Work of the Church

Since I'm home with time on my hands, I've been thinking about the work of the church. I think I've boiled it down to four areas:

• Attract--this of course is evangelism. We must attract the lost to Christ and His church. How do we do this? I think the best way is by lavishly loving others, displaying Christ's character. Truly His character is contagious.
• Assimilate--once someone is born into the kingdom of God and becomes part of the church, what then? They must be assimilated into the fellowship. The best way here is to become part of small-group ministry. Call it Sunday School or cell-group or whatever, my experience is that when someone becomes part of a smaller group in the church, he/she begins to feel more at home and comfortable. Small groups must learn to take initiative to do whatever it takes to make assimilation successful.
• Develop--there must be a thorough and well-thought out/prayed over process to develop believers in the faith. How do people get from point A to point B in discipleship? Most churches, unfortunately have not thought this process through. How do people learn the basic building-blocks of discipleship? Every church is different but every church must have a plan!
• Deploy--as believers develop they must be deployed into service. Every Christian has been saved to serve. Again, a church must have a definite plan to move believers beyond the pew into the real work of the church. If not most will not serve and the few that will become too weary in their well-doing.

Of course, these four areas are not new, but I believe these principles are sound and should become the church's "Master-Plan." Everything the church does should be planned, coordinated, and then evaluated according to these four principles. What does not enhance these four should be abandoned.