Where To From Here
Outside the doors of churches is a world of hurting and lost precious souls. There are various estimates, but perhaps 1/3 of the earth’s population has not heard the name of Jesus as Savior. Hundreds of millions of people only know Jesus as a religious person or wise teacher. Others see Jesus as a good person who lived His life to make possible His followers enjoying good health and prosperity in the present life.
Jesus lived his life as a servant (Philippians 2:7,8). His mission was driven to establish the Kingdom of Heaven on earth, to share the Good News of salvation, and to spread the message of a loving and redeeming God. Jesus went from village to village, town to town, in relentless effort to share the glorious news of hope. He went to the Cross to insure our salvation and rose from the grave in victory over sin.
Congregations of people who form church bodies are charged with the mandate to practice and teach the Christ-life.
Self-centered churches die. They should die. They should die quietly and quickly.
Self-centered churches are all about themselves. All they do, all they teach, all they give and all they spend is on themselves. They build buildings for their own pleasure. They buy vehicles for their own pleasure. They have parties for their own pleasure. They sing songs for their own pleasure. They pay preachers to tell them what they want to hear. They demand from the pulpit approval of carnal lifestyles which are rebellious to the Word of God. They die and want preachers to say redeeming words over sinful testimonies.
Evangelism is taken out of the dictionary of selfish churches. Caring for the “family” takes all the energy….like a grease factory using all grease produced to grease its own machinery.
Churches that live and have a right to live must be passionate about the gospel and sharing the gospel. Until a servant heart is born in the heart of a congregation there is no fire that will burn to share Christ with those outside the congregation.
One of satan’s favorite strategies for killing churches is to steal their zeal for missions. My hope and desire is that Covenant Church will be a frustration to hell. My hope and prayer is that our missionary zeal will grow, and grow, and grow. May God give us preachers, teachers, missionaries, evangelists. May the Lord cause the fire of the Holy Spirit to burn deep within us until we are willing to sacrifice to send and carry the gospel.
Our mission conference on March 11-13 is dedicated to celebrating that missions is not a program, not an annual pilgrimage, and not a calendar event. Missions at Covenant Church is DNA. It is who we are. We tell family and friends about Jesus. We share with neighbors. We share with co-workers. We send missionaries. We pray for missionaries. Our ethos is missions.
We will receive testimonies from missionaries via DVD, CD and in person. From Cuba, Congo, Iran, Burma, Philippines, North Korea, Colombia, and other countries we will have greetings from dear friends. We will eat international cuisine representing all our cultures. We will wear clothes representing many cultures and countries.
We will welcome other churches who will join us in fellowship and leadership of other churches that will be coming to learn how to motivate their pastor and congregation to LIVE---by being missionary-driven.
I write this letter to you with excitement. My resolve as Senior Pastor of Covenant Church is that we will be a congregation not only alive, but pleasing to God. This can only be true if we fulfill the Great Commission by the power of the HOLY SPIRIT (Matthew 28:18-20).
Pastor Bare