I Found an Old Post

So, I was sorting through my blogs, realizing I had never posted this one. So I thought I would. The only thing not true here is that I did not go to San Antonio a couple weeks ago. :)

The title of the post was to be "The Church is Smaller Than We Think"

Two weeks ago I ventured off to San Antonio for a little personal retreat. I try to go a couple times a year to meet with another worship pastor there that I really admire. While I’m there, I try to spend a great deal of time in silence while I listen for what God has to say. The next couple posts will be from an overflow of things God spoke to me during that time.

One area that I spent a great deal of time exploring was the topic of conversion. It started in my staff meeting the day before as we discussed a book called The Nine Marks of a Healthy Church. Though at times this book has seemed pretty dry to me, the chapter on true Biblical conversion really rocked my world.

The main thought: We all know there is some contingency of people in our churches that are not converts. However, we are becoming increasingly numb to the fact that there are many more people in our congregations who think that they are converts, but are not. Therefore raising the total number of unregenerate people in our midst!

Why does this rock my world? Because when the worship team leaves the stage on any given Sunday that the crowd participation is sub par, the common phrase used to describe that situation is this: “Man, what was up with them today…they were dead!” Oh how true that statement is…within in our crowd on any given Sunday, is a great number of DEAD people…no pulse, no breath…merely corpses!

So why are we surprised at a lack of response from our people? Can we expect anything more out of a lifeless being? We cannot cause them to come to life…and creating puppets that clap when we tell them too is fruitless. We have to open our mouths and let the gospel go forth! We have to pray diligently! But the actual act of breathing life into dead people…only Christ can do that!

So, I’m not going to be depressed because everyone didn’t raise their hands when we sang the song Unchanging and it tells us to “raise up holy hands.” I’m going to open my mouth, let the gospel go forth, pray for God to do what only He can, then sit back and wait on God.