What is the Church?

Dallas Willard has said that most North American churches do business along the following lines:

1. Worship as performance.
2. Leadership as celebrity.
3. Greatness measured by numbers.
4. Salvation by agreement with religious facts.
5. Evangelism without incarnation.
6. Discipleship as optional.
7. Catering to a consumer mentality.

And then we wonder why there doesn't seem to be much change in either the church or the greater society. What if we moved to doing life along these lines:

1. Worship as a heartfelt answer to God.
2. Leadership as humble service.
3. Greatness measured by character.
4. Salvation by a decision to follow Jesus.
5. Evangelism as love.
6. Discipleship as normative.
7. Catering to the committed.

Church doesn't consist of a building. Indeed, you could say church starts when the Sunday service is over and people head out into life! What if we saw our life mission to be a people who were light bearers, grace mongers and peddlers of hope to a dark and screwed up world?

Would things be different? I think so. I believe that we would begin to see the change we so desperately long for, and that change would begin in our very own hearts. Wherever you go, there is the church.

"LIFE IS EITHER A DARING ADVENTURE OR NOTHING."-- Helen Keller

Matthew 28:18-20
"I have been given complete authority in heaven and on earth. Therefore, go and make disciples of all the nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit. Teach these new disciples to obey all the commands I have given you. And be sure of this: I am with you always, even to the end of the age."