Read the quote at the end first.
I'm throwing this out there, and it is not too coherent yet. It may be off base. However, been mulling it over for some years now as I change how I serve.
I remember Neil Cole telling us (and I paraphrase) to take people to the cross and leave them there. Get new believers bonded to Jesus, hearing his voice, sensing his direction.... not running to a middle man (church or a pastor) to hear what they say you should do. This is why they do life transformation groups where people get together after reading 25-30 chapters of scripture each week to duscuss and pray over it. Bond people to Jesus and the word... not second hand sermons about it....
Certainly we learn about scripture from others, but the final direction is Jesus in you, and his word.
I rarely answer this question anymore, "What do you think I should do?".
Instead I ask, "Well, what does the word say and what do you sense the Spirit of Jesus in you suggesting? I'll walk with you until you get this figured out."
This used to sound so hokey to me... like some neo charismatic bull crap. I did not get it because, well, I was not getting "it"- "direction from Jesus". I was serving at church like I was supposed to, because that IS what Jesus wants me to do. So when I asked people what I can do for Jesus, I was given another church job or church program to run for Jesus, and, oh, "evangelize people and pray", talk. So I did the same for others for over thirteen years of minstry.....basically answering by saying, "Here do this"
Now, I ask them to ask Jesus about that. We will ask Jesus about this together. This way I feel I am training people to examine the word and tune in to the Jesus Holy Spirit's convictions, promptings, and moving based upon that.
This natural spiritual mechanism is very weak in our fellowships.... frankly because we think it's kind of "loosey spooky"... at least I did.
Rather than training individuals to take human direction, the human voice casting their idea for you (which frankly is often reduced to pluging in and filling a nebulious slot in a pastor's or leadership teams vision script, that frankly leaves no room for Jesus to move you another way.), lets develop the idea of "lets go to Jesus" so YOU can figure it out.... Jesus can guide you, and others can give insight too, and we as a body will walk with you in this process to the end, ok?
If Jesus does move you other ways, I guess it does not further my script and therefore, I am wasting my time with you. In leadership today, we only have time for people playing our game, very little for those who don't. The desire is to recruit you to the vision I cast, so I spend more time selling my vision to (for) you, than walking with people like you to help you respond to Jesus and what Jesus would have you do today.
The more people we train to live like this... the less control I have over outcomes... the more difficult it is for me to build something that I came up with. But I think it's good. Because when people do rally together for a common goal, it will be because Jesus put them together to acomplish this. I no longer need to sell it, or beg for people to serve at it. That has become Jesus’s job as it should be.
<blockquote>"Institutional Christendom is bound to sermonizing and weak because of it. Preaching is an excellent means of drawing a crowd and becoming a celebrity but the poorest means of effecting change. People listen to religious lectures all their lives and never mature to do anything. Jesus looked at the 12 and declared to them that it would be better for THEM if He went away. What could be better than life with God in the flesh? Life with the Holy Spirit in your own flesh! If we create followers dependent upon "being fed" we never create followers of Jesus who are dependent upon the Holy Spirit. Some leaders put out so much "good" food that their followers never learn to hear from the Holy Spirit. Their followers are addicted to the "milk (that which has been digested by another) of the word" . But "lactose intolerance" is rising and teachers are beginning to see that their real function is to make folks hungry to learn for themselves by asking the right questions and to train them to trust the Holy Spirit's answers."
(Steve Hill. Harvest Now April 2014)
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