The Week in Review

The Life of a Healthy Church (Final installment)

Schwarz goes on to say, “People do not want to hear us talk about love, they want to experience how Christian love really works” (38). From Schwarz definition of a loving relationship it is individuals becoming involved in the lives of others. One-way to accomplish this is with new believers/new converts. I believe it is vital that new converts be linked with another individual (I believe a Membership Coordinator would be needed to facilitate new members in their walk) that will walk with them during the initial period after their conversion. Many come into the church, but drift away because no one has taken an active role in their lives. These individuals are seeking a relationship with God but also friendship or fellowship with others.


This is one of the requirements of the believers. “Beloved, let us love one another: for love is of God; and every one that loveth is born of God, and knoweth God. He that loveth not knoweth not God; for God is love” (1 John 4:7,8). “Finally, be ye all of one mind, having compassion one of another, love as brethren, be pitiful, be courteous: Not rendering evil for evil, or railing for railing: but contrawise blessing: knowing that ye are thereunto called, that ye should inherit a blessing” (1 Peter 3:8, 9). One of the requirements of the believer is to love and encourage each other to good works. That is more than simply “saying” words but it is when we become “doers” of the word.


One of the first obstacles we must overcome in showing love to those that come within our doors is by letting go of the attitude that the church is “ours”. I recently encounter this ideology in a class and questioned the reason why. The belief is the local congregation should do all things directed for the believer and not to change anything to be directed at non-believers because they cannot worship anyway. While there is some truth in that, for non-believers do not have a relationship with Christ yet so they do not understand the importance of worship. But God can use our time of worship to draw the non-believer to himself, to make him/her desire to have what it is we have. I also understand when we talk about the universal church, the bride of Christ that this statement can be applied fully. The universal church the bride of Christ is made up only of the believers, but the local congregation has the saved and the unsaved coming in and out of its doors.


In the book, Death of the Church, Mike Regele states, “This is the Christendom paradigm. If we insist that the church be for us, then it will only be for us. Local congregations must see themselves as being for their community. From the standpoint of local congregations, community development is a subset of congregational development, especially in our urban centers” (206). When we take on the attitude that the church is ours, we unknowingly take on the attitude that others are not welcomed. Those coming to visit within our doors realize they are not welcome. Our forced smiles do not impress them, because they feel our attitudes. “Most church members believe they are friendly when in reality they are friendly only to others whom they already know. ‘Manufactured friendliness’ is obvious…Friendliness of members to non-Christians tends to be correlated to a church’s evangelistic effectiveness. Members seem to be enthusiastic about new Christians, which engenders friendliness toward others who are not Christians. Friendly churches are likely to have friendly pastors. The pastor’s modeling of friendliness is critical. A relationship is also apparent between the friendliness of a church and the members’ willingness to accept change” (Rainer, 96-97). From Rainer’s finding, individuals are looking for churches were the members show genuine friendliness and love.


As a recap, we need to start first with our leadership. Are we being trained? Are we training others and passing the vision and the mission from the top, down? Are we presenting our best; best in worship, administrative responsibilities, etc? Are we asking ourselves the important questions, why are we here and what is our purpose? Are we taking a hard look at everything we do, under the examination of our vision and mission statements? The most important point is, are we living out, what we have written down? When those two things are in line, we are setting ourselves up for success. We are releasing ourselves to reach the full potential of what we were created to be.

Cited work / source documents

Boa, Kenneth, Th.M.; Ph.D. Leadership Development. 2005. 4 April 2006. http://www.Bible.org.

Church Growth and Health: Church Growth Principles. 2007. 25 January 2007. http://webct.macu.edu/

Gildea, Spike, Ph.D., et al. The American Heritage College Dictionary. Boston, MA: Houghton Mifflin Company, 2002.

Keathley III, J. Hampton. Marks of Maturity: Biblical Characteristics of a Christian Leader. 2005. 28 March 2006. http://www.Bible.org.

Longman, Jr., Robert. Spiritual Disciplines and practices. 2005. 28 March 2006. http://www.spirithome.com/spirdisc.html.

MacArthur, John, et. al. Pastoral Ministry: How to Shepherd Biblically. Nashville, TN: Thomas Nelson, Inc. 2005.

MacArthur, John F., Dr. The Call to Church Leadership. 1986. 4 April 2006. http://www.biblebb.com.

McGavran, Donald A. Understanding Church Growth. Grand Rapids, MI: Wm B. Eerdmans Publishing Co., 1970.

Piper, John. The Marks of a Spiritual Leader. 2006. 28 March 2006. http://www.desiringgod.org/library/topics/leadership/marks_spiritual_leader.html.

Rainer, Thom S. Surprising Insights From The Unchurched. Grand Rapids, MI: Zondervan, 2001.

Regele, Mike. Death of The Church. Grand Rapids, MI: Zondervan Publishing House, 1995.

Rheenen, Gailyn Van. Biblical Foundations & Contemporary Strategies: Missions. Grand Rapids, MI: Zondervan Publishing House, 1996.


Schwarz, Christian A. Natural Church Development. St. Charles, IL: ChurchSmart Resources, 1996.

Simpson, Sandy. The Duties of Christian Leadership. January 11, 2005. 28 March 2006. http://www.deceptioninthechurch.com/dutiesofchristianleadership.html.

Stowell, Joseph M. Shepherding the Church. Chicago, IL: Moody Press. 1997.

Toler, Stan And Nelson, Alan. The Five Star Church. Ventura, CA: Regal Books. 1999.

Thompson, Frank Charles, D.D., PH.D. The Thompson Chain-Reference Bible, 5th ed. Indianapolis, IN: B. B. Kirkbridge Bible Co., Inc., 1988.