Category Archives: Church Inside Out

Equip Conference in Orlando

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equip logoI’ve been invited to speak at the Equip Conference in Orlando, Florida, this year. It’s been 8 years since I’ve been to this conference (formally known as Spiritual Growth Workshop), so I’m really looking forward to being back. Hope For Life, a Herald of Truth ministry, is paying my way, for which I’m very grateful.

The theme of the conference is “Harvest.” I’ll be doing two classes in English and one in Spanish, all covering material from Church Inside Out. The English classes are labeled as being in the missions track; hoping no one will be disappointed, because I won’t be addressing missions in the traditional sense. I’ll be discussing churches engaging their communities, as the book focuses on. In Spanish I’ve been given the theme “Cultivating Relationships,” which will have an evangelistic overtone based on the overall theme of the conference.

If you’re going to be at the conference, I hope you’ll let me know in the comments section so I can be looking for you. I’d love to have you come to one, two, or even all three of my classes.

The conference is June 30-July 3. It will be held at the Rosen Centre, in Orlando. All of the information you need can be found on the conference website or by contacting the Orange Avenue Church of Christ in Orlando:

Equip Conference
c/o Orange Avenue Church of Christ
1511 East Orange Avenue
Eustis, Florida 32726
Phone: 352-357-6616
Fax: 352-357-5335
Email: Office@myoacoc.org

Church Inside Out: Talking About Service

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churchinoutOne of the key themes in my new book, Church Inside Out, is the need for the church to be serving the community around. To give you a flavor, here are a few quotes on the topic:

One of the ways to identify the core values of your church is to look at the things that are talked about. In a church with a healthy outward focus, the conversations are about people that are being ministered to, about service projects that are meeting needs, about lost people that are coming to the Lord. (p. 27)

Time resources. Financial resources. Leadership resources. Resources of time and space. In a healthy church, these things have an outward vision, a plan for serving and teaching the surrounding community. In the inward-focused church, resources are for the consumption of church members. (p. 28)

We’ve been selected as representatives of God here on earth. Priests. Ambassadors. Sent from the kingdom of heaven to the kingdoms of this world with a message about who God is and our need to get right with Him. Aliens and strangers, foreigners and exiles, separated from the evil things of this world, but living “among the pagans” so that our lives may serve as testimony to them. We aren’t called to cloister ourselves away in Christian colonies; we are sent out into the world as ambassadors. (p. 70)

In John 13, when Jesus is getting ready to wash His disciples’ feet, John says that Jesus knew “that he had come from God and was returning to God.” (John 13:3) Such an awareness empowered Him to perform the tasks of service He was called to perform, from washing feet to dying on a cross.
If we, as a church, can recapture the sense of having come from God and being on a return trip back to God, we will find the power to do the necessary things to promote the kingdom of God on this earth. (p. 76)

That’s why one of the first steps for turning a church inside out is to see who is in our neighborhood. To whom are we reaching out? Who are the people that need our service? Who are the people who would want to come serve with us? (p. 81)

Too often we attempt to sway the world with thunderous words, but without the lightning of a life of service, our words carry no weight. (p. 107)

As we look to our cities and towns, we shouldn’t be seeking ways to control others; we should be looking for ways to serve. (p. 110)

Where giftedness meets need, that is your calling. (p. 114)

Christians who serve others and do good deeds in their community announce good news through their actions. A presentation of the gospel is merely an explanation of what our friends and neighbors have already seen. (p. 155)

Why write a book?

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churchinoutChurch Inside Out is a book designed to help churches get outside of their own four walls in order to help others find their way in. Why write something like this?

  • I’ve been blessed to be able to visit many churches in many different places. Big churches. Little churches. Churches in areas with lots of Christians. Churches in areas with few Christians. I’ve been able to observe, and much of what I’ve written comes from things I’ve observed.
  • I’ve grown in understanding about some things. Doesn’t mean that I know more than others, but I definitely know more than I used to. And I’m sure I know more than many Christians about some things, just as others know more than I do about certain topics.
  • I’m blessed to be able to read and study widely. My life situation, my field of study in college, the jobs I’ve had over the years, the availability of materials on the Internet… all has worked together to allow me to glean ideas from Christians I’ll probably never meet. In this book, I try to share some of those ideas.
  • I firmly believe that God wants to work through his church to bless this world. I firmly believe the church can do great things through the power of God. No church is doomed to be what it has been; every church has the potential to do great things with God’s help.

Those are some of the reasons I decided to write this book. I remember a quote from a Keith Green album jacket:

If I’m worthy, let me be heard. If I’m heard, let me be worthy.

That’s not exactly how I feel. Mine would be:

Lord, please use me, what I say, and what I write, to allow others to hear you. Not me, but you.

Church Inside Out is here

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IMG_5650It rained styrofoam peanuts and snowed polystyrene flakes. Books and workbooks came out of the box, and a dream became reality. The first copies of Church Inside Out had arrived.

As I’ve mentioned, this is a book that I feel that I’ve put a lot of myself into. Helping the church improve its outreach and discipleship efforts is very important to me. This book/workbook set is my contribution to this effort. I hope to have the chance to go through the material in person with congregations through the seminars Hope For Life (a Herald of Truth ministry) provides.

I hope you’ll take a few moments and look at the material. 21st Century Christian has posted sample pages of both the book and the workbook.

Workbook Cover
You can find the book sample here: https://www.21stcc.com/pdfs/samplepages/9780890989159.pdf

Workbook Cover
You can find the workbook sample here: https://www.21stcc.com/pdfs/samplepages/9780890989166.pdf

You can order the book from the 21st Century Christian website. You can arrange for seminars focused on Church Inside Out by contacting Bill Brant at bbrant@heraldoftruth.org. There is no charge for the seminars. Churches need only cover my expenses and allow me to update your congregation/leadership on what Hope For Life is doing in the world.

The Two-Degree Rule

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church kitchenYesterday I shared the link to an article by Kevin Harney about using existing ministries as outreach ministries. I thought the ideas presented there were excellent and fit well with the ideas in Church Inside Out.

Harney makes a great statement at the opening:

Churches, by nature, are selfish. Because the church is made up of people, and people are fundamentally self-serving, the church ends up expending much of its time, money, and energy on those who are already part of the family of God.

Yes. Exactly. I think a case in point is the proliferation of short-term mission trips. Churches that balk at sending $5000 to a missionary will easily spend $25000 to take their members to visit that same missionary.

But Harney isn’t talking about mission trips; he’s talking about church events:

I began thinking about the amazing things that could happen if local churches would vector their time, creativity, resources, and ministries out into the community. I call this the “Two-Degree Rule.” The idea is that we would take the effective and plentiful things we do for ourselves and simply direct these same things out into our community.

Your monthly church meals become meals for the whole community. Your funeral ministry expands its reach to include people in your community who don’t have a church home. Baby showers are held not just for church members but also for needy families in your town.

You get the idea. And it’s a great one. Start dreaming about how to transform your “inward” ministries into “outward” ministries.