Is God Calling You to Save Your Church?

Unexpected mission field

Indeed, nowhere in the New Testament are we called to sit in pews and be ministered to. The disciples had to leave everything to follow Jesus. But what they gained was far greater than anything the world could offer. “Far too many brothers and sisters are not obeying all that Jesus has commanded,” writes Breakey. “We need to help believers embrace the radical way of Jesus, not only those who we like and are healthy, but also those who get on our nerves and are sick (Mark 2:17.) That doesn’t happen when we pick and choose the believers we meet with. It happens when we plug into a messy local church.”

And let us consider how we may spur one another on toward love and good deeds, not giving up meeting together, as some are in the habit of doing, but encouraging one another – and all the more as you see the Day approaching (Hebrews 10:24-25).

Unexpected mission field

Breakey continues: To stay in a local church, whether you’ve been deeply hurt or not, requires a lifestyle of forgiveness – because you will wrong others and others will wrong you. This is the nature of imperfection. And it’s really a beautiful thing to be a part of. If your ultimate goal is to be like Jesus, then forgiving the unforgivable in local expressions of the global Church is the biggest step to achieving it. You’re never more like Christ than when you’re forgiving someone who doesn’t deserve it. The proof is in the cross. Think for a moment  about all of the godly influences you’ve had in your life. People who’ve played a part in your spiritual growth, held your hand through tough stretches, and inspired you to love people and do good works for King Jesus. God used these believers to infiltrate your soul with passionate commitment to Jesus in spite of your immaturity – and God caused you to grow. This is invaluable to you and your soul, and that’s the point. Staying in local churches to love on unlovely believers is invaluable to the souls of others. It actively pays love forward.

Unexpected mission field

“Believers who are going through the motions are primed for life-change,” writes Breakey, who shares that knows this because he was “the deadest of all Christians” until God brought passionate followers into his life and used them to flip his noisy-gong lifestyle upside-down. If your local church seems dead, if you’re frustrated that nobody lives as a reflection of Jesus – then be Jesus to them. It changes people. It makes them stop and think: What is different about this person? Why are they so in love with Christ and so serious about the red letters? Then they start thinking about their own lives and the Holy Spirit stirs transformation.

Unexpected mission field

Wherever the body of Christ meets is called “church,” and it can be anywhere. But the Bible clearly calls for structure because without it, we crumble. God wants pastors, elders, and deacons, and he wants us to devote ourselves to their teaching. He wants us to respect, submit to, and show confidence in our authorities in the church. He wants us to “come together as a church” and “behave in the household of God, which is the church of the living God, a pillar and buttress of the truth.” This structure – in traditional churches, tent churches, house churches – leads to wells dug, people loved, kids cared for, and so much more in God’s grand plan of redemption.