Don’t Get Lost In The Process
As Christmas season draw nearer, I heard some people discussing about churches becoming more number-orientated (church growth) instead of being concerned about the spiritual well-being (spiritual growth) of its members. Well, here’s my personal take.
Churches are supposed to be concerned about church growth. In fact, I believe that we need to grow ourselves spiritually in the first place because we need to grow the church! There is nothing cyclical about this; no qualms about whether the hen or egg came first. Church growth is the primary, spiritual well being is basically the strategy to ensure such growth is sustained, as such, it is secondary.
Both are important, but they are not equally important.
We are likened to spiritual paramedics. Of course we are concerned about the number of people we rescued from the brink of death! Along our journey, we take care of ourselves, we rest well, learn better ways to administer CPR all in the hope that we can save more people! If we were to learn all of those and yet stand and watch as people fall to death alongside us while the life saving news resides in us, we are no more guilty of being a heartless murderer than a useless paramedic.
We are in the life saving business. Remember that.
I believe such confusion happens because people tend to mix up priority with process. Matchsticks and charcoal are required to create a successful barbecue. However, regardless of the quantity of your charcoal, nothing is going to ignite without matchsticks.
There is no confusion in this analogy: Matchsticks are the priority; just as church growth is core.
Perhaps churches might need to spend equal amounts of time on both church growth and spiritual growth, but that does not make their priority equal.
Don’t get lost in the process. Ever.
what i learnt: paramedics learnt the skills SO AS to save people.
We learn skills SO AS to benefit the church and its people.
elise-
you got it more or less..
we grow spiritually SO AS to grow the church steadily.
Anw in an afterthought, we have lotsa time in heaven to grow spiritually, but limited time on earth to grow the church. Hence that’s another reason why church growth is priority…
Keep the main thing the main thing- Jesus is why we do what we do.
God is never interested in how many people we reach out and attempt to save than He is more interested in how much (big of a heart) we love people as He loves.
Btw, please do approach me if you see me in church cos I don’t recognise you. It would be a privilege to know you offline =)
Excellent points. A faithful Church is (almost always) a fruitful Church.
[...] agree more with this brother’s thoughts. Let’s keep the main thing the main thing- Jesus is why we do what we [...]
I guess both church growth and spiritual growth should go hand in hand. Church growth without spiritual growth in the long term will result in backsliding.
Another point to note, I fnd it ironic that church growth and spiritual growth can be separated. Perhaps more appropriate terms to distinguish the 2 would be growth in numbers and growth in spiritual stature. When we grow in our relationship with God, the growth in numbers should follow(maybe not in the short run, but at least in the long run). If we claim to grow in stature but not in numbers(or at least the increasing desire and acts to outreach), we have just grown to be like the pharisees, self righteous and unaligned with God’s heartbeat. Has anyone ever heard of self-centred spiritual growth? Therefore true spiritual growth will lead to church growth.
indeed, it’s crucial to keep in mind that we are in the life saving business. every minute, every second counts.