I had lunch with a young man this week from a local church. He shared with me his frustrations with seeing his church engage more in evangelism and community engagement.
We say it loudly and often - with as many churches and christians and ministries in this area - it should be one step away from heaven on earth. There should be more missionaries sent from this region (DFW) than any other plot of land on the globe. Seriously. But that is not the reality in this region. You have lot’s of mission agencies being based here but few people being launched from here. Often people relocate from other areas to this area to be trained and sent. Why not people from this area?
Part of the issue is one of culture. The other is what we believe is true about God.
Beliefs
If we believe that God’s primary concern is our doctrinal integrity and accuracy then that is what we will talk about and trumpet and teach. You will create programs to train people and give them all the tools and training to be successful but years will go by and little fruit will come from it. You will have enough fruit emerge from it to perpetuate the system.
Hebrews 11:6 says that without faith it is impossible to please God - that means with faith it IS possible to please Him. Romans 1:5 says Paul had a mission among the nations to bring about the “obedience of faith.” Luke 18:8 says that when Jesus returns He is going to be looking for faith and he pontificates as to whether he will find it or not. If we think our lack of knowledge is the hold up then we will never ever step out in faith. Heaven knows we all know of theological watchdog blogs, blog aggregates, youtube channels, social media posts, and documentaries that are more than willing to tell the world how ‘wrong’ you have it. We all know of some person who stepped out in faith and got blasted for his or her theological inaccuracy and then we wonder why people don’t step out. We created the wrong culture built on a foundation of false beliefs about what God is after.
Culture
But how do you shift a culture in your church, home, neighborhood, or nation? It comes from what you value and what you celebrate. When was the last time you cheered for a person who shared the gospel, got the message wrong, confused the hearer, and generally made a mess of the situation? When was the last time you saw someone who was woefully under developed asked to step into something that was above their current training? We are afraid of the mess and we think Jesus is too. But He is not.
This is one of the reasons we absolutely LOVE YWAM (Youth With A Mission). Permission. Permission to make mistakes. Permission to get it wrong. Permission to wildly follow Jesus. It’s a culture of permission that is empowered by celebration. Celebrating obedience!
This Fall and early 2021
This fall we are going to have YWAM teams and other partners coming through the DFW area. Yes there will be training and teaching, but this not not about education. This is about shifting culture. We will have outreach teams, worship teams, and ministry teams coming. What we are aiming for and praying for can only be caught and not taught. Often it will be in the context of teaching but the culture will be shifted by what we celebrate.
We also have some fantastic partners coming through who will be assisting with church planting. They are seeing amazing revival and awakening. Please let us know if you want to be a part of this amazing teaching and impartation!! You can check out their link here!
What Can you do?
We need barn space to do worship gatherings. We need outdoor space to do outdoor gatherings. We need a place to house people! Please let us know! We need to be connected to people who carry the fire of revival for this region and the world. We want to see this place set ablaze with the love of Jesus. Would you also consider also financially partnering with us to help cover some of the costs?