Earlier this year, Andrew Nixon wrote an article on the 12 hard truths about ministry in Sydney that he learned from overseeing Connect09. As a result of the feedback he is completing a series of blogs on each of these ‘hard truths’. A list of the past blogs can be found here.
#9. Our church members are a wonderful gift from God and the greatest untapped resource we possess.
Brian*, 55, shift-worker, nervously took responsibility for 30 houses as part of a ministry to a tough area in his parish. There were no Christians there, but he began to pray and visit house to house. For the first year, he could get around all 30 houses in less than an hour.
He almost gave up on the whole thing, but stuck at it. Then slowly, doors started opening (literally). It now takes him a week to get round the houses and he jokes he may need a bladder operation as he drinks so many cups of tea. People are sharing, talking, trusting as he listens and shares. He has daily opportunities to talk to people about Jesus. Several have become believers - praise God.
When asked recently how it is going Brian said, "Beats the heck out of handing out hymn books".
In 20 years of church life, that is all he had ever been asked to do.
Bob*, 68, semi-retired, joined a team of 8 to plant a church in a new area. Despite some (not insignificant) medical problems and difficulty hearing, he has taken to door-to-door visiting with gusto and now devotes 3 days a week to it. He says he has had a massive learning curve, but now reports that as many as 1 in 4 people are not only happy to talk about God, but are happy to meet up again.
In fact, there are so many wanting to find out more that he, and others on team, struggle to keep up with the follow-up. But Bob still leads the way in finding new doors to knock on where people don't know Jesus yet.
By God's grace, dozens have become believers so far and Bob says, "I am not sure what I was doing sitting in the pew all those years!"
Let me just wonder out loud for a minute.
If our church meeting/s is/are at the centre of all our thinking and activity then the church's programs (and the staff who are immersed in church) will of course be at the heart of all the church's endeavours. The regular members of the church will need to - indeed be expected to - fit in with that if church is their number one priority (aka the rosters).
But what if we moved the focus away from the church such that the local community (missionfield) was the focus of more of our prayers, thinking and activity? Then it would be the church members (who are immersed in the wider world) who are at the centre of the action: be it in their street, their workplace, their club, sporting team etc.
Now this is just a thought, but perhaps then more of the church's programs would revolve around the people - and places - where there is maximum "surface area" with the unchurched.
Rather than the staff being the "home team", with the church members as helpers; the members would become the "home team" and the staff would become the helpers. Imagine if the staff had to be rostered to spend time helping the members with their ministries!
Oops, have we just turned church upside down? Or is that, in fact, right-side up?
* Names and some details have been changed.
