In recent months I have felt like God has wanted me to rethink several aspects of ministry in our church. I want to have three teams of people to ask and answer the question, "How do we take our church to the next level as a disciple-making church?"

I want to have three groups to encourage greater participation and diversity of thought.

There are several things I want them to keep in mind as they try to answer this question.

1. I want them to think like missionaries and not like “club-members.” Matthew 9:9-13

We want to engage the lost of our community on their turf where they are comfortable, rather than waiting for them to come on ours where we are comfortable. This means serving our community in a way that builds trust and opportunities to proclaim the gospel.

2. I want them to focus on disciple-making over crowd-gathering. Matthew 28:19-20

Our challenge is to change lives and not just attract numbers. This means that we want our people to understand and practice things like whole-life stewardship. We want our people to follow Christ – to surrender their time, talent, treasure, thinking, and testimony to Him. We want people to follow Christ and use every resource that He has entrusted them to bring others to Him.

3. I want them to think relationship-building over event-planning and programming. John 13:34-35

This doesn’t mean that events and programs are bad. But relationships are key for true disciple-making. “You can impress people from a distance, but you can only impact them up close.” Howard Hendricks

We must not confuse busy-ness in church activities with spiritual growth and discipleship. (Our aim is to make disciples and not just make church-people busy with church-activity. This may mean some – perhaps even many – programs must go.)

4. I want them to think multiplication over simple addition. 2 Timothy 2:1-2

How do we multiply ministry by reproducing leaders? “He who does the work is not so profitably employeed as he who multiplies the doers.”