What Kind of Church 2025-02-09

What kind of church, do we need to be?

That is a question,

we need to look at as we plan for the future.

Given some thought, we could probably come up with a long list of things the church should be doing,

things the church should stand for

or things we should stand against.

Today I have three main ideas.

We need to be a growing Church

Physical Growth

Churches should be growing in numbers,

and if they get too big, consider planting other churches.

Growth, in numbers, should be a natural process that happens in the church.

Planting of churches,

spreading the Gospel,

should be a natural process.

God used persecution to spread people,

that is to spread the church

across the known world.

If we don’t all work to spread the gospel,

will God use persecution again?

Growth is such a natural thing, it can be embarrassing when it doesn’t happen.

illus.

When Dr. Dennis Applebee was a young lad in Great Britain, he noticed an old couple in their neighborhood who walked around on warm summer nights with a baby carriage or perambulator as he called it.

What stood about about them was that the lid was always down.

They never showed off this baby of theirs.

This was no Abraham and Sarah story.

They didn’t have this baby in their old age.

You see, if I remember the story right,

this was their baby,

and it never grew,

year after year, it did not grow.

It never went from infant to toddler

it never learned to walk, or to talk

and they were through with sharing their child and his/her story with others,

so when they perambulated around with the baby carriage,

ALL LIDS WERE DOWN.

Growth is natural,

a lack of growth is

ABNORMAL

Numerical Growth

We have made a difference in people lives and they have moved on, but numbers are down not up.

Pray for people to come.

to hear the good news.

Mental growth/knowledge

How about the knowledge of God,

knowledge of his character and compassion

Knowledge of good and evil, as clarified in God’s word.

Do you know God and His moral standards better today then when you first came to know Him?

How else can we grow.

So many ways

How about growing in our fellowship with one another.

Spiritual Growth

Spiritual Growth, often comes from relying on God

to get through our trials in life.

One time as a young married man between jobs,

I was so envious of the older people at the Monmouth Evangelical Church,

because they knew how God got them through many a hard time,

but I hadn’t had those experiences yet and

I was worried about our finances.

I was worried about bills, and food on the table.

But they knew how God had provided for them and

they did their best to assure me,

it was going to be alright

I just needed to keep trusting in God.

Through the sermons

through bible studies

through personal devotions

we should be growing spiritually,

learning to trust and follow God more.

We need to be growing the number of tithers

increasing our giving to missions and other worthy causes.

The Legalistic may tithe thinking he will earn his way to heaven

But other good men and women

growing in their obedience to God and

growing in their joy in their lives

Also tithe and give gifts to good causes.

We need to be a Healthy Church

A healthy church has programs to help people grow.

Worship, Sunday School, Sermons, Fellowship, Bible Studies, Step Studies

all to help people grow.

A healthy church discourages over commitment.

And saying that, I’m suggesting there are church’s that promote and expect

over-commentment.

Pastor’s can over-commit,

just like everyone else.

illus

Pastor Shawn struggle with the church people and people left.

The finances went south.

He had to work a part time job and serve the church.

Then, he started a masters program until he broke.

He called me out of the blue asking for two weeks off, and never came back.

The church, Pastor Parish could have counsilled him not to take on a masters program

in addition to trying to make a living and serving the church.

We could have offered to share the preaching load, to help him avoid burnout

As lay leader, I could have taken a Sunday a month

Someone else could have been found to cover a Sunday a month so

Shawn's preaching load could have been cut in half.

Some time back, I needed some Continuing Education Credits and I was all enthused about getting chaplaincy training,

With that training, I could share the community chaplaincy load with the other pastors in town.

I shared that idea with Pastor Parish and they wisely said

“Now it not a good time for this.”

We knew a church that fostered little to no family time.

Sometimes having crusades for not just weeks, but months.

In hindsight we see that was a mistake.

A Healthy church talks about the tough issues

My preaching has mostly been book studies, and I may not have gotten to these topics as i should

abortion - the sanctity of human life

abuse - escaping it, healing from it and even help for abusers change which is more a cousiling thing..

drugs and alcohol and why they are wrong.

Pastor Herman Green pastors an East Portland Church that has their van stolen with some frequency.

It has happend so often that the community is getting quicker at spotting his stolen van then the police are.

He has a saying about drugs

If you need them, take them, if you don’t need them, don’t take them.

and I say, amen to that brother.

Sexuality - That’s a topic to step on toes with. But the church should not be silent on these issues.

1 Corinthians 6:9–11 NIV

9 Or do you not know that wrongdoers will not inherit the kingdom of God? Do not be deceived: Neither the sexually immoral nor idolaters nor adulterers nor men who have sex with men 10 nor thieves nor the greedy nor drunkards nor slanderers nor swindlers will inherit the kingdom of God. 11 And that is what some of you were. But you were washed, you were sanctified, you were justified in the name of the Lord Jesus Christ and by the Spirit of our God.

A healthy church will discuss these issues and many others with clarity, tact, compassion and grace.

when it comes to good things

A healthy Church encourages fellowship

A healthy church

welcomes your non-Christian friends.

A healthy church works with others,

other Churches

other organizations and sometimes even partners with local government.

Third point.

We need to be a Great Commission Church

You know the Great Commission

Its recorded in Matthew chapter 28

The comes after Jesus resurrection.

Matthew 28:16–20 NIV

16 Then the eleven disciples went to Galilee, to the mountain where Jesus had told them to go. 17 When they saw him, they worshiped him; but some doubted. 18 Then Jesus came to them and said, “All authority in heaven and on earth has been given to me. 19 Therefore go and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, 20 and teaching them to obey everything I have commanded you. And surely I am with you always, to the very end of the age.”

How can we be a Great Commotion church

We can Support Missions and Missionaries

We can be Evangelicals, telling others the good news of Jesus Christ.

Do you know what our church name is?

I don’t mean, DEC Dallas Evangelical,

I mean our denomination name?

The Evangelical Church.

I used to be embarrassed by that title,

as though we were claiming to be the best church in town,

but our guest speaker at Mid-Winter loved our denominational name,

he said you have a great church name.

And we do,

now we need to continue living up to our name.

The Evangelical Church.

To be a Great Commission church,

we need to be committed to sharing the gospel with others,

not just relying on the missionaries we support to share the gospel

not just relying on the pastor to share the gospel

I heard about an evangelism tool that is reaching many people in Asia,

it starts with a 15 second testimony.

Can you imagine, a 15 second testimony?

I asked Bob Warren, what would that be like?

He demonstrated something like this . . .

“My life used to be really messed up and I was sad, angry and bitter all the time.

Would you like to hear how Jesus changed me and changed my life?”

Wow, that was simple and short!

Bob explained it catches their interest . . . .

before they can mentally check out.

Of course that is not exactly the words I would say,

it may not be exactly the words you would say either but

Do you think you could come up with a 15 second testimony about your life that ended with the question

Would you like to hear how Jesus changed me and changed my life?

I think I could!

If they said

“Yes, I want to hear about how Jesus changed your life?”

Could you talk about, what Jesus has done for you?

I bet you could.

Unless you are a brand new Christian or one afflicted like the very old infant in Dr. Applebee’s story, no growth.

If so, I invite you to invite Jesus into your heart and life in a new and better way and to

read his word every day.

Today, there have been three main points this morning :

We need to be a Growing Church

We need to be a Growing Church

We need to be a Healthy Church

We need to be a Healthy Church

We need to be a Great Commission Church

Putting it all together

We need to be a Growing, Healthy, Great Commission Church.

Amen? Amen

Let’s stand and pray that you and I

will work together with God and with his strength,

to be more like this as a church and as individuals.