When you were in college did you know any professional students? Maybe you called them “super seniors”. They were the students who seemed to be in school continuously, frequently changed their majors, never fulfilling graduation requirements. They found comfort and security in being a student... delaying one more semester or one more year... movement into the real world.
The college experience is all about camaraderie among students and the security of knowing if you’re in school, then you don’t have to face the harsh realities of finding a job, making a living and dealing with adult responsibilities.
Professional students played it safe, stayed inside the walls and hallowed halls of the institution, delaying as long as possible the responsibilities that come with adulthood in the real world.
Church can be like that for many believers. A safe place to hideout from the real world.
Like college, the Church is an institution that prepares and equips people for real world responsibilities. College prepares students to graduate, equipped to enter the working adult world. Similarly, the Church equips believers to fulfill their calling as disciples in their community and region of our world.
Church can actually get in the way of achieving the goal set before us by Christ to fulfill the Great Commission. His mission for us is outward bound not inward. Caring for one another, learning to live together in community and equipping is essential... but these activities can become “comfort zones” and must not be our only or primary focus.
Church is a training and equipping resource to prepare disciples for works of evangelism. There is the fellowship of disciples in worship assemblies, Biblical teaching, and learning to care for one another, bearing one another and most of all loving one another. We might liken these activities to a school for ministry preparation.
The Church, like an educational institution, equips individual believers for living in the real world, preparing them for the work of sharing the gospel. In the Church, together as believers we experience continuous “spiritual formation”. It is a lifelong process of personal growth, flexing, transforming, adapting, learning to exercise and emulate the character of Christ that will carry us forward into eternity.
Serving God is seeking the lost souls of our world and sharing the gospel. It is holy living, honorable living that pleases our Father in heaven. Divine service is living a life set apart from the world, while inthe world, but not ofthe world. Christians are to be equipped, trained and prepared to be noticed by the world as being uniquely different. The Church, the assembly of believers, is the training and equipping place for Holy and Divine living. (2 Timothy 3:17; 4:1-5; Hebrews 13:20-21)
God prepares all of us for every possible opportunity to glorify His name, magnify His Son and proclaim the gospel of salvation. Our mission is to recognize the opportunities and know when to seize them. Living Christianity each and every day is the greatest adventure in the world. There is nothing like it. The world is ripe for gospel proclamation.
In all professions, from the helper services such as doctors, nurses, teachers, social workers to business owners, managers, accountants, sales and marketers, there are opportunities to be a witness for Christ and His Kingdom. It can be verbal or it can be a silent living example of “conduct unbecoming the world”, but God-honoring and glorifying. The Church trains and enables individuals to find in their work a divine calling and see the hand of God in their efforts to create and promote what is good and to serve others in love.
The focus of our discipleship for Christ is not highly programmed church functions and activities, but equipping each other to deal with the real world. Discipleship is for the sake of the world, not for the sake of the Church. It is carried out in the environments where people spend their lives. Advancing the Gospel “in” the world and “for” the world is hard work.
Unfortunately, “discipleship” as Christian groups now teach and practice it, consists mainly of “special” activities of various kinds, religiously characterized, motivated, and organized “inwardly”, for sake of the Church. In today’s culture, there is useful value in a “place” -- the church building. It’s where people can go to hear and learn about Christ. But nothing can replace the “feet shod for Kingdom proclamation”, one on one, your mouth speaking the message of Christ to a hearers ears.
Whatever we do, every minute of everyday, lines up on one of two sides in the cosmic struggle for souls... God’s side or Satan’s side. Failing to perceive our mission as God intends it to be, “working in the real world” is a victory for Satan.
Sequestering ourselves in the confines of a programmed activity filled church building in continuous preparation and training, never stepping forth into the real world to exercise the fruits of our discipleship, is a victory for Satan. Resisting and thwarting the efforts of the Holy Spirit to transform us, so that we are a beacon for the gospel, seen and known as Christians, is a victory for Satan. We either magnify and glorify God in our life conduct by living out our discipleship training in the real world by boldly preaching the gospel, or we don’t. If we don’t step out into the real world, armed and equipped with the gospel, we fail to hold to our commitment to serve God... His way.
The assembly of believers, elders and preachers guide disciples into their place in their world and show them how to “exercise dominion in life through the one man, Christ Jesus” (Romans 5:17). Church builds the whole Christian for the whole world.
Real life is powerful. Ordinary life is the place of disciples and the place for discipleship. Equipped, prepared and outward bound is our God-given mission. SKH
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DEFEAT DISCOURAGEMENT
An athlete regularly amazed onlookers when he won the 100-yard dash after being 10 yards behind at the 50-yard mark. His fast finish always made up for his slow start. A caterpillar creeps slowly across the sidewalk, unaware that one day it will be a butterfly flitting from flower to flower overhead. Many Christians plod through life thinking, "My family background, my past sins, and my ignorance of God and His Word keep me from being an effective witness for Christ."
Don’t be discouraged:Your past background or yesterday's failures need not hold you back. Abram, who later would be featured in the Hall of Fame of Faith (Heb. 11:8-19), almost didn't make it out of the starting blocks in the race of faith. But he did believe God's promise and, after several false starts, he grew in faith to become known as "the man of faith" (Gal. 3:9). And so can you. Live by the words of a New Testament son of Abraham: "Forgetting what is behind and straining toward what is ahead, I press on toward the goal to win the prize for which God has called me heavenward in Christ Jesus" (Phil. 3:13-14). (by F. Duane Lindsey, from Devotions for Kindred Spirits, Dallas Theological Seminary)
