Posted Mar 22, 2021 |
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“Set your minds on things that are above, not on things that are on earth.” Colossians 3:2
A couple of days ago I had a conversation with my mom about what her church was up to. She was very excited to tell me that the church’s theme for this new year was “to know Him.” With excitement in her voice she went on to tell me all that entailed, including knowing His teachings, His behaviors, His love and passion but each phrase was started with “I will” such as “I will know His passion.”
My reply was simply, “and then what?”
For a moment I caught her off guard because she did not know exactly what I meant. I explained that it sounds as though the church is leaving out a key ingredient of the Great Commission; the “and then what” part. She said she didn’t quite understand what I was saying because shouldn’t it be the goal of every person to know God? Yes it is but it is also to go into the world and make Him known to others.
A few days went by of her chewing on the conversation. This morning she told me that she went to visit the church plant that her church launched and she loved it but that was not the interesting part of that conversation. The pastor asked the congregation to talk about something that God is doing in each of their lives and my mother told the story about her church and what our conversation was about. With a smile on his face, before she could even finish what I had told her, he said “the Great Commission.” She was pleased he understood what she was trying to get at but even that wasn’t the best part. He said that he was glad she brought that up because it was a great segue into what he wanted to offer to the congregation. Both churches have done door to door witnessing but this church plant pastor wanted to encourage the members to come out with him anytime for a one-on-one time of teaching the member how to go door to door; the “and then what.”
Although this is not the way I witness to people, I know many fundamental style churches do but many of those do not actually teach their members how to witness effectively making them nervous and unsure of themselves so kudos to this church and those like it that take the “and then what” to the next level.
Each person is in some sort of place in their faith, what is your “and then what?”
