HarvestInsider

At Harvest Springs, the church I pastor, our purpose is the help people become “fully devoted followers of Christ.”  We recently shared this statement with our church, and since then, I have been flooded with texts, emails, phone calls, and Facebook messages from people who are excited about this new clarifying of our Purpose.  However, one question that I wonder if everyone has a crystal clear answer to, is this:

“What does a ‘fully devoted follower of Christ look like?

If our Church doesn’t know exactly what the answer is to that question, then we are just parading around a flowery phrase, and nothing more.  If the answer isn’t clear, our purpose isn’t either.

As a Lead Pastor, one of my Chief responsibilities is to “Define” the results we are pursuing.  Unless we clearly define what the results look like, then our church will never be intentional or effective in seeing those results birthed out.  One of the reasons I believe the Church has struggled to make disciples in an effective way has been that we haven’t clearly defined what Biblical Discipleship looks like.  We haven’t fully “defined” our purpose.

One of the best and most simple illustrations of “what a fully devoted follower of Christ looks like” is the Wheel illustration.  It is an illustration that the Navigators use to help people understand the key components of a “Christ Centered” Life.  Here’s a quick overview:

• Christ The Center – A fully devoted follower of Christ lives with Christ at the center.  (2 Corinthians 5:17, Galatians 2:20)
• Obedience to Christ – A fully devoted follower of Christ obeys what Christ says.  (Luke 4:46, John 14:21, 1 John 2:4)
• The Word – A fully devoted follower of Christ spends daily time in God’s Word.  (Joshua 1:8, Matthew 4:4, Psalm 119:9,11
• Prayer – A fully devoted follower of Christ engages God in faith through prayer.  (Ephesians 3:12, Philippians 4:6-7, Hebrews 4:16, Hebrews 11:6)
• Fellowship – A fully devoted follower of Christ lives in Christ Centered relationship with other believers.  (Hebrews 10:24-25, Ecclesiastes 4:9-10, John 13:34-35, Hebrews 3:13)
• Witnessing – A fully devoted follower of Christ purposely share truth, through word and deed, with those who are far from God.  (1 Peter 3:15, Romans 1:16, Matthew 5:16)

If this is our answer, then we know exactly what we must be about.  Crafting strategies and developing systems that enable these results to manifest themselves within our church.  Once our purpose is clearly “defined” then we have a tangible and measurable benchmark to measure our effectiveness.  Without the full definition, we will never see the results we desire.

And the great tragedy is… we will probably never know what we are missing.