Managing Resources for Evangelism

Consider the following, "Honestly, our society's only hope of moral restoration is for the church to fulfill its calling from God. He called it into being so that the world would be impacted by the thoughts, words, and deeds of His followers." (Barna, 11) The point that Barna is making is that God wants his creation and specially chosen people to be in a state of work and progress, but unfortunately less and less labor is being done today in the Christian world while more and more sales and advertising is taking its place. Overall, the mentality of the masses is often to get a quick and cheep fix for problems instead of utilizing resources intensively on a solution that will last and be permanent with high quality and low upkeep, and for this reason churches have often marketed themselves for people in search of quick fixes.

On several occasions Jesus feeds the multitudes, be he also gives simple sermons like the Sermon on the Mount. Jesus thus had compassion on the masses that would have been looking for a quick fix as he addressed them, but the disciples would have been far more critical to the work of Jesus Christ in transforming the world. Overall, when much is given then also much is required in return (Luke 12:48), and this is the main reason why not everyone is a disciple of Christ since the masses are looking for a quick fix such as in the case of bread that they would eat.

A man cannot have two masters, and a house cannot stand if it is divided against itself. For this reason Christ would not want a disciple that will always be dead weight that really only has interest in the world, but yet Jesus had no problem feeding the masses of people that would gather around him as long as he felt that it was constructive. Overall, Jesus makes these points very clear in his speeches.

Consider what Jesus has to say, "Large crowds were traveling with Jesus, and turning to them he said: 'If anyone comes to me and does not hate his father and mother, his wife and children, his brothers and sisters-yes, even his own life-he cannot be my disciple. And anyone who does not carry his cross and follow me cannot be my disciple. 'Suppose one of you wants to build a tower. Will he not first sit down and estimate the cost to see if he has enough money to complete it? For if he lays the foundation and is not able to finish it, everyone who sees it will ridicule him, saying, 'This fellow began to build and was not able to finish.' 'Or suppose a king is about to go to war against another king. Will he not first sit down and consider whether he is able with ten thousand men to oppose the one coming against him with twenty thousand? If he is not able, he will send a delegation while the other is still a long way off and will ask for terms of peace. In the same way, any of you who does not give up everything he has cannot be my disciple.'" Luke 14:25-33 (NIV)

The point is that the cost of Jesus feeding the multitude with bread is a little sacrifice that takes little commitment by the listeners in return, but Jesus purchasing a disciple takes a huge commitment on the part of Jesus that requires a huge return. Of course since Jesus is God he can do anything, but does he really want to invest all his efforts into working at something that will never provide any more return than if he invested wisely and instead gave only but a little?

Many elementary educators all have the aspiration that every one of their students will graduate from High School and even from College, and the same type of ambition may have been felt by the apostles that everyone of their flock would be like an apostle just like them. What would for example happen if people get the education of a professor and then work on a assembly line producing spoons all their lives, and what would for example happen if every congregation today produced every member to be an Apostle Paul that instead of going to the gentiles would instead have few to no more people in the world to convert that has not already been exposed to the gospel. Overall, my point is that yes making disciples of Christ that worship God should be the aspiration of the church, but the reality is that not everyone will be able to fully dedicate themselves to God in order for the work of God to be fruitful in those people's lives.

Although the purpose of churches may be or should be to strive to make disciples out of all people of all nations that worship the true and living God, the reality is that much less may result and God's servant should be humble in taking what God gives. For example a small group made of disciples should not turn away from investing any time or efforts into those that they know do not have any real level of commitment, but instead the masses should be fed as long as it is constructive to do so. Overall, forcing people into commitments and obligations that require them to either be a disciple or leave the group does not fit with the idea that Jesus healed strangers once and a while and that he fed the multitudes on occasion, but investing all time, effort, and resources into making a church that is only about marketing without any real substance is a tragedy at best.

Bibliography:

Barna, George. Growing True Disciples: New Strategies for Producing Genuine Followers of Christ. Colorado Springs, Colorado: WaterBrook Press, 2001.