A few of us from GCC had the chance Tuesday to go to Mosaic Church Nashville and spend the day listening to Alex Mcmanus (www.alexmcmanus.org /author, speaker, teacher, church planter, futurist, brother of Erwin Mcmanus) talk about church planting here in the states. The fact is that we live on the mission field. We are surrounded by people each day who are far from the gospel, never grew up in a church, and have no concept of Jesus outside of Easter Sunday each year. Even though millions here in America have abandoned the church and the Christian faith they are very spiritual and seeking answers to spiritual questions. We have can either ignore the fact that we live on the mission field and huddle up in our churches and wonder why people do not come or we can join God in his mission to redeem people here and across the globe. Have no doubt God’s kingdom is expanding and moving. Will we join him in that movement? With all that said, here are some thoughts from the seminar Tuesday…THESE ARE RANDOM and I am still processing much of this but here goes. Dream with me!
Has church became a place for us to stay clean and safe together instead of a launching pad for God’s work in the world?
How can we connect with the unredeemed? What kind of environments connect with the unredeemed? How many real relationships do we have with people who are not Christ followers?
Today many times people come to Christ over time these are 4 turns people make when coming to faith in Christ… Turn to Jesus, Turn to scripture, Turn toward the world to serve, and a Turn to community
Gathering people together to live dream act like Jesus is not that popular. Planting like a church that looks like Jesus is messy. Thinking outside the box gets you slammed.
If we shut our church doors would our city miss our gathering of God’s people?
The church today struggles to reach its own generation …how will they reach future generation.
Our church structures are set up for maintenance not mission. We make people do things our way that are not working in the first place! (when David went to fight Goliath, Saul tried to gave him the armor of its failed army) Seminaries are producing leader to lead a institution! God will raise up an army of warriors to lead against the grain.
The west is a mission field, what will it take to reach this mission field. Will we do what it takes?
Its more important to be the church than just do church!