[a post from mid 2016]
I was reading Alan Hirsch’s THE FORGOTTEN WAYS, earlier today for the umpteenth time. Such an inspiring book as he looks at missional movements and the missional DNA that carry them forward. I was challenged, inspired and stopped by the following quote from Roland Allen,
“The spontaneous expansion of the Church reduced to its elements is a very simple thing. It asks for no elaborate organization, no large finances, no great numbers of paid missionaries. In its beginning it may be the work of one [person], and that a [person] neither learned in the things of this world, not rich in the wealth of this world…What is necessary is faith. What is needed is the kind of faith which uniting a man to Christ, sets him on fire.”
Roland Allen, THE COMPULSION OF THE SPIRIT,
And that is something we have to ask ourselves as believers, as people seeking to plant churches and movements that carry the gospel to those around us. Do we have a faith like that? Are we on fire for Jesus?
There are societal and consumeristic reasons for people to go to church. At times it’s even been the fashionable or trendy thing to do! But not now. The church is seen largely as irrelevant or even as threatening in our culture.
But do we have a faith that compels us? Are we there because we just have to be? Are we compelled, driven, hanging on with all we’ve got because Jesus’ love brings us running to Him?
What does such faith do?
It says, all of life is through Christ. There is no such thing as secular and religious parts in this life. Jesus is my life. He is Lord of all. It agrees with the eleventh chapter of the book of Romans, that everything is from Jesus, through Jesus, to Jesus and for Jesus’ glory.
A friend said a few years ago that when he recruits church planters he can’t give them a lot of finances or assistance but what he looks for is the ones with the “fire in their bellies”. The ones who just have to do it. Yeah. I love that. I identify with that.
Christ’s love compels us (that’s in the Bible, both as a phrase and a constant reality). That’s what makes a movement. Jesus’ love and the fire of faith that it builds in our lives.
Jesus is Lord. Catch that fire and watch where we go!
