We all want to see more people become Christians in our churches.
And we all know the importance of having good structures in place to help that happen: evangelistic courses, ‘connect events,’ training for our members in one-to-one Bible reading, etc.
But for any of these structures and strategies to work, we have to have a good mission culture in our churches first. As Peter Drucker says, ‘culture eats strategy for breakfast.’ That is, unless we do the heart work first – increase our longing as churches to see people saved – our hard work in evangelism will be much less effective.
This is where our first Network Training Day for the year kicked in. We got Steve Gibb, Mission Pastor from MBM, Sydney, to come and talk to us about ‘Building Mission Culture in our Churches.’ Here were some of the highlights:
- ‘Culture’ is ‘the way we do things around here.’ Every church has a culture: it’s just up to us, under God, to set it in the right direction.
- Mission culture starts with us personally, as leaders. Before we can attend to our church’s mission culture, we have to attend to our own. How many not-yet-Christians are we praying for/evangelising? How might we improve in this?
- Though structures and strategies aren’t everything, they give us something to aim for. Having things we force ourselves to measure in mission – how many people came to our last Life course? How many visitors did we have to church last month? – is a good way of holding ourselves accountable in mission, and keep mission on our radar.
- Having clear values helps drive mission culture. Having clear values as a church, which we keep repeating to each other – ‘We are prayerful in mission,’ ‘We will do anything to reach the lost,’ – will help shape our mission culture.
- Celebrate the wins. When people become Christians, or even come closer to becoming Christians, celebrate that! Let church know! This is so encouraging, and makes it easier for people to believe people really can become Christians, and so spur them on in their own evangelism.
Perhaps most importantly, Steve kept stressing the importance of prayer in all this, because it is only through God’s work that anyone will be saved.
Almost 100 people came on the day, and it wasn’t just for ministry staff, but also for church Leadership Teams and members of the Network Board. This was especially helpful, as it means we all heard the same things, and so can more easily keep talking about them over the year.
Let’s keep praying that 2024 will be a year when many people come to Christ in our churches, and where the urgency of mission becomes more deeply entrenched in our church cultures.
