13 Characteristics of a Growing Church: Service

This week couldn't have been more perfect if I had actually planned it this way--which I didn't! So here we are in Kansas City, Missouri, on mission trip and today we are going to be talking about Serving the Lord! Let's just say that God blows my mind. I want to stop and praise the Lord a little bit before we jump in. Praise God that our car made it hear without issue after all the problems we had with our fuel system last week. Praise God that we all made it to Kansas City safely (despite the car problems some of the other teams suffered). And praise God for this opportunity to serve! Just so you know, I am probably going to take a break from this series on Wednesday and write a little ditty about mission trip, and I will be sure to post links if Christiana writes anything although I think she is waiting until we get home. So anyway, let's talk about serving God!

So here's a quick recap of the Characteristics of a Growing Church:
1st Love Genuinely
2nd Hate What is Evil
3rd Cling to What is Good
4th Devoted to One Another
5th Humility
6th Excitement
7th Stability

The 8th characteristic of a growing Church is Service.
"Never be lacking in zeal, but keep your spiritual fervor, serving the Lord." Romans 12:11 NIV

I don't know about you but I think that Americans are really spoiled. For the most part our country is really great and we have a lot of freedoms--including religious ones. Just the fact that I can have a blog that's all about God and the things that He is teaching me and how I try to serve Him is a privilege that I often take for granted but others around the world would die for. I can go around and scream "I LOVE JESUS!!!" and all I will get are a few stares or some harsh words. Others could literally die for that. Then why aren't we as Americans taking advantage of our freedom to proclaim God and using it to serve Him? I personally think it's because we are lazy and we are worried about what our friends will think of us being "Jesus Freaks".

On Friday night I was really encouraged by one of our students. Planning for this mission trip has been difficult and there were a few times that we thought about calling it off completely. No one seemed to be excited about going to Kansas City to share Christ and to serve Him in 100+ degree heat. So I had some really mixed feelings about how things were going to turn out. Then Friday night came and so did Kody.

Kody is a new believer. This is His first ever mission trip, and He's still figuring out the whole Christian thing. Well Kody was supposed to come to our house at 9pm on Friday so that he and Scott could help us load stuff into our van bright and early Saturday morning. Kody got to our house at 8pm. His smile was beaming and his excitement was contagious. In fact, he was so excited about mission trip and coming over to help load stuff that he forgot half of his mission trip supplies including a sleeping bag, towel, pillow, water bottle, and Bible. I just laughed and was thankful that my wife keeps a stock of a few extra hospitality items. So Kody and I talked about how excited he was about mission trip while Christiana pulled out our extra sleeping bag, water, towels, Bible, and other items Kody needed.

I look forward to see if Kody's excitement continues as he serves God this week. Kody helped to remind me that a church that is focused on missions is a church that is focused on Christ. After all, Jesus' last instructions to His disciples were to go and tell all people about Him (Matt. 28:19-20). Why would they call it the Great Commission if it wasn't important? We constantly need to be serving not only other Christians but also anyone who comes in contact with the church and with us as Christians.

Serving wasn't a suggestion or just some great idea. It was a command. Go! Missions is one of the most obvious ways that we can serve God, but there are many other ways as well. Just because you can't get off work for a week to serve God in Kansas City or elsewhere doesn't mean that you get a free pass from serving. Find a need in your church or your community and meet it. You can do that. I know you can!

More Resources:

• International Mission Opportunities - International Mission Board
• North American Mission Opportunities - North American Mission Board
• International Missions for Teens - Royal Servants International

13 Characteristics of a Growing Church: Stability

If you have ever been inside the church walls for more than a few hours then there's a pretty good chance that you have heard someone talk about burnout. Why is that? Too often we as Christians and church members get too busy and too over-committed to doing stuff. All the stuff--even good stuff--can pull you away from God and from the fire of your faith. Therefore you get tired and you simply have nothing left to give. That's when you experience spiritual "burn out". You literally lose your spiritual fire and your desire to serve God. Today we are going to talk about keeping that fire (spiritual fervor) burning strong.

So here's a quick recap of the Characteristics of a Growing Church:
1st Love Genuinely
2nd Hate What is Evil
3rd Cling to What is Good
4th Devoted to One Another
5th Humility
6th Excitement

The 7th characteristic of a growing Church is Stability.
"Never be lacking in zeal, but keep your spiritual fervor, serving the Lord." Romans 12:11 NIV

Think back to what I was just saying when I talked about spiritual burnout. Picture this... if you taken a hug glowing ember from a fire it is bright and white hot, but the longer it stays out of the fire the colder and dimmer it becomes. It's the same with us. You have to keep yourself in the fire if you are going to "keep your spiritual fervor". I'm going to call this stability.

Stability is all about being stable. You aren't up and down like a rollercoaster. You aren't in and out of church on a whim. You are doing everything you can to be consisten and consistently remain in Christ. As Christians, we are our own worst enemies when it comes to stability. We let our emotions keep us angry with our Christian brother or sister so we will skip church so that we don't have to see them. Or maybe we have allowed ourselves to be drawn into too many different ministries or areas of service and now we are angry and bitter toward the church or just plain numb.

If we are going to be stable Christians who can keep our spiritual fire and passion for God then we are going to have to start by taking care of ourselves. Fires that aren't fed die. You can't stay on fire for Christ if you aren't spending time with Him on a daily basis! No exceptions! You have to fan that love for Jesus and feed it with the Word and prayer. By not doing your quiet times you are pulling yourself away from the spiritual fire (Christ). The same goes for church--be there! Other Christians are meant to build us up and encourage us. You don't have to go to church and be fake. You should be real and honest. I know that sometimes that can be really painful and people don't always understand but some of them will. Then you will be surprised in the ways that God uses those understanding individuals to meet your needs and it's all because you were real. Lastly, learn how to say "No!" By all means, if you feel like God is calling you to serve in a certain area then do it, but a need does not necessitate a call. Just because there isn't a pre-school Sunday School teacher doesn't mean that you should be the one to take it over--especially if you already have a lot on your plate. Pray about it. If God says, "serve" then serve. If not then leave the opportunity open for the person God is calling to fill it.

More Resources:

13 Characteristics of a Growing Church: Excitement!

What does your calendar look like right now? What are you looking forward to doing? Maybe you have a special vacation planned or a friend who you are going to go see. Right now I am looking at my calendar and I see one BIG thing...Mission Trip! There is a whole 8 days blocked off for our mission trip to Kansas City, Missouri (and that doesn't even count prep time!). If you are interested in some more of the specifics about our trip, feel free to read Busy Week (written by my wife) which talks more about our trip. Anyway... I am excited about mission trip! If you can't tell, today we are talking about EXCITEMENT!

So here's a quick recap of the Characteristics of a Growing Church:
1st Love Genuinely
2nd Hate What is Evil
3rd Cling to What is Good
4th Devoted to One Another
5th Humility

The 6th characteristic of a growing Church is Excitement.
"Never be lacking in zeal, but keep your spiritual fervor, serving the Lord." Romans 12:11 NIV

OK, I have said over and over that we are going to be talking about excitement but the verse above says "never be lacking in zeal" so I think that we should pause just a moment to talk about what zeal means.

According to Dictionary.com, Zeal is "fervor for a person, cause, or object; eager desire or endeavor; enthusiastic diligence; ardor." So some of these words are starting to sound familiar...enthusiastic...you know enthusiasm, but really who uses words like ardor? So the next best place we can check out is the thesaurus. I know, it's almost like school. However, these can be really great tools. Now we are really finding some words I think that we can all relate to: passion, fire, instensity, drive, and enthusiasm.

What makes you excited about church? About Christ? Whatever you can find to be passionate about in regards to church is where you should try to get involved. Are you excited about the little snot nosed preschoolers? Volunteer to help in the nursery! Maybe you love nothing better than a good, hard math problem...you should check out the budget and finance committees.

Don't let your excitement go to waste. Use it! If you don't then you will be like all the other dead beat Christians who are warming a pew and wasting their God given talents, abilities, and excitement! God gave you the talents and excitement you have for a reason. You just have to learn how to use them.

More Resources:

• Find out your spiritual gifts by taking a Spiritual Gifts Test
• Where should you serve? Find out by taking The Giftedness and Passion Assessment