Manifesting Christiantiy

I found this on the church website of the Mission in Vaccaville, Ca. What is so exciting is the humility in which it is written. I absolutely love it when Christians declare truth humbly but with boldness (the two are not mutually exclusive).

Basically, this church decided that they would admit that the Christianity that they were professing did not match with the Christianity that they were practicing. Their response was not to change their profession to match their practice, but instead declare that they Christianity they live will line up with what they preach. They were so determined that they wrote it down and put it on their website:

• We have decided that teaching the Gospel without demonstrating the gospel is not enough. Good preaching, good doctrine, and being good people is not enough.
• We have decided that having a good church club is not enough, good fellowship is not enough, and just being a member of that club is not enough.
• We have decided that having good Bible studies is good, but not good enough, that just making it to heaven is not our goal, and that knowing about God without truly knowing and experiencing God is meaningless.
• We have decided that having good programs is not enough; that change without transformation is intolerable, and that staying the same is not an option.
• We have decided that gifting without character is futile.
• We have decided that singing songs without worshiping is hallow and having meetings without God showing up is pointless.
• We have decided that having faith without works is not enough and having works without love is not acceptable - that our function comes out of our relationship first with the Father and second with each other.
• We have decided that reading about the book of Acts without living the book of Acts is unthinkable.
• We have decided that confident faith is good and bold faith is better.
• We have decided that hearing about the Holy Spirit without experiencing Him is silly, that believing in His presence without seeing It manifested in signs and wonders is hypocrisy, that believing in healing without seeing people healed is absurd, and that believing in deliverance without people being delivered is absolutely ridiculous.
• We have decided to be Holy Spirit filled, Holy Spirit led, and Holy Spirit empowered - anything less doesn’t work for us.
• We have decided to be the ones telling the stories of God’s power - not the ones hearing about them.
• We have decided that living saved, but not supernatural is living below our privilege and short of what Christ died for.
• We have decided that we are a battle ship not a cruise ship, an army, not an audience; Special forces not spectators, missionaries not club members.
• We have decided to value both pioneers and settlers - pioneers to expand our territory and settlers to build on those territories - but we are not squatters - people who take up space others have fought for without improving it.
• We have decided to be infectious instead of innocuous, contagious instead of quarantined, deadly instead of benign.
• We have decided to be radical lovers and outrageous givers.
• We have decided that we are a mission station and not a museum

Therefore:

1. We honor the past - we don’t live in it.
2. We live in the present with our eyes on the future.
3. We see past events - successes and failures - as stepping-stones not stop signs.
4. We pursue learning in order to be transformed, not learning in order to know.
5. We are people of engagement not observation.
6. We focus on what could be, not on what is or has been.
7. We are not limited to the four walls of this building. Our influence is not restricted by location - Not even the nations are out of bounds.
8. We are more concerned about how many we send out into the world than how many we convince to come into the building. This building is meant to be filled and it will be - but it will not be the measure of who we are or the measure of our effectiveness.
9. We raise up world changers - not tour guides. We train commandos, not committees.
10. We are a people of our destiny, not of our history.

• We have decided that it is better to fail while reaching for the impossible that God has planned for us than succeed settling for less.
• We have decided that nothing short of His Kingdom come, His will be done in our world as it is in Heaven will satisfy.
• We have decided that we will not be satisfied until our world freaks out and cries out “Those who have turned the world upside down have come here too.”

hattip to Wild Ox

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