Mark Jones – In His Dust

So, allow me to explain the idea behind the sub-heading of my blog.

I’ve just started reading a book called ‘Courageous Leadership’ By Bill HYbels (review/thoughts to follow).

In anger, I blogged something entitled ‘Half – assed Christians’ – you can see why I didn’t actually publish it. But in that blog I pretty much pondered what would it look like today if people were to actually yield their life FULLY to Christ? What would it look like If people actually followed Jesus – no matter what the cost? I also ranted a lot about worldliness, but that’s not important.

I just wonder how effective we are being as Christians these days. I wonder, what would the world look like if we actually lived fully for Christ? What would the world look like if the church actually done things the way it was supposed to?

In Acts 2 it talks about the fellowship of believers “praising God and enjoying the favor of all the people. And the Lord added to their number daily those who were being saved.” (verse 47)

The ‘church’ in acts 2 is a church that “offered unbelievers a vision of life that was so beautiful that it took their breath away.”

One of the amazing things about the ‘local church’ is it’s power to transform the human heart. This power I’m talking about is  the love of Jesus Christ, the love that conquers sin a wipes out shame and heals wounds and reconciles enemies and patches broken dreams and ultimately changes the world, one life at a time.

The thing is: that ‘message’ has been given to the church. It’s our responsibility to ’share’ that message!

The Acts 2 church barely even needed to go out of their way to ’share’ it. They “enjoyed the favour of all the people!” What they were doing… their lives… their relationship with God… was… attractive! And what’s more… GOD was moving… people got ’saved’ daily!

Here’s the thing:

“There is nothing like the local church when it’s working right (and people are actually living their lives in full pursuit of God and God’s plan). It’s beauty is indescribable. Its power is breathtaking. Its potential is unlimited. It comforts the grieving and heals the broken in the context of community. It builds bridges to seekers and offers truth to the confused. It provides resources for those in need and opens its arms to the forgotten, the downtrodden, the disillusioned. It breaks the chains of addictions, frees the oppressed, and offers belonging to the marginalized of this world. Whatever the capacity for human suffering, the church has a greater capacity for healing and wholeness.”

There’s a huge gap between churches that are living out their purpose, and those that are…dead in the water.

That ‘effectiveness’ that I’m reading about and talking about depends entirely on whether or not that church is doing what their supposed to be doing – reaching seekers, growing up strong believers, putting their arms around the poor, lifting broken lives, etc. And the churches ability to do that depends upon the believers living the way they’re supposed to be living.

An example of that would be… God loves holiness and righteousness (that thing Christians are supposed to aspire to be), therefore in my mind he hates worldliness. I.e. dressing sensually, drinking too much, adultery, sexual immortality (does that include the odd kiss every now and again? YES!), etc. We’re supposed to be yielding our lives fully to God, following Him no matter what the cost, and been seen as clearly different (and attractively so)… and apparently… at least as a whole… we’re most certainly not.

I take this idea… the church being the hope of the world – the church that can change the world… and I think… imagine this in Glasgow? Imagine reawakening in Glasgow? Imagine a city changing church in Glasgow? Imagine a body of believers who lived drasticly different lives – in pursuit of God – people submerged in the word of God, and actually living it out? Ooft.

Be the church – Change the world.