Are you and your church thinking differently about what the church could be–and should be–‘for’ your community?

If so, the Externally Focused Network can help you with your next steps no matter if you are just beginning this journey, or if you have traveled this path for a while.

Be the Minister That You Have Always Wanted to Be!

I believe I would be hard pressed to find a minister that took a job at a church because of their desire to reside in their office, respond to a daily flood of emails, and sit through a monotonous onslaught of weekly board meetings. Better yet, I can guarantee you it would be nearly impossible to find a church that was founded in hopes of leaving their community no better off than before they began and in keeping Jesus all to themselves.

No, people go into ministry because they want to set the world on fire for Jesus and see revival break out in their communities. Churches begin because people want to make a difference as Christ’s body and share the hope and redemption that only Jesus can provide. They want to serve those in need and love the unloved. They want to share the Truth and pray for the sick. Yes, that’s why people go into ministry and why churches begin.

Unfortunately, many ministers find themselves in positions that don’t seem to align with their original desires and in churches that seem to have fallen into a routine that saps more life than it gives. I’d even go so far as to bet that many of you are in a situation like that right now.

EFN wants to help leaders…

• Become the minister they’ve always wanted to be
• Create a church culture that embraces both doing good deeds while sharing the ‘Good News,’ resulting in transformed communities and changed lives
• Prayerfully know and act on God’s plan for them, their church, and their community
• Build community credibility and start community impact ministries
• Discover practical resources, tools, strategies, systems, and relationships which enable them to engage in ministering to their community
• Connect with like-minded leaders to share their innovative, externally focused ministry experiences and strategies
• Train their churches to believe that serving is a normal expression of Christian living and is vital to spiritual formation, to be convinced that good deeds and good news can’t and shouldn’t be separated, and to see themselves as vital to the health and well-being of their communities

EFN also wants to help your church embrace the characteristics of an Externally Focused Church:

1. Externally focused churches pray…a lot. They pray because they know that God’s ways are higher than our ways, and to rely on our own wisdom and strengths rather than on God is simply foolish. They understand that their goal is never just to do random good works, but to do the good works that God has laid out before them.
2. Externally focused churches are convinced that good deeds and good news can’t and shouldn’t be separated. Just as it takes two wings to lift an airplane off the ground, so externally focused churches couple good news with good deeds to make an impact in their communities. The good news explains the purpose of the good deeds.
3. They see themselves as vital to the health and well-being of their communities. They believe that their communities, with all of their aspirations and challenges, cannot be truly healthy without the church’s involvement. It is only when the church is mixed into the very life and conversation of the city that it can be an effective force for change.
4. They believe that ministering and serving are the normal expressions of Christian living. Even more, they believe that Christians grow best when they are serving and giving themselves away to others. They are convinced that Christians can learn through good instruction, but they really cannot grow if they remain uninvolved in ministry and service.
5. Externally focused churches are evangelistically effective. People are looking for places of authenticity where the walk matches the talk, where faith is making a difference.

This morning, God asked me a question that I think we all should ask ourselves.

However, before I tell you what it is, let me give a little context. For those of you who don’t already know, my wife and I are expecting our first child on February 21st! His name is going to be Micah James Brewer, and he is going to be the best boy ever (or so I think, even though you may hold your own opinions on the matter)!

That being said, the question that God asked me this morning was in regards to my soon-to-be-born son. He asked me, “If you were only able to teach Micah ONE THING from your life, what would you want to teach him?”

What a great question, but what a difficult answer to give! Would I want to teach Micah how to study God’s word and teach it? How to do business as mission? How to take care of his future wife and love here well? How to live in community with other believers and share the hope of Christ with others? What would it be?

I sat there and thought about it, and I realized that there is one thing that Micah could not live without. There’s one thing that He must know and one thing that I must teach him!

I would teach Micah how to pray and live in relationship with the life-giving, all-knowing, all-powerful, graceful, merciful, loving, and perfectly just God.

To be honest, I don’t really care if Micah knows how to run a business as mission, do ministry, teach God’s Word, or love his future wife well. At least, I don’t care about those things so long as he knows God, for God will teach him all of those things.

The one thing (if I could only teach him one thing) that I truly care about Micah learning from me is how to know and love God with all of his heart, soul, mind, and strength. From that will come knowledge, wisdom, and understanding about how to do all other things well.

I tell you all of this because I believe this little question also applies to what we do as church leaders. I know from my own experience that it isn’t difficult to get caught up in things that may have little significance in an eternal perspective. However, for me the most dangerous things are getting tangled up with too many good things that ultimately hold me back from doing the great things that God has called me to do instead.

So let me ask it: if you were only able to teach your congregation one thing as a result of your time with them, what would that one thing be? There are plenty of good things that you could share with them, but what is the one thing that they NEED to know?

Think about it for a minute. Then ask yourself, is that one thing central to what I do as a pastor and/or ministry leader?

I’d love for you to share what your answers to those questions are in a comment below! Blessings!

Alright, alright, alright! It’s pop quiz time!

If you can answer the following question, you will earn 10 Externally Focused bonus points (which consequently have little to no real world value…though you can cash them in for a high five if you ever bump into Brian Mavis or me).

So here it goes: What are the names (first and last) of five of your neighbors?

Take a few minutes and think about it (hint: sometimes it helps to draw a map of the houses in your neighborhood if your drawing a blank).

Alright, so how’d you do? Were you able to do it? Would you also have been able to tell me your neighbors’ professions if I asked you?

I would guess that the answer to those questions for many of you is “no.” I know it was for me several months ago when I was first introduced to the concept of neighboring.

However, I believe that EVERY Christian should be able to name their neighbors. The reason? Because I think we should all be in relationship with our neighbors. Loving your neighbor is the second greatest commandment after all, and how can we love our neighbors if we don’t know them?

The sad thing is that I had no idea who my neighbors were just a few months ago. I fell flat on my face when I was asked this queston. I would wager that many of you did too.

The good news is it’s easy to get to know your neighbors, regardless of how you did with this quiz. It’s as simple as walking across the street to introduce yourself when you take out the trash or inviting them over to watch a football game on Sunday afternoon.

It doesn’t have to be hard nor do you have to become best friends. However, until we start getting to know our neighbors and building relational equity, how in the world can we hope to share the Gospel?

As Allen Hirsch says, “The gospel is transmitted along relational lines.” I believe the first part of living missionally is learning to live relationally. For more resources on easy ways to do this in your neighborhood and city, check out the Verge Network (it’s one of my favorites).

So what do you think? How are you going to practically build relationships with your neighbors?

Photo by Luca Varoncini from stock.xchg

Most churches struggle desperately to find enough volunteers to teach Sunday school and serve at church on Sunday mornings. It seems that no matter how many announcements, short movies, testimonies, and Facebook posts you use to get people to volunteer, they just won’t come.

I believe there are three primary reasons for this, particularly among the business men and women in your congregation. 

1. Internally focused ministries may not utilize their gifts and experiences

People want to do something of significance with their lives. We like to do things that matter. We want to do things that make us come fully alive.

If a church is primarily internally focused and all they offer to their members are opportunities as ushers and Sunday school teachers, where does that leave the rest of the congregation that isn’t called to those areas?

There’s a reason that most churches struggle to mobilize the majority of their congregation to serve, and it’s usually not because your church is full of lazy people.

If we want our CEOs, sales managers, and other business leaders in our congregation to get up and get involved, we need to offer opportunities that allow them to flourish in their gifts and callings.

Opportunities could include starting a business as mission venture, such as thrift store or ACT prep agency. It could be empowering these men and women to manage a back-to-school supply drive for your local elementary school or coordinate a monthly All Pro Dad gathering.

Regardless of what it is, we need to provide opportunities that utilize our congregations plethora of gifts, experiences, and resources. This won’t only bring Christ to our communities, but it will also help our members grow to be more like Christ.

2. They want to serve in a way that meets the world’s most pressing needs

When a person spends the majority of their week immersed in a world full of broken, lost, and hurting people, serving as a greeter to people as they enter your church building may seem of little significance compared to helping the jobless, hungry, and hurting people they see on a daily basis.

In that light, we not only need to offer service opportunities that encompass a multitude of gifts and experiences, but we also need to serve in ways that matter to a broken and hurting world. Whether it’s partnering with your local homeless shelter or working with other churches to bring clean water to a village in Africa, we are called to be agents of change to our world in need.

Jesus called us to both show and tell. What good is it to tell people about the love of God if we don’t also demonstrate it? Does it matter if we encourage our congregation to read through the Bible in a year if we don’t also teach them how to live it out?

I can almost guarantee that your congregation’s working men and women see this. The question is, do you?

3. They don’t feel qualified to do ministry

I’ve talked to far too many business men and women that think they aren’t qualified to do ministry. I’ve discovered that what they really mean is because they aren’t “seminary trained”, they think they can’t do ministry.

By offering ministry opportunities other than teaching Sunday school or leading small group Bible studies, we teach our business leaders that feel unqualified that ministry is doable. Some outreach opportunities that you could offer include starting some sort of business as mission (as I previously mentioned), hosting a Thanksgiving meal for a particular group of underthanked workers in your community, or regularly bringing meals to the elderly in your town.

Additionally, as these men and women serve alongside Christians and non-Christians alike, they will grow in their understanding of what it means to “do ministry.” They will be spurred on to learn how to pray, learn how to seek answers from Scripture, and learn how to both show and tell of their faith.

So what now?

I believe that if we want to get our business leaders (and other members in our congregations) to stop going to church and start being the church, we need to make a shift. We can’t solely focus on our internal ministries. We need to be external as well.

What do you think? Is this something that rings true with your church or ministry? How have you helped your business men and women find ways to utilize their gifts and serve in a way that make them fully alive?