5 WORDS THAT CAN MAKE OR BREAK A CHURCH

I’ve spent more than 15 years studying church growth—and church decline. I am frequently asked, especially by pastors in declining churches, what keeps a church from growing—what causes a church to decline.

In my observation, talking to dozens of pastors who struggle to get their church growing again, there are some common issues among them, of which I think we can all learn.

Here are 5 words that can make or break a church:

ENTITLEMENT

When the body begins to think “this is my church,” it will soon start operating outside the complete power and utter dependency of the rightful owner. It will then lose the Spirit’s power.

ENERGY

A lack of energy stagnates a church. This is not referring to worship. You can worship to your taste, but energy is a part of any movement of God. The church is the body of Christ. Don’t forget—our God is not dead—he’s alive!

A church is revived and reenergized when it renews its vision. As a church grows closer to Christ, and introduces others to Christ, it creates more energy for the body.

I know this in my personal life, also. If I ever lose energy for ministry I have to get back to what God called me to do. I have to hang out with lost people, with people who are hurting, with people who need to better understand the grace of God. It energizes me.

EXCITEMENT

If you can’t get excited about the gospel, you’re not looking at Christ closely enough. Anyone who can rise from the dead, forgive sins and reconcile us to God—wow, talk about exciting! When the people who regularly attend the church aren’t excited anymore, visitors aren’t likely to be either.

When a body becomes comfortable it often becomes complacent, and it loses the excitement it once had. It is then no longer attractive to outsiders.

ENGAGEMENT

The body needs all its members. When a few people do all the work burnout is soon to follow. The church shouldn’t depend on paid staff to do all the work, nor should ministry be limited to those with a volunteer title of some sort.

If people always have to wait for assignments to be made before people are freed to do the work of the church, over time, the harvest is plenty, but the workers are few.

In other words, getting more workers in the harvest means casting a good vision, helping people know what the mission of the church is and then releasing people to do the work of the church. Jesus did this and called it discipleship. (And, told us to make disciples.)

EFFICIENCY

When programs are so structured even God couldn’t introduce change, decline is imminent. Growing churches are always thinking how they can improve. The cliché is true, the message never changes, but the hearers do. Finding new ways to reach a changing culture with a gospel that never changes is part of a growing church’s responsibility.

Obviously, there are many other reasons. These are just a few I’ve observed. Whenever I work with a church in decline, I will first look for one of these areas as a solution.

Source:  Ron Edmondson is CEO of Leadership Network, former pastor at Immanuel Baptist Church in Lexington, Kentucky, and the planter of two churches.

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This article originally appeared on RonEdmondson.com.

Friday Funny: Jeanne Robertson | Crowning Miss North Carolina

Jeanne is on Sirius & XM Radio this clip is from Jeanne's DVD Southern Style! Jeanne's official website http://www.jeannerobertson.com

THE PROCESS OF PERSECUTION -3: INJUSTICE

In his humiliation he [Jesus] was deprived of justice. Acts 8:33a

Christians experiencing persecution are following in the footsteps of their master, Jesus. In Acts chapter eight, Philip revealed to the Ethiopian eunuch that the passage from Isaiah 53 he was reading referred to Jesus who indeed was deprived of justice. Today in the Western world, we would describe His trial before crucifixion as occurring in a “kangaroo court!”

If disinformation about any group, including Christians, is disseminated long enough, no one will help when that group or person is discriminated against. Discrimination relegates Christians to second-class citizenship with inferior legal, social, political and economic status. Once discrimination takes place, no one will intervene when the mistreatment comes.

Examples of such injustice against Christians abound around the world: ID cards in a country where Christianity is an unacceptable entry in the religion column; daughters abducted because they are Christians; expulsion from the community just because they are evangelicals.

Christians in Pakistan are a small minority among a large Muslim majority and often face such discrimination. The problem is compounded by the fact that many Christians are illiterate and poor. One Christian teacher at a center training Christian women recently said, “We do face discrimination because we live in the midst of people who don’t want us to move forward; people who keep trying to push us down so that we will always be in slavery.”

But there is one repeated scene of injustice against Christians that occurs in Pakistan which brings me to tears which involves young Christian girls. As a father of two daughters and having six granddaughters, I shudder every time I read news reports that describe Christian family injustice in this land. The stories usually work out this way:

Muslim women must marry Muslim men but Muslim men are allowed to marry any woman they wish with the proviso that any children must be raised as Muslim. Consequently in Pakistan there are Muslim men who often desire some of the very beautiful young Christian girls in the community but realize there is no way their Christian families will agree to marriage. So these men resort to abduction.

The Christian father’s only option is to go to court where the judge—usually a Muslim—hears the case and pronounces to the Christian father, “Your daughter voluntarily converted to Islam and voluntarily married this Muslim man so you are to have no more contact with her. One of the most recent cases involved two young Christian sisters aged thirteen and ten. In this case, the judge allowed the ten-year-old to return home to her family but not the thirteen-year-old.

Safwan, a secret believer in Algeria, found a Christian pamphlet between the paperwork given him at work and started reading it. Upon discovering him reading the pamphlet, his boss reported him to the police. Later that night the police visited him and searched his entire home. They found Christian CD’s, several Christian movies and a New Testament. “It was clear to them that I had become a Christian. My boss fired me.”

RESPONSE: Today I will work toward justice for everyone in my own country and around the world.

PRAYER: Lord, be with those experiencing discrimination today because they love and serve You.

Standing Strong Through The Storm (SSTS), a daily devotional message by SSTS author Paul Estabrooks. © 2011 Open Doors International. Used by permission.

Originally Posted HERE

THE PROCESS OF PERSECUTION–2: DISINFORMATION

Blessed are you when people…falsely say all kinds of evil against you because of me. Matthew 5:11

This stage of persecution is characterized by unchecked ridicule and disinformation against a targeted group (Christian or others) most often spread through media. In this stage Christians are robbed of their good reputation and the right to answer the accusations made against them. Media, politics, entertainment, publications and schools are most often the avenues used to spread such insinuations or lies.

If disinformation about any group is disseminated long enough, no one will help in later stages because of this negative brain-washing about them. It essentially dehumanizes the person and is a pattern of thinking that may make it easier for milder wrongs to ignite a chain reaction of events. It creates an “us-versus-them” mentality.

A classic historic example is the gross disinformation the German Nazis spread about the Jews which then developed into a literal negative symbol when Jewish homes and businesses were marked with Stars of David and then targeted.

This also can result in verbal stereotyping. In the Rwanda genocide, the term “cockroach” became a negative classification of all Tutsi as conspirators against the government.

There are many significant global examples of disinformation used against our Christian brothers and sisters. The influence and impact of negative television programs against Protestant Christians in an autonomous region in Central Asia is very strong. A local pastor was shown on TV and, without reference to any evidence, labelled “an enemy of the state.” His family members’ pictures were also shown at the same time causing them to be despised by their community.

Recently a Christian woman who was shown on TV was not able to continue her work in a kiosk in the market. Other vendors forced her to leave the bazaar.

One local pastor says, “Since the program is shown regularly on TV, persecution has become worse. Some people have left the church out of fear. When you start to preach (to the public), people close up and say, we have heard about you, we don’t want to listen.”

In North Korea, the entire society is controlled by propaganda and disinformation. Persecution is so severe that in many Christian families, children are not even told about the family’s faith in Jesus until they are young adults because they are encouraged and expected to inform on their parents while in their school years. Christians are considered enemies of the state and the disinformation about this is wide spread.

Similarly, in countries like Laos, the government disinformation is that Christianity is an American religion being used to infiltrate their country rather than the former military methods. All Christians are thus portrayed as being traitors and working for America.

RESPONSE: Today I will work for truth and quash all attempts at disinformation against followers of Jesus everywhere.

PRAYER: Lord, grant Your blessing today on Your followers suffering from lies and untruths.

Standing Strong Through The Storm (SSTS), a daily devotional message by SSTS author Paul Estabrooks. © 2011 Open Doors International. Used by permission.

Originally Posted HERE

THE PROCESS OF PERSECUTION-1: OPPOSITION

Consider [Jesus] who endured such opposition from sinful men, so that you will not grow weary and lose heart. Hebrews 12:3

Whenever we ask audiences in free societies to word-associate “persecution,” most responses are what we refer to as the “big three”: torture, imprisonment and martyrdom. Many would agree that persecution is much more than the “big three” which are often only experienced in the final stage of the process of persecution.

Jesus repeatedly warned his followers that if the world hated Him, it would hate them also (John 15:18). In Luke 6:22, Jesus reminds his disciples that this opposition is a blessing. Not a blessing I ever hear many Christians praying for.

So the very basic and first step in this process is awareness that as a follower of Jesus, you can expect opposition, just as Jesus Himself experienced (Hebrews 12:3). He indicated that it will come from the world and possibly even from your own family and friends.

So do we walk around with a persecution complex, chip on our shoulder attitude, because of this? Absolutely not. The good news is that Jesus says we can live a life of joy in the midst of these troubles because He has overcome the world and so can we (John 16:33).

And this opposition is in every country and culture, not just those where severe persecution is being experienced. A few years ago Jim Cunningham and I wrote a little booklet about experiencing mild persecution right here in North America entitled Red Skies @ Dawn available at Open Doors offices. It is a dialogue between two young couples. Here’s a relevant excerpt:

Sam responded. “Ultimately Satan, our real enemy, wants to destroy the Church of Jesus Christ, wherever it’s located. And Jesus Himself is the stumbling block to those who don’t believe. When we say He is the only way, we are labeled as exclusivists and on this basis we are then considered intolerant.”

Yvonne added, “I heard a program host on the radio the other day and he was obviously upset by this. When someone told him that Jesus is the only way to God, he shouted that we evangelicals are the scum of the earth!”

“Whoa,” Sanjit reacted. “That’s a little heavy, isn’t it?”

Yvonne continued, “Well, he went on to say that it wasn’t the belief to which he objected so much but he objected to the arrogance of any person claiming ‘my way or the highway’ and writing off the rest of the human race to eternal damnation.”

All of this discussion clearly points out, “Sam concluded, “we are facing—and will face even more—attacks because of Jesus in us. Persecution may not be just for those brothers and sisters across the seas in places like East Africa and China, but perhaps even for us.”

RESPONSE: Today I will rejoice that in the face of general opposition to Jesus in me, I can be an overcomer like Jesus.

PRAYER: Help me, Lord, to be aware of any opposition without it negatively affecting my witness.

Standing Strong Through The Storm (SSTS), a daily devotional message by SSTS author Paul Estabrooks. © 2011 Open Doors International. Used by permission.

Originally posted HERE 

FOUR-STAGE PROCESS OF PERSECUTION

Speak up for those who cannot speak for themselves, for the rights of all who are destitute.                                          Proverbs 31:8

Jesus’ basic communication theory in Matthew 12 is that people speak and act from the overflow of what is in their heart. Jeremiah and others remind us that the heart can be exceedingly wicked. One of Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn’s famous statements is “The line of good and evil cuts through the heart of every human being.”

Christian persecution within a country or state rarely happens suddenly or in isolation. It is most often a process. Some years ago Rev. Dr. Johan Candelin, who headed the World Evangelical Alliance’s (WEA) Religious Liberties Commission recognized this and devised a three-stage process of what happens leading up to persecution becoming entrenched in any society.

He labeled the three stages of downward spiral as disinformation, discrimination and persecution. Dr. Candelin later expanded it to a six-stage process with each of the three having a passive, then active, aspect.

Dr. Jim Cunningham and I included this process in the first edition of Standing Strong Through the Storm (SSTS) and in our seminars.

Some academicians and wordsmiths found it problematic to label the third stage with the same word as that of the process. So we began to wrestle with this issue from a sociological, historical and biblical perspective. We found interesting academic parallels. For example, in 1996, Professor Gregory Stanton, President of Genocide Watch, proposed an excellent model of an eight stage process of genocide. There are interesting similarities between this downward spiral and what psychologist John Gottman has labeled as the four most likely predictors of divorce.

When we accepted Jesus’ four verb definition of persecution in Luke 6:22, we then found four clear biblical steps in understanding the downward spiral in the process of persecution: opposition, disinformation, injustice and mistreatment. We will look at these four steps forming the acronym ODIM individually over the next four days.

Why is this important to you and me? Just today I read again the poignant words of German theologian Martin Niemoller written after he had been imprisoned for eight years in concentration camps as the personal prisoner of Adolf Hitler:

First they came for the Socialists, and I did not speak out because I was not a Socialist. 

Then they came for the Trade Unionists, and I did not speak out because I was not a Trade Unionist.

Then they came for the Jews, and I did not speak out because I was not a Jew.

And then they came for me—and there was no one left to speak for me.

RESPONSE: Today I will speak out for the rights of those who have no voice to speak for themselves.

PRAYER: Help me, Lord, to be aware of the forces of evil that conspire against Your Kingdom.

Standing Strong Through The Storm (SSTS), a daily devotional message by SSTS author Paul Estabrooks. © 2011 Open Doors International. Used by permission.

Originally Posted HERE

Saddleback Church Celebrates 50K Baptisms

Saddleback Church reached a milestone last month that demonstrates its dedication to the gospel and evangelism.

The church, started by Pastor Rick Warren 38 years ago, recorded its 50,000th baptism.

On his Facebook page, Warren thanked church members for their role in reaching the milestone.

“I’m often asked: Why has this church, by God’s grace, been able to bring so many unbelievers to Jesus?

“Because of your LOVE!

“YOU genuinely love people and you want them to go to heaven with you! Every day, you bring your friends, co-workers and family to Jesus. Honestly, I’ve never seen a group like you anywhere else in the world. I’m humbled to be your pastor, and I could not be more proud of you.”

50,000 baptisms in 38 years is quite a feat. Warren did the math and found that since Easter 1980, the first service at Saddleback, “we’ve baptized almost four changed lives every single day. (Precisely 3.7 people every day.) YOU’RE PART OF A MIRACLE!”

Saddleback’s Milestone Comes as SBC Baptisms Fall

The milestone comes as the Southern Baptist Convention, of which Saddleback is a member, reports a decade of declines in baptisms.  

At its annual meeting in June, SBC congregations reported baptizing 254,122 people—26.5 percent fewer than in 2007. The ratio was one baptism for every 59 church members.

“It’s heartbreaking to be baptizing fewer people for Christ, even though Southern Baptists have nearly 2,900 more churches than we had a decade ago,” said LifeWay President and CEO Thom S. Rainer.

“Yet a quarter million baptisms is not an insignificant number. We praise God for every individual who has come to Christ and followed Him in baptism. It is my prayer that God would embolden Southern Baptists to share the gospel with their friends and neighbors.

Bottom of Form

“We know conversion is only by the Holy Spirit, but we also know God begins most of these conversions with gospel conversations.”

Warren wrote that according to Acts 2:47, the first Christian church (in Jerusalem) baptized someone every day. “Think about that. Daily!” Warren wrote on Facebook, “That means, at the very least, the first church baptized at least 365 new members annually! Not many churches have ever matched that kind of growth. But YOUR CHURCH has!”

This weekend’s services also included an acknowledgment of all of those in attendance who had themselves been baptized at Saddleback. A photo montage was displayed with images gathered from throughout the decades at Saddleback.

“Why is baptism such a big deal?” Rick Warren asked while standing in the baptism pool. “There are two reasons. First, Jesus commanded it. Second, he modeled it…this is the way I say to the world ‘I’m in! I’m a part of the family of God…there is no reason to wait!’”

Source:  Bob Ditmer

Bob Ditmer has worked in Christian media for more than 20 years including positions with Ravi Zacharias International Ministries and Focus on the Family.