My One Ask to Big City Big Churches

The really big churches in the cities have done wonderful things in recent years. They have made the services and approach contemporary and therefore more accessible to the younger/emerging generations. They have created first class online presence and content, and they have called many many people to put their faith in Jesus.

This is excellent!

The pandemic has accelerated their use of online presence, service streaming and such. They have attracted thousands of 'viewers', and though different this ministry has further enabled many to call on the name of Jesus to be saved.

This too is great.

Of course there are questions to be asked about followup and leading in long term discipleship, but I believe the big churches are aware of this and trying to minister to this as best they can.

But if I was given the pleasure of being put in a room (real or virtual) of big city big church leaders, and was allowed to ask of them one thing, it would be this:

Thankyou for your online presence/streaming - it is top notch. Continue to call on people to put their faith in Jesus, and continue to work out how to influence their discipleship albeit remotely. But please add one thing to your current 'pitch': as well as encouraging newcomers to continue to engage with your output, please also make absolutely clear the value of engaging with their local church. This will be a double win - it will be good for the newcomer, and it will be good for the Kingdom.

This ask calls for courage and a bigger Kingdom mindset in the leaders of the big churches. A courage to trust that by God's grace local connections will be fruitful. A mindset that the Kingdom may ultimately be better served by engagement with the local church (even if it doesn't have all the resources, bells and whistles that their big church has). That it is about empowering outwards than merely accumulating in.

Missionary Disciples

Nowadays there is much talk about missionary disciples. This is not new - 15 years ago the Baptist Union slogan was 'Encouraging Missionary Disciples', but the emphasis has come to the fore, and the perceived need certainly accelerated by Covid. So there are now conferences focusing on the subject, looking at how we enable there to be more missionary disciples in our churches.

But there are also a few voices who are saying something subtly different. They are encouraging us to see that 'Missionary Disciples' should be an unnecessary combination of words ... because Discipleship must always include being on God's mission. Therefore you don't need the adjective - all true disciples will be missionary disciples for sure.

I have to say that I completely agree with the relative few. When Jesus said 'Come follow me' (to Peter and other fishermen), he also said 'and I will make you fishers of men'. When he called Levi the tax collector to follow it wasn't simply to leave behind is dodgy dealings (though of course it did include that!) ... it was to join on mission (going straight back among his dodgy friends!).

True discipleship means to be on God's mission team.

That doesn't mean we will all be star evangelists, or all of us need to full on extrovert ... but it does mean all of us seeking God for how He wants us to be on mission, and it does mean being prepared to share the hope that we have in Jesus. To not do this, skimp it, park it, or even ignore it ... is simply not being true to the call that Jesus makes on us when we call on Him to be saved.

So I now believe we are selling ourselves short when we talk about 'missionary disciples', since it implies that there are other categories/types of discipleship on offer. Being missionary is intrinsic to the real deal of following Jesus - the other categories are not truly in Christ. What the intrinsic missionary call exactly looks like can vary widely across different people, but it cannot be negotiated out or bracketed off to a subset.

So let us not focus on 'making missionary disciples'. Let us instead repent and reform our thinking on discipleship, seeking His grace to be true to the mission calling that is in following Jesus.

Pyjama Christians

Zoom and other web technologies have helped us all through the pandemic. Churches were applauded for their adaptability and creativity in 'going online' at very short notice last year. Who knew the church could react and change so quickly!

But now conversations between church leaders run along these lines: do we want to keep streaming? The additional people engaging (connecting / viewing) with our services is encouraging ... but are we just putting out a kind of Christian entertainment? Are we forming real community? And what about real discipleship?

We know the term 'Rice Christians' - a negative term used to describe the (bad) scenarios where people seem to show allegiance to the Christian faith in order to receive aid (e.g. rice) in some far off land where access to food is an issue. Yet now, especially in the West, we are in danger of producing 'Pyjama Christians'! Of course it is easier to just click 'View' on the cusp of the meeting start time (or any time thereafter). Yes you can engage from the comfort of your own home, cup of coffee in hand ... take a break whenever you need or want.

All these increase the 'accessibility' of our church gatherings - which is sort of a good thing ...

But Jesus commissioned us to make disciples (Matthew 28). That means challenge, hard decisions, and life-on-life learning together in the Spirit. It suggests changing out of your pyjamas and dressing ready for some hard graft.

The teachings of Jesus (which we are commissioned to teach people to obey) are in many ways wonderfully simple ... and yet hard to live out. On the contrary our plethora of online content risks being sophisticated & complicated ... yet easy to consume.

Maybe simply looking to Jesus gives us a clue on this topic. For Jesus is God come to earth, born as human, living flesh and blood (aka incarnation). In Jesus we see that God is not remote or virtual! Of course the Spirit can work through our remote technologies ... just as the Spirit has worked through pen-friend campaigns and long distance short wave radio ministries in the past. Yet there is something about the together: real and physical that Jesus has already modelled for us. Maybe we were given physical bodies for a reason.

Dreams

Many are sensing, hoping or expecting that the Spirit is stirring for a fresh season of God's special activity in our land. The 'revivalist' in me certainly hopes so too! But more than just wishful thinking, I am grateful that on my radar there are one or two snippets that suggest that the Spirit is indeed stirring. This encourages me to pray that simple but classic charismatic prayer: 'More Lord'!

It has come to my attention that God seems to have given a handful of people I have the privilege to work amongst 'spiritually significant' dreams in recent weeks. One gets my attention because of the accuracy of detail the person has seen in their dream regarding another person - details that they could not possibly know. Another is also a detailed dream which suggests God is revealing deep stuff within the life of the family. Others are clear encouragements and show God-given possibility.

This encourages me that God is on the move. He is concerned with family life, He is concerned to bring healing and transformation. He wants to open things back up. He will empower us to come against specific things that are bad.

The other interesting thing about these dreams that I am aware of, is that several of them have been granted to people who are very young in the faith. These are not people 'experienced in the spiritual gifts', or people with many years of long established deep prayer life, but rather people starting out. May God graciously reveal - regardless of individual's spiritual pedigree!

I have not had any significant dreams myself (I'm not sure I have ever had), but I am taking it as significant that God seems to be moving in this way.

Joel 2:28!