Five things are needed for genuine, lasting, in-depth church growth:
(1) An exalting into prominence of the Word of God. He stresses that ministers ought to get their people "into the Book," after they had first got themselves into it! What is needed is solid, expository preaching of the books of the Bible, not the topical, syrupy stuff that is offered in so many evangelical churches today.
(2) Acts 4 teaches us that prayer to the "sovereign Lord" is essential. He asserts, correctly, that it is the churches that have the great prayer ministries that go out and reach the lost. He urges, "If you do anything under God, get those people on their knees." It is a fact that ministers often complain that it is impossible to get unconverted people to come to church services. He provides the real antidote to such defeatist thinking, when he says, "When God comes, you cannot beat people away with a club!"
(3) Acts 8 shows that pastors have to teach people how to witness. This is the sharing of the Gospel by ordinary people in the church.
(4) Acts 2 teaches us that the aim of evangelism is not to 'grab converts' but to 'make disciples.' The 'easy-believism' mentality has to be scrapped. What the Bible wants are genuine conversions.
(5) Ministers should be using the church growth methods that are suitable to their own situation, and not just import 'off the shelf' as it were, those approaches that worked elsewhere. There has to be a 'right theology' - of ministry, of growth ('we do as we believe'), a 'right understanding of the community ... right goal-setting' and realistic targets. Above all, "we just got to have the Holy Spirit amongst us." And when He is come, things will happen. Dr D Martyn Lloyd-Jones used to say that more can be achieved in one day of revival than in fifty years of preaching and planning. How true!
No comments:
Post a Comment