even though Christians know doctrinally and intellectually that justification is the basis for sanctification, many “rely on their sanctification for justification...drawing their assurance of acceptance with God from their sincerity, their past experience of conversion, their recent religious performance 47
or the relative infrequency of their conscious, willful disobedience.” In other words, they theoretically believe that “Jesus accepts me; therefore, I live a good life,” but their hearts function according to the principle that “I live a good life; therefore, Jesus accepts me.” The underlying problem, then, is that even Christians do not ordinarily live as if the gospel were true. We don’t really believe the gospel deep down. Gospel recovery takes place in a church by three means. First, a church recovers the gospel through preaching. This is because preaching is the single venue of information and teaching to which the greatest number of church people are exposed. Are some parts of the Bible “better” for gospel preaching than others? No, not at all. Anytime you can preach Christ and his salvation as the meaning of the text, rather than simply expounding biblical principles for life, you are preaching toward renewal. Preaching this way is not at all easy, however. Even those who commit to doing so tend toward inspirational sermons about Jesus, with little application. A church also recovers the gospel through the training of leaders. It is crucial to enter into a fairly intense time of processing the gospel renewal dynamics with them. The components of this include content and life-contact. By “content,” I propose studying together material such as D. Martyn Lloyd-Jones’ chapter “The True Foundation” in Spiritual Depression: Its Causes and Cures, or my short book The Prodigal God with the study guide. More advanced materials include the books by Richard Lovelace and Jonathan Edwards listed at the end of this chapter. By “life-contact,” I mean finding ways in personal meetings and counseling to help your leaders repent of idols and self-righteousness with one another. Once the gospel “penny drops” and begins its ripple effects, you will have plenty of this pastoral work to do. Resources helpful for this process include Redeemer’s “Galatians” material (for use by a small group) and World Harvest Mission’s various seminars, weekends, and materials, particularly its “Sonship” course. The third way to recover the gospel is to have your leaders begin leading groups. In these groups, they will give testimonies about how the gospel has changed their own lives, and they will lead other people through the readings, Bible studies, and materials that have been most meaningful in helping them. 2. Prevailing Prayer. To kindle revival, the Holy Spirit also uses prayer—united, extraordinary, and kingdom-centered—across cities and networks. In Outgrowing the Ingrown Church, the late Jack Miller made a perceptive distinction between “maintenance” and “frontline” prayer meetings. Maintenance prayer meetings are short, mechanical, and totally focused on physical needs inside the church. In contrast, the three basic traits of frontline prayer are families but only for boldness to keep preaching! Revivals usually begin with a very small group of people, or even just a single person, praying for God’s glory in the community (e.g., as in the case of
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the businessmen’s revival). Some kind of extraordinary prayer, beyond the normal services and patterns of prayer, is always involved. 3. Creativity. Revivals tend not to repeat themselves. Instead, the Holy Spirit creatively conveys the gospel in new ways that best fit the cultural moment. The First Great Awakening was sparked by something rarely seen previously: itinerant evangelistic preaching. A revival in the middle of the next century was ignited by prayer meetings led by laypersons. Creativity in gospel proclamation fitting the cultural moment is another way to speak of “contextualization”—adapting to new cultural situations without compromising the content of the gospel. As C. S. Lewis noted in The Chronicles of Narnia, you can never get back into Narnia the same way twice, so it’s best to keep your eyes open. The gospel humbles and emboldens us at the same time. This reality not only applies to individual renewal but also to a balanced contextualization in corporate renewal, leadership, and mission. Craving the receiving culture’s approval too greatly reveals a lack of gospel confidence, while craving the trappings of our own Christian culture too greatly reveals a lack of gospel humility (think of Peter in Acts 10 and Galatians 2). It would be prideful to assume that Christians in the past did not receive much grace in their various contexts, so we do not ignore tradition as something worthless. It would also be prideful to disparage new cultural trends as lacking grace, or to insist that all former cultures were more spiritually pure than contemporary ones. Gospel humility directs us to neither hate tradition nor be bound to it. We are semper reformanda! We thus adapt and create. The Signs of Renewal in Individuals
Revival occurs as a group of people who, on the whole, think they already know the gospel discover they really do not “know” it, and by embracing the gospel they cross over into living faith. When this happens in any extensive way, an enormous release of energy occurs as the church stops basing its justification on its sanctification. The non-churched then become attracted and drawn in by the transformed life of the Christian community as it grows into its calling to be a sign of the kingdom, a beautiful alternative to human society without Christ. 1. “Nominal” church members become converted. “Nominal” Christians realize they had never understood the gospel, experienced the new birth, or entered a living relationship with Christ by grace. They become converted, which then electrifies congregations as long-time church members speak of their conversions, or talk about Christ in radiant terms, or express repentance in new ways. These “early adopters” of renewal shake up other church members into renewal. 2. “Sleepy,” unrenewed Christians receive a new assurance of and appreciation for grace. “Sleepy” or stagnant Christians wake up to why they have been living in anxiety, envy, anger, and boredom. They gain a sense of God’s reality in the heart 49
as well as higher, immediate assurances of his love. Along with a new and deeper conviction of sin and repentance—concerning not only major “behavioral” sins but inner attitudes—they have a far more powerful assurance of the nearness and love of God. As a result, they become both humbler and bolder simultaneously. The deeper one’s sense of sin-debt, the more intense the sense of wonder at Christ’s payment of it. This is the point of the Parable of the Unmerciful Servant (Matt. 18:21–35). 3. Non-Christian outsiders are attracted to the newly beautified church and its great worship, service in the community, and loss of condemning, tribal attitudes. Explosive church growth often results. The conversions of the “nominal” and the renewal of the “sleepy” Christians bring more passion, greater freedom, and a sense of God’s presence in the worship services. As renewed believers create a more vital community of sharing, caring, and worship as the beautified community of the King, people from outside the church find this community attractive. Furthermore, Christians who begin to experience God’s beauty, power, and love put their relationship to Christ and the church first in their lives. They become radiant and attractive witnesses: more willing and confident to talk to others about their faith, more winsome and less judgmental when they do so, and more confident in their own church and thus more willing to invite people to visit it. The resulting conversions—sound, lasting, and sometimes dramatic—generate significant, even astounding church growth. Many churches do grow rapidly, but in America this occurs almost entirely through transfer growth. When that is the case, renewal dynamics are weak. During revival, however, conversions are no mere trickle. From 1857–1859, a U. S. revival brought over half a million new people into the church. Nearly all of New York City’s churches grew 50 percent in membership in that period. In Northern Ireland during this same time frame, 100,000 new converts, totaling nearly a third of the population, joined the church. It is estimated that 10 percent of the entire population of Wales and Scotland was converted during the same time. The Gospel Comes Home: The Signs and Means of Renewal in a Community
Lovelace describes a phenomenon common to churches before and after awakenings and revivals. Ordinarily, various Christian traditions and denominations tend to strongly emphasize one or two ministry functions while being weaker in others. For example, Presbyterians are historically strong on teaching and doctrine, Pentecostals and Anglicans (in their own ways!) on worship, Baptists on evangelism, Anabaptists on community and care for the poor, and so on. During times of gospel renewal, however, these strengths are often combined in churches that are otherwise more
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one-sided. The following characteristics draw on Lovelace’s insight that “secondary elements” in the church’s corporate life emerge during gospel renewal. 1. Vibrant worship. When the gospel “comes home”—when God’s holiness and his love both become far more magnificent, real, and affecting to the heart—it leads naturally to a new God-reality in worship. In whatever mode or tradition, renewed churches worship in a way that is no longer one-dimensional (not merely cerebral and academic; not merely emotional; not merely formal or perfunctory) but that now involves the whole person: mind, will, and heart (Deut. 6:4–6; Matt. 22:37). A clear, widely-felt sense of God’s transcendence and nearness permeates worship services, which edify believers while also attracting and helping non-believers. 2. Theological depth. When the gospel “comes home”—when the distinction between moralistic religion and gospel grace becomes far clearer to the mind—it leads naturally to preaching and teaching that are gospel-centered and Christcentered rather than moralistic. Preaching becomes more theologically sound as renewed interest in the gospel piques interest in biblical theology, but also very practical and connected with life. It also inevitably leads to preaching that not only makes the truth clear but also real and life-changing. During revival, liberal-oriented churches may grow more biblical, while fundamentalist-oriented churches may grow less sectarian and more focused on the gospel itself, rather than on denominational distinctives. 3. Community. When the gospel “comes home”—when believers no longer have to maintain an image of themselves as competent and righteous—it naturally breaks down barriers that impede relationships. Pretense and evasion become unnecessary. The gospel also creates a humility that makes believers sympathetic and patient with others. All this enables relationships within the church to thicken and deepen. These new relationships become the main way the gospel shapes life. Lives are not changed primarily in classes or meetings, but in close community. There, the implications of the gospel are “worked out” in discussion and through modeling, and “worked in” though formal and informal accountability, friendship, discipline, and the formation of corporate worship and sacraments. During times of renewal, the distinct countercultural nature of the church becomes attractive to outsiders. 4. Evangelism. When the gospel “comes home”—when it both humbles and affirms Christians—every believer becomes a natural evangelist. Times of renewal are always times of remarkable church growth, not through membership transfer and “church shopping” but through conversion. Evangelism in renewal happens not primarily
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through any one program or venue but naturally within the relationships of the revitalized and new Christians. It occurs because of two facets of the gospel. • The humility of the gospel. The gospel, unlike religious moralism, produces people who are not disdainful or contemptuous towards those who disagree with them. • The affirmation of the gospel. Because of the reality and joy of Christ’s love, the gospel produces people who are less concerned about others’ opinions of them. The gospel brings a gentle boldness. 5. Justice and compassion. When the gospel “comes home”—when Christians realize they did not save themselves but were rescued from spiritual poverty—it naturally changes their attitudes toward people who are in economic and physical poverty. That kind of humble concern is the message of James 1–2 and many other texts. Christians renewed by the gospel render sacrificial service to neighbors, the poor, and the community and city around them. Indifference to the poor and disadvantaged indicates there has not been a true grasp of one’s salvation by sheer grace. 6. Cultural renewal. When the gospel “comes home”—when it becomes not just a minimum set of beliefs we have to affirm to become saved—Christians recognize that the gospel is not simply the ABCs but the A to Z of the Christian faith. It not only is the way to enter the kingdom of God, but the basis for reshaping the way we live all of life. It is a recasting of our individual narratives into the redemptive narrative of the gospel. The gospel is really something like a worldview—a distinctive, comprehensive account of what life is all about, applied to every area of life. For that reason, Christians shaped by the gospel find it affects the way they pursue their vocations and life in the public spheres. Gospel-shaped believers will have a deep, vital, and healthy impact on the arts, business, government, media, and academy of any society. Note, too, that when gospel renewal occurs in the body of Christ as a whole, these corporate characteristics show up not only in renewed local churches, but also in the in the local neighborhood and even the broader culture. Revivals produce waves of people who become involved in works of social concern and social justice. In spite of ongoing scholarly debate, the past two decades have produced a far greater acknowledgement that major social justice movements had strong roots in the revivals. The Great Awakening, of course, contributed significantly to the abolition of slavery in the U.S. in the nineteenth century. Similarly, the 1904–05 revival in Wales triggered momentous social changes. Life in the coal pits was transformed; workers and management engaged in prayer meetings on company time. Poor Law Guardians,
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who administered relief, commented that many working people came to take aged parents home from the workhouses. Long standing debts were paid, stolen goods were returned, and crime rates plummeted. Because true religion is not merely a private matter that provides internal peace and fulfillment, real holiness changes the private and civic lives of Christians. It transforms behavior and relationships. The active presence of a substantial number of genuine Christians thus changes a community in all its dimensions: economic, social, political, intellectual, and more. You may have noticed the interdependence of these “secondary elements,” which flow naturally from hearts renewed by the gospel. First, many individuals are renewed by the gospel because they are drawn into a church marked by these qualities. Second, the vitality of each factor depends not only on the gospel-renewed heart, but also on each of the other factors. They stimulate each other. For example, as Christians give their lives sacrificially for the poor, their neighbors become more open to evangelism. Deep, rich community could be said to result from gospel-evangelism, but just as frequently it is a means to evangelism, because it makes the gospel credible. Often it is not through listening to preaching but listening to friends that brings us home spiritually. Although these factors are mutually strengthening, the specialists and proponents of each will almost always pit them against the others. Evangelists may fear that a social justice emphasis will lead to the social gospel, in which improving society is considered equivalent to evangelism. They also fear that care for the poor will drain energy, attention, and resources from evangelism. Social justice advocates, on the other hand, often resist an emphasis on cultural renewal because they maintain Christians should be out in the streets and identifying with the poor, rather than trying to influence the elite worlds of art, media, and business. Community-focused leaders often view rapid church growth and evangelistic programs negatively, because they do not like programs—they want everything to happen naturally and “organically.” These tensions must be overcome by leaders who grasp how the gospel inspires all of these dimensions. CONCLUSION
The marks of revival may be long or short, dramatic or quiet, widespread or localized. While varying in degree, gospel renewal dynamics produce vibrant worship, theological depth, community, evangelism, justice, and compassion.
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If these dynamics are not in place, a church may increase in numbers but not in vitality or with lasting results. It exhibits tell-tale symptoms of lifelessness. • Most or all of the growth happens through transfer, not conversion. • Because no deep conviction of sin or repentance occurs, few people can attest to dramatically changed lives. The church growth makes no impact on the local social order, because its participants do not carry their Christian faith out into their work, their use of their wealth, or their public lives. Without deep gospel renewal dynamics in our hearts, our external lives are “sealed off” from what we believe, and our beliefs never result in concretely changed living. With these renewal dynamics in our hearts and in our churches, we grow more deeply rooted in the gospel, and our lives and our churches become empowered and beautified by the Spirit of God.
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SESSION TWO READING ¡VI VAN LOS EVANG ELICOS! (A CT CLASS I C) Hispanics are not only spicing up U.S. culture, they are fueling the greatest growth in the North American church. Andrés Tapia/ AUGUST 9, 2013 Editor’s Note: In April 2013, Time magazine created waves with a story titled simply “¡Evangelicos!” On its cover, the magazine was more elaborate: “The Latino Reformation: Inside the New Hispanic Churches Transforming Religion in America.”
Both articles talk about the tremendous growth that Latino evangelicalism has experienced in the United States, offering challenges and opportunities to both Catholic and Protestant Evangelical churches. They also project the growth and influence of the U.S. Hispanic population, expecting it to be a major cultural force nationally. In 1991, Christianity Today predicted that by 2070, the Hispanic population would reach 57 million, making Hispanics the largest minority group in the US. That prediction was way too conservative. Hispanics became the largest U.S. minority in 2001, when they reached 37 million, and by 2011, the U.S. Hispanic population was just under 52 million. To stay abreast of the statistical and sociological picture, please visit Barna: Hispanics and the Pew Research Hispanic Center. One thing that hasn’t changed from 1991 is the fear that many people experience as they face seismic demographic shifts. Immigration and population issues are complex and require carefully designed changes in public policy. However, the Hispanic population is likely to strengthen the pro-faith, pro-family, pro-work ethos that helped make the United States economically strong. While many of the issues portrayed in the article remain constant, the U.S. Catholic church has increased its efforts to retain Latino adherents. Only time will tell, but we suspect their efforts have come too late to preserve the traditional Catholic influence on Hispanic immigrants. Today, among Latinos who continue to identify as Catholic, church attendance is significantly lower than among their evangelical counterparts. One positive change to note: in the church, there has been a healing of the breach between the immigrant generation with its desire to retain its language and culture, and the younger, native-born generations who have assimilated and prefer English, while holding on to their love for Latin food and music and other signs of their cultural heritage. Dr. Jesse Miranda, quoted in this 1991 article, has played a key role in reducing these tensions, and as younger leaders have now taken the stage, Latino evangelicals are adjusting to new ways of being Hispanic in the United States. On the two-mile stretch between the Montrose and Foster Avenue beaches on Chicago’s lakefront—with pricey condominiums to the west and showcase architecture to the south—thousands of Hispanics celebrate Memorial Day. Salsa, Latin America’s contemporary beat, shimmies out of huge Sony boom boxes; the 55
staccato of Spanish punctuated with an occasional “hey man” fills the air; the smell of tortillas grilling on Weber Smokey Joes wafts across the park; and wiry soccer players elicit cheers from huge families that include parents, siblings, grandparents, aunts, uncles, first, second, and third cousins, and the boy next door. As an Anglo couple whizzes by on their 10-speeds, the man comments, “I feel like I’m in another country!” THE BROWNING OF AMERICA
According to the Census Bureau, by 2070 the 21 million Hispanics legally in the U.S. today (there are estimates of up to 10 million here illegally) will have multiplied to 57 million, making them the largest minority in the U.S. Currently, in some Texan cities, Hispanics make up the majority (in Laredo, 95 percent; in El Paso, 68 percent; and in Corpus Christi, 51 percent), and in some important regions they make up a substantial number of residents (37 percent of Los Angeles County and 24 percent of California). In the seventies, the Hispanic population grew by 61 percent, says the U.S. Department of Commerce, while the entire U.S. population grew only 11.5 percent. In the eighties, the Hispanic growth rate was 34 percent. This Latin explosion is spicing up nearly every sphere of mainstream North American life. Jews in Skokie, Illinois, are heard humming “La Bamba” as they leave movie theaters; yuppies dance away their stock-portfolio worries to Miami Sound Machine’s “Conga Beat” in discos; teenagers go nuts over Latin heartthrob Esai Morales; and everyone, including Scandinavians in Willmar, Minnesota, are eating tacos. But the changes go beyond People magazine editorial copy. Numbers bring power. Political candidates court the Hispanic vote. Michael Dukakis gave part of his acceptance speech in Spanish, while candidate Bush, in an effort to reach out to the Hispanic vote that backfired, referred to his Mexican-American grandchildren as “my little brown ones.” In Chicago, with their 20 percent of the population, Hispanics hold the balance of power between the polarized white and African-American communities, each representing 40 percent of the city. Madison Avenue, in the meantime, courts the Hispanic dollar. With a purchasing power of $130 billion, Hispanics are getting the attention of companies such as Procter & Gamble, which spent $30 million in 1990 advertising to Hispanics. P&G, Anheuser-Busch, Campbell’s, and myriad other companies spent over $628 million last year targeting Hispanics sometimes in tortured translations) on any of the two national Hispanic TV networks, 145 Spanish-language magazines, 30 bilingual or English publications, or 450 Spanish radio stations. THE NUMBERS ALSO BRING FEAR
The Immigration Reform and Control Act passed four years ago granting amnesty to certain illegal aliens has also made it a crime to hire knowingly those who do not qualify for amnesty, making some employers hesitant to hire anyone of Hispanic 56
descent. Former U.S. Sen. S. I. Hayakawa of California, founder of the English Only movement, is so concerned with Hispanic growth that he wants English to be declared the United States’ official language. And once a month, frightened white southern Californians hold a Light Up the Border rally by shining their pickups’ headlights across the Mexican-U.S. border to help nab illegals. THE BROWNING OF THE CHURCH
In addition to being the fastest-growing ethnic group in the U.S., Hispanics are also the fastest-growing segment of the Protestant church. According to various polls, more than 20 percent of Hispanics are Protestant—an astounding figure given the virtual assimilation of Catholicism into Hispanic culture. In the past two decades, the growth has occurred at a dizzying rate. According to studies conducted in part by Clifton Holland, executive director of In-Depth Evangelism Association, the number of Hispanic Protestant congregations in Southern California jumped from 320 in 1970 to 1,022 in 1986 to 1,450 in 1990. Factors contributing to the surge are the influx of legal and illegal immigration, the highest birth rate among all ethnic groups, and massive defections from the Catholic church. It is in the reasons for the defections that the story of Hispanics and the evangelical church lies. Defections from the Catholic church in the U.S. to Protestant denominations are occurring at a pace of 60,000 a year, or 1 million in 15 years. This is according to a report presented in 1987 by Allan Figueroa Deck, a Catholic theologian and specialist in Hispanic studies, to the National Conference of Catholic Bishops. Sociologist of religion Father Andrew Greeley refers to this exodus as an “ecclesiastical failure of unprecedented proportions.” Deck and others point to studies demonstrating that Hispanics will constitute the majority of Catholic faithful in the United States by the year 2000. However, as Roberto Gonzalez and Michael LaVelle observed in The Hispanic Catholic in the U.S., fewer than 23 percent of Hispanic Catholics are practicing. This has Catholic leaders worried. As Deck told the nation’s Catholic bishops, “If we miss this historic moment, the window of opportunity may close on us for many centuries to come.” In fact, the Vatican is worried. In the spring of 1987, Pope John Paul II made his second visit to the U.S. His stops: Miami, San Antonio, Los Angeles—three cities with significant Hispanic populations. As in all major demographic changes, both push and pull factors are at work in the exodus from a church that in this century has traditionally served the nation’s immigrants. These factors can be summarized as intimacy, opportunity, and expression.
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INTIMACY
The emphases at evangelical churches on a personal relationship with God and on the fellowship of believers are an invitation for intimacy at a divine and human level. Jesse Miranda, president and founder of AHET (a research institute in Pasadena, California, dedicated to examining issues affecting Hispanics in the U.S. church) and trustee of Fuller Theological Seminary, explains that the need for intimacy among Hispanics is especially acute. Not only is Latin culture relationship-oriented, but as with any recent immigrant group, Hispanics are in a state of uncertainty and flux. “The upheaval of immigration creates a need for familiarity and intimacy.” The evangelical focus on small groups and accessibility to God meets this need. In addition, says Miranda, “the Catholic church has neglected Hispanics.” Catholic officials concur by saying that the church has driven away some minorities through apathy and insensitivity. Meanwhile, evangelicals are busy knocking on doors, presenting their message, and inviting people to church. Allan Deck writes in his book The Second Wave: Hispanic Ministry and the Evangelization of Cultures: “A mature and creative response to the Hispanic presence requires a great deal of energy. Frankly, there are some signs that the energy is not there [in the Catholic church]. The vigorous and often effective outreach of evangelical Protestant groups to Hispanics compared to the sometimes lackluster outreach of Catholic parishes and schools to the same group is a case in point.” H. O. Espinoza, founder and president of Promesa, a parachurch organization dedicated to training second-generation Hispanics to serve in the church and integrate into U.S. society, points to another reason Hispanics feel less attached to the Catholic church: “The Latin American Catholic church, which was virtually left untouched by Vatican II, is very different from its U.S. counterpart. The result is that the U.S. Catholic church feels foreign to many Latin American immigrants.” Isaac Canales, who is currently pastoring an inner-city church while completing his doctorate in New Testament at Fuller’s Center for Advanced Theological Research, adds, “By already being in a milieu of change—new neighborhood, new language, new jobs—and dealing with a lot of fear and trepidation, immigrants begin to question fundamental traditional religious values. Hence their openness to the evangelical church down the street.” OPPORTUNITY
The opportunity in evangelical churches to serve and be served is also attracting Hispanics. The promotion of lay leadership and the emphasis on the priesthood of all believers empowers people who have long struggled with powerlessness. In addition, Miranda says, evangelical churches such as the Baptists and Pentecostals raise and recognize indigenous leadership. The Catholic church is not even close in terms of raising leaders from within the barrios. Only 4 percent 58
of U.S. Catholic priests are Hispanic and, worse, many of these priests are not from the communities they are serving. Most are from Spain or South American countries where the cultural differences between their heritage and, say, an immigrant Mexican community are significant. In contrast, the Southern Baptist Convention claims to have 2,400 Hispanic pastors, while the Pentecostal denominations and independent churches have an estimated total of 4,200. And according to Deck, three times as many Hispanics are enrolled in Protestant seminaries and schools of theology as are enrolled in Catholic seminaries. Other hindrances for Hispanics to serve in Catholic parishes are the church’s rigorous entrance exams and long preparation time, which, for many Hispanics with lower incomes and less education, become almost insurmountable. Meanwhile, in the fastest-growing Protestant denominations, the academic requirements are less stringent and place more emphasis on spiritual anointing. ‘’I’m indebted to Bible colleges with low entrance requirements,” says Miranda, who nevertheless earned a doctorate in ministry from Fuller Theological Seminary. This philosophy of leadership development, he says, “eliminates the rails between the clergy and the pew.” Adds Canales, “This gives Hispanics a wonderful sense of ownership.” The opportunity to be served draws Hispanics to evangelicalism as well. Hispanic churches spontaneously and frequently take up collections for a needy family in the congregation. Sermons are practical, speaking to daily issues, while prayers focus on specific needs such as jobs or health. “We’re a vulnerable people,” says Miranda. “Since many of us don’t have Blue Cross/Blue Shield, we Hispanics need to rely on the Spirit for help.” Miranda speaks from experience. When he was a boy, a revival in his New Mexico family began when his mother was instantly healed through the prayers of two doorknocking Pentecostals. Faith for this type of divine intervention comes easily for Hispanics, whose world view includes a belief in common supernatural occurrences. The other opportunity to be served, of course, is the one for which Hispanic immigrants made the long trek—a chance to better their economic condition. “It is important to note that the image of America in Latin American villages is that of a Protestant nation. And so Protestantism gets equated with technology and advancement,” says Miranda. Longitudinal studies by David Martin, documented in his book Tongues of Fire, do indeed show a correlation between Protestantism and upward mobility. This is borne out in the Hispanic sectors of the church. The median income for Catholic Hispanics is $19,000, while for Protestant Hispanics it is $25,000. Canales believes that the Protestant ethic, with its emphasis on work, stewardship, and tithing, helps lowerincome Latinos get hold of their personal finances. Discipleship, with its focus on
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changing destructive lifestyle behaviors such as drinking, adds Canales, also goes a long way toward bringing economic stability to families. EXPRESSION
It is the difference between la iglesia fria (the frigid church) and la iglesia caliente (the hot and spicy church). While worship in most parishes is muted and private, gatherings in many Hispanic evangelical congregations rock and sway to loud and effusive music-expressions of the Latin spirit of fiesta. At Hope Christian Fellowship, a multiethnic Christian Reformed Church in Chicago’s predominantly Puerto Rican Humboldt Park, the Afro-Latin beat of the conga accompanies both Spanish coritos and traditional North American hymns such as “Amazing Grace.” The freedom to pray and preach in a style true to their cultural background is also inviting to Hispanics. “While Anglos are afraid of emotion, for us it’s a way of life,” says Miranda. Sermons by Hispanics have a certain level of intensity that speaks to the Latin heart. Writes Alex Montoya in his book Hispanic Ministry in North America: “A typical Hispanic speaks with his soul not just with his mouth. Hands wave in the air, feet move back and forth, the eyes are aflame and penetrating, and there’s an urgency in the tone of his voice. This is the way he speaks about everyday life. Can we imagine him accepting the truths about God with any less energy?” Because of these factors—intimacy, opportunity, and expression—it is no wonder that the churches with the greatest Hispanic growth are the Pentecostal churches, the Southern Baptist Convention, and the American Baptist churches. Hispanic membership in the Southern Baptist Convention climbed 54 percent in the eighties while it climbed 35 percent in the Assemblies of God. Holland observes that if it weren’t for the Hispanic explosion, the Assemblies would actually have, after accounting for demographics, a flat growth curve. Miranda says that nationally, 15 to 20 percent of all Hispanic evangelicals consider themselves Pentecostals, while the Latin America Mission found that 58 percent of all Latin Protestants in Florida’s Dade County are Pentecostals. AGGRESSIVE EVANGELISM
The message of what evangelicalism offers is spreading through aggressive evangelism within the U.S. and Latin America. According to Manny Ortiz, a professor in the practical theology department at Westminster Theological Seminary, many Latin immigrants are pre-evangelized either in Latin America, which is experiencing a Protestant explosion of its own, or in the charismatic renewal sectors of the Catholic church, which stimulate excitement in people for a living relationship with Jesus but often cannot nurture them further. Canales sensitively, yet unabashedly, extends invitations to accept Jesus at funerals for gang members in his church near East Los Angeles. One time a whole gang came forward, made a circle around the coffin of their fallen comrade, and accepted Jesus. 60
Protestant evangelism, not surprisingly, is causing tensions between Catholics and evangelicals. Archbishop John L. May of St. Louis, Missouri, says Protestant groups have a deceptive plan for recruiting Hispanics that includes churches featuring Catholic art and music to draw Hispanics in to hear anti-Catholic teaching. The Catholic church is trying to make parish life more Protestant in appearance. The National Pastoral Plan for Hispanic Ministry, published a few years ago, lays out a strategy to make parish life more intimate and inviting by increasing lay leadership and developing small groups. It also suggests emulating the more personal, emotional, and mystical style of the Pentecostals. Canales remembers Pope John Paul II’s mass at the Los Angeles Memorial Coliseum a few years ago. “It could’ve been a Billy Graham crusade. The mass included a popular liturgy, Protestant hymns such as ‘How Great Thou Art,’ and a focus on Jesus rather than on the Virgin of Guadalupe.” And Saint Louis Catholic Church in Miami, Florida, which has 3,500 Hispanic parishioners, effectively uses evangelical programs such as James Kennedy’s Evangelism Explosion. But Catholic efforts have little chance of stemming the exodus. As Pablo Sedillo, coordinator of the pastoral plan for Hispanic ministry told the Chicago Tribune, “When dioceses meet to balance their budgets, one of the first things to get axed is the Hispanic Ministries office. This is a dangerous action. Their congregations become a prime prize for fundamentalists.” CHALLENGES FOR PROTESTANTS
The Protestant success has its down side, however. The evangelical church now faces some of the same issues Catholics have not been able to resolve. Hispanics, as all other immigrant groups before them, experience prejudice in many evangelical churches. “Hispanics coming to a white church often face racism,” says Canales. “The murmuring begins with ‘Who are all these Mexicans coming to our church?’ These murmurings get louder when the Spanish-speaking congregation or the Hispanic department gets larger than the mother church. Whites begin to fear that Hispanics are going to take over.” Partnership is at the crux of whether the Protestant success among Hispanics will continue. Says Espinoza, “Anglo churches are receiving Hispanics with open arms, but then they are asked to serve in the kitchen rather than in decision-making committees.” Espinoza feels, however, that Hispanics share some of the blame because of their own insecurities in stepping up to the calling that God has for them. Miranda equates today’s situation with what the early church had in Acts 6:1: “The biggest problem after revival is distribution.” Miranda again: “That’s why I don’t like Hispanic departments within churches, because Anglos still hold control. We’ve been saying 61
‘listen to us’ for a long time. I hope that now that we have the numbers, churches will begin to.” The comments that follow come from long struggles and frustration. While the level of anger seems to have decreased in the past few years, key issues remain to be worked out. Here’s a sampling of what Hispanic leaders want their Anglo brothers and sisters to hear: Don’t treat us as just another marketing target group. ‘’I’m afraid that we are being seen as commodities” says Ortiz. Miranda shares this sentiment: “Often, dwindling white urban congregations look to Hispanics as a means of paying the gas bill rather than seeing the need to build a Hispanic church,” he says. The evangelical community needs to prepare leaders better for urban ministry. Seminaries, say the Hispanic leaders interviewed, are not adequately preparing pastors for work in urban multicultural settings. Classroom case studies, for example, involving a budget of $50,000 for the church’s education program are irrelevant to future Hispanic pastors charged with leading low-income congregations. Furthermore, the dichotomy most seminaries continue to perpetuate between social justice and evangelism leaves Hispanic seminarians with few ways of applying to the street what they have learned in the classroom. Curriculum is not the only problem. The lack of sensitivity to the unique challenges Hispanics face means that Hispanics are being recruited to seminaries as students and faculty but not nurtured in their new environments. “Retention levels for Hispanic pastors and faculty in Anglo settings is minimal in hierarchical church structures,” says Ortiz. This reality is leading Hispanics seriously to consider establishing alternative institutions that focus on the city and unique Hispanic issues. The church needs to address the illegal immigration issue theologically. Not all Hispanics have the same view on this issue, but many congregations must deal with its consequences. How should churches minister to those illegal aliens in their congregation? When does help cross over to become active support? Should churches act as advocates for illegal aliens? Some point out that it is not simply a case of legality. A U.S. missionary in Mexico points out that 95 percent of missionaries in that country are there illegally because Mexico does not give visas to missionaries. “If the evangelical church can justify breaking the law in order to stay here, why can’t Mexicans break the law in order to stay there?” Realize that not all Hispanics are alike. The differences between a Cuban in Miami and a Mexican in San Diego are great. Because values, foods, slang, and economic status differ among the 20 different Hispanic nationalities in the U.S. (see “Not All Hispanics Eat Tacos”), outreach methods much be appropriate to each Hispanic subculture. Advertisers are realizing that to reach a Puerto Rican, they must use salsa and not a mariachi band. The church must do the same. 62
CHALLENGES FOR HISPANICS
Hispanics face challenges of their own. The Hispanic leaders interviewed had these words for Protestant Hispanics: We need to become more U.S.-oriented. Espinoza feels this strongly: “For a long time we Latinos complained that North American missionaries to Latin America were trying to Americanize us. But now we have situations where many of the Latin American leaders in the U.S. ministering to Hispanic Americans are trying to Mexicanize or Guatemalicize us. They are trying to recreate the past in the U.S. rather than working with God on the creation of something new. This polarizes our people.” The challenge is to “become future-oriented without forgetting the past,” Espinoza says. “Fortunately, a new kind of Hispanic leader is emerging for whom Latin America is a foreign country. These men and women have an unabashed commitment to what God is doing here in the U.S.” We must stem brown flight. “Hispanic pastors and congregations are moving further away from the inner city,” says Ortiz. “Brown flight is following white flight as some Hispanics find their economic conditions improving. In the past, displacement was forced on us by oppression, but it is now time for us to look at voluntary displacement like Paul described Jesus doing in Philippians 2.” Ortiz observes that most cross-cultural mission is coming from the Anglo community. “Will we stay? For Anglos coming from the outside there is a sense of heroism, but for us Hispanics who stay, there won’t be many strokes because society’s assumption is that this is where we belong.” He concludes, “The challenge to stay is the very challenge Hispanics and blacks have put to Anglos for many years.” We must promote racial reconciliation. Ortiz is concerned that the highly publicized statistic that Hispanics are about to displace African-Americans as the largest minority is setting up both communities for great tensions. “Demographics means money, scholarships, and other resources,” he says. “We Hispanics need to talk about our own racism and begin bridging gaps between us and other communities, especially blacks.” LEARNING FROM EACH OTHER
The Hispanic influx is changing both the Hispanics coming in and the evangelical church as a whole. If partnership can be achieved, the church will end up much richer and stronger. According to the leaders interviewed each culture has something the other needs. The white church, long one that has served more with its head than its heart, has the potential to lose many of its inhibitions as it experiences the freer, more soulful styles of Hispanics. Hispanic culture, long fatalistic to the extent that even its language reflects a sense of powerlessness (for example: “el avión me dejó,” which translates as 63
“the plane left me,” rather than, “I missed the plane”), can learn from the Anglo can-do attitude. In the same vein, the focus on management in Anglo America can help Hispanics more efficiently serve their communities. And Anglos, who have come to run churches like Fortune 500 corporations, can imitate the Hispanic reliance on the spontaneous and the inspired leading of the Holy Spirit—perhaps even catching the spirit of siesta by focusing more on relationships than on productivity. George Muiioz, a lay Catholic partner at the prestigious Mayer, Brown, and Platt law firm in Chicago, describes another contribution Hispanics are making to U.S. society in general: “What made this country strong were the values of the Protestant ethic: deep religious faith, strong families, loyalty to the country, and a working ethic. With the breakdown the American family and the declining significance of religion among North Americans, it’s no coincidence that U.S. economy is not strong. Hispanics have what it takes to carry the banner of the American Dream in to the twenty-first century—not just for themselves, but for all Americans.” It is this new blood in evangelicalism that can bring renewed vitality to the North American church to reach with more relevance and conviction to its inner cities and to the pueblos across the oceans. A popular Mexican saying goes, “Pobre Mexico—tan lejos de Dios tan cerca de los Estados Unidos.” Mexico, so far from God and so close to the United States. The paradox today is that by coming to the U.S., millions of Mexicans, and other Latin Americans are getting the opportunity to come closer to God. Andrés Tapia is a technical writer and journalist of Peruvian and Anglo descent. He is the author of The AIDS Crisis (IVP).
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SESSION THREE READING C H URCHLY PIETY AND “ECCLESI A L RE V I VA LI S M ” BY T I M K E LLE R Christian community, then, is perhaps the main way that we bear witness to the world, form Christ-like character, practice a distinctively Christian style of life, and know God personally. But we must make it clear that we are not speaking merely of informal and individual relationships between Christians but also of membership and participation in the institutional church, gathered under its leaders for the preaching of the Word and the administering of the sacraments of baptism and the Lord’s Supper. The preaching of the Word by those gifted, prepared, and authorized by the church to do so, and participation in the Lord’s Supper—with all the self-examination and corporate accountability this brings—are critical and irreplaceable ways that Christian community provides witness, spiritual formation, and communion with God. An old term that summarizes a Christian’s life, practice, and spirituality is the word piety. For the past 250 years, there has been a steady move away from a focus on churchly piety toward more individualistic, private piety. We discussed this shift in part 2 (Gospel Renewal). Churchly piety puts the emphasis on corporate processes— baptism, submission to the elders and pastors, catechesis in “the church’s historic confessions, admission to membership, public vows and profession of faith, gathered worship, sitting under the preaching of the Word, regular partaking of the Lord’s Supper, and involvement in mission through the church’s denominational agencies. Today, however, most evangelical churches stress individualistic piety, which emphasizes private devotions and spiritual disciplines, small group fellowship (with little or no elder oversight), personal witness and service, and participation in many broadly evangelical cooperative ventures. Historians often trace this shift back to the revivals and awakenings of the eighteenth “century and thereafter. As we have said, revivalists believed that it was possible for baptized church members to be unconverted and to be relying on their place in the church for their salvation rather than relying on Christ and his finished work. So they (rightly) called people to self-examination, repentance, and conversion. But when revivalists spoke to people in that way, they weakened (in their minds) the necessity of the church. The revivalist insight led to an overemphasis on direct experience and on self-accreditation. “Who needs the church,” many thought, “when I am the judge of whether I’m a Christian or not?” For many, the church became an option, an afterthought, rather than the heart of how Christians live their lives. Earlier I explained that there are indeed real dangers if revivalistic, individual piety becomes excessive. Historian John Coffey notes that revivalism historically encouraged exchanging robust theological confessionalism for a doctrinal minimalism; stressed heart experience over formal churchmanship; de-emphasized sacramental routine for crisis decisions; downgraded the ideal of a learned ministry for populist, simplistic preaching; and shed careful theological exegesis in light of the wisdom of 65
the past for naive biblicism. Out of the revivals “of the past has come the individualistic piety of the present day. This is natural, for it is common to go to the opposite extreme in a well-intentioned effort to make a correction. As I said in part 2, I believe that nineteenth-century Princeton Reformed theologians, such as Archibald Alexander and Charles Hodge, took a balanced approach to this issue. On the one hand, they were keenly aware of the dangers of revivalism and stressed the importance of churchly piety. Hodge leveled a sustained critique of Charles Finney’s version of revivalism. On the other hand, Hodge was also critical of John Williamson Nevin, who (he believed) overreacted to revivalism in his particular emphasis on the sacraments. As can be seen in Alexander’s Thoughts on Religious Experience and Hodge’s The Way of Life, they accepted the basic insights of revivalism, following Jonathan Edwards in his writings on how to discern true spiritual experience; yet they put the church at the center of Christian formation and life. I have coined the term “ecclesial revivalism” to describe the balance Alexander and Hodge proposed. How can we combine the insights of revivalism with ecclesial practices in the church’s ministry today? 1. Preach for conversion yet honor communicant status. One of the ways the Princeton theologians kept the balance can be seen in the way they preached for conversion and honored the membership status of believers in the church. Princeton ministers preached that it is possible to mentally subscribe to the doctrines of sin and grace without actually putting heart trust in them and being converted. Conversion, they said, always entails some heart conviction of the sin of works-righteousness and some heart enjoyment of grace in response to a presentation of the gospel of grace—this is “justifying faith.” They directed that Christians should not be admitted to the church, nor baptized children to the Lord’s Supper, without an experience of conversion and saving faith. They called existing church members to examine themselves, but they would never declare an individual member unregenerate unless through heresy or moral lapse they came under discipline. If the church had received a person as a member, it was not the place of any individual (other than that person himself) to make a counter declaration. This was an important balance. The Princeton theologians let communicant members know that, under the clear preaching of the gospel, they might come to the conclusion that they had never trusted in Christ savingly but had only been full of “dead works.” However, unlike some revivalists, they would never rebaptize a communing member. They would consider such an act too subjective and individualistic. They might say, “You may have a time of spiritual declension and an even greater spiritual renewal sometime in the future. Will you get baptized a third time?” They would direct the person to ground their assurance in both their experience and their participation in the church community and the sacraments. They would say, “You had baptism; now you 66
have an experience of conversion. If you see signs of the fruit of the Spirit growing in you, you can rest assured you are his.” 2. Examine candidates for membership. How can we examine people with regard to their Christian experience in such a way that avoids the extremes of formalism and revivalism? Don’t insist (1) that everyone has to identify a moment or time in which they were converted, (2) that everyone must have a conversion experience that follows a particular pattern, or (3) that everyone must have a conversion with the same level of “experiential and emotional intensity. This is the mistake of overly enthusiastic revivalists. Furthermore, don’t look strictly at stated beliefs. Instead, look for gospel beliefs that take “spiritual illumination” to appreciate and grasp. Do they have a view of their sin that goes beyond simply behavior and recognizes idolatry, self-righteousness, and other such sins of heart and motive? Did they have a time in which they realized more clearly that salvation is by Christ’s work, not theirs? And look for spiritual “whole-life effect.” There should be something more than mere doctrinal subscription and ethical conformity. There should be some sense in the heart of peace and joy. There should be some growth in love. Nevertheless, we should not preclude people who can thoughtfully profess gospel faith and promise gospel living, even if their temperament shows no great emotion. We also must beware of insisting that people of other cultures conform to our patterns. This balance is seen in the early Princeton theologians with regard to the way in which they treated baptized children within the church. These theologians understood that baptized children were (1) united to the church through the vows of their parents, and therefore accountable to live as Christians, and (2) recipients of God’s grace in the life of the family through the sacrament. But they exhorted children to put their faith in Christ and counseled them about what conversion looks like. Archibald Alexander taught that children growing up in the church usually had a series of “religious impressions” over the years, and it was hard to tell which ones were spiritual preparation, which one was conversion, and which ones were deeper growth and commitment. But they described to children the conviction of sin and grace that was necessary for being admitted to the Lord’s Supper. They looked for a credible profession of faith, rather than simply admitting any child who completed church instruction. 3. Recover catechesis. In the Apostolic Tradition, attributed to Hippolytus, we learn that in the early church, conversion was seen as a journey with several stages. First, seekers were admitted to instruction as catechumens. They were given instruction several times a week in basic Christian worldview and ethics. Second, when inquirers became believers, they became baptismal candidates and were admitted to a new course of instruction leading up to public baptism. They were now seen as believers who had not yet been admitted to the community. The baptismal instruction seems 67
to have emphasized orthodox theology and an understanding of the church and its ministry. Third, after baptism, the new member might receive additional instruction in the practical issues of living and working as a believer in a pagan world. This ecclesial, corporate approach conceives of spiritual formation as a journey with public, communally celebrated milestones that entail water, food and drink, music, and joy. These milestones are baptism, the Lord’s Supper, weddings, and funerals. Unlike modern individualistic ministry models that offer short-term events, intensive classes, and programs, catechesis was much different. It was much more communal, participatory, and physically embodied. The seekers met regularly with one another and with Christian instructors. The baptismal candidates met with one another and Christian teachers and sponsors. Memorization and recitation slowed the process and “drilled in” the theology and practice of the church. It brought about greater life change and more solid assimilation into the church than most contemporary seminars and programs can. In Grounded in the Gospel, Gary Parrett and J. I. Packer urge contemporary Christians to restore catechetical instruction to the life of the church. They argue for training people by using three ancient and biblical summaries—the Apostles’ Creed (belief), the Ten Commandments (practice), and the Lord’s Prayer (experience). They urge that the process be long-term rather than compressed. They make the case for a process that is not merely formal (classroom instruction) but nonformal and informal. That is, it should incorporate practical experience and include many opportunities for developing personal relationships with mature church members. Most important of all, catechesis incorporates instruction and discipleship with the public worship and life of the whole church. In ancient times, seekers, catechumens, candidates for baptism, and new members were all recognized and prayed for in public worship. 4. Recognize that seekers need process. The success of the Alpha course and other similar courses such as Christianity Explored showed the need for a shift from the mid-twentieth-century’s prominent modes of evangelism. Crusade evangelism and various personal evangelism methods (e.g., Campus Crusade’s LIFE training, using the Four Laws; Evangelism Explosion) were neither communal nor process oriented. They assumed some background knowledge of the Christian faith. The Alpha course was more in the mode of catechesis and began to show that, as the Western world became more pagan, evangelism had to follow the pattern of the early church. Seekers today need to not only get a body of content but also see Christianity embodied in individuals and a community. They need a long time to ask questions and build up their knowledge of the (now very alien) Christian gospel and worldview. As I argued in the previous chapter, it is possible in most cultures today to make
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the worship service itself part of this process so nonbelievers find the services to be places where their interest and faith can be nursed and grown. Indeed, this is vital to merging the revivalist and the ecclesial. Most ecclesial churches do not think of their corporate worship as evangelistic, while most seeker-oriented churches do not think their seeker services can be theologically rich and spiritually edifying to Christians. We need evangelistic sermons that edify, as well as edifying sermons that evangelize. Supplementing the evangelistic worship must be a great variety of groups, events, and processes by which non-Christians can be introduced to the Christian faith. 5. Realize that baptism and reception of members can become much more instructive and a bigger part of worship. Contemporary people will expect brief, intensive procedures they can fit into their fast-changing schedules. Nevertheless, there should at least be a great deal of instruction leading up to any adult baptism. Consider requiring all baptismal candidates to complete a doctrinal course on the Apostles’ Creed, the Lord’s Prayer, and the Ten Commandments. Also, look for ways that candidates for baptism can be publicly recognized (as in the early church). Seek testimonies of changed lives from new converts who are being instructed and preparing for baptism, even though they haven’t yet been baptized. Doing so would highlight to the congregation the importance of the process and also encourage seekers in the congregation to “close with Christ.” If your church baptizes infants or has a service of dedication for newborns, consider creating a much more comprehensive process of instructing families in family spiritual formation and discipleship before the rite. In general, we could do a far better job of instructing the congregation on how baptism and membership are milestones in our spiritual journeys. 6. Use the anticipation of the Lord’s Supper as a springboard for a season of preparation. A pastoral practice used in some churches that do not have weekly Communion is calling the congregation to brief, focused seasons of preparation. I used to do this at my church in Hopewell, Virginia, where the Lord’s Supper was observed only quarterly. For a week or two, as I preached, I asked the church to think about a key area of Christian practice. For example, we might think about our relationships—the need for forgiveness and reconciliation—leading up to Communion Sunday. Everyone was urged to consider whether they should reconcile with anyone in a Matthew 5:23–24 or Matthew 18:15–17 process. The elders and pastors sometimes would visit the families leading up to the Communion season. Obviously visitation is not always feasible at a large, mobile, urban church, but even this kind of congregation can run classes or have their small groups study a topic and do self-
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examination regarding specific issues. Sometimes a church can use the period before the Lord’s Supper for a time of covenant renewal. The possibilities are many. But at the end of the day, not many churches combine the power of revivalist preaching and pastoring with ecclesial patterns of church life. Indeed, most people who are strong in one area define themselves over against Christians in the other camp, which makes it harder to incorporate both insights in a healthy way.
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SESSION FOUR READING L E ADERSHIP AND CHU RCH SIZE DYN A M I CS H OW ST RAT E GY C H ANGES WITH G ROWTH BY TI M OT H Y K E LLE R A church’s functional style, its strengths and weaknesses, and the roles of its lay and staff leaders will change dramatically as its size changes. One of the most common reasons for pastoral leadership mistakes is blindness to the significance of church size. Size has an enormous impact on how a church functions. There is a “size culture” that profoundly affects how decisions are made, how relationships flow, how effectiveness is evaluated, and what ministers, staff, and lay leaders do. We tend to think of the chief differences between churches mainly in denominational or theological terms, but that underestimates the impact of size on how a church operates. The difference between how churches of 100 and 1,000 function may be much greater than the difference between a Presbyterian and a Baptist church of the same size. The staff person who goes from a church of 400 to a church of 2,000 is in many ways making a far greater change than if he or she moved from one denomination to another. A large church is not simply a bigger version of a small church. The difference in communication, community formation, and decision-making processes are so great that the leadership skills required in each are of almost completely different orders. SIZE CULTURES
Every church has a culture that goes with its size and which must be accepted. Most people tend to prefer a certain size culture, and unfortunately, many give their favorite size culture a moral status and treat other size categories as spiritually and morally inferior. They may insist that the only biblical way to do church is to practice a certain size culture despite the fact that the congregation they attend is much too big or too small to fit that culture. For example, if some members of a church of 2,000 feel they should be able to get the senior pastor personally on the phone without much difficulty, they are insisting on getting a kind of pastoral care that a church of under 200 provides. Of course the pastor would soon be overwhelmed. Yet the members may insist that if he can’t be reached he is failing his biblical duty to be their shepherd. Another example: the new senior pastor of a church of 1,500 may insist that virtually all decisions be made by consensus among the whole board and staff. Soon the board is meeting every week for six hours each time! Still the pastor may insist that for staff members to be making their own decisions would mean they are acting unaccountably or failing to build community. To impose a size-culture practice on a
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church that does not have that size will wreak havoc on it and eventually force the church back into the size with which the practices are compatible. A further example: New members who have just joined a smaller church after years of attending a much larger one may begin complaining about the lack of professional quality in the church’s ministries and insisting that this shows a lack of spiritual excellence. The real problem, however, is that in the smaller church volunteers do things that in the larger church are done by full-time staff. Similarly, new members of the smaller church might complain that the pastor’s sermons are not as polished and well researched as they had come to expect in the larger church. While a largechurch pastor with multiple staff can afford to put twenty hours a week into sermon preparation, however, the solo pastor of a smaller church can devote less than half of that time each week. This means a wise pastor may have to sympathetically confront people who are just not able to handle the church’s size culture—just like many people cannot adapt to life in geographic cultures different from the one they were used to. Some people are organizationally suspicious, often for valid reasons from their experience. Others can’t handle not having the preacher as their pastor. We must suggest to them they are asking for the impossible in a church that size. We must not imply that it would be immaturity on their part to seek a different church, though we should not actively encourage anyone to leave, either. H E ALTHY RESISTANCE Every church has aspects of its natural size culture that must be resisted. Larger churches have a great deal of difficulty keeping track of members who drop out or fall away from the faith. This should never be accepted as inevitable. Rather, the large church must continually struggle to improve pastoral care and discipleship. Out of necessity, the large church must use organizational techniques from the business world, but the danger is that ministry may become too results-oriented and focused on quantifiable outcomes (attendance, membership, giving) rather than the goals of holiness and character growth. Again, this tendency should not be accepted as inevitable; rather, new strategies for focusing on love and virtue must always be generated. The smaller church by its nature gives immature, outspoken, opinionated, and broken members a significant degree of power over the whole body. Since everyone knows everyone else, when members of a family or small group express strong opposition to the direction set by the pastor and leaders, their misery can hold the whole congregation hostage. If they threaten to leave, the majority of people will urge the leaders to desist in their project. It is extremely difficult to get complete consensus about programs and direction in a group of 50–150 people, especially in today’s diverse, fragmented society, and yet smaller churches have an unwritten rule that for 72
any new initiative to be implemented nearly everyone must be happy with it. Leaders of small churches must be brave enough to lead and to confront immature members, in spite of the unpleasantness involved. There is no “best size” for a church. Each size presents great difficulties and also many opportunities for ministry that churches of other sizes cannot undertake (at least not as well). Only together can churches of all sizes be all that Christ wants the church to be. PRINCIPLES OF SIZE DYNAMICS
Reading books on church size can be confusing, as everyone breaks down the size categories somewhat differently. This is because there are many variables in a church’s culture and history that determine exactly when a congregation gets to a new size barrier. For example, everyone knows that at some point a church becomes too large for one pastor to handle. People begin to complain that they are not getting adequate pastoral care. The time has come to add staff. But when does that happen? In some communities it may happen when attendance rises to 120, while in others it does not happen until the church has nearly 300 in regular attendance. It depends a great deal on expectations, the mobility of the city’s population, how fast the church has grown, and so on. Despite the variables, the point at which a second pastoral staff member must be added is usually called “the  200 barrier.” That is a good average figure, but keep in mind that your own church might reach that threshold at some different attendance figure. Here are the general trends or changes that come as a church grows larger. INCREASING COMPLEXITY
The larger the church, the less its members have in common. There is more diversity in factors such as age, family status, ethnicity, and so on, and thus a church of 400 needs four to five times more programs than a church of 200—not two times more. Larger churches are much more complex than their smaller counterparts. They have multiple services, multiple groups, and multiple tracks, and eventually they really are multiple congregations. Also, the larger the church, the more staff per capita needs to be added. Often the first ministry staff persons are added for every increase of 150–200 in attendance. A church of 500 may have two or three full-time ministry staff, but eventually ministry staff may need to be added for every 75–100 new persons. Thus a church of 2,000 may have twenty-five staff. SHIFTING LAY-STAFF RESPONSIBILITIES
On the one hand, the larger the church the more decision making falls to the staff rather than to the whole membership or even the lay leaders. The elders or board must increasingly deal with only top-level, big-picture issues. This means the larger 73
the church, the more decision making is pushed up toward the staff and away from the congregation and lay leaders. Needless to say, many laypeople feel extremely uncomfortable with this. On the other hand, the larger the church, the more the basic pastoral ministry such as hospital visits, discipling, oversight of Christian growth, and counseling is done by lay leaders rather than by the professional ministers. Generally, in small churches policy is decided by many and ministry is done by a few, while in the large church ministry is done by many and policy is decided by a few. INCREASING INTENTIONALITY
The larger the church, the more systematic and deliberate the assimilation of newcomers needs to be. As a church grows, newcomers are not visible to the congregation’s members. Thus new people are not spontaneously and informally welcomed and invited in. Pathways for assimilation must be identified or established by asking questions such as these: • How will newcomers get here? • How will they be identified by the church? • Where will unbelievers learn Christianity’s relevance, content, and credibility? • Who will move them along the path? • Where will believers get plugged in? • Who will help them? The larger the church, the harder it is to recruit volunteers and thus a more wellorganized volunteer recruitment process is required. Why is this so? First, the larger the church, the more likely it is that someone you don’t know well will try to recruit you. It is much easier to say no to someone you do not know than to someone you know well. Second, it is easier to feel less personally responsible for the ministries of a large church: “They have lots of people here—they don’t need me.” Therefore, the larger the church, the more well-organized and formal the recruitment of volunteers must be. INCREASING REDUNDANCY OF COMMUNICATION
The larger the church, the better communication has to be. Without multiple forms and repeated messages, people will feel left out and complain, “I wasn’t told about it.” You know you’ve crossed into a higher size category when such complaints become constant. Informal communication networks (pulpit announcements, newsletter notices, and word of mouth) are insufficient to reach everyone. More lead time is necessary to communicate well.
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INCREASING QUALITY OF PRODUCTION
The larger the church, the more planning and organization must go into events. A higher quality of production in general is expected in a larger church and events cannot simply be thrown together. Spontaneous, last-minute events do not work. The larger the church, the higher its aesthetic bar must be. In smaller churches the worship experience is rooted mainly in horizontal relationships among those who attend. Musical offerings from singers who are untrained and not especially talented are nonetheless appreciated because “we all know them” and they are members of the fellowship. But the larger the church, the more worship is based on the vertical relationship—on a sense of transcendence. If an outsider comes in who doesn’t know the musicians, then a mediocre quality of production will distract them from worship. They don’t have a relationship with the musicians to offset the lack of giftedness. So the larger the church, the more the music becomes an inclusion factor. INCREASING OPENNESS TO CHANGE
The larger the church, the more it is subject to frequent and sudden change. Why? First, smaller churches tend to have little turnover: individual members feel powerful and necessary and so they stay put. Second, the larger the church, the more power for decision making moves away from the whole congregation to the leaders and staff. Too much is going on for the congregation or the board or eventually even the staff to make all the decisions as a group. As decision-making power comes into the hands of individual staff or volunteer leaders, change happens more quickly. Decisions can be made expeditiously without everyone signing on. Further, as we saw above, the larger the church, the more complex it is and therefore the more schedules, events, and programs there are to change. LOSING MEMBERS BECAUSE OF CHANGES
The larger the church, the more it loses members because of changes. Why? Smaller churches seek at all costs to avoid losing members. As a result, certain individuals and small groups often come to exercise power disproportionate to their numbers. If a change were made, someone invariably would experience it as a loss, and since the smaller church has a great fear of conflict, it usually will not institute a change that might result in lost members. Thus smaller churches tend to have a more stable membership than large churches do.
In larger churches small groups and individual members have far less ability to exert power or resist changes they dislike. And (as noted previously) since larger churches undergo constant change, they regularly lose members because “It’s too big now” or “I can’t see the pastor anymore” or “We don’t pray spontaneously anymore in 75
church.” Leaders of churches that grow large are more willing to lose members who disagree with procedures or the philosophy of ministry. SHIFTING ROLE OF THE MINISTERS
The larger the church, the less available the main preacher is to do pastoral work. In smaller churches the pastor is available at all times, for most occasions and needs, to any member or unchurched person. In the large  church there are sometimes more lay ministers, staff, and leaders than the small church has people! So the large church’s pastors must recognize their limits and spend more time with staff and lay shepherds and in prayer and meditation. The larger the church, the more important the minister’s leadership abilities are. Preaching and pastoring are sufficient skills for pastors in smaller churches, but as a church grows other leadership skills become critical. In a large church not only administrative skills but also vision casting and strategy design are crucial gifts in the pastoral team. The larger the church, the more the ministry staff members must move from being generalists to being specialists. Everyone from the senior pastor on down must focus on certain ministry areas and concentrate on two or three main tasks. The larger the church, the more the senior pastor must specialize in preaching, vision keeping and vision casting, and identifying problems before they become disasters. Finally, the larger the church, the more important it is for ministers, especially the senior minister, to stay put for a long time. As noted above, smaller churches change less rapidly and have less turnover. With this innate stability, a smaller church can absorb a change of minister every few years if necessary. But the larger the church, the more the staff in general and the senior pastor in particular are the main sources of continuity and stability. Rapid turnover of staff is highly detrimental to a large church. Generally, in small churches policy is decided by many and ministry is done by a few, while in the large church ministry is done by many, and policy is decided by a few. STRUCTURING SMALLER
The larger the church, the smaller the basic pastoral span of care. In smaller churches, classes and groups can be larger because virtually everyone in the church is cared for directly by full-time trained ministry staff, each of whom can care for 50–200 people. In larger churches, however, the internal groupings need to be smaller, because people are cared for by lay shepherds, each of whom can care for 10–20 people if given proper supervision and support. Thus in a larger church, the more small groups you have per 100 people in attendance, the better cared for people are and the faster the church grows.
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EMPHASIS ON VISION AND STRENGTHS
The larger the church, the more it tends to concentrate on doing fewer things well. Smaller churches are generalists and feel the need to do everything. This comes from the power of the individual in a small church. If any member wants the church to address some issue, then the church makes an effort in order to please him or her. The larger church, however, identifies and concentrates on approximately three or four major things and works to do them extremely well, despite calls for new emphases. Further, the larger the church, the more a distinctive vision becomes important to its members. The reason for being in a smaller church is relationships. The reason for putting up with all the changes and difficulties of a larger church is to get mission done. People join a larger church because of the vision—so the particular mission needs to be clear. The larger the church, the more it develops its own mission outreach rather than supporting already existing programs. Smaller churches tend to support denominational mission causes and contribute to existing para-church ministries. Leaders and members of larger churches feel more personally accountable to God for the  kingdom mandate and seek to either start their own mission ministries or to form partnerships in which there is more direct accountability of the mission agency to the church. Consequently, the larger the church, the more its lay leaders need to be screened for agreement on vision and philosophy of ministry, not simply for doctrinal and moral standards. In smaller churches, people are eligible for leadership on the basis of membership tenure and faithfulness. In larger churches, where a distinctive mission and vision are more important, it is important to enlist without apology leaders who share a common philosophy of ministry with the staff and other leaders. SPECIFIC SIZE CATEGORIES HOUSE CHURCH: UP TO 40 ATTENDANCE Character
• The house church is often called a “store front church” in urban areas and a “ country church” in rural areas. • It operates essentially as a next ended small group. It is a highly relational church in which everyone knows everyone else intimately. • Lay leaders are extremely powerful and they emerge relationally—they are not appointed or elected. They are usually the people who have been at the church the longest and have devoted the most time and money to the work.• Decision making is democratic and informal and requires complete consensus. Decisions
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are made by informal relational process. If any member is unhappy with a course of action, it is not taken by the church. • Communication is by word of mouth, and information moves very swiftly through the whole membership. • The pastor is often a “tentmaker” and does church ministry part-time , though once a church has at least ten families who tithe, it can support a full-time minister. The minister’s main job is shepherding, not leading or preaching. How it grows
House churches grow in the most organic possible way—through attraction to their warmth, relationships, and people. New people are simply invited and continue to come because they are befriended. There is no “program” of outreach. Crossing the threshold to the next size category
The house church, like any small group, gets to saturation rather quickly. Once it gets to 40+ people, the intense face-to-face relationships become impossible to maintain. It then faces a choice: either multiplying off another house-church or growing out of the “house-church dynamics” into the next size category, the small church. If it does not do either, evangelism becomes essentially impossible. The fellowship itself then can easily become ingrown and stagnant—somewhat stifling, sometimes legalistic. An ongoing problem for the stand-alone church of this size is the low quality of ministry to specific groups like children, youth, and singles. If it opts to multiply into another house church, the two (and eventually several) house churches can form an association and do things like youth ministry together. They can also meet for joint worship services periodically. If it opts to grow out of the house-church size into a small church, it needs to prepare its people to do this by acknowledging the losses of intimacy, spontaneity, and informality and agreeing to bear these as a cost of mission, of opening its ranks to new people. This has to be a consensus group decision, to honor the dynamics of the house church even as it opts to change those dynamics. SMALL CHURCH: 40–200 ATTENDANCE Character
• The range of this category goes from churches that are barely out of the housechurch stage up to churches that are ready for multiple staff. But they all share the same basic characteristics.+ While the relational dynamics are now less
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intense, there is still a strong expectation that every member must have a faceto-face relationship with every other member. • And while there are now appointed and elected leaders, the informal leadership system remains extremely strong. There are several laypeople—regardless of their official status—who are “opinion leaders.” If they don’t approve of new measures the rest of the members will not support the changes. • Communication is still informal, mostly word of mouth, and relatively swift. • The pastor is still primarily a shepherd. While in a larger church people will let you pastor them if you are a good preacher, in a smaller church the reverse is true: people will listen to your sermons if you are a good pastor. • Effective, loving shepherding of every member is the driving force of ministry— not leadership or even speaking ability. A pastor who says, “I shouldn’t have to shepherd every member, I’ve delegated that to my elders or small group leaders,” is trying to practice large-church dynamics in a small-church environment. • However, as the congregation grows the pastor of a small church will feel more and more need for administrative leadership skills. Small churches do not require much in the way of vision casting or strategizing, but they do eventually present a need for program planning, mobilization of volunteers, and other administrative tasks. • Changes are still processed relationally and informally by the whole congregation, not just the leaders. But since the congregation is larger, decisions take a longer time than in either the house church or the medium-sized church. Ultimately, however, change in a small church happens from the bottom up through key lay leaders. No major changes can be made unless you get at least one of these people to be an ally and an advocate for them. How it grows
Like house churches, small churches grow through newcomers’ attraction to the relationships in the congregation. However, in the small church it can also be a personal relationship to the pastor that is the primary attraction for a new person. The pastor can begin two or three new ministries, classes, or groups, as long as he has secured the backing or participation of one key informal leader. Together they can begin a new activity that will bring many new people into the church.
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Crossing the threshold to the next size category
This church may eventually face the famous “200 barrier.” To make room for more than 200 people in a church takes a significant commitment to some or all of the following changes. First change—multiplication options
• There must be a willingness to question the unwritten policy that every voting member should have a face-to-face relationship with every other member. • When a church gets to the place where the older members begin to realize that there are members whom they barely know or don’t know at all, the complaint may be voiced in a tone of moral authority: “This church is getting too big.” Another form of this complaint is that the church is getting “impersonal.” Essentially, this attitude must change if newcomers are to be welcomed. • Often the key change that a congregation must allow is a move to multiplying options such as more than one Sunday service, or putting more emphasis on small group ministry than on having one unified corporate prayer meeting. • As a general rule, multiplying options generate a growth spurt. The single best way to increase attendance is to multiply Sunday services. Two services will immediately draw more people than one service did. Four Sunday school electives will generally draw more people than two Sunday school electives. Why? Because when you give people more options, more people opt! Second change—a willingness to pay the cost of an additional primary ministry staff person.
• It is a sociological fact that a full-time minister cannot personally shepherd more than about 150–200 people. At some point any pastor will lose the ability to personally visit, stay in touch, and be reasonably available to all the people of a growing congregation. • The minister’s span of pastoral care can be stretched with part-time or fulltime specialty or administrative staff, such as children’s workers, secretaries, administrators, and musicians, There are variations to this figure depending on the minister’s personality and energy level and the local culture. For example, a more white-collar community tends to demand far more specialized programs than does a working-class community, and therefore you may find in such a place that you need a full-time ministry staff person for every 100–150 in attendance. • Eventually that second ministry staff person must be hired. This is commonly another ordained pastor, but it could be a layperson who is a counselor, overseer of small groups, or supervisor of programs who does a lot of shepherding work and teaching. It is important to be sure that this second person really can grow 80
the church and, practically speaking, grow the giving that will pay his or her salary. So, for example, it may not be best to have the second ministry staff person be a youth minister; it would be better to hire a small group minister or a minister of evangelism and outreach. Or, if the senior minister is excellent at outreach, the second staff worker could be a pastor/counselor who complements the gifts of the first minister and works on the church’s internal growth. Initial staffing must be for growth. • The tension that often arises in a church this size is that the church is big enough that the pastor begins to feel burned out but is not yet big enough to financially support a second minister. Third change—a willingness to let power shift away from the laity and even lay leaders to the staff.
• As you get to this size barrier, the old approach to decision making, which required that everyone to come to a consensus, becomes far too slow and unwieldy. In the consensus model of decision making, it is considered impossible to proceed with a change if any member is strongly opposed, especially if it appears that the change would actually result in some people’s leaving the church. • As a church nears the 200 barrier, there is almost always someone who experiences the concomitant changes as a loss. Therefore no changes will ever occur unless many of the decisions that used to involve the whole membership now shift to the leaders and staff. But it is not just that the laity must cede power to the leaders. Long-time lay leaders must also cede power to the staff and volunteer leaders. • In a smaller church the lay leaders often know more about the members than the pastor does. The lay leaders have been there longer and thus have more knowledge of the past, more trust from the members, and more knowledge of the members’ abilities, capacities, interests, and opinions. • Once a church gets beyond 200, however, the staff tends to know more about the church members than the lay leaders do, and increasingly the new members in particular take their cues from the pastor(s) rather than from the lay leaders. • The lay officers’ board or elders will no longer be able to sign off on absolutely everything and will have to let the staff and individual volunteer leaders make many decisions on their own.
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Fourth change—a willingness to become more formal and deliberate in assimilation and communication.
• For a church to move beyond this barrier it can no longer assume that communication and the assimilation of newcomers will happen “naturally,” without any planning. Communication will have to become more deliberate instead of by word of mouth alone. Newcomers will have to be folded in more intention- ally. For example, every new family could be assigned a “sponsor” for six months—a member family who invites the new family over to their home, brings them to a new members’ class, and so on. Fifth change—the ability and willingness of both the pastor and the people for the pastor to do shepherding a bit less and leading a bit more.
• The next-size church requires a bit more vision casting and strategizing and a lot more administrative know-how. The pastor of the medium-sized church will have to spend much more time recruiting and supervising volunteers and programs to do ministry that in the smaller church he would have done himself. This takes administrative skills of planning, delegating, supervising, and organizing. • In this next-size church the pastor is simply less available and accessible to every member. Even with the hiring of additional ministry staff, every member will not be able to have the same access to the senior pastor as he or she did before. Both the people and the senior minister need to acknowledge and accept this cost. Sixth change—considering the option of moving to a new space and facilities.
• Will such a move be crucial to breaking the next growth barrier? Sometimes, but not usually. Usually what is needed is planning multiple worship services, staffing for growth, and adjusting attitudes and expectations in preparation for a new size culture. MEDIUM-SIZED CHURCH, 200–450 ATTENDANCE Character
In smaller churches, each member is acquainted with the entire membership of the church. The primary circle of belonging is the church as a whole. But in the mediumsized church, the primary circle of belonging is usually a specific affinity class or program. Men’s and women’s ministries, the choir, the couples’ class, the evening worship team, the local prison ministry, the meals-on-wheels ministry—all of these are possible circles of belonging that make the church fly. Each of these subgroups is approximately the size of the house church, 10–40 people. Leadership functions differently in the medium-sized church.
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• First, since the medium-sized church has far more complexity, the leaders must represent the various constituencies in the church (e.g., the older people, the young families). • Second, there is too much work to be handled by a small board. There are now influential leadership teams or committees, such as the missions committee or the music/worship committee, that have significant power. • Third, because of the two factors above, leaders begin to be chosen less on the basis of length of tenure and strength of personality and more on the basis of skills and giftedness. • Fourth, the role of the lay officers or board begins to change. In the smaller church, the officers basically oversee the pastor and staff, giving or withholding permission for various proposals. The pastor and staff then do the ministry. In the medium-sized church, the officers begin to do more of the ministry themselves, in partnership with the staff. Volunteer ministry leaders often rise up and become the decision-making leaders. Chairs of influential committees sit on the official board. As noted above, the senior minister shifts somewhat from being a shepherd toward becoming a “rancher.” Rather than doing all of the ministry himself, he becomes a trainer and organizer of laypeople doing ministry. He also must be adept at training, supporting, and supervising ministry and administrative staff. At the medium-sized church level, this requires significant administrative skills. While in the smaller church change and decisions come from the bottom up through key lay people, in the medium-sized church change happens through key committees and teams. Ordinarily the official board or session in the medium-sized church is inherently conservative. They feel very responsible and do not want to offend any constituents they believe they represent. Therefore change is usually driven by forward- thinking committees such as the missions committee or the evangelism committee. These can be very effective in persuading the congregation to try new things. How it grows
As noted earlier, smaller churches grow mainly through pastor-initiated groups, classes, and ministries. The medium-sized church will also grow as it multiplies classes, groups, services, and ministries, but the key to medium-sized growth is improving the quality of the ministries and their effectiveness to meet real needs. The small church can accommodate amateurish quality because the key attraction is its intimacy and family-like warmth. But the medium-sized church’s ministries must be different. Classes really must be great learning experiences. Music must meet aesthetic needs. Preaching must inform and inspire.
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Crossing the threshold to the next size category
I have said that the small church crosses the 200 barrier through (1) multiplying options, (2) going to multiple staff, (3) shifting decision-making power away from the whole membership, (4) becoming more formal and deliberate in assimilation, and (5) moving the pastor away from shepherding everyone to being more of an organizer/ administrator. You can grow beyond 200 without making all of these five changes; in fact, most churches do. Often churches grow past 200 while holding on to one or more of the smaller-church attitudes. For example, if the senior minister is multi gifted and energetic, he can take care of the organizational/administrative work and still have time to visit every member of his church. Or perhaps new staff persons are added but the decision-making is still done on a whole-congregation consensus model. But to break 400, you must firmly break the old habits in all five areas. As for the sixth change—moving to new space and facilities—this is usually needed for a medium-sized church to break the growth barrier, but not always. LARGE CHURCH, 400–800 ATTENDANCE Character
We have seen that in the small church, the primary circle of belonging is the entire church body. In the medium-sized church, the primary circle is the affinity class or ministry group, which is usually 10–40 in size. However, in the large church the primary circle of belonging becomes the small group fellowship. This is different from the affinity class or ministry in the following ways: • It is usually smaller—as small as 4 and no bigger than 15. • It is more of a “miniature church” than is the affinity class or ministry. Affinity classes or ministries are specialty programs, focusing only on learning or worship music or ministry to the poor and so on. The small group fellowship does Bible study, fellowship, worship, and ministry. Leadership also functions differently in the large church. In the small church, leaders were selected for their tenure; in the medium-sized church, for their skills and maturity. Both of these are still very desirable! But in the large church, these qualities must be combined with a commitment to the church’s distinct vision and mission. The larger the church becomes, the more it develops certain key ministries and strengths that it emphasizes, and the common vision is an important reason that members join. So leaders need to be screened for vision as well as other qualifications. In the small church, the board gave or withheld permission to the pastor(s), who did the ministry. In the medium-sized church, the board is made up of lay leaders and committee chairs who share the ministry work with the pastors and staff. But in the large church, the board must work with the senior minister to set overall vision and goals and then to evaluate the overall ministry. Unlike the small church board, they 84
don’t oversee all the staff—they let the senior minister do that. Unlike the medium church board, they may not necessarily be the lay leaders of ministry. Instead they oversee how the church and ministries are doing as a whole. In the large church, the roles of individual staff members become increasingly specialized and that also goes for the role of the senior minister. He must concentrate more and more on (a) preaching and (b) vision casting and strategizing. He must let go of many or most administrative tasks; otherwise he becomes a bottleneck. While in the small church change and decisions happen from the bottom up through powerful lay individuals, and in the medium-sized church they come from the boards and committees, in the large church they happen “top down” from staff and key lay leaders. How it grows
The small church grows mainly through new groups, classes, and ministries initiated by the pastor, sometimes with the help of an ally. I call this the “backyard approach,” since it grows from informal new fellowship circles. The medium-sized church grows mainly through ministries that effectively target “felt needs” of various groups such as youth, seniors, young married couples, and “seekers.” I call this the “side-door approach,” since it brings in various people groups from your city or neighborhood by addressing their felt needs. The large church, however, grows through a “frontdoor” approach. The key to its growth is what happens in the worship services—the quality of the preaching, the transcendence of the worship experience, and so on. Crossing the threshold to the next size category
The same five changes mentioned before need to be taken to the next level. First change—multiplying options. Up to the “800 barrier,” churches can still getaway with having a mediocre or poor small-group system. The people may still be getting shepherded mainly through larger programs, affinity classes, and groups that are run by staff people directly. But if God keeps sending you new people, so that you are bumping up against the 800 barrier, you must have the majority of your members and adherents in small groups that are very well run and that do pastoral care, not just Bible study. Multiple services were more important when addressing the 200 or 400 barrier, but small group life is the key to navigating this change. Second change—multiplying staff. Up to the “800 barrier” churches can still get away with a small staff of generalists, but after the 800 barrier there must be much more specialization. Staff members must be increasingly gifted, and not simply workers, nor even leaders of workers, but leaders of leaders. They must be fairly mature, independent, and able to attract and supervise others. Third change—shifting decision-making power. Up to the “800 barrier,” decisionmaking power was becoming more centralized—migrating from the periphery (the 85
whole membership or the whole lay board) to the center (the staff and eventually the senior staff). Now the decision-making power must become more decentralized— migrating out away from the senior staff and pastor to the individual staff and their leadership teams. As noted above, the staff must become increasingly competent and must be given more authority to make decisions in their area without having to run everything through the senior staff or lay board. Fourth change—becoming more formal and deliberate in assimilation. Assimilation, discipline, and incorporation of newcomers must become even more well organized, highly detailed, and supervised. Fifth—adapting the senior pastor’s role. The pastor becomes even less accessible to do individual shepherding and concentrates even more on preaching, large group teaching, vision casting, and strategizing. THE VERY LARGE CHURCH Character
The very large church has a missional focus. In general, smaller churches give members a greater voice (see below), and thus the concerns and interests of members and insiders tend to trump those of outsiders. On the other hand, the larger church gives the staff and executive leaders a greater voice. The more staffdriven a church is, the more likely it is to concentrate on ministries that will reach nonmembers and that don’t directly benefit its own constituents—that is, church planting, mercy and justice ministries, and other new services and programs. The very large church has several traits that attract seekers and young adults in particular: • Excellence. Those with no obligation to go to church based on kinship, tradition, ethnicity, or local history are more likely to attend where the quality of arts, teaching, children’s programs, and so on is very high. • Choices. Contemporary people are used to having options when it comes to the schedule or type of worship, learning, support services, and the like. • Openness to change. Generally, newcomers and younger people have a much greater tolerance for the constant changes and fluidity of a large church, while older people, long-term members, and families are more desirous of stability. • Low pressure. Seekers are glad to come into a church and not have their presence noticed immediately. The great majority of inquirers and seekers are grateful for the ease with which they can visit a large church without immediately feeling pressured to make a decision or join a group.
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The very large church also has greater potential for developing certain qualities and ministries: • Being multicultural. A larger staff can be multiethnic (while a single staff/ pastor usually cannot). A larger church with multiple services, classes, or even “congregations” can encompass a greater variety of interests and sensibilities. • Creating a full-service family support system. Families often need a variety of classes or groups for children in different age groups as well as counseling services, recreational opportunities, and so on. Larger churches often attract families for that reason. • Doing church planting. Larger churches, in general, are better at church planting than are either denominational agencies or smaller churches. • Carrying out faith-based holistic ministries. Larger churches have a bigger pool of volunteers, finances, and expertise for carrying these out. • “Research and development” for the broader church. Again, the larger church is usually a good place for new curriculum, ministry structures, and the like to be formulated and tested. These can all be done more effectively by a large church than by denominations, smaller churches, or para-church ministries. ONE OF THE MOST COMMON REASONS FOR PASTORAL LEADERSHIP MISTAKES IS BLINDNESS TO THE SIGNIFICANCE OF CHURCH SIZE.
Of course the very large church has disadvantages as well: • Commuting longer distances can undermine mission. Very large churches can become famous and attract Christians from longer and longer distances, who cannot bring non-Christians from their neighborhoods. Soon the congregation doesn’t look like the neighborhood and can’t reach its own geographic community. However, this is somewhat offset by the mission advantages and can be further offset by (a) church planting and (b) staying relentlessly oriented toward evangelism and outreach. • Commuting longer distances undermines community/fellowship and discipleship. Christians coming from longer distances are less likely to be discipled and plugged in to real Christian community. The person you meet in a Sunday service is less and less likely to be someone who lives near you, so natural connections and friendships do not develop. This can be somewhat offset by an effective small-group system that unites people by interest or region. • Diminished communication and involvement. “A common pattern is for a large church to outgrow its internal communication system and plateau . . . as many people feel a loss of the sense of belonging, and eventually [it declines] numerically.” People are no longer sure whom to talk to about things: in a smaller church, the staff and elders know everything, but in a very large church, 87
a given staff member may know nothing at all about what is going on outside his or her ministry. The long list of staff and ministries is overwhelming. No one feels they can get information quickly; no one feels they know how to begin to get involved. This can be offset by continually upgrading your communication system. This becomes extraordinarily important in a very large congregation. • Displacement. People who joined when the church was smaller may feel a great sense of loss and may have trouble adjusting to the new size culture. Many of them will mourn the loss of feeling personally connected to events, decision making, and the head pastor. Some of these “old-timers” will sadly leave, and their leaving will sadden those who remain in the church. This can be offset by giving old-timers extra deference and consideration, understanding the changes they’ve been through, and not making them feel guilty for wanting a different or smaller church. Fortunately, this problem eventually lessens! People who joined a church when it had 1,500 members will find that not much has changed when it reaches 4,000. • Complexity, change, and formality. Largeness brings (a) complexity instead of simplicity, (b) change instead of predictability, and (c) the need for formal rather than informal communication and decision making. However, many long-time Christians and families value simplicity, predictability, and informality, and even see them as more valuable from a spiritual standpoint. The larger the church, the more the former three factors grow, and many people simply won’t stand for them. • Succession. The bigger a church, the more the church is identified with the senior pastor. Why? (a) He becomes the only identifiable leader among a large number of staff and leaders of whom the average member cannot keep track. (b) Churches don’t grow large without a leader who is unusually good in articulating vision. This articulation then becomes the key to the whole church. That kind of giftedness is distinctive and is much less replaceable even than good preaching. This leads to the Achilles’ heel of the church—continuity and succession. How does the pastor retire without people feeling the church has died? One plan is to divide the church with each new site having its own senior pastor. Lyle Schaller believes, however, that the successors need to be people who have been on staff for a good while, not outsiders. How it grows
Basically, a very large church continues to grow only if the advantages described are exploited while the disadvantages described are resisted and minimized.
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A FEW MORE SUGGESTIONS REGARDING VERY LARGE CHURCHES Be Nonjudgmental
A common problem in churches is that people attach a moral significance to their ideal size culture. They don’t see a large-church size culture as “different” but as “bad.” For example, some members may feel that a very large church is an “unfriendly” or “uncaring” church because they can’t get the senior pastor on the phone personally. However, if everyone in a church of 3,000 could get the pastor on the phone anytime they wanted, it would not lead to a more caring church at all. He could not possibly respond to all their needs. (On the other hand, if a pastor in a church of 150 can never be gotten on the phone, he is imposing a larger size culture in a smaller church, and that will lead to disaster.) Because a very large church is marked by change, the overall vision may stay the same, but few or no programs or practices are sacrosanct. Because it is complex, it is not immediately obvious whom to talk to or who needs to be in on a given decision; many new events may have unforeseen consequences for other programs. Because there is a need for greater formality, plans have to be written down and carefully executed, rather than worked out face to face and relationally. In a very large church, all of these traits must be considered the inevitable cost of ministry. There should be little hand-wringing and no moral significance attached to these traits (calling change “instability,” formality “being impersonal,” etc.). Different cultures are just that—different, not inferior. Form Smaller Decision-Making Bodies
In general, the larger the church, the fewer people should be in on each decision. Why? The larger the church, the more diversity of views. If the older processes are followed, decisions take longer and longer to be made, and they result in watereddown compromises. As a church gets larger it must entrust decision making to fewer and fewer people just to maintain the same level of progress, decisiveness, and intentionality it had when it was smaller. Many  Christians consider the size culture of a very large church to be by definition undemocratic or unaccountable. This is one reason that many churches never get very large, or shrink again once they do. Allow the Decentralization of Power
Another mark of a very large church, especially once it surpasses about 1,800 members, is that the “hub and spokes” structure, in which the senior pastor serves as the captain or “hub” and his staff are the “spokes,” becomes obsolete. Instead of being a team under the senior pastor, the staff becomes a team of teams. The power of directors and clusters of directors grows greatly. The church has become too complex for the senior pastor to supervise directors closely, and power is shifted to specific departments. This has two consequences. On the one hand, it means that staff leaders have more decision-making power for their own area. Other staff 89
directors and even the senior pastor have less information and ability to secondguess them or interfere. This happens increasingly as a church gets larger. On the other hand, it means staff cannot expect to receive as much mentoring, instruction, and rescuing from the executive staff as they did when the church was smaller. Bring on More Specialized, Competent Staff Workers Who Understand the Vision
Studies show that churches of fewer than 800 members are staffed primarily with seminary-trained ministers, but the larger a church gets, the fewer trained ministers are on staff. Why is this? First, the larger church needs specialists in counseling, music, finance, social work, and childhood development—whereas seminaries train generalists. Very large churches do not need theologically trained people to learn a specialty so much as they need specialists who can be theologically trained. Second, the very large church cannot afford to bring on a newcomer with a steep learning curve as director of a large ministry. In a church of 500, you may have a youth ministry of 30 kids, so you can hire a young person out of seminary to be the youth pastor. But in a very large church there may be 300 youth—so the staff director has to be very competent from the start. The larger a church gets, the more competent the staff needs to be. The call to the staff changes from “Do what I tell you” to “Go out and make things happen.” Resourcefulness and creativity become more and more important. The staff often need to be able to inspire followers and to find creative ways to bring something out of nothing. They must move from being leaders to being leaders of leaders. Third, the larger the church gets, the more distinctive its vision is. It has a highly honed and carefully balanced set of emphases and styles—its own “voice.” People who are trained theologically before coming to staff inevitably come in with attitudes and assumptions that are at variance with the church’s vision. They may also feel superior to other staff people who are not theologically trained or may underestimate their own ignorance of the church’s specific context. The larger the church, then, the more important it is to raise and train leaders from within. This means that staff coming from outside need thorough training in the very large church’s history, values, culture, and so on, and staff coming from within should be supported heavily for continued theological education. Change the Senior Pastor’s Role
A very key and very visible part of the large size culture is the changed role of the senior pastor. As stated earlier, in a very large church the preacher cannot be the people’s pastor. The senior pastor must move from an emphasis on doing the work of ministry (teaching, pastoring, administering) to delegating this work so that he can concentrate on vision casting and general preaching. Many churches and ministers 90
never allow this to happen; indeed they believe it is wrong to make such a shift. While the senior pastor must not become a CEO and stop doing traditional ministry altogether, he must not try to do pastoral care or provide oversight for the church at large either. That responsibility must go to others. This is undoubtedly difficult; the senior pastor will have to live with guilt feelings over it all the time. It’s a burden he must be willing to bear, with the help of the gospel. Otherwise the pressures of trying to do it all will lead to burnout. The senior pastor, the staff and ministry leaders, and the congregation must allow this transition to happen. Build Trust
Schaller shows that the very large church is more accessible and capable of reaching young people, single people, the unchurched, and seekers than smaller churches are. He then poses a question: If the need for very large churches is so great, why are there so few? Why don’t more churches (a) allow the senior pastor to become less accessible, (b) allow the staff to have more power than the board, (c) allow a small body of executive staff to have more decision-making power than the larger staff or congregation, or (d) allow directors more power to hire competent workers and release generalists? His main answer is that the key to the very large church culture is trust. In smaller churches, suspicious people are much happier. Every decision goes through a process of consensus that is accessible to any member. Any minority that is unhappy with something can block it. The larger the church gets, however, the more and more the congregation has to trust the staff, and especially the senior pastor. Though the staff (and the senior pastor) must do everything they can to be open to criticism, to be relationally available, and to communicate with people in a way that makes them feel included and informed, ultimately a very large church runs on trust. Copyright © 2006 by Timothy Keller, © 2010 by Redeemer City to City. This article first appeared in The Movement Newsletter, and was reprinted in the Spring 2008 edition of Cutting Edge magazine, Vineyard USA. We encourage you to use and share this material freely—but please don’t charge money for it, change the wording, or remove the copyright information.
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SESSION FIVE READING T H E M ISSIONAL CHU RCH June 2001—Tim Keller THE NEED FOR A ‘MISSIONAL’ CHURCH
In the West for nearly 1,000 years, the relationship of (Anglo-European) Christian churches to the broader culture was a relationship known as “Christendom.” The institutions of society “Christianized” people, and stigmatized non-Christian belief and behavior. Though people were “Christianized” by the culture, they were not regenerated or converted with the Gospel. The church’s job was then to challenge persons into a vital, living relation with Christ. There were great advantages and yet great disadvantages to ‘Christendom.’ The advantage was that there was a common language for public moral discourse with which society could discuss what was ‘the good.’ The disadvantage was that Christian morality without gospel-changed hearts often led to cruelty and hypocrisy. Think of how the small town in “Christendom” treated the unwed mother or the gay person. Also, under “Christendom” the church often was silent against abuses of power of the ruling classes over the weak. For these reasons and others, the church in Europe and North America has been losing its privileged place as the arbiter of public morality since at least the mid 19th century. The decline of Christendom has accelerated greatly since the end of WWII. The British missionary Lesslie Newbigin went to India around 1950. There he was involved with a church living ‘in mission’ in a very non-Christian culture. When he returned to England some 30 years later, he discovered that now the Western church too existed in a non-Christian society, but it had not adapted to its new situation. Though public institutions and popular culture of Europe and North America no longer ‘Christianized’ people, the church still ran its ministries assuming that a stream of ‘Christianized’, traditional/moral people would simply show up in services. Some churches certainly did ‘evangelism’ as one ministry among many. But the church in the West had not become completely ‘missional’—adapting and reformulating absolutely everything it did in worship, discipleship, community, and service—so as to be engaged with the non-Christian society around it. It had not developed a ‘missiology of western culture’ the way it had done so for other non-believing cultures. One of the reasons much of the American evangelical church has not experienced the same precipitous decline as the Protestant churches of Europe and Canada is because in the U.S. there is still a ‘heartland’ with the remnants of the old ‘Christendom’ society. There the informal public culture (though not the formal public institutions) still stigmatizes non-Christian beliefs and behavior. “There is a fundamental schism in American cultural, political, and economic life. There’s the quicker growing, economically vibrant...morally relativist, urban-oriented, culturally adventuresome, sexually polymorphous, and ethnically diverse nation... 92
and there’s the small town, nuclear-family, religiously oriented, white-centric other America, [with]...its diminishing cultural and economic force....Two nations...” Michael Wolff, New York, Feb 26 2001, p. 19. In conservative regions, it is still possible to see people profess faith and the church grow without becoming ‘missional.’ Most traditional evangelical churches still can only win people to Christ who are temperamentally traditional and conservative. But, as Wolff notes, this is a ‘shrinking market.’ And eventually evangelical churches ensconced in the declining, remaining enclaves of “Christendom” will have to learn how to become ‘missional’. If it does not do that it will decline or die. We don’t simply need evangelistic churches, but rather ‘missional’ churches. THE ELEMENTS OF A MISSIONAL CHURCH
1. Discourse in the vernacular. • In ‘Christendom’ there is little difference between the language inside and outside of the church. Documents of the early U.S. Congress, for example, are riddled with allusions toward references from the Bible. Biblical technical terms are wellknown inside and outside. In a missional church, however, terms must be explained. • The missional church avoids ‘tribal’ language, stylized prayer language, unnecessary evangelical pious ‘jargon’, and archaic language that seeks to set a ‘spiritual tone.’ • The missional church avoids ‘we-them’ language, disdainful jokes that mock people of different politics and beliefs, and dismissive, disrespectful comments about those who differ with us. • The missional church avoids sentimental, pompous, ‘inspirational’ talk. Instead we engage the culture with gentle, self-deprecating but joyful irony the gospel creates. Humility + joy = gospel irony and realism. • The missional church avoids ever talking as if non-believing people are not present. If you speak and discourse as if your whole neighborhood is present (not just scattered Christians), eventually more and more of your neighborhood will find their way in or be invited. • Unless all of the above is the outflow of a truly humble-bold gospel-changed heart, it is all just ‘marketing’ and ‘spin.’ 2. Enter and re-tell the culture’s stories with the gospel • In “Christendom” it is possible to simply exhort Christianized people to “do what they know they should.” There is little or no real engagement, listening, or persuasion. It is more a matter of exhortation (and often, heavy reliance on guilt.) 93
In a missional church preaching and communication should always assume the presence of skeptical people, and should engage their stories, not simply talk about “old times.” • To “enter” means to show sympathy toward and deep acquaintance with the literature, music, theater, etc. of the existing culture’s hopes, dreams, ‘heroic’ narratives, fears. • The older culture’s story was—to be a good person, a good father/mother, son/ daughter, to live a decent, merciful, good life. • Now the culture’s story is— a) to be free and self-created and authentic (theme of freedom from oppression), and b) to make the world safe for everyone else to be the same (theme of inclusion of the ‘other’; justice). • To “re-tell” means to show how only in Christ can we have freedom without slavery and embracing of the ‘other’ without injustice. 3. Theologically train lay people for public life and vocation • In ‘Christendom’ you can afford to train people just in prayer, Bible study, evangelism—private world skills—because they are not facing radically non-Christian values in their public life—where they work, in their neighborhood, etc. • In a ‘missional’ church, the laity needs theological education to ‘think Christianly’ about everything and work with Christian distinctiveness. They need to know: a) what cultural practices are common grace and to be embraced, b) what practices are antithetical to the gospel and must be rejected, c) what practices can be adapted/ revised. • In a ‘missional’ situation, lay people renewing and transforming the culture through distinctively Christian vocations must be lifted up as real ‘kingdom work’ and ministry along with the traditional ministry of the Word. • Finally, Christians will have to use the gospel to demonstrate true, Biblical love and ‘tolerance’ in “the public square” toward those with whom we deeply differ. This tolerance should equal or exceed that which opposing views show toward Christians The charge of intolerance is perhaps the main ‘defeater’ of the gospel in the nonChristian west. 4. Create Christian community which is counter-cultural and counter-intuitive. • In Christendom, ‘fellowship’ is basically just a set of nurturing relationships, support and accountability. That is necessary, of course. • In a missional church, however, Christian community must go beyond that to embody a ‘counter-culture,’ showing the world how radically different a Christian society is with regard to sex, money, and power.
• In sex. We avoid both
the secular society’s idolization of sex and traditional society’s fear of sex. We 94
also exhibit love rather than hostility or fear toward those whose sexual life patterns are different. • In money. We promote a radically generous commitment of time, money, relationships, and living space to social justice and the needs of the poor, the immigrant, the economically and physically weak. • In power. We are committed to power-sharing and relationship-building between races and classes that are alienated outside of the Body of Christ. • In general, a church must be more deeply and practically committed to deeds of compassion and social justice than traditional liberal churches and more deeply and practically committed to evangelism and conversion than traditional fundamentalist churches. This kind of church is profoundly ‘counter-intuitive’ to American observers. It breaks their ability to categorize (and dismiss) it as liberal or conservative. Only this kind of church has any chance in the nonChristian west. 5. Practice Christian unity as much as possible on the local level. • In Christendom, when ‘everyone was a Christian’ it was necessary (perhaps) for a church to define itself over against other churches. That is, to get an identity you had to say, “we are not like that church over there, or those Christians over here.” • Today, however, it is much more illuminating and helpful for a church to define itself over against ‘the world’—the values of the non-Christian culture. It is very important that we not spend our time bashing and criticizing other kinds of churches. That simply plays in to the common ‘defeater’ that Christians are all intolerant. • While we have to align ourselves in denominations that share many of our distinctives, at the local level we should cooperate and reach out to and support the other congregations and churches in our local area. This will raise many thorny issues, of course, but our bias should be in the direction of cooperation. CASE STUDY
Let me show you how this goes beyond any ‘program.’ These are elements that have to be present in every area of the church. So, for example, what makes a small group ‘missional’? A ‘missional’ small group is not necessarily one which is doing some kind of specific ‘evangelism’ program (though that is to be recommended) Rather, 1) if its members love and talk positively about the city/neighborhood, 2) if they speak in language that is not filled with pious tribal or technical terms and phrases, nor disdainful and embattled language, 3) if in their Bible study they apply the gospel to the core concerns and stories of the people of the culture, 4) if they are obviously interested in and engaged with the literature and art and thought of the surrounding culture and can discuss it both appreciatively and yet critically, 5) if they exhibit deep 95
concern for the poor and generosity with their money and purity and respect with regard to opposite sex, and show humility toward people of other races and cultures, 6) they do not bash other Christians and churches—then seekers and nonbelieving people from the city A) will be invited and B) will come and will stay as they explore spiritual issues. If these marks are not there it will only be able to include believers or traditional, “Christianized� people.
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SESSION NINE READING VO C ATION IN CONTEMPORARY S OCI E T Y Contributors: Gordon Preece Adopted by the © 2014 by the Theology of Work Project, Inc.
INTRODUCTION
Vocation (or calling) language is still common in both religious and secular sources as this spectrum of examples shows: •Baylor University advertises through the mouth of a new college student: “I got calls from UNC Emory and George Washington. But I found my call at Baylor.” This raises the question “What does God call us to and how?” • In another ad MDiv student Michelle Sanchez says “I wanted to become a CEO, but then God called me to something greater….I sensed God was calling me to full-time ministry.” This raises the question “What is the value of ‘secular’ work and is paid church ministry greater or more sacred?” • An article entitled “The Case for Kids” asks are women who have children merely “breeders”? Or is having children the call of all women able to do so? • The back-cover blurb of Max Lucado’s book He Chose the Nails says “Max Lucado has a blessed calling: Denalyn calls him Honey. Jenna, Andrea, and Sara call him Dad. The members of the Oak Hills Church of Christ in San Antonia call him their preacher. And God calls him His.” This raises questions of our calling to spouse and family, God’s people in ministry, and God himself – all through the ways we are addressed, named or called by our most significant others. • The caption in a recent ad for a mobile phone with vibrator read “I can feel when somebody is calling me. It’s not supernatural, it’s technological.” How do we experience God’s call in a cacophonous, technological world of thousands of calls? This collection of “calling” quotes raises the question where do our concepts of calling come from and what does Scripture say about calling? This paper will start with the apostle Paul (and his great interpreter Luther) who is central to the debate about calling and closest to our post-resurrection situation, move to the gospels, then examine broader biblical, especially Old Testament themes of creation and providence. We will then seek to synthesize and balance the scriptural material through connecting calling to the doctrine of the Trinity as a summary of the story of salvation or God’s work, as a model for human work. We will finally apply this scriptural and doctrinal material to the question of vocational guidance – does God call us to particular work and if so how?
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CALL IN PAUL AND LUTHER
A helpful contemporary definition of calling is “the truth that God calls us to himself so decisively that everything we are…do…and have is invested with a special devotion, dynamism, and direction lived out as a response to his summons and service.” But what does calling or vocation (“to call” in Latin) mean in Scripture? The general New Testament view stresses a Christians’ common calling to conversion and corresponding Christ-like character or holiness (cf. Romans. 1:7; 1 Corinthians 1:2, 9, 1 Cor. 1:9, 26, 2 Cor. 3:18; Ephesians 4:1; 2 Timothy 1:9; 1 Peter 1:15-16, 2:9, 1 John 3:2-3). Our common use of the concept of calling to a particular social or work role dates back to the early 16th century when Protestant Reformer Martin Luther interpreted “calling” this way in 1 Cor. 7:20, opening it up to all Christians in the light of his doctrine of the priesthood of all believers. This replaced the millennium-long traditional Catholic sense that a calling only applied to the priesthood or monastery. The monastic tradition exalted the “perfect” contemplative, Mary-like life of poverty, chastity and obedience (to the church) over the “permitted” active, Martha-like life (Luke 10:38-42) of secular work, marriage and obedience to the State, thus making an eternal principle out of a particular incident. But many today say Luther’s view of an individual calling to a social or work role is due to his incorrectly translating the Greek term klesei in 1 Cor. 7:20 as “vocation” or “calling,” in the sense of occupation. This influenced the King James Version’s (KJV) literal English translation “Let every man abide in the calling wherein he was called.” Contrast the more liberal modern translation “Let each of you remain in the condition in which you were called” (NRSV) or converted. To decide between these two views Paul’s condensed summary statement in 1 Cor. 7:20 (cf. 1 Cor. 7:17 and 7:24) needs its context unpacked. The Greek (soul versus body) dualism of the Corinthians and their desire for upward social and spiritual mobility caused them to question Paul about marriage, seeking to change to an apparently more spiritual, heavenly, unmarried status (1 Cor. 7:1, 25 cf. Matthew 19:12 and Luke 10: 38-41). In response, Paul states his general principle of staying in the same social status/class and roles as when they were converted. After all, Christ called or converted them there, making their social roles relative, not absolute. These “intertwined” senses of “calling” cause Paul to nearly jump, like Luther, to seeing “the setting in which one is called as ‘calling’ itself.” But “at most ‘calling’ refers to the circumstances in which the calling took place.” The prepositions are key here. The difference is between calling in a situation when converted (Barrett and Volf) and calling to a situation (Luther). Os Guinness captures the sense of our primary call: “First and foremost we are called to Someone (God), not something (such as motherhood, politics or teaching) or somewhere (such as the inner-city or Mongolia).”
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Yet, while God’s call to Christian conversion and conduct is not equated with these social spheres, it is closely related to them and sanctifies them in 1 Cor. 7:17ff. A secondary use of calling language for relational and work roles is still justified, as Fee notes: Paul means that by calling a person within a given situation, that situation itself is taken up in the call and thus sanctified to him or her. Similarly, by saving a person in that setting, Christ thereby “assigned” it to him/her as his/her place of living out life in Christ .... Precisely because our lives are determined by God’s call, not by our situation, we need to learn to continue there as those who are “before God” .... There let one serve the Lord, ... whether it be a mixed marriage, singleness, blue-or white-collar work, or socio-economic condition. Paul then illustrates his basic principle of “staying” put in one’s social situation and occupation through the ultimate unimportance of both circumcision (vv. 18, 19) and slavery/occupation (vv. 21-24 cf. Gal. 3:28) compared with salvation. Yet instead of the Corinthians’ view of our relational/occupational setting as mere stage scenery or scaffolding to be discarded as soon as possible, Paul sees it as potentially part of our primary calling to live out salvation but in our secondary social and work roles. Like sacraments, callings are an outward, visible sign of inward, spiritual transformation. For Paul, our relational and occupational settings are not accidental but providential. Staying in the situation you were in when called or converted potentially converts even the most unpromising situation into a place of service to God. But this is not a rigid law. Paul sees occupational or role change as undesirable in some cases e.g. selling oneself into slavery or changing racial identity (uncircumcision); and unnecessary but possible or desirable in others, if e.g., a slave-master or nonChristian spouse allows one’s freedom (v. 15, 21). The Corinthians therefore need not abandon their social roles, nor must they stay in them. Paul’s explanation in v. 29-31 stresses the tension of Christian freedom in marriage and work in a fallen world, between the now and the not yet dimension of our call to God’s Kingdom: “the time is short. From now on those who have wives should live as if they had none; … those who buy something, as if it were not theirs to keep; those who use the things of the world, as if not engrossed in them. For this world in its present form is passing away.” We are called to stay in our worldly situations/roles or creation but our fundamental allegiance and concern is called away towards the new creation. In understandable reaction to a millennium of monastic denial of created roles like marriage and work in their super-spiritual enthusiasm for the away part of the tension, and from his own Medieval conservatism, Luther stresses the stay (or creational) side. In equally understandable reaction to the later “Protestant Distortion” or Protestant Work Ethic’s idolatrous elevation and secularization of work into our primary calling, even a “work” earning salvation, contrary to Luther, Volf 99
stresses the away (or new creational) side. The Spirit of the new creation transforms our social and work situations to allow gifts to flourish. In sum, Paul challenges the Corinthians and us to maintain our availability to God’s kingdom or new creation but without abandoning the created roles it will preserve and perfect. While there is a tension between our roles in creation and in God’s Kingdom (1 Cor. 7:29-31), between being called to stay and being called away, the two are ultimately reconciled, for the Kingdom is “creation healed” (Hans Küng). CALL IN THE GOSPELS
When we turn to the Gospels with this interpretive grid we see that contrary to the dominance of the monastic “Catholic Distortion” and a Protestant form of the same distortion in terms of so-called “full-time Christian ministry,” Jesus’ followers were not all called away from their occupations. Jesus’ followers came from all walks of life and many stayed in them. The first group, the disciples, included middle class fishermen with their own boats and servants. Fishing was one of the biggest businesses in Galilee—fish being the basic source of protein. Levi was a wealthy tax collector (Luke 5:29). To answer Jesus’ call and follow Jesus they left behind relative wealth and security (Matthew 4:18-22; Mark 1:14-20) as the rich young ruler failed to (Mt. 19:16-30). The second group, the stay-at-home supporters, followed Jesus closely and continuously, although they did not travel with him. They supported him and his disciples from their relatively well off positions. These include Peter’s mother-in-law (Mark 1:29-34), Lazarus (John 11) and his sisters Mary and Martha (Luke 10:38-42), wealthy men like Joseph of Arimathea (Luke 24:50-51), and the wealthy women “who provided for them [Jesus and his disciples] out of their resources” (Luke 8:3). This group included followers of Jesus who stayed in their occupations. A third group, the crowds, included a wide range of people, less intimately and regularly connected to Jesus. Many were called to stay in their situation and testify to their salvation like the Gadarene demoniac after his healing (Mk.5:18-20;cf. 8: 26; Matt. 8:13; 9:6). Tax collectors like Zacchaeus (Luke 19) were called away from greed but not from their occupations. Compare Luke 3:10-14 on repentance on the job, not from the job, for the ethically challenged occupations of soldiers and tax collectors. In sum, Jesus called his followers to lives of redemptive sacrifice and celebrative delight. Perhaps the outer ring of followers, including especially Zacchaeus, is the best ‘type’ for professional people ... These ‘righteous rich’ committed their possessions and their positions in the world to the work of redemption in the fullest sense ... A poverty of spirit animated their delight, and this proved itself in free and effective actions of good will toward the poor and the powerless.
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A BROADER BIBLICAL, CREATIONAL AND PROVIDENTIAL BASIS OF VOCATION
Luther’s great rediscovery of “the priesthood of all believers” saw our primary calling to Christ consecrating our secondary but significant social roles to Christian service. However, Luther’s perhaps over-enthusiastic stress on calling to specific occupational roles, his static medieval stress on staying permanently within them, and later Protestant secularizing and individualizing of calling have led many to throw out the baby with the bathwater on the grounds that he misread 1 Cor. 7. However, we, like Luther, can draw a biblical theology of work deductively from broad biblical themes. For example, our first and foundational calling in Scripture is to image and reflect God’s royal reign through the creation mandate, to “have dominion...,be fruitful and multiply and fill the earth and subdue it” (Genesis 1:2628 NRSV). As God’s people we are called to anticipate and reflect the Kingdom of God in our domestic partnership with each other as male and female and in caring, cooperative dominion over creation. This involves reproductive and productive work for both men and women in their distinctive ways. We image God through our work because the biblical God is the first worker. God is the one who effortlessly says “Let it be.” Everything visible and invisible is “the work of his hands”. He is the master craftsperson - the potter (Isaiah 45:9, 64:8), the architect of the universe (Proverbs 8:22-31), the homemaker (Luke 15:8-10), the weaver who knits humans together in their mother’s womb (Psalms 139:13-16). Recently, some theologians, most notably Pope John Paul II, have depicted humans as “co-creators” with God. This is true in the sense that our work (and rest) should be modelled on God’s creative work (and rest), “six days you shall labour and do all your work ... for in six days the Lord made the heavens and the earth, the sea and all that is in them . . .” (Exodus 20:9-11). However, our work is secondary and creaturely and does not complete God’s. The exclusive theological use of barah, to create, sets the original creative work of God apart from all possible human works. Nonetheless, in Exodus 31:1-11 and 35:31-36:1 Bezalel and his fellow workers were filled with the Spirit in designing a sanctuary for the Ark of the Covenant. Some reject any general doctrine of creativity from such a specific reference to a sacred activity.[23] Yet, in the light of the portrayal of the whole creation as God’s sanctuary in Genesis 1 and humans as God’s image set in the sanctuary as a sign and sacrament of God’s rule, creative activity is one way we externalise our identity and calling in God’s image. As J.R.R.Tolkien writes, we are “sub-creators.”
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Although now long-estranged, Man is not wholly lost nor wholly changed. Dis-graced he may be, yet is not de-throned, And keeps the rags of lordship he once owned: Man, Sub-Creator … Fantasy [or any creative work] remains a human right: we make in our measure and in our derivative mode, because we are made: and not only made, but made in the image and likeness of a Maker. The special and Spirit-filled callings of Bezalel and his colleagues and the Old Testament prophets (Exodus 3, Isaiah 6, Jeremiah 1:1-15) are universalised as God’s Spirit is poured out “on all flesh … even on the male and female slaves” (Joel 2:2829), the lowest of workers. In the New Testament we are all filled, gifted and called as part of God’s prophetic people, the new humanity in Christ (Acts 2:17-18, Ephesians 4:1-13). The Old Testament’s high view of creation, humanity and our creative calling to dominion under God (Psalm 8) prepares the way for a powerful sense of God’s providential presence in our work. Robert Banks sees Luther linking “human work with God’s ongoing providential work” in Psalm 127 and 139, Proverbs 3:5-6 and Matthew 6:25-34 and 10:29-31. He says of Luther’s providential extension of churchbased vocation terminology that: He has widened the notion of calling beyond its reference to evangelistic and pastoral responsibilities to cover all work that provides a service to others. As long as the special importance of the former is recognised, and the responsibility of all Christians to be involved in them, Luther’s more highly developed understanding of vocation is quite valid. It simply brings Paul’s teaching on work into contact with broader biblical themes and through these develops it in a more systematic and practical way. Philosopher Paul Helm agrees: So a Christian has two callings. He is effectually called by grace, converted. In addition there is a call of a different kind, that which is provided by the network of circumstance, personal relations, past history, in which he is found when God’s grace comes to him .... Here the biblical teaching about divine providence is presented in a particular and personal way. As Harry Blamires notes: The Christian doctrine of vocation ... follows indisputably from two propositions. The first, that God is everywhere active in human affairs and his will operative at all times. The second, that he is a rational God, fully aware that the world needs farmers and miners as well as priests and nuns .... The doctrine of Providence 102
stresses the ceaseless and ubiquitous intrusion of God into human affairs. The doctrine of Vocation defines a prime mode of that intrusion. Lee Hardy pictures Luther’s perspective as “God’s Providential Presence in the Work of our Hands.” Through the order of stations [social roles] God sees that the daily needs of humanity are met. Through the human pursuit of vocations across the array of earthly stations the hungry are fed, the naked are clothed, the sick are healed, the ignorant are enlightened and the weak are protected. That is, by working we actually participate in God’s ongoing providence for the human race. However, this had dangers through Luther’s historical and polemical overidentification of God’s providence with particular social structures and occupational roles. This sometimes led to a sense of vocational unchangeability and manipulative misuse of calling language to exploit those called by requiring long hours and paying low wages. A THREEFOLD, TRINITARIAN CALLING
Luther’s great breakthrough in recognizing ordinary callings nonetheless overemphasized God’s work as Creator and providential maintainer of creation and our work of staying in our created roles and occupations. He separated this from God’s work in Christ and the Spirit in his doctrine of God’s Two Kingdoms—the worldly kingdom of God the Creator and the heavenly kingdom of Christ and the Spirit. This split within God’s triune work opened up his doctrine of vocation to later secularization—separating our sense of calling to a job from our primary calling to Jesus. To gain a balanced and united understanding of our callings (including work) in the light of God’s work, we will draw on the Trinitarian summaries of God’s work in the great orthodox creeds (Apostles and Nicene Creeds). Because we all have partial perceptions of God’s work we need to be more thoroughly Trinitarian instead of often practicing a Unitarian (one person e.g. God as Creator) or Binitarian (two person e.g. Jesus and the Spirit) theology playing favourites with the Trinity. Individuals, institutions and marketplace ministries often grasp one or two aspects of the Trinity’s work that highlights their own work or calling. Some mainline liberal churches and groups focus more on work as just dominion over and care for creation (the Father), some Evangelicals focus on work as a means to evangelism (the Son), some Pentecostals focus on spiritual gifts, fruits and new creation (the Holy Spirit). A particular emphasis, gifting or calling is fine but it is divisive and competitive to claim ours is more essential, as if the whole body of Christ is only one organ (1 Corinthians 12:14-31).
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SON Evangelistic
FATHER Creation
HOLY SPIRIT Relational
In classical Trinitarian theology, the Father, Son and Spirit all cooperate in their work in the world. Yet each takes the lead in the Trinitarian dance for their special part in salvation history. So while the Father is primary in creation, the Word/Son is involved (John 1:1, Colossians 1:15-20,Hebrews 1:3 etc) and the Creator Spirit too (Genesis 1:2, Psalms 104: 30 ‘You created all of them by your Spirit, and you give new life to the earth’). Christ is primary in relation to reconciliation and evangelism (Matthew 28:20ff; 2 Corinthians 5:17-21), the Spirit in transformation and completion of our relationships to God (Romans 5:1-8,Matthew 22:37-40), humanity (Galatians 5, 1 Corinthians 12) and the earth (Romans 8:18-27). But they work together. Like the Trinity we should all bless each one’s work if we are to have a properly balanced view of God’s Trinitarian work in creation, reconciliation and transformation. This is why we need a three callings or commissions theology. Paul Stevens similarly pictures this as a three-tiered wedding cake of callings. I will adapt this in a more explicitly Trinitarian way. The foundational bottom layer of the creation commission is to all humans (to communion, community building and co- or preferably sub-creativity—Genesis 1: 26-28, Psalm 8). The second tier is the Great Commission—to all Christians (to conversion, community and Christ-like character, witness and dominion through service (Matthew 28:18-20, Ephesians 4:1-13). The third and top layer is the Spirit’s personal or particular call to individuals to apply the relational commission or Great Commandment to work, family and political roles (1 Corinthians 7:17, 20, Ephesians 5: 21-6:9, Romans 13) using their unique gifts. This Trinitarian view of our callings in the context of the three commissions corrects the Medieval Catholic hierarchical distortion of only some Christians i.e. monastics and priests, having a Christian and personal calling. A Protestant echo of this has clergy and missionaries on top as working for Christ as pastors and evangelists, caring professions like social workers and doctors next as having a personal, spiritual calling working for others in personal relationships, while business people, skilled 104
workers, scientists, IT technicians, artists etc. who develop creation or matter come last. Each of these Trinitarian emphases has real strengths, but also weaknesses, when used exclusively. Their exclusive emphasis leaves us with an unbalanced, wobbly one or two-legged stool which cannot take the weight of our working lives and cause misunderstanding, disunity and competition in workplace ministry. Firstly, mainline Christians with a creational/cultural commission emphasis rightly stress the biblical wisdom tradition that we are creatures first,then Christians, and stress our positive relationship to the world of nature and culture. They have made great contributions to science, culture and social justice. As just one example of many, Professor Graeme Clark, inventor of the bionic ear, consciously imitated God’s creative design of a shell he found on a beach to thread electrodes to stimulate hearing in the similarly spiral-shaped human ear. Many leave out the realm of our relationship with creation and the earth in blessing, dominion and stewardship (Genesis 1:26-28, 2 and Psalm 8). The creation commission is often the Great Omission compared with the Great Evangelistic Commission and the Great or Love Commandment. The sense of its foundational greatness, as wide as creation, has been lost. The loss of the creation commission has detrimental pastoral effects on Christians who are not primarily or directly people-workers or evangelistic workers. They often feel like third-class believers because they are not social workers or evangelists at work. Yet an exclusive or over-emphasis on God as Father and Creator can become easily secularised and lose a sense of evangelistic urgency and Christ’s finality and uniqueness in a comfortable chaplaincy to secular, pluralistic societies and workplaces. This over-emphasis can also lack a sense of the Spirit’s intimate and intrusive involvement in our life and work in creation. The modern secularised and individualised Protestant ethic distortion often depicts calling as just an individual career, forgetting the divine Caller and Gifter and other relational priorities. A thoroughly Trinitarian approach to calling does not anchor it to a static, deistic view of nature, but sees the Son and the Spirit thoroughly involved with the Father in calling us to humbly co-operate in the work of creation and re-creation. Secondly, Evangelicals (like myself) are rightly Christ-centred and urgently evangelistic, majoring on the calling of the Great Commission. But they forget that Christ is also the creator as John 1, Colossians 1:15-20 and the first chapter of almost every NT book shows. They stress the urgency of training more ‘‘fulltime Christian workers” for kingdom work and see ordinary or secular work as worthwhile only “to put food on the table and money in the plate” or people in the kingdom through evangelism. They fail to recognise that exercising responsible dominion through 105
work is also kingdom work. Dominion or ruling is what kings do. Ruling creation is worthwhile in itself not merely as a means to evangelism. It is worship of the King of all creation (Romans 12: 1, 2). Many still identify real Christians with clergy and missionaries called away from ordinary, creation work by Christ’s call to evangelistic or Kingdom work. I recently heard a well-known, gifted preacher in a prominent US church make a throw-away remark about the dirty, smelly fishing trade Jesus called his disciples from. The distaste smacked of a man of letters, a pastor (like myself) who works with words and people, not creation or things, completely overlooking the necessary, useful, and rewarding nature of the work itself. An antidote to such an over-emphasis on Christ’s call to evangelise is the story that former Institute of Christian Studies lecturer Calvin Seerveld tells about his Dutch father and fishmonger. One day a woman asked for some fish. His father sprang into action and speedily and skilfully gutted and scaled it. The pleased customer said “I can see that you haven’t missed your calling.” Recently, I ate swordfish in a fine Gloucester (Massachusetts) restaurant while watching a fishing boat unloading its catch. I also saw a wonderful monument there to those thousands “that go down to the sea in ships” (Psalms 107:23) and who risked and lost their lives. I then read the book and saw the movie The Perfect Storm about many of them. I vowed never to take the fish I eat or the people who catch and prepare it for granted again. Theirs is a difficult, but still divine calling of exercising respectful dominion over the sea. Because the three persons of the Trinity work co-operatively, not competitively, we need to re-link the creation and evangelistic commissions. The creation commission’s go forth and ‘fill the earth’ (Genesis 1:28 to Adam, cf. Genesis 9:7 to Noah, Genesis 12:1-3 to Abram) is behind the Great Commission’s ‘go’ into the world (Matthew 28:1820 or ‘as you go’ about your daily work and life (Matthew 10:7).When Jesus says ‘all authority in heaven and on earth has been given to me’ he claims dominion over all creation as the true, ultimate human. Thirdly, others from a more Pentecostal perspective correctly remind us of the importance of the Holy Spirit’s presence, calling, gifting, empowering and healing, anticipating the Kingdom’s coming. People are gifted by God’s Spirit (Ephesians 4:113; Romans 12:3-8) for specific tasks for others’ good (1 Corinthians 14:12). The Spirit also applies the relational commission of love for God and others to our particular relational roles and responsibilities. The Holy Spirit nurtures the fruit of Christlike character (Galatians 5:22-26) that is developed in our life and work callings. The Holy Spirit’s calling of all God’s gifted people makes us all 24/7 servants or fulltime ministers (1 Corinthians 12:5). Even Nero’s Roman state is called God’s “minister” or “servant” (Romans 13:4 before Nero lost his philosopher – adviser Seneca and his 106
sanity). We are all kleros or “called” (from which “clergy” derives), and all are laos or “people” (from which “laity” or “God’s people” derives). Given the Spirit’s pouring out upon all believers at Pentecost (Acts 2:4, 17-18), we need to rediscover our calling to the priesthood, prophethood and kingship of all believers, teaching/pastoring, prophetically challenging and wisely ruling/managing God’s people and creation respectively (Jeremiah 18:18). Bank manager Sandra Herron rediscovered this by ‘Reflecting Christ in the Banking Industry: The Manager as Prophet, Priest, and King.” To affirm these gifts and callings of God’s people like Sandra we need to develop forms of recognition of lay vocation in society through regular lay or marketplace commissioning services. However, those who over-stress the Spirit’s work can forget that the Spirit is the Spirit of the Word/Christ and of the Creator. Thus they rightly pray for spiritual healing in church, but not often for the work of doctors and nurses or architects, builders and craftspersons (Exodus 35:2-3; 1 Chronicles 28:11-12) in the workplace who also have God’s creative gifts. But gifts of administration, craftsmanship, mercy, evangelism, political leadership and counsel etc overflow the church to bless the workplace. Miroslav Volf, who comes from a Pentecostal background, contrasts the traditional “additive” or top-up model of new supernatural and extraordinary spiritual gifts being added to our ordinary created talents with a more biblical “interaction” model that sees the integral relationship between created and re-created gifts, both coming from God’s creative and re-creative Spirit. A recent debate in LayNet magazine revealed the difficulty many preachers and people have in associating spiritual gifts and calling with created things or matter. A bishop wondered how a truck-driver could possibly have any sense of calling, not being a professional people-person like a doctor, nurse or social worker who is supposed to love others according to the Great Commandment. However, philosopher-priest-carpenter Armand Larive notes how the Hebrew word hokmah is used for wisdom and skill. Bezalel, “chosen [or called] by God and …filled with the Spirit of God, with skill, ability and knowledge in all kinds of crafts” (Exodus 35:30 cf. 35) and other craftsmen working on the tabernacle have it, “taking and respectfully using what the created order will allow. A goldsmith knows the malleability of his material, a farmer knows the seasons, a sailor [or fisherman] develops an eye for the seasons and stars. It would apply also to the way a truck driver can back a big rig into a narrow alley. Such a driver has hokmah.” This is an expression of the creation commission of having responsible dominion over the earth or material reality, but the Creator Spirit (Genesis 1:2, Psalm 104) gives the ability to do so. While truck driving can no doubt have many monotonous elements, it also involves skill and responsibility for safety. Recently I was moving home and was shocked to find (a 10 or more ton) interstate semi-trailer arrive at my new apartment block which has a 3 ton limit on trucks entering. I warned the driver as I had when they 107
were loading but he insisted on backing his skill. With many people watching and me pretending to have nothing to do with it, I watched as the truck got stuck half-way around a very tight bend. I had images of it being permanently stuck, blocking the apartment complex forever. Fortunately, while lacking wisdom for trying it at all, the truck-driver had the great skill to reverse the semi out, something I, who have trouble reversing a tiny trailer, could only marvel at. I thanked God in a silent prayer for this man’s dominion over machinery and matter. He had hokmah, at least over his truck. Such work exercising dominion over material creation can be not only a matter of skill but of loving care. As the Australian cartoonist Michael Leunig said: I watched a man making a pavement in Melbourne in a busy city street: the concrete was poured and he had his little trowel and there was traffic roaring around, there were cranes and machines going, and this man was on his hands and knees lovingly making a beautiful little corner on the kerb. That’s a sort of love …. That man’s job is important and he’s a bit of a hero for doing it like that…. Love involves that as much as it involves what happens between people. It’s about one’s relationship between oneself and the world and its people and its creatures and its plants, its ideas. What Leunig calls heroic and important, Christians can see as God’s calling. VOCATIONAL GUIDANCE: DOES GOD GUIDE PEOPLE INTO THEIR WORK AND IF SO HOW?
How does a biblical view of calling apply to an individual’s gifting from God? As we will see, this may or may not neatly fit a person’s paid work and primary use of time, particularly in developing economies. Is vocational choice just a middle-class luxury when most people are stuck with whatever job is available (if any)? Is there a single particular calling God has for us and is it for life? These are questions of vocational guidance for which we propose some basic principles based on our preceding understanding of calling. 1. We need to first focus on God’s cosmic purpose or calling to the Kingdom. This operates on a far broader canvas than the debilitating deterministic and individualistic “dot” or “bullseye” approach of “what job is God’s will for me” or “what marriage partner is God’s choice for me?” as if there is only one job or one possible spouse. This bigger biblical canvas for callings puts them in second place to our primary calling to follow Christ and “seek first his Kingdom and his justice.” Then our other basic needs will be met as well (Matthew 6:33). As Robert Banks notes “The criterion for choice and change of calling then becomes: Does it point in the direction of the Kingdom?” Further, our calling to God’s Kingdom community, not pursuing an individualistic career, sets self-fulfilment in the threefold context of service to God, one another and creation. Self-fulfilment is not something to anxiously seek but more a pleasant by-product of this network of right relationships or shalom. 108
Callings or questions of God’s “will” for work, marriage etc are significant but not ultimately significant, in contrast to Christ’s work and God’s will for the world’s salvation (1 Timothy 2:4) and God’s ethical will. Within that will we have great freedom to prayerfully and wisely choose (if we have a choice) optimal opportunities for ministry, knowing that a mistake will not cancel our salvation. This way provides a balanced Christian response between the anxiety–inducing bullseye view inspired by heavenly voices or signs and a secularised rationalism that collapses calling into just a job or career that we rationally calculate. As Os Guinness noted earlier, more important than the “what” or “where” of guidance is the “who” of our guiding Shepherd Jesus (John 10:11-15) and who we become in Christ, not what we do. 2. “Freedom in limitation.” In a time of such surfeit of ‘choice’ for western middle-classes and “the options generation” we need a longitudinal, historical perspective on these choices in the light of the prominent lines of God’s providence in our lives and through salvation and church history. The great Swiss theologian Karl Barth writes wisely of “freedom in limitation.” God calls us providentially to serve him through the liberating limitations of our place in history, stage of life, gifts and opportunities. “These are the creaturely carriers and media of the voice of God Himself.” Despite the crippling consumerist illusion of infinite choice we are finite creatures, bound to time and place. Like Esther in exile under the Persians, protecting her people from genocide, God may have raised us up “for such a time as this” (Esther 4:14). 3. A Hard Call. What of those with little choice and a hard call? Can difficult, gruelling work, a human necessity, be a calling? Take for example Graeme Marriott’s story of his callings as a father of three children and foreman at CBM Waste Management. We are a small … company. We were into recycling but it’s not that profitable. Our attention turns to waste disposal. My job is to run the place: I organise and do some paper work. We do garbage and recycling…. There’s three guys, and we start at 3 am…. I drive the compactor for half the run, and I run at the back of the truck for the other half. I’ve been doing this for six years. I process the recycling every day. … It’s heavy manual work. There is lifting, lots of noise especially when you’re processing. Running … steep streets is physically demanding particularly in the summer …. You’ve got to get going early, and that is disruptive to family life. You work all days, all weather, even public holidays. As an essential service you can’t have time off. I like the challenge of the physical aspect: how fast and efficient can we get? But it’s pretty mindless – smashing bottles, running behind a truck…. People ask me about my work and some see me as a bum. In some way it is an end of the road job. But it is essential and people rely on you. If we went on strike, and waste started to 109
build up, it would be a health risk. … Recycling is more important these days, and I’m respected a bit. My daughter’s school asked me to speak to the children about recycling. These recycling issues affect us all so my role is important. I know that even if it’s sometimes hard to say, God has called me to do my job. Graeme has a grueling job, but he makes the most of it, sharing the difficult aspects around, and he takes his responsibility seriously as something from the hand of God. 4. The Need is not Necessarily the Call. Many years ago, as an adolescent, I visited my cousin the night she died in hospital from a brain tumour. She was delirious and I was overwhelmed with compassion at such desperate need and wanted to be a doctor. But I was not gifted at maths and science and eventually channelled my compassion towards pastoral ministry where I was more suited and less likely to kill somebody, unless they mistook the Dr in front of my name for a medical doctor. There are many needs and our finitude means we can only be in one place at one time. So we need to pay primary attention to the needs of our “nearest” neighbours – not necessarily geographical – but those we have the gifts, resources and responsibility to meet. In this light Frederick Buechner writes: “The place God calls you to is where your deep gladness and the world’s deep hunger meet.” God wants us each to be “a cheerful giver,” (2 Corinthians 9:7) aware that the gifts we can gladly give, are not our private possession, but God-given, to be passed on to others. The language of adding depth to our relational roles is also used by John Schuster. Calls draw us into the depth level of whatever roles we may already have … [They] turn the insurance policy pedlars into advisors of needed financial security, grocery store employees into health and nutrition suppliers, doctors into healers, secretaries into stewards, businesspeople into entrepreneurs, bureaucrats into civil servants, writers into dreamweavers, parents into cocreators of life. While this may sound a bit grandiose, Schuster’s point is that awareness of God’s activity in and through our ordinary roles deepens our opportunities for extraordinary love and service. 5. Community Discernment. One of the major problems of the western approach to guidance is its individualism and unaccountability. We make up our own minds and say “Here I stand, I can do no other’ like Luther, but without his qualification that “my conscience is captive to the word of God.” Those of a more Spirit-oriented bent can hear the voices they want to hear. Luther said to those in his day “I don’t care if you swallow the Holy Spirit feathers and all” you must convince me by Scripture, tradition and sound reason. Each of these for Luther, through the rational interpretation of Scripture in the church 110
present and past, is a communal process. The Spirit speaks but more often to us than just me. In Acts we hear of the Holy Spirit’s guidance when Paul and Barnabas were sent on mission by the church at Antioch (Acts 13:2-3) and when the Gentiles were accepted into the then largely Jewish church without onerous Jewish laws - “it seemed good to the Holy Spirit and to us” (Acts 15:28). Such corporate discernment, wrestling with one another and in mutual accountability, is a good model for our vocational discernment, though there is obviously individual liberty and responsibility also. Archbishop William Temple was right that to choose a career on selfish or individualistic grounds, without a true sense of calling, confirmed corporately, is “probably the greatest single sin any young person can commit, for it is the deliberate withdrawal from allegiance to God of the greatest part of time and strength.” But the fault is as much, if not more, that of the Church which has left people to their own devices, without resources of corporate discernment and vocational guidance, unless they are considering ordained ministry. 6. Called to be More – and Less. Gail Godwin’s novel Evensong has a character affirm the vocation of a female Episcopal priest by saying “something’s your vocation if it keeps making more of you.” It’s more than just a job but part of a “faithful, flourishing life.” While the language of passion is all-pervasive today, vocation includes, but is more than passion in the emotional sense. It is the commitment and disciplined practice of a focus for life rather than a nibbling approach to food or a channel-surfing approach to media. It is this that “keeps making more of you.” In this way vocations or callings are connected to long-term, holistic covenants in relation to our role responsibilities - to our nearest neighbours - husbands and wives, parents and children, bosses and workers, rulers and citizens. Gregory Jones balances Godwin: “Conversely, we ought to avoid those vocations that are likely to make “less” of us, especially if in them we are likely to be ‘shrivelled’ by one or another form of sin. We can be made ‘less’ by our own temptations, by a particular mismatch between what we are doing and the gifts we have been given by God, by contingent events that overwhelm the possibilities of continuing a specific vocation, or by the corrupting practices or institutions that currently shape our vocation.” Godwin’s phrase helps orient us toward vocations that encourage a flourishing of life. But Godwin’s phrase ‘more of you’ can be co-opted by a seductive culture of selffulfillment…It needs to be placed next to Dietrich Bonhoeffer’s claim in The Cost of Discipleship that when Christ calls [someone] he bids him come and die.”
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