One of the more difficult aspects of knowing the health of the church has often been number oriented…How many come to the worship service? How many are in small groups? How many new members? All very common questions in the church world. And to some degree, a decent indicator of what is happening in the life of the church. Of course this isn’t taking a number of details into the equation…Where did these people come from? Other churches? Are we just offering them something a bit more their “style.” So in the long run did the Kingdom really prosper? What about this. Why are the people coming? Is it because the church has a phenomenal speaker and they love to hear him speak? Is the worship band incredible, and one of the best in the area? Is it because the church is offering Starbucks coffee when the other churches stick with Foldgers?
What about approaching it like this. How many lives are being changed? As in, what stories of true life change do you have at the end of the year, instead of the percentage of growth in a particular body. And even more, how many lives are changing because of Jesus instead of what “your” church has to offer them. Life change looks like any of these according to the Scripture: from greedy to generous, from worried to carefree, from lost to found, from righteous to humble, from selfish to selfless, from hateful to loving, from confused to aware, from broken to whole, from unaware to informed, from doubtful to faithful, from first to last, from apathetic to striving, from safe to reckless, from judgmental to introspective, from hopeless to hopeful, from self-indulgent to self-controlled, from alone to family, from stagnate to growing, from quick to speak to quick to listen, from aggressive to meek, from accusing to understanding, from self-seeking to discipling. Just a few that stand out to me. This is, however difficult to put into a year-end-review report if you have such a thing. The good thing is, we’re ultimately responsible to God for the direction of the church and I would guess he wouldn’t mind hearing the stories again, about how life is different when you know Jesus.
So much of the focus of this church is on being rather than doing. Being a group of people that seek whole-heartedly to follow after the Jesus of the Scriptures. The doing just happens as a byproduct of loving Jesus. So if and when you ask me how the church is doing, be prepared to hear stories of life change, not statistics.
