Invitation To Church Service Quotes

Christianity did not begin with a confession. It began with an invitation into friendship, into creating a new community, into forming relationships based on love and service.

When women are restricted from the service of God in any capacity, the Church is mistakenly allowing an imperfect male-dominated ancient culture to drive our understanding and practice of Christ’s redeeming work, instead of Jesus Christ and the whole of the Scriptures.

Eisenhower, in contrast, turned spirituality into spectacle. At a transition meeting with his cabinet nominees, he announced that they and their families were invited to a special religious service at National Presbyterian Church the morning of the inauguration.

Protestant churches chiefly gave their energies to the practices of worship, Bible study, and service. Christians worldwide had lost touch with the riches of historic spiritual practices, particularly those of a contemplative nature. This loss

About the same time I came in contact with another Christian family. At their suggestion I attended the Wesleyan church every Sunday. For these days I also had their standing invitation to dinner. The church did not make a favourable impression on me. The sermons seemed to be uninspiring. The congregation did not strike me as being particularly religious. They were not an assembly of devout souls; they appeared rather to be wordly-minded people, going to church for recreation and in conformity to custom. Here, at times, I would involuntarily doze. I was ashamed, but some of my neighbours, who were in no better case, lightened the shame. I could not go on long like this, and soon gave up attending the service.

If the churches came to understand that the greatest threat to faith today is not hedonism but distraction, perhaps they might begin to appeal to a frazzled digital generation. Christian leaders seem to think that they need more distraction to counter the distraction. Their services have degenerated into emotional spasms, their spaces drowned with light and noise and locked shut throughout the day, when their darkness and silence might actually draw those whose minds and souls have grown web-weary.

But when considered from the unique perspective of eternity, fame and popularity aren't nearly as important as loving and being loved; status doesn't mean much when compared to service; and acquiring spiritual knowledge is infinitely more meaningful than acquiring an excess of wealth.

THE next morning Catherine went to church for the last time—for when Stephen was in London, and not there to invite her to accompany him, which he solemnly before each separate service did, there would be no more need to go—and for the last time mingled her psalms with Mrs. Colquhoun’s.

We are committed to involving as many people as possible, as young as possible, as soon as possible. Sometimes too young and too soon! But we intentionally err on the side of too fast rather than too slow. We don’t wait until people feel “prepared” or “fully equipped.” Seriously, when is anyone ever completely prepared for ministry? Ministry makes people’s faith bigger. If you want to increase someone’s confidence in God, put him in a ministry position before he feels fully equipped. The messages your environments communicate have the potential to trump your primary message. If you don’t see a mess, if you aren’t bothered by clutter, you need to make sure there is someone around you who does see it and is bothered by it. An uncomfortable or distracting setting can derail ministry before it begins. The sermon begins in the parking lot. Assign responsibility, not tasks. At the end of the day, it’s application that makes all the difference. Truth isn’t helpful if no one understands or remembers it. If you want a church full of biblically educated believers, just teach what the Bible says. If you want to make a difference in your community and possibly the world, give people handles, next steps, and specific applications. Challenge them to do something. As we’ve all seen, it’s not safe to assume that people automatically know what to do with what they’ve been taught. They need specific direction. This is hard. This requires an extra step in preparation. But this is how you grow people. Your current template is perfectly designed to produce the results you are currently getting. We must remove every possible obstacle from the path of the disinterested, suspicious, here-against-my-will, would-rather-be-somewhere-else, unchurched guests. The parking lot, hallways, auditorium, and stage must be obstacle-free zones. As a preacher, it’s my responsibility to offend people with the gospel. That’s one reason we work so hard not to offend them in the parking lot, the hallway, at check-in, or in the early portions of our service. We want people to come back the following week for another round of offending! Present the gospel in uncompromising terms, preach hard against sin, and tackle the most emotionally charged topics in culture, while providing an environment where unchurched people feel comfortable. The approach a church chooses trumps its purpose every time. Nothing says hypocrite faster than Christians expecting non-Christians to behave like Christians when half the Christians don’t act like it half the time. When you give non-Christians an out, they respond by leaning in. Especially if you invite them rather than expect them. There’s a big difference between being expected to do something and being invited to try something. There is an inexorable link between an organization’s vision and its appetite for improvement. Vision exposes what has yet to be accomplished. In this way, vision has the power to create a healthy sense of organizational discontent. A leader who continually keeps the vision out in front of his or her staff creates a thirst for improvement. Vision-centric churches expect change. Change is a means to an end. Change is critical to making what could and should be a reality. Write your vision in ink; everything else should be penciled in. Plans change. Vision remains the same. It is natural to assume that what worked in the past will always work. But, of course, that way of thinking is lethal. And the longer it goes unchallenged, the more difficult it is to identify and eradicate. Every innovation has an expiration date. The primary reason churches cling to outdated models and programs is that they lack leadership.

When Leonard was invited to come to the youth service at the local church, he replied in all seriousness, “I’m not interested in a dog and pony show,” to which they said, “Well, it’s going to be a prayer meeting.” He then asked, “How long are they going to pray—ten minutes?” “No”, they said, “It’s going to be an all-night prayer meeting.” Leonard said, “Well then I’m interested; I’ve not been to any youth meetings where they want to pray all night.

Remember that a little learning can be a pleasant thing. Italy gives much, in beauty, gaiety, diversity of arts and landscapes, good humor and energy—willingly, without having to be coaxed or courted. Paradoxically, she requires (as do other countries, probably more so) and deserves some preparation as background to enhance her pleasures. It is almost impossible to read a total history of Italy; there was no united country until a hundred years ago, no single line of power, no concerted developments. It is useful, however, to know something about what made Siena run and stop, to become acquainted with the Estes and the Gonzagas, the Medicis and the Borgias, the names that were the local history. It helps to know something about the conflicts of the medieval church with the Holy Roman Empire, of the French, Spanish and early German kings who marked out large chunks of Italy for themselves or were invited to invade by a nervous Italian power. Above all, it helps to turn the pages of a few art and architecture books to become reacquainted with names other those of the luminous giants. The informed visitors will not allow himself to be cowed by the deluge of art. See what interests or attracts you; there is no Italian Secret Service that reports on whether you have seen everything. If you try to see it all except as a possible professional task, you may come to resist it all. Relax, know what you like and don’t like—not the worst of measures—and let the rest go.

Instead of waiting around for church to assemble a perfect group dynamic of People Who Can Meet on Tuesdays, maybe just invite some folks over. A shared table is the supreme expression of hospitality in every culture on earth. When your worn-out kitchen table hosts good people and good conversation, when it provides a safe place to break bread and share wine, your house becomes a sanctuary, holy as a cathedral. I’ve left a friend’s table as sanctified and renewed as any church service. If you have a porch, then you have an altar to gather around.

The situation we have just described—the disconnection of life from faith, the absence from our churches of Jesus the teacher—is not caused by the wicked world, by social oppression, or by the stubborn meanness of the people who come to our church services and carry on the work of our congregations. It is largely caused and sustained by the basic message that we constantly hear from Christian pulpits. We are flooded with what I have called “gospels of sin management,” in one form or another, while Jesus’ invitation to eternal life now—right in the midst of work, business, and profession—remains for the most part ignored and unspoken.

Under the leadership of religious professionals, modern worship has become passive—listening to a message and singing some songs. Seldom is there a call to service or an invitation to trust Christ. Baptisms take place inside the church where it is safe and comfortable rather than in public where there is opportunity to give witness to the saving grace of Christ. The great needs of society are left to para-church groups, government agencies, and other social service organizations. All the while the church is losing its muscle tone, its biceps are becoming loose and flabby and its belly is becoming round and soft. Not a pretty picture for one who once was toned and buff—a lean, mean fighting machine.

The former South African archbishop Desmond Tutu used to famously say, “We are prisoners of hope.” Such a statement might be taken as merely rhetorical or even eccentric if you hadn’t seen Bishop Tutu stare down the notorious South African Security Police when they broke into the Cathedral of St. George’s during his sermon at an ecumenical service. I was there and have preached about the dramatic story of his response more times than I can count. The incident taught me more about the power of hope than any other moment of my life. Desmond Tutu stopped preaching and just looked at the intruders as they lined the walls of his cathedral, wielding writing pads and tape recorders to record whatever he said and thereby threatening him with consequences for any bold prophetic utterances. They had already arrested Tutu and other church leaders just a few weeks before and kept them in jail for several days to make both a statement and a point: Religious leaders who take on leadership roles in the struggle against apartheid will be treated like any other opponents of the Pretoria regime. After meeting their eyes with his in a steely gaze, the church leader acknowledged their power (“You are powerful, very powerful”) but reminded them that he served a higher power greater than their political authority (“But I serve a God who cannot be mocked!”). Then, in the most extraordinary challenge to political tyranny I have ever witnessed, Archbishop Desmond Tutu told the representatives of South African apartheid, “Since you have already lost, I invite you today to come and join the winning side!” He said it with a smile on his face and enticing warmth in his invitation, but with a clarity and a boldness that took everyone’s breath away. The congregation’s response was electric. The crowd was literally transformed by the bishop’s challenge to power. From a cowering fear of the heavily armed security forces that surrounded the cathedral and greatly outnumbered the band of worshipers, we literally leaped to our feet, shouted the praises of God and began…dancing. (What is it about dancing that enacts and embodies the spirit of hope?) We danced out of the cathedral to meet the awaiting police and military forces of apartheid who hardly expected a confrontation with dancing worshipers. Not knowing what else to do, they backed up to provide the space for the people of faith to dance for freedom in the streets of South Africa.

I make a special appeal regarding how young women might dress for Church services and Sabbath worship. We used to speak of “best dress” or “Sunday dress,” and maybe we should do so again. In any case, from ancient times to modern we have always been invited to present our best selves inside and out when entering the house of the Lord—and a dedicated LDS chapel is a “house of the Lord.” Our clothing or footwear need never be expensive, indeed should not be expensive, but neither should it appear that we are on our way to the beach. When we come to worship the God and Father of us all and to partake of the sacrament symbolizing the Atonement of Jesus Christ, we should be as comely and respectful, as dignified and appropriate as we can be. We should be recognizable in appearance as well as in behavior that we truly are disciples of Christ, that in a spirit of worship we are meek and lowly of heart, that we truly desire the Savior’s Spirit to be with us always.

Anxious to bring both the year and New Year’s Day into line with the West, Peter decreed in December 1699 that the next new year would begin on January 1 and that the coming year would be numbered 1700. In his decree, the Tsar stated frankly that the change was made in order to conform to Western practice.* But to blunt the argument of those who said that God could not have made the earth in the depth of winter, Peter invited them “to view the map of the globe, and, in a pleasant temper, gave them to understand that Russia was not all the world and that what was winter with them was, at the same time, always summer in those places beyond the equator.” To celebrate the change and impress the new day on the Muscovites, Peter ordered special New Year’s services held in all the churches on January 1. Further, he instructed that festive evergreen branches be used to decorate the doorposts in interiors of houses, and he commanded that all citizens of Moscow should “display their happiness by loudly congratulating

When high expectations are communicated to members, the unchurched are attracted to these churches that have meaningful membership. One such church among the churches we have received information on is Carron Baptist Church, an African-American church in Washington, D.C. They actually require their members to agree to a church covenant that mandates the following: To read the Bible daily. To pray with and for members of your family daily. To attend all worship services unless hindered by health or circumstances beyond your control. To abstain from gossip, backbiting, murmuring, or negative talk. To respond to conflict and disagreement according to biblical precepts. To share your faith regularly; to invite people to church. To participate in Bible study/ Sunday school To be in agreement with the church’s doctrine. To be involved in at least one ministry in the church. To tithe. To abstain from alcohol and illegal drugs. To be sexually pure. The unchurched that visit Carron Baptist Church quickly discern that it is a high-expectation church. Yet they keep returning, keep joining, and the church continues to grow.

What’ll it be?” Steve asked me, just days after our wedding. “Do we go on the honeymoon we’ve got planned, or do you want to go catch crocs?” My head was still spinning from the ceremony, the celebration, and the fact that I could now use the two words “my husband” and have them mean something real. The four months between February 2, 1992--the day Steve asked me to marry him--and our wedding day on June 4 had been a blur. Steve’s mother threw us an engagement party for Queensland friends and family, and I encountered a very common theme: “We never thought Steve would get married.” Everyone said it--relatives, old friends, and schoolmates. I’d smile and nod, but my inner response was, Well, we’ve got that in common. And something else: Wait until I get home and tell everybody I am moving to Australia. I knew what I’d have to explain. Being with Steve, running the zoo, and helping the crocs was exactly the right thing to do. I knew with all my heart and soul that this was the path I was meant to travel. My American friends--the best, closest ones--understood this perfectly. I trusted Steve with my life and loved him desperately. One of the first challenges was how to bring as many Australian friends and family as possible over to the United States for the wedding. None of us had a lot of money. Eleven people wound up making the trip from Australia, and we held the ceremony in the big Methodist church my grandmother attended. It was more than a wedding, it was saying good-bye to everyone I’d ever known. I invited everybody, even people who may not have been intimate friends. I even invited my dentist. The whole network of wildlife rehabilitators came too--four hundred people in all. The ceremony began at eight p.m., with coffee and cake afterward. I wore the same dress that my older sister Bonnie had worn at her wedding twenty-seven years earlier, and my sister Tricia wore at her wedding six years after that. The wedding cake had white frosting, but it was decorated with real flowers instead of icing ones. Steve had picked out a simple ring for me, a quarter carat, exactly what I wanted. He didn’t have a wedding ring. We were just going to borrow one for the service, but we couldn’t find anybody with fingers that were big enough. It turned out that my dad’s wedding ring fitted him, and that’s the one we used. Steve’s mother, Lyn, gave me a silk horseshoe to put around my wrist, a symbol of good luck. On our wedding day, June 4, 1992, it had been eight months since Steve and I first met. As the minister started reading the vows, I could see that Steve was nervous. His tuxedo looked like it was strangling him. For a man who was used to working in the tropics, he sure looked hot. The church was air-conditioned, but sweat drops formed on the ends of his fingers. Poor Steve, I thought. He’d never been up in front of such a big crowd before. “The scariest situation I’ve ever been in,” Steve would say later of the ceremony. This from a man who wrangled crocodiles! When the minister invited the groom to kiss the bride, I could feel all Steve’s energy, passion, and love. I realized without a doubt we were doing the right thing.

LEAD PEOPLE TO COMMITMENT We have seen that nonbelievers in worship actually “close with Christ” in two basic ways: some may come to Christ during the service itself (1 Cor 14:24 – 25), while others must be “followed up with” by means of after-service meetings. Let’s take a closer look at both ways of leading people to commitment. It is possible to lead people to a commitment to Christ during the service. One way of inviting people to receive Christ is to make a verbal invitation as the Lord’s Supper is being distributed. At our church, we say it this way: “If you are not in a saving relationship with God through Christ today, do not take the bread and the cup, but as they come around, take Christ. Receive him in your heart as those around you receive the food. Then immediately afterward, come up and tell an officer or a pastor about what you’ve done so we can get you ready to receive the Supper the next time as a child of God.” Another way to invite commitment during the service is to give people a time of silence or a period of musical interlude after the sermon. This affords people time to think and process what they have heard and to offer themselves to God in prayer. In many situations, it is best to invite people to commitment through after-meetings. Acts 2 gives an example. Inverses 12 and 13 we are told that some folks mocked after hearing the apostles praise and preach, but others were disturbed and asked, “What does this mean?” Then, we see that Peter very specifically explained the gospel and, in response to the follow-up question “What shall we do?” (v. 37), he explained how to become a Christian. Historically, many preachers have found it effective to offer such meetings to nonbelievers and seekers immediately after evangelistic worship. Convicted seekers have just come from being in the presence of God and are often the most teachable and open at this time. To seek to “get them into a small group” or even to merely return next Sunday is asking a lot. They may also be “amazed and perplexed” (Acts 2:12), and it is best to strike while the iron is hot. This should not be understood as doubting that God is infallibly drawing people to himself (Acts 13:48; 16:14). Knowing the sovereignty of God helps us to relax as we do evangelism, knowing that conversions are not dependent on our eloquence. But it should not lead us to ignore or minimize the truth that God works through secondary causes. The Westminster Confession (5.2 – 3), for example, tells us that God routinely works through normal social and psychological processes. Therefore, inviting people into a follow-up meeting immediately after the worship service can often be more conducive to conserving the fruit of the Word. After-meetings may take the shape of one or more persons waiting at the front of the auditorium to pray with and talk with seekers who wish to make inquiries right on the spot. Another way is to host a simple Q&A session with the preacher in or near the main auditorium, following the postlude. Or offer one or two classes or small group experiences targeted to specific questions non-Christians ask about the content, relevance, and credibility of the Christian faith. Skilled lay evangelists should be present who can come alongside newcomers, answer spiritual questions, and provide guidance for their next steps.

Focus your attention, your study efforts and your praise on Jesus himself. In other words, fill yourself with the knowledge of Jesus and believe on him. (John 7:37–39) 2. Invite the Lord to empower your life and overflow you with the Holy Spirit for the benefit of others. 3. Believe and accept that he is now working in your life. Since all God’s gifts are received by faith, you can trust that he will answer this prayer. 4. Watch to see what new events will happen in your life, what new power will be there, what new understandings, what new energy for service, what new drive toward purity. 5. Do not close the door to the miraculous or to new experiences if they match Scripture. Be bold and watch God work. 6. Pray for boldness to speak God’s word and ask God to heal and “perform miraculous signs and wonders through the name of Jesus.” In the early church, God responded with an overflow of the Holy Spirit when this prayer was prayed. (Acts 4:29–30) 7. The Holy Spirit was also given as a down payment in our lives to assure us of our salvation. (2 Corinthians 1:22 and 5:5) If you lack this sense, ask the Lord to reveal this reassurance to you. Then just enjoy watching what the Holy Spirit is doing in your life. 8. Pray more and more unselfishly. Discover the promise that the Holy Spirit also prays in our behalf in keeping with the will of God. That cooperation unlocks great power. (Romans 8:26, 27) 9. Abandon fear. With the Holy Spirit in your life, you have a restful assurance of God’s relationship to you. Enjoy it! (Romans 8:15, Galatians 4:6) 10. Prepare to know him more and to be more like Jesus because of the action of the Holy Spirit in your life.

SINCE I HAVE MY LIFE BEFORE ME” By Brooke Bronkowski I’ll live my life to the fullest. I’ll be happy. I’ll brighten up. I will be more joyful than I have ever been. I will be kind to others. I will loosen up. I will tell others about Christ. I will go on adventures and change the world. I will be bold and not change who I really am. I will have no troubles but instead help others with their troubles. You see, I’ll be one of those people who live to be history makers at a young age. Oh, I’ll have moments, good and bad, but I will wipe away the bad and only remember the good. In fact that’s all I remember, just good moments, nothing in between, just living my life to the fullest. I’ll be one of those people who go somewhere with a mission, an awesome plan, a world-changing plan, and nothing will hold me back. I’ll set an example for others, I will pray for direction. I have my life before me. I will give others the joy I have and God will give me more joy. I will do everything God tells me to do. I will follow the footsteps of God. I will do my best!!! During her freshman year in high school, Brooke was in a car accident while driving to the movies. Her life on earth ended when she was just fourteen, but her impact didn’t. Nearly fifteen hundred people attended Brooke’s memorial service. People from her public high school read poems she had written about her love for God. Everyone spoke of her example and her joy. I shared the gospel and invited those who wanted to know Jesus to come up and give their lives to Him. There must have been at least two hundred students on their knees at the front of the church praying for salvation. Ushers gave a Bible to each of them. They were Bibles that Brooke had kept in her garage, hoping to give out to all of her unsaved friends. In one day, Brooke led more people to the Lord than most ever will. In her brief fourteen years on earth, Brooke was faithful to Christ. Her short life was not wasted.

I have a complicated spiritual history. Here's the short version: I was born into a Mass-going Roman Catholic family, but my parents left the church when I was in the fifth grade and joined a Southern Baptist church—yes, in Connecticut. I am an alumnus of Wheaton College—Billy Graham's alma mater in Illinois, not the Seven Sisters school in Massachusetts—and the summer between my junior and senior year of (Christian) high school, I spent a couple of months on a missions trip performing in whiteface as a mime-for-the-Lord on the streets of London's West End. Once I left home for Wheaton, I ended up worshiping variously (and when I could haul my lazy tuckus out of bed) at the nondenominational Bible church next to the college, a Christian hippie commune in inner-city Chicago left over from the Jesus Freak movement of the 1960s, and an artsy-fartsy suburban Episcopal parish that ended up splitting over same-sex issues. My husband of more than a decade likes to describe himself as a “collapsed Catholic,” and for more than twenty-five years, I have been a born-again Christian. Groan, I know. But there's really no better term in the current popular lexicon to describe my seminal spiritual experience. It happened in the summer of 1980 when I was about to turn ten years old. My parents had both had born-again experiences themselves about six months earlier, shortly before our family left the Catholic church—much to the shock and dismay of the rest of our extended Irish and/or Italian Catholic family—and started worshiping in a rented public grade school gymnasium with the Southern Baptists. My mother had told me all about what she'd experienced with God and how I needed to give my heart to Jesus so I could spend eternity with him in heaven and not frying in hell. I was an intellectually stubborn and precocious child, so I didn't just kneel down with her and pray the first time she told me about what was going on with her and Daddy and Jesus. If something similar was going to happen to me, it was going to happen in my own sweet time. A few months into our family's new spiritual adventure, after hearing many lectures from Mom and sitting through any number of sermons at the Baptist church—each ending with an altar call and an invitation to make Jesus the Lord of my life—I got up from bed late one Sunday night and went downstairs to the den where my mother was watching television. I couldn't sleep, which was unusual for me as a child. I was a champion snoozer. In hindsight I realize something must have been troubling my spirit. Mom went into the kitchen for a cup of tea and left me alone with the television, which she had tuned to a church service. I don't remember exactly what the preacher said in his impassioned, sweaty sermon, but I do recall three things crystal clearly: The preacher was Jimmy Swaggart; he gave an altar call, inviting the folks in the congregation in front of him and at home in TV land to pray a simple prayer asking Jesus to come into their hearts; and that I prayed that prayer then and there, alone in the den in front of the idiot box. Seriously. That is precisely how I got “saved.” Alone. Watching Jimmy Swaggart on late-night TV. I also spent a painful vacation with my family one summer at Jim and Tammy Faye Bakker's Heritage USA Christian theme park in South Carolina. But that's a whole other book…

The majority of believers on this earth find it laughable that we could reduce the call to follow Jesus and make disciples to an invitation to sit in church service.

A good church service pulls the vulnerability out of people. When God’s presence is strong in a corporate worship setting, hopefully people will drop their guard and invite Him in. When a sermon is anointed and passionate, people will open their hearts to the words and the message behind it. People come to church expecting to find answers and help for the tender spots in their lives.

During my time in India, the commitment level of the believers there shocked me. I visited thousands of Christians who had been beaten or watched relatives murdered for their faith. At one point, I said to one of the leaders, “Every believer seems so serious about his or her commitment to Christ. Aren’t there people who just profess Christ but don’t really follow Him?” He answered by explaining that nominal Christianity doesn’t make sense in India. Calling yourself a Christian means you lose everything. Your family and friends reject you, and you lose your home, status, and job. So why would anyone choose that unless he or she is serious about Jesus? I witnessed that same passion during my time in mainland China. The highlight was attending a meeting with underground church members training to become missionaries. The way they prayed and gave testimony about being persecuted was convicting and encouraging. The most surprising part of our time together was when they asked me about church in America. They laughed hysterically when I told them that church for Americans tends to focus on buildings and that people will sometimes switch churches based on music, child care, preaching, or disagreements with other believers. I honestly was not trying to be funny. They laughed in disbelief at our church experiences, thinking it was ridiculous that we would call this Christianity. Keep in mind that the population of China is over 1.3 billion, and in India it’s over 1.2 billion. Meanwhile, there are around 300 million people in the United States. This means that we are a small minority. Our views of “Christianity” are peculiar to the vast majority of the world. I used to think of those “radical believers” overseas as the strange ones. Some simple math revealed to me that in actuality we are the weird ones. The majority of believers on this earth find it laughable that we could reduce the call to follow Jesus and make disciples to an invitation to sit in church service.

On my first Sunday morning visiting Capitol Hill Baptist Church in Washington, DC, my family and I sat in front of a lovely family in the church balcony. I first noticed them because their young children sat attentively and patiently as they participated in the service. I then noticed their lovely, vigorous singing. But they really grabbed my attention when they greeted us warmly immediately after the service. The man of the family took me around and introduced me to many of the men in the church, and after about fifteen minutes or so invited my family to join his family at their home for lunch—right then. Honestly, the experience made me feel a little weirded out. First of all, his name was Jim, and literally the first three men he introduced me to were all named Jim. Strange, I thought. What kind of church is this? Will I have to change my name again? Then the quick invitation to lunch about knocked me down. It happened too fast. And with my Southern upbringing, it might have even been considered impolite. So I gave him my best polite Southern way of saying no: “That is mighty nice of you. Perhaps some other time.” Everybody down South knows that a sentence like that means no. Southerners know that that is how you must say no because saying no itself is impolite. Southerners are nothing if not polite. So I had clearly said no to this man’s kind but hasty offer of lunch. And wouldn’t you know it? The very next week, when we went to this strange church again, he insisted that we join them for lunch. I was North Carolina. He was New Jersey. There was a failure to communicate. He didn’t understand the rules of the South, but Washington, DC, apparently was too close to the Mason-Dixon Line to clearly establish which “Rome” we were in and what we should do. But I was wrong, and Jim was right. He was the godlier man. He was more hospitable than anyone I had ever met and remains more hospitable than I am today. He embodied Paul’s insistence that hospitable men lead Christ’s church. And rightly, he was a church elder.

The Invitational Church In the invitational church, the focus is on growth. The goal of the church is to reach out and gather people into the church. Therefore, the church is designed as a consumer-oriented place that takes special care to make sure the red carpet is rolled out for visitors and guests. A highly trained staff puts forth great effort to ensure the very best experience for everyone who comes to the church, with special attention paid to visitors. Invitational churches are often successful at growth because this is a large part of their goal and focus. There are many wonderful aspects of the invitational church. I believe God sovereignly birthed the church growth and seeker movements to help the institutional church get beyond itself and start caring about the millions of people trying to find God who were unable to fit into the institutional church. I deeply appreciate and value invitational churches, because they have come up with a way to re-create a modern day “Court Of The Gentiles” aspect of the temple, a place where God-seekers can come and find God. They have unselfishly set aside their desire for church to be about themselves, and they have designed church services for lost people and seekers. What a refreshing change when invitational churches hit the scene! They have really harvested many people for Jesus and helped thousands of churches become outward-focused. This is a good thing! The difficulty with the invitational church is that the individual is essentially irrelevant. What I mean is, when most people walk into an invitational church, it really doesn’t matter whether or not they show up. Why is this true? Because the invitational church has, by default, set the bar very low to make sure that whosoever will may come. However, the inadvertent message is that the individual is not really needed. Little is asked or required of people, and it is very clear that if they aren’t part of the overall goal to facilitate growth, their gifts may not be needed. To prove the point: where do many of the people who have left institutional churches go? They often sit in the back of invitational churches where they can go unnoticed and where they can have very little asked of them. The invitational church is a great place to recover from the institutional church. Some go on and become involved in meaningful ways. But often over time, two negative things happen to believers who have been in invitational churches. One, they become sedentary, consumer-oriented Christians. Those who joined the institutional church and who wanted to make a difference have all but lost their initial fire. Often they no longer burn with zeal for God and His purposes. Instead, they unwittingly adopt the culture of the invitational church into their Christianity, and they, too, lower the bar to the point where, for all intents and purposes, they are now just showing up at a weekend service. Or two, they begin to feel the need for a more personal, relational church, and they move on to something more personal and meaningful to them.

Early on, Christians recognized that the long-term vitality of the church, as well as the extension of the church across new cultural, social, and linguistic barriers, required a secondary group of people who were not bound by the normal responsibilities of life. Religious orders developed, which called people to a life completely consecrated to God, marked by vows of poverty, chastity, and obedience. These religious orders functioned as sodalities. Belonging to a religious order was never intended to be a general expectation of the entire church but a special, voluntary commitment for a few who felt led by God to dedicate themselves completely to Christian service. The vows were considered necessary in order to free these Christians from the heavy, time-consuming obligations of property, work, and family.

Second, the Holy Spirit endues the church with God's authority. In responding to some Pentecostal exegetes who emphasize the role of the Holy Spirit only in empowering believers for witness, Max Turner makes the observation that several of the key manifestations of the Holy Spirit in the book of Acts are not linked to an empowerment-for-witness theme.' In several texts people are filled with the Holy Spirit to give service or direction to the church. For example, in Acts 6 the seven deacons are filled with the Holy Spirit to serve the church (6:1-7). Similarly, in Paul's farewell to the elders at Ephesus, he acknowledges that it was the Holy Spirit who had appointed them as overseers of the church (20:28). In Acts 11:27-28, Agabus is filled with the Holy Spirit to inform the church that a severe famine will spread over the entire Roman world. In Acts 15 the Holy Spirit directs the church in their decision regarding the terms through which Gentile believers were to be admitted into the church (15:28). The Holy Spirit extends the judgment of God on both the church and on the unbelieving world (5:3, 9; 13:9-12). Thus, the Holy Spirit serves not only to empower the church to witness but also is the "teacher of the church" and the "executor of Christ's will in the world" (John 15:26; 16:14-15).7 The Holy Spirit conveys revelation to the church by communicating to the church the will of God, thereby helping to bring the church under the authority of Christ. The early church regularly confesses that it is the Holy Spirit who inspired the biblical authors and, thereby, delivered to the church the Word of God (Acts 1:16; 4:25).

The following approaches are likely to fall flat, with less than 10 percent of the churchless reporting they might be attracted by such efforts: information about a church provided through the mail advertising for a church on TV, in a newspaper, or on the radio an unsolicited phone call from someone representing a church in the community to describe the church and offer an invitation to attend advertising for the church on a local billboard a website that describes the church and invites people to attend a sermon from the pastor on CD or podcast emphasizing that the church has multiple locations in the community providing entry to a “video church”—a ministry that has a real-time video feed of live teaching from the main location, with live music and leadership at the remote location a contemporary seeker service showing a Hollywood-quality movie at the church that deals with issues like marriage, faith, or parenting providing a book club that discusses books about faith and life offering an open-mic discussion group or online chat that focuses on questions related to faith and spirituality a celebrity guest speaker appearing at a church’s worship services

I am frequently amazed at the difference between the accent I find in the pages of sacred Scripture and that which I read in the pages of religious magazines and hear preached in the pulpits of our churches. We have an image of God as full of benevolence. We see Him as a celestial bellhop we can call when we need room service or as a cosmic Santa Claus who is ready to shower us with gifts. He is pleased to do whatever we ask Him to do. Meanwhile, He gently pleads with us to change our ways and to come to His Son, Jesus. We do not usually hear about a God who commands obedience, who asserts His authority over the universe and insists we bow down to His anointed Messiah. Yet, in Scripture, we never see God inviting people to come to Jesus. He commands us to repent and convicts us of treason at a cosmic level if we choose not to do so. A refusal to submit to the authority of Christ probably will not land anyone in trouble with the church or the government, but it will certainly create a problem with God.

Many church leaders don’t question the process of making disciples. They lead congregations that meet regularly. They invite non-believers to attend weekend services and occasionally hold community outreach events. They teach the Bible and have small group meetings during the week. The process may have a few more components, but this is a standard model for making disciples. These activities may bring people to God; getting people to make a profession of faith isn’t difficult. But

Five days after the food was Easter Sunday. The only church that had not been flooded in the neighborhood invited everyone to services, come as you are. Mom decreed we were going to church. "Church!?" I thought. What in the world was she thinking? We had been cleaning up flood mud for three days with no water to clean ourselves up. Mom insisted. She said that Calvary Baptist was going to allow women into the sanctuary in pants and that was something we were not going to miss. (In 1977 this was earthshattering for sure.) I guess we would take a stand for women's equality!

The build-your-own-website program was child’s play to him, and before long we had a home page with photographs that changed every five seconds, starting with a full sanctuary that looked very racially diverse (taken the day we’d invited a nearby Baptist church to our worship service); followed by Amira officiating at a lesbian wedding; then a pan-racial group of laughing kids eating cupcakes (same Baptist church visiting day); a shot of Arroyo House foregrounded by orange trees, with the snow-covered San Gabriel Mountains behind; and last, a yoga class in the new chapel, ten human triangles in a downward facing dog.

I was speaking to a brand-new Christian who told me about a cocktail party he went to recently. Some of Henry’s friends were a little perplexed by his “finding religion”. One of them said, “Why on earth would you go to church?” Henry threw it straight back at him: “Come with me on Sunday and you can see for yourself!” That is a believer who enjoys his church service! And why wouldn’t he? It was a church service that hooked him in the first place. Henry had not attended church since the enforced chapel services of his Catholic school days. But one day his wife, Sandra, decided she wanted to take the kids to Sunday school-she had been invited to the church by a local school mum. Sandra went and loved it and within a few months found herself trusting in Christ. Naturally, she asked Henry to come along. Reluctantly, he did, and to his surprise he too loved the experience. He couldn’t put his finger on it but something about the singing and the prayers and the preaching (and the people) captivated him. He says it was an hour of depth and solace in an otherwise full and frantic life. Henry came back again and again. He soon found himself joining in with the songs and the prayers and finding that he really meant it. Christ had become real to him. Henry and Sandra have not looked back. They are among the most regular members of my church and remain eager to throw down the challenge to their friends and family: “Come with me on Sunday and you can see for yourself!

The services Henry and Sandra were so taken with were not evangelistic events; they were regular services designed for the praise of God and the strengthening of believers. There were Bible readings, songs, prayers, creeds and preaching-all the things that have always been part of church gatherings. Henry and Sandra were eavesdroppers, as it were. And this, I think, is part of the power of services like these. Visitors to church can easily feel threatened if they suspect the whole event is pitched at them. But when they feel the freedom simply to observe what Christians do-praying to the Lord, giving thanks to him, listening to his Word-visitors are often more at ease, less defensive and more open to the things they hear. They are more attentive to our “praises” of him who called us out of darkness into his marvellous light. I still think there is a place for the evangelistic church service and even for the so-called seeker service. I also think it is important to consider making small adjustments to our gatherings to make them more comprehensible to the uninitiated. However, I want to stress in the strongest terms that visitor-focused services are not an evangelistic necessity. Normal church meetings conducted exceptionally well will not only inspire the regulars; they will draw in visitors and, through the powerful vehicle of our corporate praise, promote the gospel to them. The burden is on us-whether we are laypeople or leaders-to do everything we can to enhance what goes on in our services and to invite our friends and family to eavesdrop on what we do.

It wasn’t just that Jeremy didn’t have a chance in the church; the church was unwilling to give Jeremy a chance. He had experienced church many times over again, and it seemed to be the same thing. The church would put their best foot forward through an invitation to their service and then refuse to use the other foot to walk with him.

INVITATION How to Invite the Nonbeliever into Real Life, Not a Church Service You can make more friends in two months by becoming interested in other people than you can in two years by trying to get other people interested in you. DALE CARNEGIE, How to Win Friends and Influence People I have an enormous amount of trouble getting people to come to my place. . . . I can’t tell you how much leftover guacamole I’ve eaten.

Some made it an excuse for not attending the church service on a Sunday morning, that they could not awake early enough to get their families ready. He provided for this also. Taking a bell in his hand, he set out every Sunday for some months at five in the morning, and went round the most distant parts of the parish inviting all the inhabitants to the house of God.

Pastor Oscar Muriu of Nairobi Chapel openly invited North Americans to join the African church in reciprocal service. But he exhorted us, "Don't come thinking that you are coming to fix Africa. You cannot fix Africa." Isaiah Lawon from Nigeria echoes a similar caution. He writes, "You Americans are problem-solvers. Every time I come to the U.S., I like to spend a couple hours in the New York underground and at Walmart and driving around your road system! I find solutions to problems that I never thought of! I like to watch your TV advertisements! We in Africa tend to live with our problems. The negative when it comes to North Americans coming to serve in our world is that Americans don't easily live with a problem; they want to solve the problem and move on. Here we tend to live with the problems, and we'd rather not have an outsider come in to fix us."8

•from hard power to soft power. Hard power (control of information and resources and the agenda) no longer stands. Soft power means influencing behavior through inviting everyone into the process, engaging the widest audience possible and leading by influence rather than by control. •from "gathering-based" metrics to "scattering-based" metrics. Gathering-based metrics focus on what you control (how many members, how many attended and how many events). Scattering-based metrics reports on the difference the people are making in their communities: not how many people attended our service, but how many hours of service did our people give away to their communities.

Jesus invited people to 'repent and believe' this Good News; to set aside fear and worry in order to believe in God's love; and to reject self-centeredness in order to give loving service to others. Jesus insisted, says Karl Baus, that purity of mind and intention is the basis for moral behavior, 'thus giving the individual conscience the decisive role in the sphere of religion.

For churches that observe behaviors from the list on the right, this is a strong indication that the associated convictions are not consistently held within the body. Leaders are often surprised when these deviant behaviors manifest, especially in a church with strong, biblical doctrinal and mission statements. We, as leaders, often assume that the things we hold dear transfer by osmosis to our church members. Sadly, it just doesn’t work this way. For example, many evangelical churches pride themselves on having a robust theology and conviction about the immanent return of Christ. And, if a majority of members in one of these churches was asked how they should live in light of that conviction, many would say something like, “I should live ready for His return any day.” Yet the same church may demonstrate consistently a lack of urgency. How can this be? Simple. People don’t always really believe what they say they believe. There is often disparity between actual beliefs and articulated ones. These cultural inconsistencies are pervasive and no church is immune. At Austin Stone, where Kevin serves as lead pastor, there was a time at the start of the church when this truth became so clear. For years, the leadership team talked about the call of every Christian to be a part of the mission of God. Yet, when looking deeply at the church, something was not quite right. The worship services were growing, but impact in the city was not. The team knew it needed more than just a sermon, more than just a class or a strategy. The church needed a cultural change. The Austin Stone was certain that God was calling her to be a church for the city of Austin, but teaching a list of “dos and don’ts” wasn’t going to get her there.4 The seeds for a city-loving, God-honoring church were in there, but until God altered some of the fundamental beliefs as a local church, nothing would have changed. The church needed to really believe the urgency of the mission, needed to really believe that the Lord was inviting His people to join Him on mission in all spheres of life. Culture change is key.

Holy Week invites us to face the times we have betrayed the Lord, the times others have betrayed us, the times the church has been betrayed, in her moral life or in her faith, even by those consecrated to her service. In the midst of these betrayals, we find ourselves with Christ, who was betrayed by Judas and then by Peter and those who fled from him in his passion. In Christ, we find new life beyond betrayal and we rejoice in the hope his resurrection brings.

In a culture drunk on power and in need of an intervention, the church has too often become an enabler. In many places, churches openly affirm the way from below. Instead of being told how desperately I am in need of God, I am repeatedly told how much God needs me. Instead of being exhorted to pick up my cross and follow Christ, I am told that Jesus wants to be my partner in the plan I have to rid my life of all struggles and challenges. We hear gospels of moralism, centering on our power to become a better person, and we hear sermons offering up God as merely another resource along our journey for successful and happy living. Sermons become pep talks amid a quest for power and significance. Instead of worship being an invitation to come before God in humble awe and reverence, worship becomes an experience meant to lift us above the travails of everyday life and give us a sense of transcendence. Instead of hearing God’s vision of redeeming all things in Christ by the power of his Holy Spirit, we hear of the pastor’s vision to grow an even bigger church that does bigger things so that he can be powerful and we can be powerful with him. The church is called to rest in the grace of God, whose power is perfected in weakness (2 Cor. 12:9).10 Unfortunately, the church has often capitulated to the way from below. It has embraced the way of power to control. This must be addressed head-on. If we ignore the deep vices of the church by pointing to signs of success on the surface, we are in grave danger. The Lord, we are told, “weighs the spirit” (Prov. 16:2). When we embrace the way from below for ministry, we develop a superficial spirit. We can build buildings, programs, and services of power that are, in the end, weightless. What might it look like to become weighty churches? Who are the brothers and sisters in Christ we can look to who have embraced the way from above? Who are the voices crying out in the wilderness that there is a different way?