My desire is to pastor a “healthy church”. Sadly, as I noted in Part 1 & Part 2 of this post, we see more and more examples of spiritually unhealthy churches in the evangelical world. To help me stay properly focused on God’s purposes, here is my attempt to lay out the principles and guidelines that can help a local church become a place of spiritual health.
Note: I considered listing the Bible verses that serve as the foundation for each of the following points, but ultimately decided this was unnecessary. I believe these principles will make sense to anyone who is reasonably familiar with Scripture.
1. A healthy churchy is not perfect, because it is comprised of broken people; recovering sinners who together are striving to learn how to live together as a community in Christ. We will strive to work out our issues and resolve our conflicts through an over-riding commitment to prayer, to biblical truth, and to the guidance of the Holy Spirit.
2. The church will make every effort to connect with the culture, but we will not let the culture define us. Nor will we use cultural trends as the yardstick to evaluate our ministry. We will define ourselves biblically, then ask God to help us find culturally meaningful ways to communicate the good news about Jesus.
3. We will affirm the biblical truth that “spiritually healthy people produce spiritual fruit”. We will strive to live in faithfulness to biblical principles…and we will trust the Lord to produce such fruit from our efforts as He sees fit.
4. Pastors and leaders will not make plans for the church and then ask God to bless our plans. Instead, we will approach God humbly in prayer and ask Him to set the agenda for His church. In other words, we will not view our primary role as one of “holding meetings” and “making plans”. Our role is to intercede for, and on behalf of, the church.
5. We will plan worship services to be as participatory as possible so believers can use their spiritual gifts. We will strive for excellence, but we will not turn the service into a production. All of the elements – vocal music, instrumental music, prayer, communion, offering, preaching, and even announcements – will be viewed as an act of corporate worship to the Lord.
6. Preaching will largely be “text-based”, with message topics and themes derived from the Scriptures. In other words, we will preach from the text and through the text, letting God’s Spirit and God’s Truth drive the preaching agenda. Whenever I preach and teach, I will prayerfully open God’s Word, determine the main point of a Bible passage, make that the main point of a sermon, and then – with God’s help – apply that eternal truth to modern life.
7. The goal of our biblical proclamation will be: to reach lost people with the gospel, and to help believers become more like Jesus in thought, word, deed, and character. Therefore, we will promote an ever-deeper relationship with God through His Word, to allow the Spirit to continually transform us from the inside out.
8. We will welcome visitors and strive to do all within our power to make them comfortable… without watering down the difficult message of the Cross. We will be a safe place for spiritual seekers to ask questions and wrestle with spiritual truth. We will provide regular opportunities for seekers to choose to follow Christ, and we will do so by fully explaining the gospel message:
• We are separated from God by sin.
• Jesus died on the cross to pay the penalty for our sins, so that we could receive God’s forgiveness.
• When we confess our sins, and repent of our sins, then God will choose to extend His mercy to us.
• To respond to the Father’s great love, we must choose to be baptized and demonstrate our desire to live a new life in relationship with Jesus Christ.
9. We will place a high value on “membership”, and we will ask members to commit themselves to live together as a covenant community. Members will be expected to give of their time, their talent, and their tithes. When conflicts and disagreements occur (as, of course, they will) members will be expected to engage in biblical principles of reconciliation. And the church will, when necessary, practice loving discipline to help members grow in godly character.
10. Church members do not exist to serve the pastors; the role of the pastors is to serve the members. We will do this primarily through (a) pastoral care of the members and (b) by developing people to use their gifts, so they can find their place and fulfill their purpose in the Kingdom of God. In other words, we will focus on actually equipping people for ministry…not just recruiting workers to staff the programs.
11. People who are called by God to serve as church leaders - whether paid or volunteer - will be interviewed and evaluated before they are placed in positions of authority. And while they serve, they must be willing to submit to ongoing evaluations of their character, lifestyle, and quality of ministry.
12. We will create community through small and medium-sized groups. These groups will be built around Bible–based discussion, participatory prayer, and member care.
13. The church will prayerfully determine how our ministry can have an impact that is local, regional, and global in nature. All such ministries will be subject to ongoing evaluation.
14. Recognizing the biblical mandate to help grow the Kingdom of God (whether or not our church grows), we will strive to be a church-planting church and a missionary-sending church.
15. The teaching ministry at all levels of the church will be unified and will function under the oversight of the leadership. All curriculum or topics will be subject to oversight and review. When new teaching ministries or programs emerge, or when a staff member desires to teach a new curriculum, it will be reviewed and approved before it is presented to the church.
These principles may seem to be ambitious…perhaps even idealistic. I do not expect them to be easy to implement, because life together in community is a messy business. But I believe these principles are biblical in nature, and will lead to a healthy, life-giving, and reproducing church.
My prayer is that God will lead me to a church where I can - in partnership with godly men and women - learn how to truly live out these principles so that together we can be the church of Jesus Christ.
- Bruce
About Me
- Bruce and Julie
- After seasons of working in both the for-profit and non-profit worlds, God called both of us into ministry. We have two over-riding passions: (1) to communicate - via speaking, teaching, and writing - God's truth as found in the Bible, and (2) to help men and women experience a faith in Jesus Christ that meets the deepest needs within their souls. + + + + Both of us are ordained ministers in the independent Christian Churches. Bruce is the Preaching Minister at Garden Way Church in Eugene, Oregon. Julie has earned a certificate in Spiritual Direction, has been a Women's Pastor and an adjunct college professor, and oversees a non-profit women's ministry called "the unfolding soul". Together we are developing a prayer garden at our home in Springfield called The Lavender Pavilion. + + + + We have been married for more than 30 years and have three adult children.
