The most wonderful things that are now done on earth are wrought in the public ordinances, though the commonness and spiritualness of them makes them seem less wonderful… Here the Lord speaks unto life unto dry bones, and raises dead souls out of the grave and sepulchre of sin,… Here the dead hear the voice of the Son of God and his messengers, and those that hear do live. Here He gives sight to those that are born blind; it is the effect of the gospel preached to open the eyes of sinners, and to turn them from darkness to light. Here He dispossesses Satan, and casts unclean spirits out of the souls of sinners that have been long possessed by them. Here He overthrows principalities and powers, vanquishes the power of darkness, and causes Satan to fall from heaven like lightening. Here He turns the whole course of nature in the souls of sinners, makes old things pass away, and all things become new. Wonders these are, and would be so accounted, were they not the common work of the public ministry. It is true indeed, the Lord has not confined himself to work these wonderful things only in public; yet the public ministry is the only ordinary means whereby He works them.

It should be of little surprise that a nation that increasingly despises public worship is so spiritual anemic. One is the symptom of the other. No Christian will remain weak for long that relentlessly gives himself to the public ministry of a biblical church. Don’t neglect the gathering of yourself together, brothers!

My track record isn’t perfect. I’ve missed a service roughly twelve times. There are legitimate reasons to skip services. Kids get sick. Sometimes Sunday travel is require due to circumstances. Stuff happens. The main thing is that you don’t develop a habit of forgoing worshiping publicly with the  local church.  Charles Spurgeon rightly observed that this is all too common:

Persons go out on Monday to business who cannot go out on Sunday. It is raining on Sunday, and it is very curious how rain on Sunday will keep some people in; their health is so weak, though the same rain on Monday does not affect them at all in that particular way. Have you never observed how some persons appear to be periodically ill on Sundays? That seems to be a favourite day for being ill; and then they will say that they cannot walk so far, and they would object to ride, the objection being, probably, to going at all, at the bottom.

Where there is a will, there is a way. Make Sunday worship services a priority. Finish well.

I’ve given just three ways in which a pastor can create a culture of discipline in his church and each of them were only briefly discussed. There is so much more to be said. A pastor must seek and fine tune every means possible to make his church a place that produces godly disciples. John Leadley Dagg, the author of an influential church manual of the nineteenth century, said: “It has been remarked, that when discipline leaves a church, Christ goes with it.” Many churches–even those that practice the reduced version of church discipline–are functionally Christless. They have no testimony because they have no discipline. The remedy to this both starts and ends with the pastor.

“Adele Ahlberg Calhoun (M.A., Gordon-Conwell Theological Seminary) currently copastors Redeemer Community in Wellesley, Massachusetts, with her husband, Doug. She was formerly Pastor of Spiritual Formation at Christ Church in Oak Brook, Illinois.”

“A trained spiritual director, she has taught courses at Wheaton College and Northern Baptist Theological Seminary. In the early 1970s she helped pioneer student work with the International Fellowship of Evangelical Students in Southeast Asia and the Middle East. She has also worked with InterVarsity Christian Fellowship in New England and Canada and with the International Fellowship of Evangelical Students in the West Indies and South Africa.”

More details here.

“Discovering and exercising your God-given spiritual gifts allows you to experience maximum fulfillment with minimum frustration in your Christian life and ministry. For that reason, we are pleased to introduce you to the nation’s best-selling Spiritual Gifts Inventory!”

Did you take note of their reasons for supplying you with a best-selling Spiritual Gifts Inventory? It has nothing to do with building the kingdom of God, serving the people of God, or magnifying the glory of God. Quite to the contrary, it is all about you experiencing your life and ministry to their absolute fullest. They are promising nothing more than a variation of the “Best Life Now Christianity” that dominates the church in America. This, of course, is diametrically opposed to the teaching of Scripture. Paul says,

“There are varieties of effects, but the same God who works all things in all persons. But to each one is given the manifestation of the Spirit for the common good.” 1 Cor. 12:6-7

Why has the manifestation of the Spirit been given to us? It is given for the common good of the saints in the local church. It really isn’t about you and your desire for fulfillment. God has endowed us with gifts for his glory and the church’s good. We must keep this in focus as we seek to serve him in the local church. If we aren’t careful our deceitfully hearts will be quick to seize the search for spiritual gifts as an opportunity o turn our eyes inward instead of outward and upward.

How shall we then seek out our gifts? There are three areas where an adjustment of focus will provide us with a safe path to pursue using our gifts.

1) Focus on service more so than discovery

God calls the leadership of the church to equip the saints so that each and every last member of the church ministers. This is how the body of Christ grows to maturity (Eph 4:11-16). Furthermore, since the church is a living organism, each member is either contributing to the life or death of the entire body. How would your body be effected if, say, 20% of it failed to function properly? How many churches out there are functioning at a far lower level? That’s a sobering thought. The body dies when people aren’t ministering. God has granted each and every person a function (Rom 12:4). The New Testament imperative is not, “please perform a lengthy assessment of your abilities to determine which ones are/are not spiritual so that you can serve.” Rather, the repeated injunction is, “serve!” Moreover, God will bring you gifts to the forefront as you die to yourself in the service of others. Which leads us to…

2) Focus on needs more so than preferences

Part of dying to yourself is laying aside your preferences for the good of others. Paul reminds us, “not [to] merely look out for your own personal interests, but also for the interests of others” (Phil. 2:4). This applies not just to individuals but also to the local church. You need to stop asking where is a place for you to use your gifts. Instead ask for a place where you can serve even if it is—gasp—the children’s church. When a soldier sees a gap in the skirmish line they run to fill it. Victory depends on it.

3) Focus on weaknesses as much as strengths

Serving in weakness is a rather conspicuous theme in the New Testament (cf. the book of 2 Corinthians). God calls us to do all sorts of things that we feel remarkably incapable of carrying out. Yet, we trust that if our Lord gives us a ministry, He will empower us by his Spirit to accomplish it. If we consistently play to our strengths in ministry, we severely curtail what God wants to do through us. What if Nehemiah had stayed in the King’s court? What if Esther had stayed quiet? God often raises people up to serve in ways that they had never expected. Don’t let your selfish desire for glory to get in the way of the church storming the gates of hell.

“Masculine piety is something we simply don’t understand anymore because all our assumptions today of how to be godly are feminine assumptions. Feminine piety is our baseline. It’s our operating system. I’ve heard it said that culture is all that stuff you suck in without noticing. Today, effeminacy is the air we breathe. So as soon as we become convinced that we need to have masculine worship, inevitably we try to get everybody sitting around fire pits, roasting wild boar, and acting like a bunch of un-bathed Viking Neanderthals. Now, I’m exaggerating, but my point is that when what we’re trying to recover is as far gone as masculine piety, it’s our tendency to overcorrect in the pursuit of it. And this is because we lack any godly frame of reference. Which is to say, we lack wisdom.”

You can read the rest of the post here.

He is a video of the joyous occasion:

Why do you not invite people to your church functions? Here are a few of the answers:

“Right now, it’s because I work mostly with Christians, that are members at Christian Churches.”

“Currently in my life, my circles are pretty much my small group, youth kids, friends from church, and people at work. However, most of the people that make up those circles claim to be Christians.”

“The only non-christians that I see these days are the ones at work and we don’t have much a chance to talk because we are a call center.”

“Other than work, pretty much all my circles are composed of people from church, especially with school on hiatus for the summer.”

So, here is our first reason: we only know Christians. Many believers have few, if any, relationships with non-Christians. Most of the people we know belong to our church or to another local church. This shouldn’t be a major surprise. Birds of a feather flock together. Moreover, it is actually a good sign that the majority of our friends are Christians and members of the same church. We are called to be deeply committed to members of our local church. This, in turn, results in most of our time being rightly spent with the Christians.

Now, taking that all into account, we still should have some relationships with those outside the church. Christ made us to be salt and light. Our very presence should effect those around us. Jesus said, “In the same way, let your light shine before others, so that they may see your good works and give glory to your Father who is in heaven.” We should live openly Christian lives. That is what it means to let our light shine. Our “light” will effect our barbers, baristas, mechanics, co-workers, and neighbors. It will cause them to ask questions. This is why Peter writes, “..always being prepared to make a defense to anyone who asks you for a reason for the hope that is in you.” A distinctly Christian life will naturally create opportunities to build relationships with non-believers or nominal believers. Most of these relationships will be ever-so-brief due to the offensive nature of the gospel. A few will develop into a channel that brings the individual into the church.

This brings me to my proposed solution.

First, ask God to open your eyes to the opportunities already present in your life. To avoid non-Christians, Paul says, “you would need to go out of the world.” You might not have any non-believing friends but you most certainly have interactions with non-believers. Paul says so. Therefore, we cannot use the excuse that we never have any interactions with non-believers. That isn’t true. The truth is that they don’t register as an opportunity. We don’t see interactions at the local playground as a chance to “let your light shine.” A trip to the barber is merely for a hair cut as opposed to a “short term mission trip.” The reason for them not registering could range from being lazy to just being caught up with the business of life. Either way, the solution to this problem will always start with prayer.

Second, use these everyday interactions to make little “gospel jabs.” The jab is everything in boxing. Its the punch that sets up all other bigger punches. A skilled boxer uses it to find his opponent’s openings. In this sense, evangelism is a lot like boxing. More often than not, you’ll end up on the canvass if you go for the knockout too early. It is the accumulation of “gospel jabs” to your “opponent” that create opportunities for the K.O. shot. Most Christians have an “all or nothing” mentality towards evangelism. They come out swinging wildly looking for a knockout. This is usually a mistake. You don’t have to lay out an entire Christian theology during your haircut. Just a little gospel jab here and there will have a powerful effect over time. Let me give a few real life examples of what I mean by “gospel jabs.”

Starbucks

Barista: What you’ve been up to?
Me: I just got out of a church gathering.
Barista: Oh, where do you go?

Great Clips

Stylist: What does your wife do?
Me: She is a household executive.
Stylist: Ok…what does that mean?

YMCA Hot-tub (I read in the hot-tub)

Random member: What are you reading?
Me: Its a book on preaching by a famous Welsh preacher.
Random member: Cool. Are you a seminary student?

Each of these examples happened last month. The first two didn’t go much further than recorded here. The last one turned into a fairly lengthy conversation. The man ended up being an agnostic who was studying law here in Bloomington. He was visibly shaken by my explanation of the gospel and the judgment to come. The last time we crossed paths he purposely ignored me. So, please, don’t think I’m suggesting this is some magical evangelism formula. I strike out most of the time. Most people just brush me off or go no further than the socially-mandated niceties. Jesus said, “For the gate is narrow and the way is hard that leads to life, and those who find it are few.”

Everyone has opportunities to influence non-Christians with the gospel. The opportunities don’t require street preaching or going door to door. They only require seizing everyday interactions as a fertile ground for proclaiming the truth of Christ.

Shut up as we are in the prison house of our flesh, we have not yet attained angelic rank. God, therefore, in his wonderful providence accommodating himself to our capacity, has prescribed a way for us, though still far off, to draw near to him. (And that way is the) church, into whose bosom God is pleased to gather his sons, not only that they may be nourished by her help and ministry as long as they are infants and children, but also that they may be guided by her motherly care until they mature and at last reach the goal of faith. “For what God has joined together, it is not lawful to put asunder,”  so that, for those to whom He is Father the church may also be Mother. (Institutes, IV.1.1, “The Necessity of the Church.”)

You cannot draw near to God outside of the church. She is our mother and through her ministry we are brought near to the Father.