Change Our World

This Sunday it will be two weeks since I got home from Campmeeting 2009, where the theme was "Change our World." The evangelist for the week was Mitchell Burch and he was full of fire and the Holy Spirit. I have been ruminating over what he shared since I came home: some of what he said convicted me; some of what he said puzzled me; some of what he said excited me; and some of what he said had me saying AMEN. I think when you are still mulling over a set of sermons two weeks later, you know you had a good campmeeting.
Pastor Burch spoke about the missional church vs. the institutional church. All churches start out as missional churches....in each church life there is an ebb and flow ...and what can happen is, that missional church begins to become comfortable with its traditions and habits, and morphs into an institutional church. These are common words heard around the institutional church: us, we, ours, them..with a church lifestyle characterized by a level of fear. The institutional church wants to defend something, keep something. The missional church is all about community, others, the world, needs, ministry; has a capacity for risk and no fear. To be a missional church, and remain a missional church, we must be savvy; we must be aware of what is going on in our community. We must present the gospel, which has never lost its relevance, in a relevant fashion.
As we make ourselves aware of the culture around us, and continue to remain holy, we must remember the words of Jesus: "Father, I pray that you not take them out of the world but that you keep them from the evil one." Don't be in a holy huddle while the rest of the world goes to hell!
We, as salt, can get out of the salt shaker knowing that we have the keeping power of the Holy Spirit! And we can get out there and CHANGE OUR WORLD.
P.S. My sister and I were discussing a point of one of the sermons that we didn't quite get. So today, I emailed Pastor Mitch to ask him to clarify for me and provide Scriptural text, if he would. He replied within 45 minutes. HE REALLY WANTS PEOPLE TO GROW IN CHRIST AND CHANGE OUR WORLD