Category: Future

Last week I attended the Church Planting Today conference run by the Baptist Union of Victoria and the Churches of Christ, featuring the English church planting guru, Stuart Murray Williams. Stuart had a remarkable collection of stories to tell about church planting and emerging church efforts in the UK ranging from the relatively tame to the outrageously extreme.

Something from the conference which struck me in a new way was how important church planting efforts are in the mission strategy of the church as a whole. When you look at the areas of substantial population increase (growth corridors) predicted for Melbourne over the next 25 years, you can see all too clearly how many people won’t have a nearby church to attend even if they want to, unless some church planting work is done now.

I also found out that Crossway is engaged in some excellent church planting efforts. I had a chance to visit Craigieburn, where Brett Mitchell is leading a Crossway planting team. Their public services started less than 3 weeks ago. Brett is a great guy, and he exudes excitement and enthusiasm. I’m sure that Crossway Craigieburn is in for a great future. Many more churches need to catch the planting vision.

According to the National Church Life Survey, the number of people who attend churches in Australia on any given Sunday declined by about 7% between 2001 and 2006, after declining by a further 7% between 1996 and 2001. Mainstream denominations bore the brunt of the declines, whereas Pentecostals saw small increases.

One possible reason is that Pentecostals are the only ones being faithful to God. A more likely reason, in my view, is that most churches perform poorly when it comes to doing what churches are supposed to do. We keep telling people that it is essential for Christians to be members of local churches, but the reasoning is somewhat confused. Usually the reason given is something to do with fellowship, but often the quality of fellowship on offer isn’t that great.

The real reason why followers of Jesus must team up with other believers is because Christians are designed by God to work in teams. Churches which can find ways of linking believers together in teams to do productive ministry will be growing churches, regardless of denominational affiliation or theological inclination in respect of non-core beliefs. Non-Pentecostal churches in Australia just need to do a better job of putting people to work.

Yesterday I watched the movie Amazing Grace, about the anti-slavery struggle of William Wilberforce and his friends. Although the movie is about events which happened in the past, it also gives excellent directions for shaping the future. It shows that a small group of people with a sufficiently compelling objective and sufficient determination and persistence can overcome overwhelming odds to achieve that objective.

First, it is necessary for the objective to be clear and compelling. You need to be able to see what the future will look like when the objective is achieved, and it has to be something that is worth struggling for. Secondly, you have to be determined. You have to be willing to make sacrifices, devote a significant amount of your energy, and lie awake at night dreaming of ways to reach the objective. Thirdly, you have to be persistent. You have to face up to criticism, abuse and setbacks, and keep heading forwards until the objective is reached.

It is easy for us to look back and say that the great social issue of the day was slavery, and Wilberforce’s objective of abolition was the right one. But if we are looking forwards, how do we identify the great issue or issues of our day? What is the objective to which we should be devoting the rest of our lives?

If the job of the church is to follow as closely as possible in the footsteps of a man from Nazareth who wore sandals, had hardly any money, and never used electricity or a motor vehicle, what use do we have for technology in a church? Instead of spending money on sound systems, lighting, air conditioning, video projectors and other equipment, shouldn’t we be selling it off and getting back to the basics?

Well, that depends on what you consider the basics to be. If you believe that the message of Jesus was fundamentally about being nice to other people, then I would agree that technology has no place in a church. But if you believe that Jesus has appointed us with special roles in fulfilling God’s mission here on earth, saving people from the consequences of their sin, then it would be foolhardy for us not to use the resources which he has given to us.

If we need to communicate the good news to others as effectively as possible, we need to do so within a cultural context which will maximise their understanding of the message. If people typically receive what they regard as true through the media of television, the internet, radio, and conversations with friends and acquaintances, then we need to be using the same media to communicate the timeless message. If we don’t speak in ways which people can understand, we won’t be heard at all.

Less that two percent of the atoms in your body were there 12 months ago. 98% of the atoms in a living human being get replaced each year, through the body’s natural building processes including breathing, eating and drinking. So no matter how hard you try to be the same person you’ve always been, you are constantly changing, and there’s nothing you can do to stop it.

You can choose to make change your enemy, or you can choose to make it your friend. If change is your enemy, then your life will be filled with a continuing series of unpleasant surprises. If change is your friend, then each day is an opportunity to experience something new, to learn something new, to meet new people, and embrace more of the good things God has provided.

If only followers of Jesus were less conservative and more future-focussed and change-friendly. Then we could imagine a world in which poor people really are hearing good news, prisoners really are being set free, blind people are seeing, oppressed people are being released from their oppression, and the favourable year of the Lord is arriving.

We’ve all heard about megachurches in the US that attract 20,000 people each weekend. But we know that could never happen in Australia. People in Australia are not sufficiently religious / gullible / conformist / idealistic / respectful of leadership (pick your preferred reason).

So how is it that the Hillsong Church in Sydney does manage to attract 20,000 people each weekend, despite the irreligious non-conformist style of Australians when compared with Americans? I was at the annual Hillsong Conference last week, and I observed a high degree of vitality and commitment amongst rank-and-file church members. Over 4,000 people had voluntarily taken a week off work to help with the conference. These weren’t people acting under compulsion. These were people who felt they had a significant part to play in changing the future of the world.

Maybe the “barrenness” of Australian spirituality isn’t such a big factor in preventing the spread of the good news after all. Maybe all that is required to ignite a spiritual revolution is a group of gifted leaders who are ready to follow Jesus with all their hearts, casting a bold and compelling vision, and inviting others to step into the roles which God has created them to fulfil.

The Ugley Vicar blogs about the Millennium Development Goals and asks the question, Even assuming these goals could be met, what happens next?

If we define poverty as people with an income below $2 per day, we could eradicate poverty by giving everyone $3 per day. But have we really solved anything? In Australia the Henderson Poverty Line for a family with two adults (one working) and two children is $661.45 per week. People struggle to get by because of the high cost of living. The problem is that when incomes go up, the cost of living goes up, and poverty is not solved. Jesus said, You will always have the poor among you (John 12:8).

Poverty is a subject of vital importance to followers of Jesus. We are called to serve the poor, and I think we should be pursuing that with as much passion, diligence and effectiveness as we can. However, it seems to me that Make Poverty History is simply not an achievable goal, because poverty is a concept with moving goalposts.

Thanks for stopping by. The purpose of this website is to explore what it means to be a fully committed follower of Jesus today. Often following Jesus is presented as an event, rather than a process. Once you have decided to follow Jesus (the event), what are you supposed to do after that (the process)?

I selected choosethecross.com as the domain name because following Jesus is rarely about taking the easy options, pleasing yourself, and being the most popular person in town. As Jesus said, If you want to come after me you will have to deny yourself, take up your cross and follow me. If you want to save your life you will lose it, but if you lose your life for my sake you will find it. (Matt 16:24-25)

Starting July 2007, I am intending to make posts on the following topics:

Mondays: Past — Lessons from history

Tuesdays: Present — Things in the news

Wednesdays: Future — Where are we headed?

Thursdays: Poverty — Helping those who are most in need

Fridays: Publications — Books worth reading

Saturdays: Faith — What it really means to believe

I will soon be putting up a link to the website for my forthcoming book, The Global Christian Adventure. In the meantime, please feel free to comment on any of my posts. Please note that I will be reviewing comments before accepting them. The rules for acceptable comments are set out on my Policy page.