Before I began, let me say that this is by no means a knock on church planters or the church. This is me thinking out loud in my blog. Okay with that said, on the way to work the other day I noticed something quite peculiar, every school I passes had a church meeting in it and then between the school were actual churches with their own buildings. On my way to work, which is about 12 miles away from my house, I counted 9 churches. Yes, nine, ten if you want to include the church in which I am on staff. Nine churches. Part of me felt that I should be excited about so many churches in a small area, because in the area I live there are over 100,000 unchurched people. I would guess that all of the churches combined attendees would be less than 10% of that number. So may the answer to the question on how to reach these people is not another church, another way of doing church, or a cooler edgy church, maybe the answer can be found with a group of people in the book of Acts. See a few things I noticed about this crazy group of church planters in Acts is this, first they were a united group. They were all about the same thing, raising up the name of Jesus Christ. See what I noticed today is a lot of churches are about raising up their denomination, their type of worship, or how cool they dress instead of raising up the name of Jesus. Also it almost seems like we brag about how ununited we are. For example, I hear alot of churches talking about how they are reformed over here, we are Calvinist of there, good grief, at the end of the day I want to know if you love the Lord your God with all heart, mind and soul! Also the church in Acts loved everybody, they really got the statement they will know we are Christians by our love. Let's take note of this and let us love one another. The world is crying out to see an authentic picture of this love. Let us show them this love. So here is the point of all my ranting, if the Lord has led you to plant a church or start one, be obiedient and do so, but maybe it does not need to be across the street from another one, maybe God has called you to be a part of that other church and make it better, I don't know. I just want the thing we raise up to not be how we are different from the church around the corner, but that we have been united by the blood of a glorious savior, Jesus Christ!
