"Across all the years where we can document them, the warriors who compose a special force are likely to be those most deemed capable of independent initiative without orders" (Leebaert, To Dare & To Conquer p. 31).

I can envision a spiritual community where this sort of independent initiative is normative.  People simply share the life of Jesus that lives within them because they want to.  But for the most part, we're not there yet. 

There were some great insights on the comment section of the last post about what we really need to do church.  In one comment, my friend Lisa wrote:

The church building and service should not seem like an exclusive club, but it's sad that most of the time it does. I guess that's my ideal. That's is what I want from the "church". Teach me to live justly, love mercy, and walk humbly with God, and then send me out with blessings (and the trust) that I will share Him with my life.

Jesus talked about both being His disciple and making new disciples.  Whether it is "supposed to be" or not, church is for Christians.  Very rarely do people that do not already believe ever find reason to go to church.  They've been exposed to and offered church their whole lives and have consistenly turned it down.  So in that sense, church is a gathering of believers.  What I get most concerned about is what Lisa mentions as the sad reality in the majority of those gatherings - they get exclusive.  The group becomes so Teflonized, as my friend Charlie says, that no one not already a part has a chance of sticking.  I think we're looking for something other than just a great place of Christians to enjoy one another and worship God.  If that's all we needed for evangelism to start happening naturally, it would have happened a thousand times over by now.  But it has not.  People still, in general, do not participate in evangelism.

Surely there are lots of reasons for this, but I think one of the roots is a failure in the disciple making process.  It seems clear that to Jesus, being His disciple meant actively making other disciples, yet we have separated the functions.  We have the stuff we do "for us" and then if we're in the mood for it, we put on a little evangelism program.  If our disciple being process includes teaching, training and regular practice at disciple making, then evangelism begins to form in our groups at the DNA level.  So to me, churches are about evangelism in the sense that all of the new conversions that have happened "out in the streets" need a place to gather where they too can be disciple-making disciples.

So let me quote Lisa one more time:  "Teach me to live justly, love mercy, and walk humbly with God, and then send me out with blessings (and the trust) that I will share Him with my life."  This is so good.  I think with some changes to the "system," we can do this. 

So my next question is:  What changes need to be made in order for you to receive the trust and freedom you need to start sharing Him with your life?

"The special operation is not defined by size... What prevails is the 'Commando idea,' as Churchill called it - of guile unified with fortitude and imagination" (Leebaert, To Dare & To Conquer p. 22).

Every move we make and every change we pursue in building the community of believers (called a local church) is in pursuit of God's leading and God's Spiritual power.  That's what I believe.  I am very interested in reading and thinking about "new" ways of doing church, but I am not interested in building the next cool church or having the funniest little video clips or the hottest worship sound on the scene.  Are lives being changed?

I've been looking into what causes a church community to get off track.  Many churches I know get formed with the idea of pursuing God's Spirit but then shift focus to maintaining the organization.  What happens?  Looking again at this fantastic book that brings me so much inspiration, To Dare & To Conquer,  I think that churches get caught in a trap of having to pay the bills and keep the "staff" afloat.  It's very difficult to stay on mission when you have to make payroll or you have to pay the mortgage.  So many churches that I have had the opportunity to work with or witness up close clutter themselves with so much unnecessary fluff that it's no wonder they cease to be effective at reaching people.  What does it really take to have a church?  When planning a military special operation, there is immense pressure to drill down to the essential.  They can do this because the overwhelming attitude within that culture is the dogged pursuit of effectiveness and efficiency.

I would love to see what could happen if a group of believers formed around this same, "Commando idea."  What do we really need to do what we need to do?  And let everything else pass away.

What do you think we must have in order to have a church - I'm interested in your perspective. 

"The special operation keeps testing the limits of familiar procedure - its own side's and the other's" (Leebaert, p. 21).

I've been reading quite a bit and thinking even more about what I envision for a church.  I'm involved in a church plant right now and we're doing things differently to some degree, but for the most part it is church as usual.  I'm so ready for something different, but I'm also very concerned about how we get there.

Inspiration continues to flow through this book I'm reading, To Dare & To Conquer.  Special operations often evolved out of irregular problems that conventional military units do not have the ability to address.  From my reading, there are a lot of people looking at the American church with the same mind - these familiar methods of "doing church" are not meeting the needs like they used to (if they every really did).  There are plenty of books out to criticize and challenge the effectiveness of church methods and even some that outright reject the idea of having any kind of "church" as you and I would define it.  What is coming of all these opinions?

I'm having a hard time putting my thoughts together on this concept of doing church differently.  The ideas are everywhere but channeling them and making them readable is difficult.  There are certainly many ways to build and sustain a spiritual community.  I don't think we're in search of the right way.  However, I do not believe that any way will work.  This is part of what Paul imposes his apostolic authority to correct in Corinth.  People were doing just about whatever they wanted to do and calling it a fellowship of believers.  So Paul writes to them with instructions like, "Eat dinner at home.  Don't come to church and gorge yourself, calling it the Lord's table."

So some Corinthians had their opinion of how church should be done.  Paul tells them they can't do things that way and call it a meeting of God's house.  Instead of changing, the Corinthians begin to express their opinion about Paul and his apostleship.  Who did he think he was to tell them how they would put on their Christian community?  What makes Paul think he can tell them how many people are allowed to prophesy or speak out in church?  This is the "spirit of this age," if you ask me.  We're in the age of opinions, and no one is allowed to challenge the opinion of anyone else.  Sure, we can "dialog" about it - we can have conversations but no one is going to change his opinion.

We just don't have an apostle available to put the foolishness to rest.  When Paul's authenticity as an apostolic leader was called into question, he wrote back to the Corinthians and seems to be doing his best to give them the benefit of the doubt.  His letter has the tone of, "maybe you haven't heard some of these things about me..."  But toward the end of his letter, Paul declares that all the signs, wonders, miracles and authority of an apostle had been demonstrated among them.  Paul had legitimate power through God's Spirit.  He had the authority to put an end to the droning on of the opinions of the opinionated because his message was not composed of the enticing words of men's wisdom, but of the demonstration of the Spirit and power.

As a church, we need to be testing the limits of familiar.  We need to be willing to take risks and bear criticism for the sake of getting on board with something fruitful.  But the pursuit is toward a demonstration of the Spirit and power.  I'm not looking for the next really cool church.  I have no intention of being part of something void of God's power.  How can we call it a spiritual community without the power? 

Some time ago, I started to write about a book that is inspiring my ideas and ideals of church planting.  It's been about 4 months so I might as well get around to all that writing I promised.

A great passage that I highlighted reads:

"The special operation often finds its peculiar advantage in targeting the enemy's most heavily defended positions - striking directly at his confident strength and dignity" (To Dare & To Conquer. Leebaert, pg. 22).

Starting a church is an intensely spiritual enterprise.  So why is so much time and energy so often spent on strategizing how to do it all on our own?  One book I read, and benefited from reading, spent a few pages saying basically, "You better have a calling from God or you shouldn't even get started," but then devoted the entirety of the rest of the book to raising money, gathering your team, doing marketing / evangelism, and managing your Sunday morning meetings.  I believe the Holy Spirit could inspire any of those efforts.  But come on!  You know what the author is really saying.  Below the surface is the assumption that if we're "called" then God must want us to put a great plan together and start working our network so we can buy LCD projectors and burgundy, velour offering bags.

I wrote in the introduction to my thoughts from this book (back in October) that I am no longer interested in making my living as a pastor - I want to raise the dead.  I want to enter a place that has been "enemy territory" for a long time and start leading people out.  Isn't this the mission Jesus was launching in Luke 4:18-19?  I don't think we'll be able to develop a strategy to do that.  It has nothing to do with organizing or business models or market research.  I just don't believe God wants to give birth to a calling inside of me so that I can go on to manage it (or manipulate it) with my own ingenuity.  Uzzah figured out what happens when you try to put your human hand on God's glory.

I'm a long way away from being able to develop an exhaustive "how to raise the dead" list, but one possibly-overlooked weapon to turn death into life does come to mind.

Repentance & Forgiveness

As Jesus was being wounded for our transgressions and bruised for our iniquities, he cried out, "Father forgive them, for they do not know what they are doing."  As Jesus gave up his life for the salvation of others, "...graves were opened; and many bodies of saints who had fallen asleep were raised."

When we feel the call to start a church what if we started pleading the cause of the community before the Lord?  What if instead of doing market research and probing our connections for "start up capital," we started repenting for the way we (not other, nameless Christians who had it all wrong, but me... and you... us) have misrepresented Jesus to the people around us.  This is my notion of targeting enemy held territory.  This is what I think of when I read the words, "...striking directly at his confident strength and dignity."  I imagine graves opening and the "dead" coming out and into the light as a result of a group of people spreading that news. 

We've made a big mistake in trying to introduce people to God.  We've made Him look religious and cold, but He isn't.  We're asking God to forgive us for misrepresenting Him to you.  I've seen people accept that as some actual Good News from the church.

One of the great conversations that I had while passing out free water at Gasparilla was with two couples who asked me why I was giving water in the first place.  Whenever people asked, I took it as an invitation to share the concept of God's no-strings-attached love and the way I believe God desires to show people His kindness.

In a tongue-in-cheek sort of way I said, "If Jesus were here today, I guarantee He would be out giving away water!"  One of the guys had a quick and witty response: "No, Jesus would be turning it into wine."  That little give and take was all we needed to chip away the awkwardness of a stranger with a canvas bag of water bottles over his shoulder.  "So what denomination are you from?" was the next question.  I tried to explain, but neither of the denominations that we're associated with are large or well-known enough for these people to have any frame of reference.  So the next question was, "So do you believe in 'born again' stuff?" 

As soon as I said that we did the other guy piped up.  "Oh, so you're against beer!"  Isn't it funny how people immediately associate Christians with what they stand against?  These people had already decided (or maybe it had been decided for them) that they don't fit in with those "born again" people.  I surprised myself with my answer to his exclamation.  I have been meditating on what I said ever since because it was totally spontaneous and un-premeditated.  My conclusion up this point is that it was Spirit-inspired, but I have not put it to a full "scholarly test" yet.  I'm interested to hear your thoughts.

My response went something like this:  Jesus had basically two messages as He traveled the earth.  The first message was to the religious crowd, and He told them to change the way they think and to change the way they treat people (repent).  His message to the rest of the non-religious world was essentially, "Hey, God is not really like all these religious people say He is."  So I feel like the church people around today have, for the most part, confused Jesus' messages.  Church people today try to convince everyone that they are the only ones who know what God is like and that everyone else needs to change  to fit the image they have created for Him.

From my original audience of the two couples on their way to Gasparilla, this drew the greatest line of the day.  One of the young ladies said, "See, now that makes me almost not want to hate you."  I laughed out loud!  "Well, as long as people almost don't hate me, I'll feel like this was a successful day."

But I knew exactly what she meant.  What I just said to them was about as contrary as anything could possibly be to the message they had come to expect from Christians.  I'm not certain, but I think I'm on to something important here.  To whom was Jesus' message of, "Repent for the kingdom of God is at hand" directed?  It's difficult to tell in the context of Matthew 4 where we first see it, but I think a pretty good case can be made for applying it to the already-religious.  Think of it in terms of the famous repentance passage from the Old Testament, 2 Chronicles 7:14.  "If My people, who are called by My Name..."  I also think about it based on Peter's repentance message of Acts 3.  That message was definitely directed to a religious crowd outside of Solomon's Porch.

I'm certainly not saying that "the rest of the world" doesn't need repentance.  I am saying that it doesn't seem to be Jesus' style to rub their faces in it.  How about the "Woman at the Well," from John 4.  Jesus could not have been more direct with her, but He never even insinuated that she should change her ways.  He just let her know, that He knew.  And what about Romans 2:4?  Paul's rhetorical question, "Is it not the kindness of God that leads a person to repentance?"  Or Ephesians 2, when Paul is specifically referring to our lives "before Christ" and explaining the way salvation appeared to us.  In verse 7, he says that it was God's plan to reveal grace to us through the kindness of Jesus Christ.

There is clearly a lot more work to be done in order to flesh this thought out, but I think it is worthy of investigation.  Has the church taken a completely wrong tack in trying to bring change to the last several generations?  Why else would people immediately associate us with what we stand against when our Lord and Savior was actually accused of being a drunkard and a glutton because of the people He was around the parties He attended?