Friday, February 12, 2010

Chapter 2 ::: The Light

The church - a light - yellow.

The mission of the church is to shine a light on who God is - this is what it was created for. It was not intended to shine a broad light on political issues, church politics, the unchurched, homeless, or anything else - it was solely intended to shine a light on WHO God is ... the rest are spin offs of shining that light to the community.

Reggie Joiner says it best on page 36 of Think Orange ...

"What is sacred is the mission of the church .... Our mission is not to preserve the local church as it presently exists in its various forms or models; our mission is to be the church."

So often, I feel that we get caught up in preserving the local church, or trying to make it what we want it. We argue over whether to drink coffee in the worship center, have a guitar and drums on stage, play secular songs or traditional hymns, dress-up or dress-down, and the list could go on and on and on ... there isn't a day that goes by where some church somewhere in the world loses focus of its light and wanders off course. Ultimately, what matters is someone's relationship with God ... not the things we argue over on a daily basis.

There's a lot at stake as the church shines it light, yet - if done in the proper way that illuminates WHO God is the next generation will be impacted in ways we can't even imagine - they'll grow spiritually and love others as God intended us to love them.

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