“Whatever I can imagine, I can accomplish. I am no longer a vassal in a faceless bureaucracy. I am an activist, not a drone…I am a revolutionary.” -Gary Hamel's book Leading the Revolution
*here is the last paper i wrote in my missionary life & work class...with a few minor changes & reordering to help the reading go easier for you who probably hasn't read this book called The Shaping of Things to Come...
what do you think??? :) ok ok. at least read the last paragraph. sheesh.*
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In order to reach people, we have to live where they live and hang out in the places where they hang out. For so long the Western church as made church an “attraction.” Instead of trying so hard to draw people into our church, we need to go out from the church and show others God’s love. We have made the effort to make everything in church look so appealing to outsiders, but we have taken the wrong approach. We have tried to make our churches look like the world so that the world will accept us, because typically people think that church is boring, and even most believers feel that they are only going to church out of obligation. If we shift our focus to the example that Jesus left for us, we will realize that the church is in desperate need of a revolution.
Building relationships with people and serving others is crucial, and it is the beginning of our Christian mission. Learning to relate to people and caring about what they are interested in will make them pay special attention to us. We can serve others in every capacity, even if it is just walking their dog, watching their children or listening about their difficult day at work. People appreciate someone taking an interest in their lives. Jesus took an interest in the loneliest people and hurting people of His time, especially among the sinners and the sick, who no one else would be around.
We are capable of accomplishing anything for the Kingdom. If we can imagine that the world truly can change and we believe we can accomplish anything, we become a revolutionist instead of a faceless believer that does nothing for the Kingdom. Too often we sit in church on Sunday and go back to our ordinary lives only to return to church again the next Sunday, making no effort to go out from our comfortable lives and make disciples like we have been commanded to do. We take no risks and make no journey. We must realize that we are responsible for this revolution. We must go and gather up people for the harvest.
Jesus is our model for Christian mission. He cares about every little detail of our lives, even in the moments of pain and confusion. Jesus hung out with all kinds of people from all different walks of life. He put no limitations on people as to how worthy or unworthy they were. He simply loved. He took them along with their pain and suffering and loved them. Jesus hung out with people, who according to society and even the modern day church, would be unacceptable to be around. Sometimes I wonder if Jesus walked into our churches today, if we would even recognize Him as Jesus, and if we would condemn Him for hanging out with “the wrong crowd”. As we learn to love unconditionally as Jesus did, people will begin to come into the Kingdom, because they will see the love of the Father inside of us. Our abandonment to Jesus Christ and our service to others is what will make the greatest difference.
Mission is what defines us as Christians. Mission is our purpose and our calling in life. We are called to live a life of love and service as our Father did. It is time for us to take the dream that God has given us and run with it and proclaim His name to the nations. When we get our minds off of the familiar and comfortable, we will begin to see a change. When we take courageous risks and commit our lives fully to the cause of Christ will there come about a revolution like this world has never seen.
We must revolutionize our thinking and our actions if we want to make a difference in our world. We must go where no one else is willing to go and stretch ourselves farther than we ever have before. We must learn to think “outside of the box”. This is a phrase that we hear often, but rarely grasp the importance. Christians have been putting God in a box for far too long. It is time for this generation to rise up and let God have supreme control and authority over our lives. We must learn to love like Jesus does and let our creativity and imagination spark new and fresh ideas for bringing people into the Kingdom. We must forget the lowly thinking we have of God’s power and let His Spirit whisper in our ears the direction in which He would have us go. It is time for us to pick up our cross and truly follow after Him. In order to bring people into His Kingdom, we must be willing to sacrifice all that we have and all that we are, chasing after one goal: the Father’s heart. We must align our heart with the Fathers. After all, if we can’t hear His heartbeat, how can we change the heart of people and the heart of nations?
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“We must not be afraid to be unpopular, to be seen as revolutionaries…The real revolutionary perhaps the only one, is the person who has nothing left to lose." -Frost & Hirsch's book The Shaping of Things to Come
