Churches as trojan horses

"They zealously court you, but for no good; yes, they want to exclude you, that you may be zealous for them. But it is good to be zealous in a good thing always" - Galatians 4:17-18

Whilst Christians are commanded to deal with individual cases with charity, nonetheless, it is impossible when it passes by your nostrils not to think that you're smelling the spirit of the world and to recognise it as such. Treating others with kindness and grace may yet co-exist with an unavoidable suspicion that something is very wrong, and that we'd be wise to a) keep a sensible distance and b) ourselves operate otherwise.

In the above verses from Galatians, Paul was speaking about false brethren: the "Judaizers", who sought to recruit the Galatian churches to their false gospel of justification through Christ plus obedience to Old Covenant laws. Nonetheless, it refers to a matter seen throughout the Christian world today. A matter rarely mentioned, unless I have been looking the wrong way.

The Judaizers presented themselves as being zealous for God's truth, and for God's standards. They, after all, preached laws that God himself had given, and which were good things. Was not being enthusiastic for those things a good? Who could question it? An apostle of Jesus Christ not only could, but had to, and did, not only question but refute it. The Judaizers' "zeal for God's truth" was a trojan, cloaking their own naked ambition. Such was their zeal for their real cause - their own pre-eminency - that they would quite happily exclude the Galatians from the blessings of the gospel of grace - which had brought those Galatians life, knowledge of Christ, the gift of the Holy Spirit, and incorporation into the people of God and the promise of an eternal inheritance - in order to achieve it. That's quite some zeal: and a very evil zeal.

Christian brother or sister, is it only people preaching rank heresy who possess that same zeal and who are animated by the same lust for pre-eminence, for man's praise and fame amongst those of their chosen domain? Do you not think you often caught a strong whiff of the same odour in many sound Christian institutions, conferences, colleges, ministries, websites, blogs/podcasts and the like? Many attempts to build one's own personal brand, and zealous entering into all kinds of pointless and empty controversies in order to further not the glory of Christ, but the development of someone's brand/institution/reputation?

It is good to be zealous for Jesus Christ, his honour and glory, and his priorities - spreading the gospel to the lost, building up his sheep in the local church, glorifying his name through good works in the home and community, and eagerly awaiting his return. But he forbids us to attempt to serve two masters (one reason for which is that since it's impossible, you'll only deceive yourself and others in the attempt). And he forbids us to seek any of his glory for ourselves. In Christian ministry, "the way up is down", and those who seek the true and eternal glory must be willing to be the servant of all: genuinely willing, not just willing to be praised by other men for their 'umble service.

Show no interest in your personal brand, because the one who will sit on the throne and judge the nations (judge you) on the last day, has no interest in it except insofar as he is disgusted with your displays of the flesh. Show no interest in the prestige of your institution, because if it gets too much of it it may become a rival to his purposes and need destroying in order to advance those purposes. Show no interest in a "wider ministry" that means neglecting the flesh-and-blood sinners who inhabit the place where God's providence has placed you. Leave aside your reputation except insofar as it will aid the preaching of the gospel if you are known to live in the light (and then with great care because of the danger of self-deception).

How many churches and other ministries are ultimately trojan horses whose real aim is to win fame, praise and boost the ego of their founders and followers? How many have little to do with encouraging the weak and stumbling sheep in Christ, and much more to do with building a personal empire? The last day will tell us. I shudder to think, because I can't help noticing that familiar smell. As a son of the first Adam myself, I know it well. May I die with Christ more each day, so that the only life I seek is that of his resurrection.

Elders

My church is doing some studies in Acts in our adult Sunday School. Tomorrow we are asking the question, "What are elders, and what do they do?". Here are the notes for the handout. These notes of course always reflect something of my own burden as a missionary - to eventually see and leave behind a "three-selves" church (self-governing, self-sustaining, self-propagating) that will carry on the work, understanding that it needs nothing more than full obedience to God's truth enabled by God's Spirit:

We have been studying Acts. We have chosen it because it is the record of the first churches – the original. It tells us what churches really should be. Last week we asked the questions, “What is baptism, who is it for, what does it do?” This week we have a new question – what are elders, and what do they do?

The word “elders” is first used in Acts in 4:5-8. There we see that the Jewish nation was led by elders (as well as others). This is how God prepared his church to be led by elders – it was not a new idea for them. (Remember that at the beginning, all the believers were Jews). In the church, the first time we read the word “elders” is in 11:27-30. But this passage does not tell us much.

In 14:21-23 we see the first missionaries (Paul and Barnabas) travelling through some towns – Derbe, Lystra, Iconium, Antioch. These were places they had preached, and where churches had begun. Now they returned to strengthen and encourage the churches again – and to appoint elders. Here we can see that: 1) Each church had its own elders to lead the work. Paul and Barnabas were not staying, and so could not be leaders, nor could anyone else who was not staying there. 2) There was more than one elder in each church – God's way is not to have people on their own in difficult work (e.g. Luke 10:1) because the temptations are too great. 3) The elders were chosen from each church – from among the people. They were not brought in from outside. This also is the wisest way – a local church needs to belong to the local people.

Acts 20:17-38 is the longest and most important passage of teaching on elders. Here, Paul called the elders from Ephesus to come and see him before he travelled. It was the last time he expected to see them, so he spoke to them directly about their work as elders. Firstly, Paul showed them his own example. Elders are to lead, first of all, by example – an example of continued, godly, self-sacrificing service. Elders are not trained firstly by sending them away to a school, but by seeing and learning from real men of God doing real work.

Paul told them that elders are shepherds, looking after God's flock. They must feed them all of God's truth. They must watch – always – against spiritual dangers. They are not kings, to reign – but servants, to give themselves. They must always be looking at the flock, and trying to build them up in God's truth. Paul then spoke again about his own example, in particular in the areas of hard work and money. He had always worked hard, did not lead for his own profit, but showed the people how to be generous, helping the weak. He showed them in practice that giving is better than getting, which is what Jesus taught. These are the kinds of men that God wants to lead churches: not the mighty and powerful, but humble, self-sacrificing servants of Christ.

Church planting

A church that has no plan to church-plant is a disobedient church - disobedient to Christ and the Great Commission (Matthew 28:18-21), that is.

This needs clarifying - what counts as a "plan"? I do not necessarily mean a formal, written plan, or even an unwritten one where that means we have already identified places and dates.

What I mean is that:

• The clearly revealed will of Christ is for his gospel to spread through all nations, amongst every people, language and cultural group (Revelation 7:9-10, Genesis 12:1-3, Matthew 28:18-21).
  

• It is also clearly revealed that wherever the gospel spreads, believers are intended (commanded) to gather together in churches for worship, encouragement, instruction and discipline (e.g. Acts 14:21-23, Matthew 16:18, Titus 1:4ff, Philippians 1:1).

Evangelism is not an end in itself. Those who are saved are then to be trained up, gathered together in churches and equipped to carry on that same work themselves. Each church is to aim to fulfil the "three selves" articulated and championed by Rufus Anderson (no relation that I know of!), Henry Venn, John Nevius and others in the 19th century:

1. Self-governing: Every church should work towards managing its own affairs without being dependent on outside leadership.
2. Self-supporting: Each church should be looking to finance its own activities without depending long-term on outside money.
3. Self-propagating: Every church should itself be seeking to do what it can to fulfil the Great Commission in particular in its own region, not looking to outside agencies to do or even lead the work for it.

It is against this big-picture criteria that historical mission efforts, ventures and missionary newsletters today should be evaluated. But this is not just for "missionaries"; it is for every church. God never sub-divided his church into "ordinary" churches which don't do mission and "missionary" ones that do. Every church is intended to be somewhere along the line, and no matter what trials and disturbances may knock it off course, yet to know where the goal is and how they intend to head towards it. Converts should be being trained and evaluated. Those with particular gifts in the area of evangelism, of teaching others and of leadership should be being looked out for and given particular mentoring attention and training. A watch should be kept on whether the church is outward looking and the members are mission minded. Opportunities should be sought. The pastors should be asking, "are we in a position yet to send some out, and if not, what steps are the next ones to take to move us closer?". The road might be very long - training, testing, correcting, etcetera, is not the work of a day or a year. But are we actually travelling on it?

What we need to be at war against is the conservative mindset that is forever saying, "we can't spare anyone, we're busy here, there's a lot to do, we have many problems to attend to, planting would be problematic, we're not experienced in that, etcetera etcetera." No doubt there may be a seed of truth in all of these things. So what? The aim is to please Jesus, and he's made his will clear. The actual step of sending out some members with a commission to begin a new work is just one (final) step in the chain, and the question is not if we know which date that will take place on (in Eldoret, we have no idea!). The question is if we actually are heading towards the goal at all in a meaningful way, or just paying lip-service to it. Are we traversing the other links that come earlier on, or just treading water and enjoying the comfort? Every worthwhile new church in the world was the result of someone taking these costly, time-consuming and difficult steps. Without them, the church will eventually die; churches are closing all the time - there need to be more opening so that the advance continues. Whose work is this meant to be? Not ultimately the work of missionary agencies, whatever their place may be.... but the work of individual local churches, working alone or in partnership as the opportunity arises. A church that has no plan to church-plant is a disobedient church.