Thursday, September 30, 2010

Vision for Transformation

I began reading a book this week entitled “Tranformational Church” by Ed Stezter and Thom Rainer. The basic idea is that as a disciple-making missional community of believers our primary goal in aiming for the glory of Jesus Christ is to see transformation taking place in people’s lives.

They say, “transformation is at the heart of God’s mission to humanity” (p. 3). Certainly, this is taken right out of Romans 8:29, “for whom he foreknew, he also predestined to be conformed to the image of His Son, that he might be the firstborn among many brethren.” Through the power of the gospel, God takes a life that is ruined by sin and transforms it into “his workmanship” for His glory.

God’s agent and tool for accomplishing this is through the disciple-making missional community of believers called the church.

However…

“The alternative to this biblically-mandated transformation is to pick a rut and make it deeper. And this is just what many churches have done, preferring, even if not consciously, repetition or even stagnation. As leaders, we sometimes fool ourselves into thinking that just managing the status quo is good enough. Some leaders take the merry-go-around approach to church. They think that is they can just keep everyone moving, the flashing lights shining bright, and the music happy, they won’t get any complaints. Some leaders try to take the “don’t rock the boat approach” approach. They think that if we all remain very still in the boat, it won’t turn over. But it also won’t go anywhere.” (p. 3)

“Rather than missionary disciples for Christ going into the world, we have a group of people content to go in circles.” (p. 3)

All of this had gotten me thinking about us as a church. Have we caught this kind of vision for our church—to be a disciple-making missional community of believers who desire & seek to cultivate transformation by the power of the gospel & the Holy Spirit in the lives of our members and our community?

“I can only imagine…” what the Lord wants to do through us for the sake of His kingdom. Let’s dream together for the future that God has for us…catch the vision…transformational church!

1 comment:

  1. Good observation, the aspect of transforming the lives of those we are leading was modeled by Jesus. He had to bring the disciples along a continuing path of change as His ministry grew. Change is the only constant of life, embrace it or find yourself in despair. We should always look for growth in ourselves, our churches, and those we lead individually as He did.
    But when do you tell them the cost of following Christ? He did not reveal to them the full journey He had come to take until the time was short, then He revealed the cross as a necessary step in His plan. This is when He also told them the cost of following Him. They would not have been able to accept this in the beginning, those closest to Him even rejected it upon the first hearing of it. May we not stay in the same place, as we look to Him to lead our path we should feel the fresh breeze of new air upon our face. Seek Ye the Kingdom of God.

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