Purposes of a New Generation

We have talked a couple of previous times about God's purposes.  We have discussed his overarching purposes, the ones that describe the grand scheme of God.  We've also discussed that his purposes change from generation to generation.  From time to time, we have alluded to the individual sons of God finding their personal purposes.

We have also noted from time to time, that some purposes of God have clearly been ignored by the organized church system.  One obvious example in the United States is that the organized church shifted the burden and responsibility for care of the poor from the church to the government.  The Scriptures, however, teach us that true religion and undefiled involves care for orphans and widows and the strangers in our cities.  Therefore, it can only be a government that is our religion, which has the responsibility to care for the poor.

There is an interesting Scripture which points out that “in the fullness of time" God sent his Son.  Have you ever considered what that means?  What was unique about the time when Jesus arrived on the Earth?  Why was the time then full any more than any other time?  Alexander the Great, the Macedonian who extended his empire from Europe to Africa and India, built libraries and insisted that the Greek language be taught throughout his empire.  When his empire was supplanted by the Roman Empire, the Romans built roads throughout the entire empire making travel simple and convenient.  When Jesus arrived on the Earth a very large part of the Earth's population could understand the common language (Greek) and could be reached by convenient means of travel.  The world had been prepared for the spread of the Gospel.

In a similar manner, we can see the events of the 20th century.  The airline industry, educational institutions, and world commerce made English a language readily understood throughout most of the Earth.  Later in the 20th century, the Internet penetrated most of the Earth.  We can see, therefore, a virtual parallel to the results of Alexander and the Romans.  We have a condition in which rapid communication throughout the world is much more readily accomplished than was possible prior to the end of the 20th century.  Have you asked yourself the question, why has God brought about this parallel condition?  What is his purpose?  Is it a similar purpose to that which was intended to occur in the first century?

You may have noticed the similarity between what happened at the Garden of Eden/ the Tower of Babel and what happened at the initial spread of the Gospel.  In both cases, God instructed man to go out from his present location to accomplish a specific task.  Man chose not to go.  God permitted circumstances to compel him to go.  Although circumstances may compel us to leave the place where we become uncomfortable circumstances cannot force us to become obedient to the instructions of the Lord.  The confusion of languages at the tower of Babel caused man to go forth across the Earth.  Nonetheless, there were no circumstances that required us to take loving lordship over the creation that God had entrusted to our care.  In the same manner, persecution caused many believers to depart from Jerusalem toward Samaria and other parts of the World.  The persecution could not compel us to undertake the process of making disciples.  The Father's willingness to let liberty reign, wherever His Spirit is permitted to lead, is an awe-inspiring display of His humility.

For most of 2000 years the church has continued to ignore, denigrate, or misinterpret Jesus' simple instruction to go and make disciples.  We have instead elected to build great organizations, to enlist crowds of members, to make converts with no commitment, and/or to attempt to teach the world concepts which can only be grasped by people who have become alive in Christ.  Except that we recognize the pride of man, our continuing unwillingness to undertake the simple task of making disciples seems beyond comprehension.  But, God has not changed His plan for how the Church is intended to be built and grow.

We are being permitted to watch the development of a generation of people, who for the first time in many generations seem willing and able to apprehend the concepts of making disciples and being disciples.  We are faced with a generation of young men and women who crave and hunger for men and women they can look up to and emulate.  This new generation is different from past generations.  In that it now has access to information from all around the world.  This generation is not looking for more words of teaching.  This generation will only respond to demonstrations of the reality and the power of the Kingdom of God.  This generation accepts without reservation the apostle Paul's statement that the Kingdom of God does not consist of talk but of power.  Tragically, the large organizations that call themselves the church are totally devoid of real spiritual power.  They embody much talk with no power.  The vast majority of the organization's members are completely without relationship to the living God of the universe.  They have only a limited intellectual understanding of things about that God.  But they are totally devoid of intimate familial relationship with Him.  Because these masses of people are without familial relationship with God, they have raised biological children with whom they have very little familial relationship.  Therefore, the children are left with great spiritual and emotional needs.  The children seek all sorts of fulfillment for those needs.  Many choose drugs.  Many choose false religions.  But, among them are some who hunger and thirst after righteousness.  These are the ones who will be filled.

Many of us have chosen to believe that the christian church is a very large and widespread organization.  Unless one accepts that Jesus is a liar, however, this cannot be true.  Jesus said that the way is narrow and only a few will enter.  The Church of Christ is much smaller than we have been led to believe throughout its history.  This is not surprising in light of the pride of man.  Nor is it surprising that man who built organizations rather than people want those organizations to be as large and lucrative as possible.  To be sure, many of the people who have led to the building of these organizations have been men and women of good hearts with good intentions.  But, good hearts and good intentions are no better substitute for the plan of God than wood, hay and stubble are as a substitute for gold, silver and precious stones.  This is not to suggest that buildings made from wood and hay are not adequate temporary shelter.  Rather it is to make clear that such buildings simply will not pass the test of time.  They have no eternal significance.

Jesus told his disciples that the Kingdom of God is among us.  This was not to suggest that the kingdom is like a coffee table, sitting in the middle of a group.  Nor was it to suggest that the kingdom is like a box of chocolates being passed out among us.  Rather it was to suggest that the very fabric and nature of His Kingdom exist in the form of the relationships among us.  Primary, of course, is the relationship that each son of God has with the Father, Son and Holy Spirit.  But also, the relationships each son of God has with his brothers and sisters throughout the world are an integral part of the fabric and nature of His Kingdom.  Throughout the New Testament these connected relationships among the believers are emphasized over and over again.  We are talked about as the body of Christ.  We are talked about as a Temple made with living stones.  We are told that we are members of the body placed in it as it pleases Christ.  We are told that we are members of the body and belong to every other member.

Envisioning the close-knit nature of these relationships has been made extremely difficult in light of the teachings of modern churchianity.  As we look around the organizations that call themselves the church, we can gain no vision for what it means to be a disciple or a disciple maker.  For most of us, we would not know what a disciple looks like if we met one.  Throughout churchianity, there has been a substitution of better and better programs for any real personal relationships.  One local church pastor whom I know describes himself as being able to invent new programs faster than the old ones can fail.  As an imitation substitute for discipleship, many organizations have started mentoring programs.  Mentoring is the process of pouring good ideas from one man's mind into the mind of another.

Disciple making on the other hand, is the process of one man, pouring his spirit and life into another.  This process is one in which the two become engaged in a very close knit relationships.  And yet, contrary to much teaching that has been spread around, the relationship is not one of authority.  The disciple maker remains the brother of the disciple.  He is not in a superior position.  Indeed he is subservient to his disciple.  Jesus chose the most menial of tasks, the washing of His disciples’ feet, to demonstrate His understanding of their relationship.  In the act of washing those feet, Jesus demonstrated that his leadership in the kingdom of God is not based on his power and authority; rather, it is based on his love and servant hood.  This Man (at the time the only Son of God walking in the flesh on the Earth) had every right to exert His power, His authority, and His will over these men, whom He had created.  Instead, Jesus laid down his life for these men, as one who loves them and made himself a servant to them.

We are faced with a generation of young people who are looking for someone who will love them, set an example for them and serve them by leading them into the presence of the God of the universe.  Over and over again as we look about churchianity.  We see men who are modeling their style of leadership after the great captains of industry that they see around them.  This captain of industry leadership is a leadership that is based on position, power and authority.  But Jesus gave us a very different example of leadership.  The difficulty, of course, lies in this: Jesus’ style of leadership requires that we lay down our lives.  In it, there is no room for pride.  In it there is no room to judge the people whom we lead.  In it, there is no room for men, who will not go to the cross, laying down their lives for their friends.

The Holy Spirit has demonstrated and declared that He is choosing to operate differently among this upcoming generation than He has in past generations of the Church.  Among this new generation the Holy Spirit has been systematically turning away from those who would build groups and large organizations and turning toward those who would build the close-knit personal friendships and relationships.  We are being returned to the Great Commission.  We are being asked to stop building better and better clubs.  We are being asked to build disciples.  And it is those who have become our disciples, not the large crowds and the masses of people, whom we are instructed to baptize and teach.

It is time for all of us to change our focus and align ourselves with the purposes of God for this generation.

His, thus Yours,

Stuart