Category: Faith

Willow Creek have recently released a book entitled Reveal: Where Are You? based on congregational research which they have conducted over the past few years. The research reveals that, like most good churches, Willow Creek caters well for people who are exploring Christianity or in the early stages of growing in their faith. However, most churches do not cater well for people who have moved beyond the initial stages in their faith, and more committed Christians are increasingly dissatisfied with their churches.

Once a person has reached a certain level of maturity in the Christian faith, weekend services and small groups are no longer able to provide significant increases in spiritual growth. Further growth can only come from personal spiritual practices. Perhaps churches create unhelpful expectations about what they can provide by way of teaching. Tim Stevens and Daniel Decker both have posts on what Bill Hybels had to say about this at this year’s Leadership Summit.

My personal view is that many churches misunderstand the reason for their existence. Many churches seem to assume that their purpose is to grow people in their faith by teaching them stuff. In my view, the main purpose of churches is to provide communities for deploying people into ministry roles. Learning more about God is something that committed believers should be doing themselves. Active ministry, however (such as finding ways of introducing people to Jesus and helping people who are poor or oppressed), needs to be done in the context of community.

Steve Addison has provided an interesting post on factors which affect the effectiveness of people engaged in certain types of cross-cultural Christian mission, based on research conducted by Patrick. Numerous different factors were listed, and many of them may be equally applicable to the effectiveness of anyone trying to live a life fully committed to following Jesus. Some of the research findings included:

Workers who attended Bible college or seminary are no more effective than those who did not. Those who are fluent in the local language are consistently more effective. Those who regularly invite friends to their houses and spend vacations with friends are more effective than those who spend their free time with family or alone. Workers who have someone holding them accountable in ministry at least once a month are more effective.

Age and gender do not affect effectiveness. Those who have a daily devotional life are more effective, and the most effective are those who fast regularly. Those who are highly committed to their jobs are less effective than those who have jobs which allow flexible working hours. Following the customs, dress, and practices of locals did not increase effectiveness. Those who found it easy to start conversations about their faith were more effective than those who placed priority on building relationships before talking about faith.

There is often a reality gap between what our mind thinks and what our body does. Our minds might be convinced that junk food is bad for us, but that doesn’t necessarily stop our bodies eating it. Daniel Decker has an interesting post on what we really believe. His post quotes John Ortberg, who talks about public convictions, private convictions and core convictions.

Public convictions are the things which we want others to think that we believe. Private convictions are the things which we sincerely think we believe. Core convictions are what our actions demonstrate that we believe. For many people, faith in Jesus is more a matter of public conviction than private conviction. For others, it’s a matter of both public and private conviction but it’s not a core conviction because it’s not reflected in their lifestyles.

This is another way of saying that faith – real faith – isn’t just something that happens in your head. It isn’t just a matter of giving intellectual assent to all the right theological doctrines. It isn’t something passive. Real faith is active faith. As James said, faith is about showing what you believe by what you do.

Seth Godin reports on a number of things which are contagious. According to a recent study, a person’s chances of becoming obese increases by 57 percent if they have a friend who becomes obese. Other contagious things listed by Seth include teen suicide, terrorism, spamming, graffiti, and becoming a millionaire. You just have to hang around with the right friends.

Faith is also something contagious. I’m talking about active faith, not passive faith. The type of faith which involves following the Holy Spirit’s promptings to do things which appear risky or foolhardy to others and which are doomed to failure without divine intervention. The type of faith that makes life an adventure and gets the blood pumping. The type of faith that believes God is living and active in the world today, and we can have significant roles in his mission.

Contagious faith is frequently at work in the world. In Africa, contagious faith in Jesus has spread from less than 9 million believers in 1900 to 417 million today. The makings of contagious faith exist in every believer’s heart. All it takes is a willingness to listen to what God is saying, and the courage to step out wholeheartedly into the unknown and risk everything.

A lot of people find the miracles in the Bible to be a stumbling block. Such people argue that we now live in a more advanced age. We understand more about the principles of science, and we know that supernatural events don’t occur. Over the past century there have been various attempts at demythologising the Bible, and efforts at rediscovering the historical Jesus, free from any miracles or interpretations.

I myself think that such efforts are a lot more irrational than believing in a God who is able to perform miracles. If there is a God who is so powerful that he can create the universe and everything in it, then it must be trivial for him to throw in a few extra miracles and a resurrection. It is illogical and incredibly arrogant for me to attempt to redefine the limits of God’s powers by reference to my own very limited cultural understanding.

But on the other hand, miracles are of very limited usefulness in persuading someone to believe in God. The most unmistakeable miracle performed directly in front of a determined skeptic will be explained away as a statistical aberration or an occurrence of a phenomenon which has a scientific explanation which is yet to be discovered. How else can atheists explain away the creation of the world and everything in it out of nothing?

What is it that distinguishes Christians from everybody else? Most people would say that Christians are more conservative than others, and they place a greater emphasis on enforcing moral rules relating to such issues as sexual practices, abortion, and decency. In other words, most people seem to think that Christianity is primarily about following the rules.

For some reason, Christians are giving out entirely the wrong signals. Following Jesus is supposed to be about grace, and not about law. Eric Bryant says that followers of Jesus should be practising the Art of Woo. He says that deep down, we long to be part of a loving and diverse community, to be part of a church know for caring for those the world has forgotten. Wouldn’t it be amazing if people saw our lives and wanted what we have?

I think it’s something to do with control. We want to control other people, and get them to conform to what we consider to be acceptable behavioural patterns. However, the Bible tells us to exercise faith, rather than control. Our job as followers of Jesus is to be agents of grace in the world. It’s not up to us to be making rules for others to follow. We’re here to reflect the image of Christ in the way we live our lives.

Many people misunderstand the nature of faith. If you’re a Protestant you’ve probably heard many times that salvation comes through faith, and not through works. In other words, the good or bad deeds which you do in life are irrelevant to the question of whether you get into heaven. The only way to get in is by believing in Jesus.

So a lot of people form the view that your knowledge is more important than your actions. They think that being a Christian is about believing the correct doctrines, rather than doing the correct activities. In other words, it’s all in your head. If you haven’t studied enough theology and absorbed enough teachings, then you might miss out.

In reality, faith isn’t just something you think. It’s something you experience. You only really get to trust in God when you rely on him to do something that he’s promised, something that couldn’t happen if he didn’t make it happen. If you never step out and take risks in doing God’s work, you never get to discover what God can do when you’re actively putting your faith in him.