Letters to the Church

by Francis Chan

The Bible tells us that every member of the body has a gift necessary to the functioning of the Church. When I looked at what went on in Cornerstone, I saw a few other people and me using our gifts, while thousands just came and sat in the sanctuary for an hour and a half and then went home. The way we had structured the church was stunting people’s growth, and the whole body was weaker for it.

Sounds similar to what's been going on at Waves

I saw such fearless dedication and boldness from the pastors in India, who had renounced everything for the Lord.

Since the beginning of time, there has been worship God loves and worship He rejects. As I examine the state of the Christian Church today, I can’t help but think that God is displeased with many of the churches in America.

While others quickly judge God’s actions and question His commands, we are to be careful even to speak His name. We don’t carelessly question His actions or inaction. Instead, we pray, “Hallowed be your name”

While others rush into prayer with opinions and demands, we cautiously approach His throne in reverence. Like the high priest entering the Holy of Holies, we are to treat prayer as sacred.

It is tempting to speak faster and scream louder so your voice will not be drowned out. But we must avoid that temptation. The Bible is clear: those who talk a lot sin a lot.

Somehow I am a block of a temple that transcends time and space. And because the structure is a temple, this means that God makes His home among us!

Your existence didn’t begin at conception. You began in the mind of God before the foundation of this earth. Meditate on this. Few things will make you feel smaller … or bigger.

Far from being an accident, you and I are part of a brilliant plan that started before planet Earth and continues beyond it. This is why self-deprecation is as wicked as slandering God’s Church. We are belittling the creation of something God has planned and crafted. He chose us before the foundation of the world, knew us before He made us (Jer. 1:5),

Honestly, what is it that gets people in your church stirred up for change? Is it disobedience toward commands from God? Or is it falling short of expectations that we have made up? The answer to these questions might just show us whether our church exists to please God or please people—whether God is leading our church or we are.

Honoring traditions made the Pharisees feel like they were obeying God when they actually weren’t. If we are not careful, we can be guilty of the same sin resulting in the same divine displeasure.

If the sheep don’t hear His voice, let them walk away. Don’t call out with your own voice.

At the core of our dysfunction is not necessarily style or structure but lack of devotion.

He did the same for you. So ask yourself, Who does God want you to pursue? Who could you desire to spend time with more? Jesus went to the ultimate extent for them; why would you hold anything back? Jesus pursued those people from heaven to earth to bring them into His family; what barriers could hold you back from pursuing a deep familial relationship with them?

It is crazy to me that we live in a time when people are voluntarily doing this to themselves! No church has placed them outside the fellowship; instead, they’ve handed themselves over to Satan!

We have become too easily satisfied. We are content if a person leaves pleased. God wants them awed.

I am saying that we have settled for the natural and our choices give little evidence that we believe in the Holy Spirit. For that reason, we end up with gatherings that are very explainable and at times feel mechanical and even obligatory.

Traditionally, the Church values people the same way the world does. We look for great leaders, strong communicators, and talented artists. We value their gifts and put them on display. Just like the world, we overlook so many who don’t initially appear to have much to offer. Do our actions show that we expect supernatural contributions from every member of the body? We would never dream of looking God in the face and telling Him we thought one of His children was worthless. But we don’t have to say it with our lips if our actions scream it.

The Church’s purpose is not just to exist. It’s to produce.

It is of far greater importance that we have better Christians than that we have more of them.”

The result has been an army of equipped leaders who could be dropped off in any city in the world and they would be capable of making a living while making disciples.

Am I sure I should be in this position? Am I in a good place to lead? Is my relationship with Jesus one that I want replicated?

Turn around and look. If there is no one following you, something is wrong with your life.

If you can’t find a single person who looks to you as a mentor, something is wrong with you.

And social media doesn’t count. I’m talking about flesh-and-blood humans who mimic your actions. This requires living a life that’s worth duplicating, which is quite a bit harder than posting pictures and quotes.

Can we really expect Spirit-filled disciples to be produced from that kind of leadership? Are we unknowingly setting up godly men and women for failure?

I was deeply affected by a pastor in China who said to me, “In America, pastors think they have to become famous to have a big impact. In China, the most influential Christian leaders had to be the most hidden.”

Those who pursue massive Kingdom impact seem to always be fighting a losing battle with pride. It is how the Enemy lures us away from the very character that makes us effective.

Nothing can be worse than the opposition of God. James made it clear: “God opposes the proud” person

How effective can a church be if God is opposed to its leader? On the contrary, God promised to draw near and show grace to the humble person who draws near to Him.

While many pastors boast of how many children sit under their care, doesn’t it make more sense to boast of how many have graduated from their care? Isn’t it more a sign of failure when children are unable to leave the house? Raising thousands of consumers is not success.

Let’s not be too hasty in attributing to the Spirit something that others can muster up in the flesh.

The New Testament could not be clearer: we are not just to believe in His crucifixion; we are to be crucified with Christ.

When a friend of mine came back from visiting a church in Iraq, I asked him what the biggest difference was between our church and the church in Iraq. He said, “What we call sanctification, they call prerequisite.”

And in their prayers, they were screaming out to God to take them to the most dangerous places. “I want to suffer for You. I don’t want to go to a safe place. I don’t. Please! I want to be counted worthy to die in Your name.” That’s the way they prayed. If you have a group like that, how are you going to stop them? That’s the way the Church is supposed to be—an unstoppable force—ready to take a hit and go right back into battle.

Think about that for a second: “rejoicing that they were counted worthy to suffer dishonor for the name.” How are you going to stop people like that? That was the problem with the government and the early church. They were saying, “How do we stop these guys? We kill them, and they’re happier. We torture them, and they walk away rejoicing. We can’t stop them. Are we just going to kill them all—just to not listen to them anymore? They’re rejoicing in this. They get stronger through persecution.”

Part of the reason we have created a culture of noncommittal Christianity that avoids suffering is that we don’t treasure Him enough. We want Jesus, but there are limits to what we will sacrifice for Him.

I have friends who love so well they have adopted children with special needs or troubled children out of the foster system. These loving decisions often wreak havoc in a family. As I ask the couples why they do this, the answer usually sounds like this: “We don’t think about how much we will suffer if we take her in; we think about how much she will suffer if we don’t.”

The apostle Paul suffered more than anyone I know. In speaking of his personal sacrifice, he said, “If in Christ we have hope in this life only, we are of all people most to be pitied” (1 Cor. 15:19). He knew how idiotic his actions would be if his existence ended at death, but it didn’t matter because he was confident his physical death would just be the beginning. The suffering in his life was proof he believed the first verse we all memorized. He knew he would “not perish but have eternal life” (John 3:16).

But the zebra finds himself dreaming about the wild. He can’t shake the feeling that he wasn’t made to live in a zoo; he was made to roam free. His restlessness creates a situation where several of the animals escape the zoo and later find themselves stranded in the jungle of Madagascar. The movie is hilarious, mostly stemming from watching domesticated animals trying to survive in the wild. These animals were born to live free, born with the instincts and physical characteristics required to thrive. But their zoo environment had made them tame, useless in the wild.

I wonder whether you’ve felt like the zebra. You’ve been a faithful member of your church, but you keep feeling like you were made for something more. Maybe you’ve even experienced what it’s like to live in the wild. It may have been on an overseas mission trip or while boldly reaching out in your own neighborhood. You’ve known the joy of seeing your instincts kick in and allow you to thrive. But now you’re stuck in the zoo, where everything is comfortable, everything is controlled. And you just want to get back to living in the wild.

Does this sound familiar, sweetheart?

We need to start reminding our children of their power. Maybe it’s our lack of expectation from younger kids that bleeds into the way we treat middle-school kids in the church. We teach them as if their only goal is to refuse to drink or have sex. Then when they hit high school, we try to entertain them enough so they keep coming. A far cry from the one lost sheep! We can keep doing things the way we’ve always done them, but maybe we need to do more releasing and less taming. What would happen if we trained our young lions to attack rather than keep them sheltered? It’s time we obey Jesus’ words and set ourselves in the posture of learning from our kids.

“The theology that matters is not the theology we profess but the theology we practice.”

Assume Missions. God wants to be worshipped by every nation and language (Rev. 7:9–10). There are still billions who have never heard the gospel.3 For this reason, we ask everyone to consider going to unreached people groups. Rather than assuming you are staying until you hear a word from God, it seems more biblical to assume you are going unless you believe God called you to stay.

If we continue to promote a model where people flood to a church building to congregate around a preacher, how do we expect to reach the billions of people who live where that model is illegal?

If our missionaries have to reject everything we’ve ever taught them about Church in order to reach another country, are we confident what we’re doing here is best?

It’s a lot easier to tear down a building than it is to build one.

All of us tend to avoid arrogant people because they annoy us. God’s response is that we can’t make this about us. He tells us “not to please ourselves” (v. 1). It may be true that people have hurt our feelings, but we must learn to value God’s Church more than our feelings. We can cause real damage to our churches when we want our feelings validated more than we want His Bride elevated.

One of the biggest mistakes we make is to allow proud people to consume our thoughts. We allow our minds to replay the instances when others have offended us. This robs us of our joy and robs God of the worship He deserves.

Ephesians 5 explains that the Spirit-filled person continually worships and gives thanks. Satan hates the sound of our praise and thanksgiving, so he makes it his mission to disrupt worship. He loves when our minds are filled with frustration and discouragement rather than praise. Don’t give him the victory. Control your thoughts.