What is the best kind of church for this dark hour? What kind of church transcends outward success and has true impact? What kind of church does not kill its pastor or crank out lukewarm believers?
Right now God is recruiting men and women to lead a new kind of congregation. He is asking for volunteers to build churches that can save America. He is offering you a glorious opportunity to build a storm proof, battle tested family of believers. An army who will not just survive, they will thrive.
I am writing to the sincere, brokenhearted pastor and to the people who love that pastor. I want this to be a word that brings life, hope and direction. You will not hear this in any seminar on church growth. It is a radical departure from what you have been told. But there is no doubt this will work.
1. Let go. Let go of the stress of human church growth models. Let go of the nasty people—both the pharisitic who criticizes all you do and the parasitic who sucks the life out leadership. Let go of the pressure to please anyone but God. Let go of the fear of finances. Let go of the fear of failure. Now what are you left with? You are in a complete state of joyous dependency on God.
2. Seek Jesus. I am absolutely telling you to break away and seek God. Don’t seek guidance. Don’t seek provision. Don’t seek growth. Just seek Jesus until He is more real than anything you fear.
David Wilkerson said this after Christ set him free from man made ministry: “Now, my greatest joy is waiting upon Him for direction. I have made time to be alone with Him, and have prepared my soul to abide in His quiet presence. He is letting me sense what the Spirit is saying to this generation. The more He empties me, the more He fills me with a desire to depend only on Him for everything. I see now that all along the Lord was waiting for me to lay down all my plans, all my ambitions, and be given over to Him as a bond slave. The sweat is now gone – the pressure is off. He is recreating all my values.”
3.Tell the people they are destroyers of the works of the devil. Does that sound oversimplified or strange? The fact is, this is the most lethal announcement Satan will ever hear in your church .
1 John 3: 8 tell us that Jesus was purpose driven: “for this purpose was the Son of God revealed that He might destroy the works of the devil.” However, the purpose that drove Him was totally unlike what modern preachers love to talk about. Jesus is a destroyer of the works of the devil. Why is that important to note?
It shows the people the purpose that should drive them. They are an extension of the purpose of Christ and not some freelance boring substitute. So much is said about being purpose driven. Here is the purpose!
If the people redefine themselves as destroyers of the works of the devil it will instantly transform your meetings. Gone is the harmless fellowship or self-help seminars. From this point on, church services are demonstrations of the power of God and training sessions for your people to go out and destroy the works of the devil.
Your people will cease to attend church to do time, or learn to tread water. They will expect miracles. That part is the key to reaching modern America. If church becomes a center for Holy Spirit led signs and wonders. If the moving of the Spirit is free and balanced then outsiders will see undeniable proof of the power of Christ. That becomes the attraction.
Today we have been ushered into one of two extremes in church models. One is totally entertainment business model that runs like a machine. The other, sadly, is a model of reaction where declining attendance and religious defiance drives preachers to preach angry sermons and put increasing bondage on their dwindling numbers.
Church should attract but for the right reason. When the reason is right it, brings people who are hungry for truth, who need a miracle, who yearn for deliverance from addiction, perversion and all the damage of our sick and stupid culture.
Best of all they not only come—they stay. You don’t have to cater to their whims because they have met Christ and have been ruined by His glory.
4.Give the Holy Spirit actual and not symbolic control to make revival sustainable. Once you start growing and the crowds come, you will need wisdom from beyond this world to make it sustainable. Don’t violate the power that brought you this miracle by falling back into human wisdom and old habits. Determine to make your dependency on the Holy Spirit real not symbolic or mystical. The more you do this the clearer His guidance will become.
How can you not try this? If the possibility exists for a congregation that is excited, unselfish, supernatural and uniquely forged to save America why wouldn’t you be open? I pray you will!
