Letters to the Church

by Francis Chan

  SENDING

  Only months after calling His disciples, Jesus sent them out. This doesn’t mean they were fully trained and mistake free. It shows that sending was part of their training. Jesus didn’t teach them in a classroom setting. They walked with Him, and they were sent out by Him. He expected them to proclaim repentance, cast out demons, and heal (Mark 6:12–13). He told them He was sending them out as sheep among wolves and explained that they would be hated and persecuted (Matt. 10:16–22). It was also at this time that Jesus promised they would be given words to say during their most trying times. It was an extremely dangerous mission they were sent on with minimal training.

  Maybe this is why these men were able to make disciples around the world. This is the opposite of how we train people today! Should we consider that placing people in comfortable classrooms and auditoriums for years may not be the best way to train fearless leaders? Consider some of the movements that have happened recently in other countries. This is all due to a belief that training and sending is for everyone.

  Look at the following stats:3

  • “In East Asia, a missionary reported: ‘I launched my three-year plan in November, 2000. My vision was to see 200 new churches started among my people group over the next three years. But four months later, we had already reached that goal. After only six months, we had already seen 360 churches planted and more than 10,000 new believers baptized! Now I’m asking God to enlarge my vision.’”

  • “Chinese Christians in Qing’an County of Heilongjiang Province planted 236 new churches in a single month.” In 2002 a church planting movement in China brought about 15,000 new churches and baptized 160,000 new believers in one year.

  • “During the decade of the 1990s, Christians in a Latin American country overcame relentless government persecution to grow from 235 churches to more than 4,000 churches with more than 30,000 converts awaiting baptism.”

  • “After centuries of hostility to Christianity, many Central Asian Muslims … are embracing the gospel. In Kazakhstan, [the decade before 2004 saw] more than 13,000 Kazakhs come to faith, worshipping in more than 300 new Kazakh churches.”

  • “A missionary … in Africa reported: ‘It took us 30 years to plant four churches in this country. We’ve started 65 new churches in the last nine months.’”

  • In the heart of India, in the state Madhya Pradesh, one movement planted 4,000 new churches in less than seven years. Elsewhere in India, “in the decade of the 1990s, the Kui people of Orissa started nearly 1,000 new churches.… In 1999, they baptized more than 8,000 new believers. By 2001 they were starting a new church every 24 hours.”

  • In Outer Mongolia, a church planting movement saw more than 10,000 new followers. Another movement in Inner Mongolia counted more than 50,000 new believers—all during the 1990s.

  Don’t we all want to be a part of movements like these? This is the kind of power we would expect to see among believers. It makes sense in light of Scripture.

  The Church was meant to be a beautiful army, sent out to shed light throughout the earth. Rather than hiding together in a bunker, we were supposed to fearlessly take His message to the most remote places. People should be in awe when they see His people with a peace that surpasses comprehension and rejoicing with an inexpressible joy (Phil. 4:7; 1 Pet. 1:8). Think about what those passages are saying! Once again, those phrases sound like exaggerations rather than expectations. Have people ever been in disbelief over the amount of peace you display? Are you known for being ridiculously joyful? Add that to “the immeasurable greatness of his power” in you (Eph. 1:19) and you cannot go unnoticed. We have tried to attract people through so many different strategies. What if they saw an army of people with inexpressible joy, peace that surpasses comprehension, and immeasurable greatness of power? How could they not be intrigued?

  People were attracted to the early church. Who wouldn’t be fascinated by a group that shared possessions, rejoiced nonstop, had peace beyond comprehension and immeasurable power, never complained, always gave thanks …? Some people joined them, others hated them, but few could ignore them. They wouldn’t allow people to ignore them as they went out fearlessly sharing the gospel. This is our heritage. This is in our DNA. We must stop creating safe places for people to hide and start developing fearless warriors to send out.

  9

  CHURCH AGAIN

  If I could go back and hand a note to the twenty-five-year-old version of me, here are some things I would write:

  “Definitely marry Lisa. You won’t regret it.”

  “Have plenty of kids. And don’t stress about your oldest—she ends up fine.”

  “Know God. Don’t just serve Him. You tend to spend your time accomplishing tasks. God wants you to sit with Him. It’s not a waste of time.”

  “When you start your church, don’t just copy others. Study the Bible with fresh eyes, and search for what He actually commands. You will be constantly tempted to do what you want or what others want. Do what pleases God most. The years will fly by faster than you can imagine. You are going to face God sooner than you know, so don’t let people talk you out of your convictions.”

  We would all do things differently if we could go back and relive the last twenty-five years. One of the blessings in my life is that I actually had an opportunity to start over. God gave me a chance to start another church, and the older (hopefully wiser) me is approaching Church much differently than the younger me did. We are still far from what I believe the Church can become, but I am loving the process.

  While part of me wishes I had spent my whole life doing things this way, I also see how God used the path I took for His glory. In hindsight, I see how God used even my pride for His purposes. When Cornerstone was growing, some pastors tried to convince me that growing smaller churches was a better strategy for cultivating the love and obedience God wanted. In my arrogance, I thought to myself, They are only going small because they are incapable of building a large church and their vision isn’t as big as mine. It’s great they are being faithful with the three talents they have been given. I need to be faithful with the eight or nine talents He has given me. That is so embarrassing to publicly admit, but maybe some will find my confession helpful. There is a prevailing attitude that the best thing we can do is build the largest church we are capable of building. Maybe my flawed journey can dispel notions that going small is merely the default of the less competent and show that it can actually be a choice made out of biblical conviction and a desire to reach the masses.

  I went back and forth trying to decide whether I even wanted to write this chapter. Up to this point, the book has been about biblical absolutes. I have addressed sin issues that no church can afford to ignore. These are clear commands from the mouth of God. You would be crazy to see failure in these areas and do nothing.

  I don’t want to confuse the issue now by writing about my current church experience, but I know there are a lot of people who are curious how we try to flesh out these commands in twenty-first-century America. The purpose of this chapter is to describe some things we have done in an effort to be obedient to the commands mentioned in the previous chapters. Those commands are perfect and holy, and my hope in this book is simply to motivate you to change anything necessary in order to be obedient.

  If our church in San Francisco grows to one hundred thousand people, then you shouldn’t be motivated more. And if it shrinks to a dozen people, then you shouldn’t be motivated less. God’s commands are sacred. They came from the mouth of God. That should be more than enough to motivate our tireless pursuit of obedience. If one of my pastors suddenly has a moral failure next week (God forbid), it doesn’t negate the truth of everything that has been written thus far. Okay, I think I’ve made enough disclaimers. You get the point.

  STRUCTURE MATTERS

  The New Testament avoids laying out a model for precisely how the Church ought to be structured. The biblical authors could have been very clear on this, but instead,
they leave us with a lot of freedom. I think that’s important, and it’s part of preserving the mystery of the Church.

  This doesn’t mean that structure does not matter. I have learned from years of attending and pastoring churches that we have to be intentional about the way we structure our churches, because it dictates the direction the church will go. Solid, biblical structure is absolutely necessary to keep us from going astray.

  Your church model often communicates your true theology. In reexamining what the Church was meant to be, Tim Chester and Steve Timmis borrowed the concept of “heretical structures” from John Stott. Here’s how this works. I’m assuming your church’s doctrinal statement says something about every believer using his or her spiritual gifts to manifest the Holy Spirit. That’s good theology. But let me ask you this: Does your church structure convey a different theology? Does your structure demonstrate that the gift of every believer matters? Or does it suggest that only the gifts of the teaching pastor, a couple ministry leaders, and a few musicians matter? If so, you’re functioning with a heretical structure. Your heretical structure almost certainly speaks louder than your orthodox theological statement. “The theology that matters is not the theology we profess but the theology we practice.”1

  I continue to run into people who assume certain modern traditions are necessities. The reality is that some of these optional practices can actually hinder the Church from living out the biblical principles meant to shape the Church. There are elements of modern churches that on the surface seem like good ideas, but they can actually keep us from the biblical vision of unity, true fellowship, mutual love, and pursuit of the mission. Too many look at these elements and insist you can’t have a church without them.

  MORE ROOM FOR GOD

  As I write this, my wife is in the garage. I can hear her clearing the shelves of stuff we have accumulated over the past few years. I love it when we purge. Sometimes it actually feels as if I can breathe better when clutter is removed. Maybe you’ve seen an episode or two of Hoarders? It’s suffocating to watch people accumulate so much junk they can barely walk in their own homes. Haven’t there been times when you have felt suffocated by the busyness at a Christian event? Something in you longs for more space to breathe, more room for God to move.

  I recently took my family on vacation. For four days, we lived in a cabin in the snow. I made a rule for our vacation: no electronics. No phones, video games, TVs, or computers. I know what some of you are thinking: How did you survive? How did you convince your whole family to live like savages for four whole days? My rule wasn’t exactly met with cheers of celebration, but they knew Dad’s intentions. As I expected, the absence of electronic devices forced us to entertain one another. The days were filled with snowball fights, sledding, snowboarding, building fires, playing board games, talking, laughing—you know, all the things humans used to do before we discovered smartphones. As you probably guessed, we had an absolute blast and came home more bonded as a family. In fact, some of the kids suggested we do this on every vacation! By removing electronic devices, we made more room for one another.

  I think we would be surprised by how much more we would experience if we had less. Imagine if the Church purged until all that was left was a group of people with a Bible, a cup, and some bread. For some that sounds boring; for others it sounds ideal. For many around the world, that is all they have ever known of Church and they love it. We might all benefit from a simpler experience of Church. It would lead to deeper relationships and a stronger dependence on God. We might find that the things we added to improve our churches are the very things that crowd God out.

  Some of our additions are birthed from a lack of faith. We don’t really expect God to move, so we fill our gatherings with exciting elements that will entertain people even if God does nothing. This won’t work in the long run. Eventually the people will no longer be amused with the type of excitement they can find at the movies. They came to the Church to find something otherworldly. Don’t be afraid of silence. Don’t be afraid to develop gatherings that will be dull if God doesn’t move. Days of praying together in an upper room require faith and patience, but the payoff will be worth it. We have to stop assuming that bigger and busier is always better than smaller and simpler. We can’t keep increasing production as a substitute for genuine expressions of the Spirit in ordinary, nonprofessional people.

  WE ARE CHURCH BEGINNINGS

  In 2013 I gathered about twenty people at my house. I didn’t have a detailed plan, just a lot of convictions. At our first gathering, I remember saying I wanted us to be focused on pursuing everything I saw in the New Testament. I wanted to see deep familial love and for all of us to be using our gifts. I made it clear that I would not be the pastor forever. Instead, during the six to twelve months I led the church, I would disciple four people and help them become pastors so when our church multiplied into two churches, each church would be led by two of the pastors I had discipled.

  We became such a tight family that everyone hated when it came time to multiply, but we understood it was necessary so we could grow and produce more leaders.

  We have made many changes over the years, and I anticipate more. While the church will be in constant change, the elders have tried to keep us focused on some core values. Though the wording has changed over time, this is basically what we are striving to produce.

  Devoted Worshippers. We want to be people who are committed to worshipping God, people who can’t get enough of Him, not people who worship only when it is convenient or when the right people are leading. It must be the Object of our worship that makes worshipping exciting to us.

  Loving Families. We want to be people who love one another deeply and show this by how we sacrifice for one another. Our goal is not merely to get along but to love one another to the extent that Christ loved us and to be united to the extent that the Father is one with the Son.

  Equipped Disciple Makers. We want everyone trained up to make disciples. No one should come as a consumer, but we need everyone to come as a servant using his or her gifts to build up the body.

  Spirit-Filled Missionaries. We want to be people with supernatural character, who regularly share the gospel with neighbors and coworkers. Some will go to foreign countries to share Christ where He has not been heard. The others will support those who have gone.

  Suffering Sojourners. We want to be people who are eagerly waiting for the return of Christ. We are willing and wanting to suffer because we believe in heavenly rewards. Far from seeking comfort, we thrive on hardship, refusing to become citizens of this earth.

  This is what we are after as a church. We don’t want to get caught up in anything that will distract us from these things. For this reason, we have a few daily and weekly practices. As I said earlier, structure matters. It’s easy to say these are our values, but unless we structure in weekly practices to achieve these goals and structure out anything that distracts, we will never become the church we want to be.

  Below are some of the practices we have found helpful in achieving our values.

  Daily Bible Readings. We want people to be obsessed with Jesus. We believe the most effective way of cultivating this is by spending time alone with God in the Scriptures daily. Our members follow the same reading plan, which enables us to talk about the Scriptures with one another daily.2

  Meet in Homes. There are more than fifty “one another” commands that call us to care for one another in a supernatural way. God wants meaningful interactions when we gather. For this reason, we keep our churches small (ten to twenty people), meeting in homes to create a family atmosphere. This way each person can be known and use his or her gifts to bless others.

  Multiply Leaders. In Luke 10:2, Jesus told His disciples to pray that God would send more workers out into the world. For this reason, we pray and constantly develop new pastors and elders to be sent out. Each church has two pastors, who train future pastors for the next church plant. Pastors are the spiritual parents of
the congregation, having both the responsibility and the authority.

  Elder Authority. Some of you have experienced a form of home churches where the leader is rebelling against authority and simply doing what he or she wants to do. That’s not healthy. The size of the church has nothing to do with this point. As we have seen, God designed His Church to function under the leadership and humble, service-oriented authority of elders (1 Pet. 5:1–4). At a time when everyone bashes leadership, God calls us to show the world something different: people who love having a King and joyfully follow godly leaders.

  Everyone Discipled. It is the Church’s responsibility to bring people to maturity (Eph. 4:11–16). Jesus set a wonderful example of living life with His disciples. We expect every member to have a more mature believer shepherding him or her toward maturity and greater holiness.

  Everyone Disciples. Jesus rose from the dead and then commanded His followers to make disciples (Matt. 28:16–20). He was calling them to share the good news with those who didn’t know Him, teaching them to obey His commands. We want all our members to share the gospel with those who don’t believe and to teach them to become disciple makers.

  Everyone Exercises Gifts. Paul said, “To each is given the manifestation of the Spirit for the common good” (1 Cor. 12:7). He went on to list various gifts and emphasized the necessity of each member. We create space for everyone to contribute at gatherings and in everyday life. We aim for total participation, where each member blesses others with his or her gifts.

  Regular Multiplication of Churches. We must stay focused on reaching those who don’t know Jesus (Acts 1:8). It is so easy for house churches to become selfish rather than missional. We naturally run toward comfort. Our churches aim to multiply annually to maintain a healthy pressure toward developing leaders and reaching more people. Let’s face it: without deadlines, not much gets done.