Tuesday Re-mix:
But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, forbearance, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness and self-control. Against such things there is no law. Galatians 5:22-23
For this very reason, make every effort to add to your faith goodness; and to goodness, knowledge; and to knowledge, self-control; and to self-control, perseverance; and to perseverance, godliness; and to godliness, mutual affection; and to mutual affection, love. For if you possess these qualities in increasing measure, they will keep you from being ineffective and unproductive in your knowledge of our Lord Jesus Christ. 2 Peter 1:5-8
It is an important question to ask ourselves as church leaders…is our church being effective? I do not mean that in terms of numbers. I think numbers of baptisms and numbers of people in worship and numbers of dollars in the budget are all important metrics for us…but nothing matters more than the question of whether lives are really being changed as a result of our efforts. That, after all, is what we are supposed to be accomplishing as a church: changed lives. And if we are NOT being effective, if we are rather unproductive and irrelevant, then what can be done about it?
As it turns out, for God’s people, making “relevance” all about music and worship styles and the latest trends in children’s ministry is a lot like making “quality” of a book all about its cover…it’s not that those things are not important, it is that they barely scratch the surface of quality, relevance and effectiveness. That is probably why, when Holy Scripture addresses genuine effectiveness and productivity of our faith, it doesn’t talk much about forms of worship, musical styles, youth curriculums or cool murals on the walls of our preschool space. Rather, scripture ties the effectiveness of the church to the growth and the bearing out (i.e., the preservation) of certain personal characteristics in God’s people.
It is an interesting study in their respective personalities, comparing how Paul and Peter each discuss this issue of “effectiveness” in ministry. Paul chooses a metaphor about fruit. He would say that true effectiveness in ministry is about the Spirit of God being set free to live through the lives of His people, producing qualities and characteristics in them which only He could produce. That metaphor leans more toward getting self out of the way, and letting the Spirit work through you. Paul, you see, was an intellectual, a thinker and a teacher of thinkers. “Be transformed by the renewing of your mind…” he would say to the Roman church. For Paul, it all starts with how we think about things. Peter, on the other hand, was all about action and doing. Both, the Peter of the gospels (“ready, fire, aim”) and the powerfully transformed Peter of Acts, were about doing. Peter would have said, “You claim to follow Christ? Show me.” His instructions about how to stay relevant and effective in ministry were about our actions. He would say, “ADD these things to your belief…be good, be kind, exercise self-control, persevere through difficulties and, above all, love each other well.”
Their respective counsel goes together like nuts and bolts. Paul encourages us to allow the Spirit of God within us to incline our hearts as only He will. Peter then encourages us to act on those spiritual inclinations. For example, the Spirit produces “kindness” as a fruit in us…He inclines our heart toward helping that homeless person on the sidewalk outside the church. But we must then act on that inclination if we are to be effective as a church. It will never be enough to just feel the inclination, or to just see the world around us as God sees it. We must actually do something about it. If not, we become useless, ineffective, irrelevant and fruitless. We must have fruit AND we must do something to preserve that fruit.
Yes, it is about personal characteristics (“fruit”) which only the Spirit can produce in us, and yes, it is about actually doing something with those inclinations (acting to preserve that fruit). It is about both.
Seems to me this would be a good thing to be teaching our people.