Tag Archive for 'discipleship'

Page 2 of 2

Church Growth

Published by bcg on 4 January 2008 in Church. 0 Comments Tags: , , .

At the end of last term we had a study week on Church Growth & Church Planting.  It was a good week – one of the better study weeks.

One of the points of interest for me was that, although the week was focused primarily on numerical growth and planting, there were a couple of sessions about discipleship.  I have often placed more emphasis on discipleship than evangelism, thinking it more important to grow deeper before growing wider.

However, I think that each is equally important, and that each feeds the other.  The more people existing Christians see coming to faith, the deeper their own faith becomes.  Equally, people with a strong and deep relationship with God become more like him, and therefore more attractive and able to share their faith in a non-threatening and powerful way.

Many Anglican churches are stuck in 'discipleship' mode; and even that has been watered down to little more than maintenance of what is already existing.  Without new Christians, a church becomes stagnant, and without depth new and existing Christians wither and die.

The challenge to me, and to the Anglican church, is a renewed focus on evangelism and numerical growth, which is after all a sign of the kingdom throughout the New Testament.  God still wants people who know him more and more, and people to know him for the first time.

Gift(s) of the Spirit

Published by bcg on 30 December 2007 in *Starred, Bible and Church. 0 Comments Tags: , , , , , , , .

This topic has been mulling over in my mind for a long time.  Since the 'rediscovery' of charismatic gifts and the phenomenal growth of the Pentecostal church, I suppose it has been a hot topic for the church generally.

I am currently reading Knowing God by J.I. Packer, a chapter a night – a fantastic book, which I will review when I'm done – and last night I read chapter 12, 'The Love of God'.  Packer makes some excellent points which happen to coincide with my own feelings on this subject, so I will quote him, and then comment.

In Romans 5.5 Paul says, 'God’s love has been poured into our hearts through the Holy Spirit who has been given to us.'  Packer says:

Paul is not talking of faint and fitful impressions, but of deep and overwhelming ones.

...

Paul assumes that all his readers, like himself, will be living in the enjoyment of a strong and abiding sense of God's love for them.

Third, notice that the instilling of this knowledge is described as part of the regular ministry of the Spirit to those who receive him – to all , that is, who are born again, who are true believers.  One could wish that this aspect of his ministry was prized more highly than it is at the present time.  With a perversity as pathetic as it is impoverishing, we have become preoccupied today with the extraordinary, sporadic, non-universal ministries of the Spirit to the neglect of the ordinary, general ones.  Thus, we show a great deal more interest in the gifts of healing and tongues – gifts of which, as Paul pointed out, not all Christians are meant to partake anyway (1 Cor. 12:28-30) – than in the Spirit's ordinary work of giving peace, joy, hope, and love, through the shedding abroad in our hearts of knowledge of the love of God.  Yet the latter is much more important than the former.

...

It will be tragic if the concern for revival that is stirring at the present time in many places gets diverted into the cul-de-sac of a new Corinthianism.  The best thing that Paul could desire for the Ephesians in connection with the Spirit was that he might continue towards them the Romans 5:5 ministry with ever-increasing power, leading them deeper and deeper into knowledge of the love of God in Christ.

...

Revival means the work of God restoring to a moribund church, in a manner out of the ordinary, those standards of Christian life and experience which the New Testament sets forth as being entirely ordinary; and a right-minded concern for revival will express itself, not in a hankering after tongues (ultimately it is of no importance whether we speak in tongues or not), but rather a longing that the Spirit may shed God's love abroad in our hearts with greater power.  For it is with this (to which deep exercise of soul about sin is often preliminary) that personal revival begins, and by this that revival in the church, once begun, is sustained.

J.I. Packer, Knowing God, 133-134

I wholeheartedly agree with Packer.  The Spirit's work is so much more than we might sometimes be led to believe – he gives so many gifts to each and every Christian, not least the fact that they are believers!  Of course the 'sporadic gifts' are important – I have no doubt that God heals people today – but focussing too much on them leads us to forget the more important, universal gifts.

I want to sit down one day and read a proper and full exposition of the work of the Spirit – I believe Calvin in particular does this well.

Everything we do as a Christian is a gift of the Spirit!  We live entirely by grace, which God gives us in the power of the Spirit.  In talking so much about 'the gifts', in constantly asking the question 'what is my gift?', 'what is my ministry', we forget that all we have is a gift, and that we are given all we have in order that we might serve God and each other, and steward creation aright.  If we get this sorted in our Christian lives, then we will have the right perspective on the 'sporadic gifts' as well – they are not for ourselves, but to enable our service of others, to build up the church.

Given all this, I would argue that it is not just 'conservative' Christians who 'quench the Spirit' (1 Thessalonians 5.19) by refusing to allow space for his work publicly – 'charismatic' Christians do the same by focussing too much on the particular gifts the Spirit gives, and too little on the primary, universal gifts that he gives.  Both are important in the life of the church – but the universal gifts are much more so; the balance needs to be restored.

I think that the greatest miracle is not a dramatic healing but someone who dies in Christ.

Barth on Human Wickedness

Published by bcg on 9 December 2007 in Theology. 0 Comments Tags: , , , , , , , , , .

This was originally published as a comment on this blog on 13 May 2006. The author asked: 'And what is the difference between the wickedness exhibited in the actions that led to that young man's death, and the wickedness of ordinary folk muddling their way through life?'

Karl Barth's answer to your question,

'If wickenedness belongs to human nature, how would it possible for the incarnation to take place?'

is basically that we are not truly human – Jesus is. We are corrupted, so that what we do does not flow directly from what we are. We are liars, appearing to be something we are not. Obviously there is a lot more to it than that, but this isn't the time (or space..!), and I'm not the person.

This is one of his reasons for starting his anthropology with Christology – looking at Jesus (rather than ourselves) for his definition of 'human'. We can know ourselves more truly through Jesus, whose nature is revealed in the Bible and through the Holy Spirit, than through looking at ourselves. Our actions are symptoms of our corruption, they do not show us what it is to be human.

That does side-step rather neatly the problem of Jesus being 'just like us', when we are fallen and corrupted.

Thus 'evil' within us is not a characteristic, but something deeper than that, twisting and corrupting our very being. It cannot be trained out of us, and it is common to us all.

Hueston's final question is the tricky one! In human terms of course, we would say there is a huge difference between beating someone to death and lying to your boss. The 'sound' answer is to say that sin is sin is sin – any black mark on something white spoils it. There are effectively two states of being – holy (God) and sinful (us).

While that last statement is undoubtedly true, it's difficult to accept the previous one. A couple of little black marks are hardly noticeable – a great splodge of ink is surely much worse. Surely lying to your boss is nowhere near as bad as murder.

On one level, that is correct. Our society recognises that in the criminal justice system. There are set fines and jail sentences for difference crimes, increasing with the severity and circumstances of the crime, and so on.

But on another level, it isn't. We come back to Barth's idea that we are basically liars. We do not behave as we should, we do not act like true humans, because we are corrupted. Any lie is a lie, no matter how big or small. Any act which is not in line with our humanity is a lie, it de-humanises us (quite literally for Barth – when we sin we give up our humanity and become something else).

The bar is high, and we'll fail to jump it every time we try, because of our corrupted nature. We can't win! But that's where Jesus comes in – as the only true human that has ever lived, he sealed that achievement on the cross when he died. Through his achievement, on his return all those who belong to him will be transformed to be like him: fully and truly human, incapable of sin and free from the power of death.

God has promised to forgive all who turn back to him in repentance – whoever they are, whatever they've done. God's forgiveness is open to those people who beat that poor boy to death, hard as that may be for us to accept, in the same way as it is there for the rest of us.

Passing Judgement

Published by bcg on 10 November 2007 in Church. 0 Comments Tags: , , , , , , , , , .

At the sermon I heard on Sunday the preacher told a story which effectively made two points:

  1. we should derive our sense of self-worth from the fact that God loves us, not from what other people think of us;
  2. judging others is often hurtful, and usually wrong – we should leave it up to God.

After the service I reflected that the reason we often allow other people's judgements to 'stick' to us, is because we actually deserve judgement. It is of course God's judgement that we deserve, however, not other people's – we have no right to judge each other simply because we all equally deserve judgement ourselves. In judging others we demonstrate our hypocrisy.

I would argue that the place of 'accountability', close friends/family telling you where you are going wrong, is not the same as 'passing judgement', because 'accountability' is only that if it works both ways. Passing judgement is a one-way street from one person to another.

That leaves two reasons why other people's judgements shouldn't stick to us:

  1. only God has the right to judge us – when others do (and when we judge others) it is hypocritical;
  2. God doesn't punish us when he judges others, because Jesus took that punishment on himself, and gave us his righteousness – so although we deserve judgement, actually we don't because Jesus has taken that judgement on himself.

So, given that, is it ever right for humans to pass judgement on other humans? Well, yes actually, in two situations I think:

  1. secular authority, law and order, criminal justic;
  2. Church discipline, where we sometimes have to deal with difficult and damaging situations here and now (as opposed to waiting for God's final perfect judgement).

But when we judge others in these situations, it should always be done with humility, acknowledging that the authority to judge comes only from God, and that ultimately we all deserve judgement. These two situations are God exercising his authority through us – which, again, calls for humility.

‘The Love of God’ or the Cross?

Published by bcg on 22 April 2007 in Bible, Church, Quotations and Theology. 0 Comments Tags: , , , , , , .

Susie and I visited our local church today for a baptism communion service. In some respects it was my ideal service (over in just under an hour and a quarter, very friendly, lots of families and kids), but I was deeply disappointed with the sermon.

The preacher had two passages, from Acts and John. In Acts, Saul was struck blind and spoken to by Jesus. In John, Jesus told the disciples how to catch a load of fish and then asked Peter if he loved him.

The preacher began by talking about the debate between nature and nurture, relating it to the child about to be baptised, and to his own recently baptised granddaughter, as the family and friends of each wonder about the child's future.

He wanted to offer a 'third way'. This 'third way' was above, beneath and beyond nature and nurture. The 'third way' was the love of God. This love is the foundation of life, given equally to all, unchanging no matter what kind of person we are, no matter what our nature is, or how we are nurtured.

It was a short sermon (5-10 minutes), and mentioned Jesus once. The two Bible passages were simply 'illustrations' of the love of God in action (we weren't told how, or in what way), and mentioned in a maximum of five sentences towards the end of the sermon.

I was left wondering what in fact was Christian about it. It seems to me that many people could have spoken about love as a third way, between nature and nurture, and found a couple of illustrations in the Bible, or in some novels. The rather nebulous phrase 'the love of God' occured many times.

Many people appear to use this phrase as a way of not offending anyone, of saying something without really saying anything at all. After all, what is this 'love of God'? Is it acceptance? Is it a gift of something? Is it simply 'being there'? Is it all three? Or something else? I couldn't help but wonder if the sermon wouldn't have been a whole lot better if the preacher had talked about Jesus instead of 'the love of God'.

Richard Hays writes this: 'the content of the word "love" is given fully and exclusively in the death of Jesus on the cross.' (Richard Hays, The Moral Vision of the New Testament, Edinburgh: T&T Clark, 1997, p.202)

If we follow Hays, the main reason the preacher told us very little in his sermon, is because he never thought to give real content to 'the love of God'. He could have given us, from the passages he had, a blinder of a sermon about discipleship and life following Jesus, how difficult it is, following the way of the cross, yet how possible it is, in the power of the cross. What a sermon for a baptism! To say nothing of the baptismal symbolism of dying and rising with Christ, or of Jesus' call to follow him (in both passages).

As you can tell, I was left extremely unsatisfied by the sermon. Christian leaders and preachers need to be teaching and demonstrating to their congregations a Christian way of understanding and living in the world. Otherwise, what is the point of being a Christian? And, at the deepest leve, that Christian understanding, that Christian way of living, is in fact the way of 'the love of God', but that way has a real, concrete and historical (and human) definition: the way of the cross.

Mark 8.34.

The Spirit and Discipline

Published by bcg on 1 March 2007 in Church. 0 Comments Tags: , , , , , , , .

I had a fascinating discussion today with three other guys. We were talking about how to preach about holiness and drunkenness, without being judgemental.

We talked about two dangerous opposites that people fall into when seeking after holiness. Some people focus very much on personal and rigorous discipline, refusing to allow the possibility for any temptation. However the result of this is often simply repression, rather than genuine healing. The temptations remain, they are not healed, and so if the discipline cracks, an explosion is likely.

The equal and opposite approach is to focus very much on the healing power of the Holy Spirit. Being open and honest about emotions, temptations, desires, allows the Spirit to transform you inwardly, so that your desires are directed toward God, and not sin. This brings these things to the surface, hopefully so the Spirit can deal with them, but often it also enhances the temptation, making it more likely for you to fall into it.

There are very few people I imagine who would advocate one to the exclusion of the other, but there is a danger in our behaviour to tend towards one or the other. Think of it this way: which is most important? To be focused on disciplining yourself, or on being open to the Spirit's healing.

Of course, the answer is 100% of both. Repression of emotion and desire is not helpful discipline, although it may look like that. Openness to healing is not real healing if bringing things to the surface causes you to do them.

If we recognise that we fall into a certain sin or sins regularly, we need to do something about it. We need to ask God to give us the strength not to fall into temptation, to transform us so we no longer feel that temptation (it does happen, I promise!), and to work as hard as we can to make sure we don't fall into any traps.

What this looks like in real life, is regular prayer, on your own and with other people with whom you can be honest. And it means being sensible about temptation. If you struggle with drink, don't go to the pub, unless the people you're going with aren't going to drink. If you struggle with pornography, get some software that blocks it, or that emails a list of the websites you visit to someone who will hold you to account. Do these things whilst at the same time praying – and getting people to pray with and for you – about it. Be open and honest with yourself, and with someone else, about your struggles, and ask God for healing.

Discipleship (living and growing in holiness, which is the image of Christ) is really tough. And we don't help ourselves when we don't use our common sense, and when we don't ask God for his help, and when we don't make use of our fellow-Christians. One of the most important things in growing as a disciple of Jesus, is our community. We are all in this together, don't fool yourself into thinking you're the only one, or that you can sort yourself out on your own. We are all put here by God to help each other.

Of course that doesn't always work out, but it's the best (and only) way for our churches to grow in discipleship.

Categories

Twitter

Archives