{"id":305,"date":"2008-05-10T21:23:49","date_gmt":"2008-05-11T02:23:49","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/redeeminggod.com\/?p=305"},"modified":"2013-05-31T18:38:44","modified_gmt":"2013-06-01T02:38:44","slug":"the-future-of-the-church-part-3-of-3","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/redeeminggod.com\/the-future-of-the-church-part-3-of-3\/","title":{"rendered":"The Future of the Church (Part 3 of 3)"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>In <a href=\"https:\/\/redeeminggod.com\/the-future-of-the-church-part-1-of-3\/\" target=\"_blank\">Part 1<\/a> and <a href=\"https:\/\/redeeminggod.com\/the-future-of-the-church-part-2-of-3\/\" target=\"_blank\">Part 2<\/a> of this short series on the Future of the Church, I wrote about how\u00a0the church needs to escape the attractional, church-growth model of the church, and become more missional. Doing so will enable us to prepare for the world-wide reawakening of the church that is coming.<\/p>\n<p>In this post, I want to focus on\u00a0a process by which you personally can prepare for this reawakening.<\/p>\n<p><strong>1. You must <em>reimagine<\/em> the church as the\u00a0body of\u00a0Christ.<\/strong>\u00a0Forget <em>everything, <\/em>and I mean <em>everything, <\/em>you know or think you know about the church, what it is supposed to be, do, and look like. Then, start reading the Gospels with the understanding that Jesus is showing by example and teaching with words and works how His followers are to live and act. I believe that\u00a0Jesus&#8217; life is God&#8217;s dream for the church. If we are the body of Christ, then we must be the body of Christ <em>now <\/em>as\u00a0He was 2000 years ago. When people say they want to get back to the early church the way it was in Acts, I believe they have not gone far enough back. They need to get back to the way Jesus lived and acted. He is our church model.<\/p>\n<p><strong>2. Follow up this study by\u00a0<em>reliving<\/em> the life of Christ. <\/strong>In other words, try to live like Jesus lived. But here&#8217;s the key: You can&#8217;t do this by yourself, because you are not Christ, and you are not the Body of Christ. It is only &#8220;we&#8221; who believe in Him and follow Him who are His body, and so we can only live as He lived, and do what He did, in concert with other members of the body. So, find some other like-minded people, and together, start trying to be Jesus to the world. As the body, you can help the poor, set captives free, help the blind to see, heal the sick, feed the hungry, and show people the way back to God. And I don&#8217;t mean with miracles, though I don&#8217;t rule miracles out. It is amazing what a few people can do together who share\u00a0a common desire to help others.<\/p>\n<p><strong>3. Don&#8217;t <em>revert<\/em>!<\/strong> When people start to join with you, and your numbers begin to grow, and people start coming to faith in Christ, resist the urge to protect what you have gained by reverting to more safe and common ways of doing church. Trying to become safe and protected is the beginning of decline and ineffectiveness. I&#8217;ll let you decide what this looks like in your context.<\/p>\n<p>When you embark upon this process, you&#8217;ll notice that once you are able to discard everything you think you know about church, and begin\u00a0the adventure of reimagining church (step 1), your life begins to spiral upward in some new and interesting ways (step 2), which then causes you to both seek more from Scripture (step 1) but also desire to run from risk and return to what is safe and known (step 3). So this is a constant process of going back and forth between reimagining (step 1) and reliving (step 2), while warding off the temptation\u00a0of reverting (step 3).<\/p>\n<p>I know because I&#8217;m right there. It&#8217;s a terrifying and thrilling place to be.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>In Part 1 and Part 2 of this short series on the Future of the Church, I wrote about how\u00a0the church needs to escape the attractional, church-growth model of the church, and become more missional. Doing so will enable us to prepare for the world-wide reawakening of the church that is coming. In this post, [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_bbp_topic_count":0,"_bbp_reply_count":0,"_bbp_total_topic_count":0,"_bbp_total_reply_count":0,"_bbp_voice_count":0,"_bbp_anonymous_reply_count":0,"_bbp_topic_count_hidden":0,"_bbp_reply_count_hidden":0,"_bbp_forum_subforum_count":0,"_genesis_hide_title":false,"_genesis_hide_breadcrumbs":false,"_genesis_hide_singular_image":false,"_genesis_hide_footer_widgets":false,"_genesis_custom_body_class":"","_genesis_custom_post_class":"","_genesis_layout":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[],"tags":[19,32],"class_list":{"0":"post-305","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","6":"tag-discipleship","7":"tag-theology-church","8":"entry"},"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO plugin v23.5 - https:\/\/yoast.com\/wordpress\/plugins\/seo\/ -->\n<title>The Future of the Church (Part 3 of 3)<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/redeeminggod.com\/the-future-of-the-church-part-3-of-3\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"The Future of the Church (Part 3 of 3)\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"In Part 1 and Part 2 of this short series on the Future of the Church, I wrote about how\u00a0the church needs to escape the attractional, church-growth model of the church, and become more missional. 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