Immeasurable: Reflections on the Soul of Ministry in the Age of Church, Inc.

by Skye Jethani

When this idea is carried into the Christian faith, we come to believe that our value to God is rooted in how much we achieve for Christ and His kingdom.

We have replaced the love of the living God with sacrifices to the Idol of Effectiveness.

But the most tragic lie the Idol of Effectiveness tells us is that a life spent in service for God is the same as a life with God.

Because God does not judge our effectiveness. He judges our faithfulness.

God does not need you. He wants you. He did not send His Son to recruit you to change the world. He sent His Son to reconcile you to Himself. Your value to God is not in your effectiveness, but in your presence.

If we are to slay the Idol of Effectiveness then we must recapture the glorious truth that before we are called to something or somewhere, our highest calling is to Someone.

As ministers of the gospel of Christ, we must stand boldly against the popular belief that everything and everyone exists to be useful. We must remember that in His grace God has created some things not to be used, but simply to behold.

the word ministry did not refer to the activity of a certain vocation or class of people. Instead, it referred to any act of service that brought glory to God.

Leaders within the church are called to equip us to serve Jesus everywhere, every day, and in every aspect of our lives.

We now find ourselves in a culture that defines our relationships and actions primarily through a matrix of consumption. As the philosopher Baudrillard explains, consumption is a system of meaning.1 We assign value to ourselves and others based on the goods we purchase. Your identity is constructed by the clothes you wear, the vehicle you drive, and the music on your iPhone. In short, you are what you consume.

Approaching Christianity as a brand (rather than a worldview) explains why the majority of people who identify themselves as born-again Christians live no differently than other Americans.

According to research from the Barna Group, most churchgoers have not adopted a biblical worldview; they have simply added a Jesus fish onto the bumper of their unregenerate consumer identities.

After all, in consumerism, a desire is never illegitimate; it is only unmet.

In Jesus, the Word became flesh, and for ages the church followed that pattern, but our generation has finally set the Word free from the inherent limits of incarnation. Our Lord must be grateful to us.

To put it simply, many church leaders unknowingly replace the transcendent vitality of a life with God for the ego satisfaction they derive from a life for God.

The irony is that in our desire to draw people away from the selfishness of consumer Christianity, we may simply be replacing one idol with another.

We try to change the perspective from taking to giving, when we should start with being. We count it a success if we change people from consumers to producers, when God has called us first and foremost to be worshippers.

Jesus is not diminishing the older son’s service, just as He is not endorsing the younger son’s sinfulness. Rather, He is showing that both religious consumerism and religious activism fail to capture what God truly desires for His people.

This is what they both failed to understand, and it is what both Christian consumerism and Christian missionalism fail to see. God’s gifts are a blessing and His work is vital, but neither can nor should replace God Himself as our first calling.

As shepherds of God’s people, we must not allow our fears of insignificance to drive us into an unrelenting pursuit of church growth, cultural impact, or missional activism.

living in perpetual communion with God Himself.

Vischer spoke about having his vision of faith shaped by “a mix of the gospel, the Protestant work ethic, and the American dream.”