Local Church // transformation // one on one

Wrote a little bit yesterday about how I am changing and seeing transformation in my own life. Its always an encouragment and blessing to be able to see your own progress because as I said yesterday, there are those times where you are in the desert and you can’t track what’s going on, you just know you are in a sucky season.

Thought today would be a good day to give some evidence of that transformation and what it is looking like in my life right now.

Until a year and a half ago, most of the time I spent in ministry was traveling to different places across the U.S. playing for various camps, discipleship weekends, revivals, retreats, etc. But when Kristen and I moved ourselves to Auburn, we planted pretty firmly and decided we needed to do everything we could as a family to lay down a better foundation as the first five years were spent moving and changing. Honestly, I think we changed more by staying in one place than we did in traveling.

My assumption for quite some time, in fact I remember expressing verbally to some people, was that God had called me to the “church.” And what that looked like to me was traveling and leading in new places. It exposed me to a wide variety of people across the nation and allowed me the opportunity to see the different ways people worship, which shaped me. Over the past few months, however, God has clarified what He meant by calling me to His church. Sit still somewhere and invest in a group of people. As a result, I’ve fallen more in love with the local church as I’m coming to see the power that is locked up inside of her. Yes, she has her quirks and frustrations, but she’s beautiful. God is continually reminding me that the Church is His bride and He is deeply in love with her and so should I be.

In this, I am realizing the power of one on one ministry. Its only here that true growth is going to take place, as we move away from ousourcing our spirituality to the pastor. It’s here that we help people move from, “you teach and feed me and make me a disciple…Pastor” to “I’m hungry and I want to grow on my own.” It’s here that we help people move from the selfishness of the “Burger King, Have it your way worship, give me my hymns or my postmodern emergent worship songs or whatever and that’s not the way it should be done” to “God have it your way, consume us, and may we do whatever we need to do in order to reach those who are outside of relationship with you, even if its not my preferred style.” It’s here that we help people move from “you save the world…Pastor” to “I’ve been called to go and make disciples of all nations.”

That’s one area where I’m growing. Hopefully this helps answer the question I’m alwasy asking people, “You say you are growing, what does that look like?”

Here’s a link to my local church, Cornerstone.