Jon Freeman :: Blog

For many years, I have been a part of churches that operate on the principle that “life change happens best in the context of community/small groups.” To that end, countless dollars and man hours have been spent to create community: small group leader training, organizing small groups, curriculum, and assimilation programs to get people into small groups. All of these things are good and positive shifts in our church cultures moving from a very individualistic view of following Christ (me alone in my closet with my Bible & prayer) to following Christ in the context of a small group. But, the question I have been asking myself is, “what do we mean by life change?”

I propose that the life change we as church leaders desire is spiritual transformation brought about by the work of the Holy Spirit – period. Romans 8:5-17 emphasizes a mind that is controlled by the Spirit which leads to life in our bodies (life change). Galatians 5:16ff talks about the fruit of living by the Spirit. When we talk about life change in the context of church ministry and discipleship, what we are really talking about is spiritual transformation; spiritual transformation is, at its core, a work of the Holy Spirit as a believer submits to His leading and prompting day by day.

Now, I know this is not really news to most people. What is troubling to me is that church leaders assume that because people are in small groups, they are somehow experiencing life change. Just as life change doesn’t happen during an hour service on Sunday morning (the unquestioned assumption of a generation ago), neither does it happen during a two-hour small group on Wednesday nights (the unquestioned assumption of our generation). The Reveal study by Willow Creek is causing churches to re-evaluate their small group programs and authors like Hirsch are challenging small groups to move towards a missional focus, but we are falling short of helping people to walk in a way that is controlled by the Spirit.

To say that “life change happens best in the context of community” is akin to saying that “cakes bake best in an electric oven.” Yes the statement is true, but it is not particularly helpful if the goal is baking a cake or seeing life change happen. Lots of things happen best in community just like lots of things bake best in an electric oven. What is more helpful is challenging young believers to follow Christ and submit to the Holy Spirit. The point is not to obsess over the oven but to help people to understand what goes into baking a great cake.

Spiritual Life Change happens only when believers submit their minds and their wills to the work of the Holy Spirit and present their bodies to God as living sacrifices. Yes, the encouragement and accountability from other believers (as in a small group) can help a believer to submit to the work of the Holy Spirit, but small groups (no matter how strong the relationships or how deep the Bible study) cannot bring about spiritual life change. As we seek to spiritually transform people’s lives, let us as church leaders strive to help those in our congregations and in our small groups to wrestle with obedience to the Spirit of God moment-by-moment aligning our will and our minds to His will and His mind.

What constitutes a missional activity? It seems that in the name of being missional and engaging our culture, any random act of kindness is heralded as being a move in the missional direction. I personally find this a troubling trend among young church leaders and church planters. In an effort to distance ourselves from the fear-driven scare tactics and the bait-and-switch practices of yesterday, many are proudly declaring that they have “no hidden agendas” when it comes to “missional activities.”

Not long ago, I sat with a church planting pastor who proclaimed that he was leading his church to be missional. He told me that he and his congregation had gone to the middle of their major metropolitan city and passed out flowers at Valentine’s Day to random people who passed by as a way of doing something nice with no strings attached (they intentionally didn’t mention their church or anything about them because they did not want to have any hidden agendas). I will get into the issue of hidden agendas at a later time (should we consider the Gospel a hidden agenda?), but here I want to talk about what constitutes an activity as being missional. Is handing out flowers to random people bad? Of course not. Is it missional? I say it is NOT MISSIONAL because unbelievers never had an opportunity to take the next step towards encountering Jesus Christ as a result of this activity.

What do I mean by “next step towards encountering Jesus Christ?” I mean this: missional activities seek to gain influence in the lives of unbelievers in the hope and expectation of inviting them to encounter the person of Jesus Christ. An activity that is disconnected from relationship lacks the ability for gaining influence. However, an activity that allows a Christian to meet a tangible need or show genuine love to a person who is disconnected from God, it creates the opportunity for influence. Relationship is key because Influence is key!

Being good citizens is good and being nice is good – but being a good citizen and doing nice things does not necessarily lead to spiritual transformation. Only Jesus Christ can change people’s lives, and apart from the opportunity to encounter Christ, nice activities are just that – nice. They may make us feel good about ourselves, but let us not confuse feeling good and helping people as being about the task of making disciples of all nations. There are plenty of atheist philanthropists who are doing nice things and feeling good.

So, as we as church leaders think through how to become more missional, let us think two questions: (1) How are we going to build relationships with unbelievers and gain influence in their lives? (2) What is the next step that I hope my new friend will take in encountering the person of Jesus Christ?

People are free to take the next step or not – we have no control over that, but we do our community and our friends a disservice when we fail to do our part to lead people to the only one who offers hope.