I probably don’t have this quite right (someone can straighten me out), but I understand that one of the questions that Lou Holtz (former coack of Notre Dame) would ask people who would be part of his team or staff is: "Are you only interested in what I can do for you, or are you interested in being concerned about me as a person?"
I think this is a reality for check in everything that we are doing. Are we interested in developing our program, or our house church, or our ministry, or our agenda? Or have we genuinely developed a concern for people? Just people!
I have discovered that motivation is everything! If my concern is not genuinely about the welfare and interests of individual people, then I am already headed down the road of control or manipulation. I will use people for my interests rather than be availabe for whatever is of most value to them.
The church, of course, is traditionally guilty of asserting the corporate vision and then assuming that what is in the best interest of each person is to help fulfill that corporate vision. In the process, we miss the individual beauty and uniqueness of each of God’s children. We marginalize those who do not quite fit the "mold" of what "our church" values or esteems.
However, lest we throw stones, I do not want to assert the new "house church vision" and miss the point. It’s not about starting house churches, developing a network of churches, or planting yet more house churches. It’s about people. A person, whoever he or she is, that I am called to minister to. Whatever is best for that person’s calling and community life is what God is into. Not my agenda but His agenda in and through that person.
Church communities do develop in order to support people in what God is doing in and through them. These communities and gatherings are important and necessary. But our motivation in our approach to these communities is everything. Are we building communities, churches, or house churches? Or are we laying down our life to build people. Maybe just one person. Because that one person matters!
Are we interested in people because of how they might facilitate our vision? Or are we simply, genuinely interested in people?
Comments
9 responses to “It’s About People”
Now you quit preachin’ and went to medlin’ on that post Roger!
Seriously, thank you very much for that reminder! God had you write it just for me as I consider some important decisions before the end of the year.
Your comments underlined a message that God delivered to me in a movie I watched over the Thanksgiving Holidays. The movie was, “Beyond the Gates of Splendor” and had a profound effect on me as I watched it. For those not familiar, it’s a documentary about 5 missionaries. I’ll avoid spoiling it for you but, suffice to say, these missionaries did not go to build something – they went to help people. (Just the type of theme you are describing.)
This is a great insight. I am a former staff member of a megachurch. I was always looking for that next key volunteer who could help my portion of the church’s vision produce results. I read books that counseled me to spend 80% of my time with the 20% of my volunteers that produced 80% of my ministries results. On the surface this looks wise. If one only has a limited amount of time to spend with people, the wise person will spend the most time with the people who produce the most results. This is good organizational thinking. There is only one problem. The local church is not an organization. The local church is an extended family. I don’t view time invested in family members as being directly proportionate to the results I am required to produce. Investing time with family members is an expression of love and servanthood. Time invested is based on their needs, not on my need to complete an annual ministry plan. The modern, institutional church is about building great organizations that can realize the vision of a key organizational leader (senior pastor). This is all wrong. Local churches are not about vision statements and organizational leadership, they are about family.
Great post, Roger. Well said. Any man, espeically those of us who care to ‘co-build’ with the Lord (and I wish that was all of us, btw), but any man with testosterone in his body will face the draw to become task-oriented instead of people-oriented. Most men become that way in their private lives, anyway; focused on their jobs and not their families. It’s truly part of the masculine part of the fall of man.
May the spirit of the Lord within us continue to quicken our spirits to pay close attention to His goal. That Christ may be expressed in us, that Christ may be spread by us more to one another, that Christ may be increased upon the earth.
That is no “task”. That is Jesus Christ in his spirit moving within, between and among his people.
People. Amen, Roger. Thanks again.
Great post here Roger! I know I, at times, get wrapped up in the discussions and conversations so much that I forget about the people. I’m sure I’ve been preoccupied in ministry as well and have looked for certain results or other things instead of being concerned about the people, even just one person. Thanks for bringing it back home for us!
Peace to you.
Hi Saints,
Great posts!!
Compassion, caring for one another, sharing each others burdens, building up of the body of Christ.
Church history is mared with men claiming to have “the vision”. All it really boils down to is men leaving a legacy.Spiritual ego.
Caring for a brother or sister might be more important than building something man made.
As I recall the vision was all ready prayed for {John 17:20-25}.
Rodger your post spoke to my heart, thanks.
DannyD
Great blog and reminder to all that people matter beyond what they can do for us. Every new person that we meet can potentially teach us something and add to our fellowship rather than merely “fitting” in somewhere.
A friend of mine prays this prayer: “God, help me to see others as I see my own children.” This isn’t as pious sounding as “God, help me to see others as you do”, but I think it brings home concretely the vision that we need for others.
Wonderful reflections! Reminds me of Jesus, saying: “I am the good shepherd. The good shepherd lays down his life for the sheep.” For Jesus the sheep was the goal, not the means. For “shepherds” of this world, the sheep are simply means, and it would be absurd to lay down ones life for them.
Being a mother of 5, I would have to agree with you about churches and their programs. I have been in lay leadership at times, and it seems so often we hype and conjole people to fit the programs and agendas of the local church “vision”. Jesus said, Come unto me, ye that are weary and heavy-laden and I will give you rest.. and he vehemently rebuked the leaders who rejected people who didn’t measure up to their man-made standards.
Sir, no doubt you have the Spirit of our Lord on this matter. After reading several of your posts I have meditated on what to respond with. I am not sure how much I will be permitted to say but suffice to say you are on the right track. If we so desire to usher in this dispensation of our Lord’s Kingdom and government since it is His government, we must establish it His way in truth. This is truth, it doesn’t matter what anyone believes about the word it does remain it is His word so to co-operate with the cloud of witness we must find out what He believes about His word, His government, His ways, and agree. If it is His word then the manifestation of the witness to that word will bear witness in the demonstration of the power of that word toward change. Not of our own strength of trying but in the faith of His faithfulness to produce that which He has promised. I was sent where I am currently, ironically enough to about the most rugged wilderness of the U.S. both in terrain and principalities, to implement His government first in me (Jeruselem), in my family (Judea), the particular body of Christ I associate with (Samaria), and the uttermost parts of the earth. I was not sent here to start another church since we are the church! None the less the bones have shaken and are coming together. We get together in houses any where from four to six days a week. I have searched the net for over three years for others that are of the same mind but have found none that do not promote ministry, doctrine, or vision with a motive. I have, to this point, come to the conclusion that the voice of the true Apostles and Prophets are not permitted or not in operation in the Bride through the mode of “promotion of ministry”. The “church”, as we have known it in the past, for the most part are ruled by the gifts of the teacher, pastor, and or evangelist which are the matriarchal gifts since they distribute the milk of the word. I hope I do not offend in this manner for it is just logos not an indictment. It was, and is still, necessary for a season. My reason for contacting you is that it may be possible to contact others across the world that are of the same mind. We are in contact with some relationally throughout the earth but few they are because the promotion of this is done relationally instead of mass distribution of propaganda. That makes it difficult to locate these fellowships though they exist. They are more concerned with the current voice of their Father at work in them then to promote numbers. These promote “the” Spiritual house not the temples of Moses as is written in Hebrews. It is always an encouragement to exhort one another and keep each other in faith. Keep up the good fight. All your questions that you have inquired about will be answered if you will not allow old mindsets and experiences to be lifted above the desire for the truth. The only obscurity that exists in us is because we have not agreed with His mindset (Holy Spirit) who is the light and no darkness is in Him.