Today I read a good post on the Young Adults AG Blog, which is a blog associated with the Young Adults Ministries division of the Assemblies of God. This post, by Lindsay Fosner, notes that she used to be "in charge of young adult ministry at a larger church in the Seattle area" with a regular attendance of 60 "Jesus-believing, raised on the pew young adults". Noting that a ministry to 60 young adults is noteworthy, she pointed out the vast number of young, creative 20somethings in the Seattle and her realization of how many young adults she was missing. She writes:
She says she immersed herself in their culture. She now works at Starbucks and says that she serves coffee to hundreds of this 20something postmoderns every week while also building relationships, learning their stories, and looking for common threads of connection. What has she found?
But she has raised a question: Why do they talk to her -- a barista at Starbucks? While they have hundreds of friends on Facebook, why do they take the time to share their story with her? She writes, "Is it because I'm right in front of them and seem interested? Could it be that all of the options and opportunities in life leaves young adults feeling lonely or isolated? Maybe they are longing for face-time with a real human as opposed to connection online."
She comes to one conclusion, though, that I think is huge:
One of our core values at Fellowship is that we must GO, so much that it's also one of the big three in our mission statement: Guide, Grow and Go. Our core values statement says, "We believe that as part of an intentional lifestyle of bringing others to Christ, we are each called to develop genuine relationships with those around us and to extend invitations, one by one, to experience God's grace." Note that it doesn't say that we're to invite them to church - it says that we're to invite them to experience God's grace. It's not the church staff's job to extend invitations to meet Jesus -- it's the duty of every person who calls themself a part of Fellowship Bible.
We believe that just as Jesus came into our world and immersed himself in our culture and our life as a human, we as followers of Jesus are called to go out into the world and be with people who don't know Jesus, living life with them, developing authentic relationship, hearing their stories, and sharing life and Jesus with them. We believe that when people who have the Holy Spirit in them and who are totally in love with Jesus hang out in relationship with people who don't know Jesus, the aroma of Christ will serve as an attractant to those they meet. Each individual who knows Christ is called to invite their friends into this life of grace, forgiveness and authenticity that we enjoy, and that inviting is best done by the person who knows them well, as their friend, because of the existing relationship in play, not some paid staff member or eloquent preacher who doesn't know them or their story.
Lindsay's blog post really grabbed me this morning because it expresses that idea that it's not about what we're doing inside the walls of the church so much as the relationships we're building outside the church walls with people who don't know Jesus and don't understand why we do. While growth and maturity as a believer is a necessary part of life in Christ, it is not the ultimate goal. The ultimate goal and calling is to GO and live outside the church walls, living a life amongst people who don't know Christ in hopes that they can come to know Him.
And Lindsay figured out another secret -- there is no formula, because people are not made from cookie cutters. Each individual will come to know Christ in his or her own way, and Christ tailor fits his invitation to him or her based on the life and story and experience of that person. The sooner we, as followers of Christ, realize that there are no formulas for leading the postmodern to Christ but instead that the Holy Spirit uses true, real, authentic relationship to bring people to him (as opposed to manufactured, formulaic, "end in mind" relationships), the better off we will be.
