Perhaps you are different than me, but when I became a believer I did not get zapped with a spiritual gift I never had before. I realize good and godly people hold different views on the acquisition of spiritual gifts. In this area I identify more with what Paul said about the reason for His effectiveness in ministry through the utilization of his spiritual skill set. He humbly yet frankly stated it was due to his “laboring more abundantly” (1 Cor. 15:10). What does this mean and what does this look like?

It’s one thing to be engaged in ministry and to have a grasp of how God wired you with particular abilities that you have surrendered to Holy Spirit control and developed through hard work. It’s another thing to recognize potential in others and to specify what that potential is in them, even when they might not know it yet. For me, it was a dedicated Sunday School superintendent who saw “something” in me as a young person and took the initiative to challenge me in various areas of ministry involvement. God used his seemingly small acts of encouragement to powerfully give direction to my life.

Needed today are pastors who both grasp this truth and see this as an important responsibility. In people work, this turns my crank more than anything in the privilege of seeing individuals grow! Here are a few practical things I do to awaken awareness of spiritual gifts and their development in people I see as future spiritual leaders:

1. The power of the pen. Today people rarely receive handwritten notes. A sincere statement of encouragement that contains your observation of an individual’s potential for the Lord’s work can go a long way.
2. Get out of the office. Whether it’s for breakfast, coffee, lunch, or whenever, the face-to-face approach communicates best. It shows your personal interest in them and results in an individual giving more weight to your suggestions and observations on how they can develop themselves for the Lord to use.
3. Be like Mike. You may or may not remember the commercial, but the question is this: “Who wants to be like you?” Who is buying into your life? Would you follow you? Pastors need to model not only authentic godliness, but the fact that they love what they do and have unlimited optimism in their great God! Excellence of character both attracts and compels others to develop similar traits in their lives. It gives a clear road map to follow.
4. Be specific, but general. Point out the specific admirable traits of a person’s godliness and character, but then be general in how the Lord might use them. Say something like, “Because of such and such, it could be that God’s hand is on your life in a real way, and maybe He is using _______ in your life right now to point you in a new direction.” All you are doing initially is planting the seed that the Lord might grow. Give them a simple, doable first step.
5. Just do it. Make these kinds of conversations and appointments happen. Just last week I met with a young man in our church in whom I see ministry potential. I was sharing this with a friend of mine who teaches in a seminary. His remark to me on how few pastors do this kind of thing was shocking to me, and unfortunately other Christian leaders have shared the same observation.

Behind each of these points I see the faces of people who are now active in the Lord’s work, including my two pastoral associates. They are men who years ago did not know beans in a basket about the Bible! They were not “zapped” either, but today they are my peers and partners in ministry!

Donald A. Shirk is pastor of Grace Baptist Church, Batavia, N.Y.

He points out to himself that fellowshipping around the gospel is the focus of much of the New Testament and that it shouldn’t be assumed in one’s theology or community. It should be central. So fellowshipping around the gospel is highly important. He ends it this way:

“We do not need less of the gospel. We need more of it. True, we need to proclaim it and to defend it. But we also need to hear it, learn it, explore it, apply it, and love it. You say that the gospel is to be assumed. What—do you want us just to take the gospel for granted? We can’t afford that! The gospel was never more needed by God’s people than it is today. If you do not take these matters into consideration, I think that you will never understand how important it is to be together for the gospel. You will always have a limited and shallow approach to Christianity. Perhaps you should reconsider.”

Read the entire article here.

MacDonald writes:

The pastoral vocation is to help people grow spiritually, resist their lowest impulses and adopt higher, more compassionate ways. But churchgoers increasingly want pastors to soothe and entertain them. It’s apparent in the theater-style seating and giant projection screens in churches and in mission trips that involve more sightseeing than listening to the local people. . . .
The trend toward consumer-driven religion has been gaining momentum for half a century. Consider that in 1955 only 15 percent of Americans said they no longer adhered to the faith of their childhood, according to a Gallup poll. By 2008, 44 percent had switched their religious affiliation at least once, or dropped it altogether, the Pew Forum on Religion & Public Life found. Americans now sample, dabble and move on when a religious leader fails to satisfy for any reason.

MacDonald says the solution is for Christians to ask their clergy for challenges to growth. He writes, “Clergy need parishioners who understand that the church exists, as it always has, to save souls by elevating people’s values and desires. They need churchgoers to ask for personal challenges, in areas like daily devotions and outreach ministries.”

In reviewing MacDonald’s book Thieves in the Temple Chuck Leddy notes, “MacDonald continually calls upon churches to renew their commitment to moral purpose, to stress that “the life of faith is actually a sacrificial one.” MacDonald concludes by describing a few examples of successful churches that “reinforce the notion that spiritual growth is supposed to be difficult and uncomfortable at times.”

We all face the pressure to some degree of people in our congregations wanting “Christianity Lite”—being more entertained than transformed. While I understand and sympathize with what MacDonald is describing, I think there are two areas that MacDonald is ignoring to his peril and the church’s peril. MacDonald is part of the United Church of Christ, which many years ago moved away from the authority of the Bible and the necessity of the gospel.

One reason church members join is because they believe something in common. The problem MacDonald is describing ( but doesn’t acknowledge) is that he is dealing with a denomination that has watered down Christianity until it means nothing beyond a common “urge to be united and do good in the world.” The problem is that doing good in the world doesn’t require the spiritual disciplines he’s talking about. On the other hand, believing in Christ crucified as the only atonement for sin and living for Him in that light does require discipline.

Another reason church members join is because they all worship something in common. Second Corinthians 3:18 states clearly that we grow as we gaze upon the glory of Jesus Christ our Lord. When MacDonald’s church dilutes that glory to look like the glory of mankind, the result is predictable. People live up to their own standards and look for people who agree with them. They cannot be challenged by Christ because they aren’t gazing at His glory.

This should be a warning to us that we need to help our membership believe in and gaze upon Jesus Christ. To get distracted from this all-consuming goal will be to have our congregations go wild and our membership be nothing more than access to a club. Membership is a call to a community that shares unique beliefs and worship—not sharing our own ideas and pursuits but in a pursuit of Jesus Christ. If we need to remind our congregations of that through clear preaching and loving church discipline, we only call ourselves and our churches to following Jesus Christ more closely.

Read the following posts and share your comments:

• Describing Church Membership Differently
• Members Who Are Not There
• Congregations Gone Wild: Membership Has Purpose

Know of a resource on this topic? What has worked for your church? What has not worked? Share your ideas by submitting an article or post to one of the moderators.

Many churches have policies in place within their constitutions or bylaws that address this issue. Here is once such policy:

Members failing to support the church by their attendance within a period of three months, without legitimate excuse, will be placed on the inactive list by vote of the church and so lose their right of franchise. All members placed on the inactive list shall be notified by letter. If there is no response on the part of the inactive member and no indication of regular church attendance within six months of the time of being placed on the inactive list, such a one shall be dropped from the roll of the church by church vote and be notified by letter. An inactive member may, by faithful and regular attendance during a three-month period, be placed on the active list again by the Pastor(s) and Deacons. The church shall be notified of such action.

How does your church approach lack of membership? Let us know in the comments.

Usually those who ask these questions are those who grew up in church and are familiar with church membership. Because of this, when we teach and talk about the subject, we must do it employing fresh terms and new imagery. Those who grew up in church have often built an immunity to the normal ways of describing things. I was reading a book the other day, and it briefly brushed on church membership. It used some terminology that I thought was helpful and insightful. The book is The Trellis and the Vine by Colin Marshall and Tony Payne. Below is the paragraph from pages 66 and 67 that I thought was helpful. Read it and respond with your thoughts.

The gospel itself demands that we stand with our leaders and preachers in profound unity, teamwork and solidarity—not because of their personalities or gifts, but because of our common partnership in the gospel of Jesus Christ. There aren’t two classes of Christians—the partners and the spectators. We’re all in it together. One church we have been involved in tried to express this by not having a ‘membership’ of the congregation, but a ‘partnership.’ In our society, when you join as a ‘member’ of something, it can have connotations of passivity and consumerism. I join a club, and expect certain benefits. The ‘partnership’ language, on the other hand, communicates immediately that we are signing up for active involvement—for being partners together in a great enterprise: the gospel mission of Christ.