Earnest Christ-Followers for the 21st Century
A State of the Mission Address
Board of Bishops
October 2008
To Abram: "Go from ... to the land I show you. I will bless you ... so that you will be a blessing." Gen. 12:1-3
To Moses: "I have seen ... heard ... I know ... I have come down to deliver them. So I will send you ..." Exodus 3:7-10
To Jesus" "This is my Son, whom I love; with him I am well pleased." Matt. 3:17
Jesus: "The Spirit of the Lord is upon me ... anointed me to bring good news to the poor. He has sent me ... " Luke 4:18-19
"The time is fulfilled ... kingdom near ... repent and believe." Mark 1:15
"Follow me ... "
"He appointed twelve ... apostles ... to be with him ... to be sent out ... to proclaim .. and to have authority ..." Mark 3:13-15
"The Lord appointed 70 others ... sent them ... " Luke 10:1
"All authority ... committed to me ... go ... make disciples of all peoples, baptizing ... teaching to observe ... I am with you always ..." Matt. 28:16-20
We greet you in the name of the Lord Jesus Christ whose work and mission we are privileged to share.
You may note from the title of our presentation that we are most concerned with the Mission and the state of its conduct among us, as opposed to the concerns often highlighted in a more traditional "State of the Work" report. A quick look at the concluding appendix will reveal some primary report data for the past three years. We will return to this along the way.
Free Methodists are called to be earnest Christ-followers in the company of a people–past, present, and future–who obey that call. We are Christ-followers and we are earnest.
We are Christ-followers
As Christ-followers, Jesus of Nazareth stands at the center of who we are, how we live, and what we do. We are persons made in the image of God. Once we had all but lost that image because of our sin and rebellion against God. But now we have been reclaimed, redeemed and restored in that image through Jesus Christ. We have died with Christ in order to be raised to new life, in order to put on the new Person–the Jesus-Person–created after the likeness of God in true righteousness and holiness. As Christ-followers our identity is in Christ who first loved us, whose continuing love sets the parameters for our daily lives, fills us up, and then compels us toward the others near and far also loved by Christ.
As Christ-followers, thus filled and shaped by love, we develop the character of Christ. We are known by the fruit of His Spirit: by love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, gentleness, faithfulness and self-control. We are led by His Spirit. We are led in continuity with the story of Christ that fulfills the entire story of God's way with his world. We share in the call to Abram to receive and share blessing with all the world's families. We share in the call of Moses to enter into the pathos of a God who sees, hears, and knows the misery of people trapped in bondage, and who therefore determines to set them free. Above all, as Christ-followers we follow Christ as he fulfills the Father's mission to announce the kingdom, demonstrate its reality, and offer its blessings to the world, even at the cost of His life.
Christ-followers not only aspire but expect to be like Christ–to think, feel, act and react as he did in the circumstances of his life. Indeed, Christ gives us the clearest and most compelling picture we have of holiness of heart and life. Holiness is to be like Jesus, loving God with our all and loving neighbor as self, to be so filled with love that nothing contrary to love can remain in us or hold sway over us.
Moreover, as Christ-followers who reflect the character of Christ we follow Christ in mission. We will love the world in the way God did, so much that God gave his best, his one and only. Jesus is God's gift of love to the world. As Christ-followers, formed into church as the Body of Christ, we are likewise God's gift of love to the world. More precisely, like Jesus we move out to seek, serve, love, and embrace those missing from the Father's household. We tolerate no false dichotomy between being and doing. A Christ-like character compels us to Christ-like ministry and service in the world. In this sense, for us church is all about the world. Worship, teaching, and receiving the blessing of God all flow through the Body to others not yet awakened to God. There is no static blessing, only dynamic blessing, flowing to and then through Christ's own.
That is, as Christ-followers we follow a real Person who is still on the move in the world today. We follow Christ to the people, especially the poor, the weak, and the vulnerable. We go to these people in particular because Jesus does. We go to these people confident that embracing them will yield multiple opportunities to embrace others, even as we observe in the initial days of Jesus' ministry. Now, in these later days of Jesus' ministry through his earnest followers, to target the poor, the weak and the vulnerable will deepen the credibility of our claims for Christ to a watching world, including those who by this world's standards are wealthy, strong, and secure.
People who have never met their Messiah, especially those who do not know there is a Messiah, simply must meet him. And, just as the Messiah didn't wait for the world to come to him, so Christ-followers and the local churches they form do not wait for the world to come to them. It is not sufficient to be seeker sensitive or seeker targeted if the seekers must first come to us. It is not only better, it is at the heart of true obedience–our actual following after Christ–that we demonstrate our seeker sensitivity and targeting by actually entering into the world to find and identify with seekers.
We declare that the Free Methodist Church no longer recognizes a sharp–or any ultimately relevant–distinction between foreign and home ministry. We no longer tolerate the exaltation of heroic Christ-followers who go to another country to share Christ by U.S. based Christ-followers who are not themselves engaged in ministry to the people near them. We celebrate God's call to international mission work, and just the same we celebrate God's call to domestic mission work. Earnest Christ-followers of the 21st century will see in international missions the models most appropriate for their homeland missional obedience.
Christ-followers not only follow Christ in mission to the people, but participate in no less than his mighty work. Jesus chose the twelve and eventually gave them authority to share in his own ministry. Later he chose others (70 or 72) and authorized them. In the "great commission" the mission of the church is bracketed by the ultimate authority of Christ and the personal presence of Christ. In the Acts that authority and presence come with the promised Holy Spirit. The sign of life in the community of Christ-followers was the indwelling Spirit of God. He brought power and generated a movement to the ends of the earth. He enlivened the community of Christ-followers with resurrection power and so they continued the ministry Jesus began, to the amazement of outsiders. We understand that the true church has been created to act on Christ's authority as ambassadors of his Kingdom, fully equipped to speak on the King's authority the word that created and sustains the universe. Such authority creates faith, sustains courage, inspires risk, subverts the power of the evil one and undoes his strong-holds.
Counting what counts
In order to make good on our intent to be true Christ-followers, we are learning to count the things that count. Here we draw attention again to the statistical sheet at the end of this report. A quick glance (which is the kind of look we like best) would seem to reveal both good news and bad news, apparently this year more bad than good. We could easily illustrate. What we want to note is this: even if a quick, all the more a sustained, glance at the stats reflected all "good news"–that is, numbers up in every category–such stats would not necessarily mean we are deepening and expanding as a movement of true Christ-followers. And, conversely, even if our glance reflected some "bad news"–that is, numbers flat or down–such stats would not necessarily mean our focus and direction are off. Not necessarily. In other words, again, we must learn to count the things that count.
We are learning again what it means to follow, that the point of being Christian and being Holy is in fact to follow. We are falling in love with Jesus Christ all over again, and we're calling the church back to its first love. We are looking at the world, ourselves, and our ministries through the lens of Christ. We're resolved to be no less than like Jesus Christ, our first love. Therefore, to be a people and local churches that love Jesus and are drawing others to love him counts.
Our failures are rooted in sinful distractions, or outright defections, from the centrality of Christ powered by the Holy Spirit. Our failures trace to inadequate or no authentic discipleship. We have plenty of classes and groups and lessons and booklets, but far too little transformative partnerships with other Christ-followers, and transformative participation together in the work Jesus began and continues to do. We are resolved to disciple. That we become a people in whose fellowship and gatherings the likeness and activities of Jesus are reflected counts.
Our future draws us to a full participation in the ongoing mission of Christ. That we are moving outwardly, away from our own kind or selves, entering into to the world of others, counts.
That we are being led by the Holy Spirit to the next theatres of action, to recognize, explore and seize new opportunities and to initiate new ministries counts.
That "outsiders" around our ministry centers know we're there and are glad because we have impact that is good in the public's view counts.
That we are a people growing up to our full potential to have impact, to assume leadership in the church and marketplace and other social arenas counts.
That our unwillingness to wait for people to come to us drives us to envision ever more diverse and innovative ways of going to them counts.
That we refuse to limit the birthing of new churches by the models of church currently in vogue which highlight large crowds, owning property and buildings, and depending on a minimal annual budget–but are compelled by the Spirit to different places and ways of being together as Christ-followers to worship, learn, conform to Christ's image, and have impact on our cities, towns, and regions for the Kingdom counts.
Why we are encouraged
We are confident we are on the right track, that more and more who belong to our faith-family are understanding themselves and their churches in the ways we have described. Here are a few of the reasons.
- The missional focus we have shared in this address finds deep resonance wherever we go. And, if you look at our schedules, you will see that is all over the place.
- The expanding of our view of "mission work" to include North America signals our desire to be truly global in our pursuit of the church's mission.
- Our people's responses to the crises in India, Haiti, and the U.S. south suggest an opening up toward the world in gracious generosity.
- In every region of the nation, conferences are acknowledging an inadequate or total lack of intentional discipling strategies and structures, and are responding in multiples ways to make coaching, peer mentoring, internships and the like endemic to the Free Methodist Church.
- In many locations around the country, we can celebrate freedom from the forms that contain the church's outbreak or inhibit its vital in-break into local communities. Smaller units of church–such as house churches, multi-site ministries, shared facilities, are becoming common among us.
- The organization and first meeting of the Commission on Leadership Development (COLD) signals a concerted and more intentional focus on understanding how God calls his people to lead in various ways within church and marketplace, and how we may best cooperate with God's call.
- Our recent Overseers Consultation focused on the need for the U.S. church to approach its ministries as cross-cultural in nature. Our Superintendents not only "get it," but have been (re)orienting conference and congregational ministries accordingly.
- Our January Gathering for Strategic Ministries will bring together some of our most innovative and passionate missional leaders for a time of affirming the ministries the Lord wishes to give them (and through them the FMC) and discern how better to see a flourishing of new ministries, especially among people in the U.S. who have recently been underserved by the classic Holiness Denominations.
- The Financial Reports for both FMWM and for the Home Ministries of the church are both encouraging to date. If, as we believe, our people will fund a vision that captures their hearts, then the signs are highly encouraging.
We are earnest
Finally, in our following after Christ we are earnest. What does this mean? Bottom line: we are "live-serious" and we will do whatever we must to move more consistently in these Christ-ward directions. We are taking the story of the first Christ-followers, the first to be church, and laying alongside it all the other stories–the stories of our lives, our local congregations, including our regional, national and global stories. And wherever the Story diverges from our stories we commit to bring our stories into full alignment with the Story. We commit to a brutal honesty in seeking the alignment. We want to walk only in the light, as painful as that may.
What does it mean to be earnest? We take a page from the first to be Free Methodist Christ-followers. In the course of reading Howard Snyder's Populist Saints, we are moved by the account of B.T. and Ellen Roberts' determination that the city of Buffalo simply had to have a free church for the poor, where it was most needed, in the heart of the city. Yet they had just been expelled from the church and now faced the needs of all unemployed persons. How could they plant a free church there–in the city for the poor? Listen as Dr. Snyder reports it:
During 1859 and 1860 Roberts thus made his base in Buffalo while traveling widely. His vision for his Buffalo ministry was to preach the gospel to the poor in the heart of the city, however, ...
So Roberts began looking for a downtown location.
In April of 1860 ... Roberts found an ideal location. The Old Pearl Street Theatre ... was for sale at $3,500.00. It seated nearly 800 and would be ideal for a central-city ministry.
The problem, of course, was money. Benjamin figured he needed $500 to equip the building for church services. "Thus for $4,000 we can get a good brick church centrally located," he told his father. Roberts negotiated for the building and found he could buy it for $1,000 down and yearly payments of $500 or so.
But where to find the needed $1,500 to get started? Benjamin and Ellen decided to sell their home on Palmer Street, for which they had paid $2,200. Ellen later told the story:
My husband felt we must get a place for worship in the heart of the city, where the gospel could be preached to the poor. He could see no way of doing it except he gave our home towards it. It was all we had. I looked the matter over. We had three children. I thought of the way the Disciples were led, at that marvelous outpouring of the Spirit, when they old their possessions and goods and parted them to all men as every man had need" ... Let those who have prayed long for blessings not received, begin to fee the poor, clothe the naked, and yield themselves and substance to the Lord as if they meant it (i.e., earnestly), and he will pour them out blessings that will measure beyond their desires and expectations.
What does it mean to be earnest? Let us cite a page from a recent Free Methodist Christ-follower whose walk in this present age is now complete.
The entire Free Methodist family has had an opportunity to witness Mitch Thomas's earnest following after Christ. In the weeks before finishing this leg of that journey, Mitch assured his father:
Dad, as we walk through this, it becomes clear to me that holiness matters. I have no regrets, no moral issues to settle, no relationships to repair, no decisions to undo and no priorities to rearrange. My heart is clear. My memories are sweet. My ministry has been rewarding. My Jesus is always near. I am just fighting a physical illness while experiencing the riches of God in every other way.
And what of the consequences of such earnest following? His dad, our colleague, commented:
We have all walked through a sea of tears. But in that walk, we have scoured his calls and emails of people grieving his loss and telling the stories of his transforming influence in their lives. I am caught up more and more in the reality that he was a "life maximizer". I don't have a clue how someone at 28 (only 26 healthy years) could impact so many so deeply to do so much. It's not that Mitch didn't enjoy tv, sleeping in, and "hanging out" (I've never fully figured out what that entails) as is customary with his generation. In fact, sometimes he seemed a little too relaxed for my driven tastes. But, somewhere in the middle of all the "hanging out", he made the most of opportunities to lift up, encourage, tell about Jesus, challenge growth, press toward reconciliation, bring people together and do a number of other very productive, big picture things.
I honestly would have viewed myself at 28 years to have been a life maximizer ... I worked harder than Mitch, I'm convinced. He worked smarter than me with better focus on the most important things, I'm equally convinced... (i.e., earnest).
So far, I am aware of more than 50 people who were introduced to Jesus by Mitch. ... a dozen of whom he discipled into significant ministry; about 700 attended his service yesterday in a wonderful tribute to his life, and some of them renewed their commitments to Christ at the memorial. His impact was broad reaching and deep. Additionally, the emails and blogs of Mitch, Marlene, his wife Chelsea and me were visited and/or read by approximately 60,000 first time or repeat visitors. Their (Mitch and Chelsea were wed on August 2, 2008) wedding pictures alone were seen by more than 18,000 people. Through these avenues, I am aware of dozens who have either committed their lives to Christ for the first time or made recommitments to Christ along the journey. ... we had the privilege of praying with 4 people in the hospital to enter the family of God. All of this to say, "This has been a painful, yet blessed .. (time) through which one of Mitch's prayers was answered." He said, "I simply want God to be glorified through this and for his Kingdom to grow." God has been glorified and His Kingdom has been expanded. (i.e., earnest)
And, so, with his father, we encourage "everyone ... to do a life self-analysis. Are we half asleep, caught up in the trivial or self centered, squandering good opportunities to do good? Or, are we red hot, seeking, yearning, prime focus people." That's what it means to be earnest Christ-followers. And to that we are committed.