Is what you are doing worth the life of the Son of God?

I do not remember where I came across the title of this post, but it is a question that I use to challenge the church leaders who attend my workshops.  It is one of the most powerful questions that churches can ask of themselves.  I remember that the pastor who wrote about this question said he asks each of the committees and boards in his church to ask this question at the start of every meeting, and that he asks it of the congregation about once a month.  "Is what we are doing here today worth the life of the Son of God?"  As I explain to my workshop attendees I am not always as tactful as others so I will sometimes ask the question this way, "Did Jesus really die for this?"  The emphasis is on the "this."

The reason I think this is such a powerful question is that I doubt that Jesus really cares about much of what the church is doing.  I fear that we spend way too much time focusing on things that really don't matter and miss out on what God wants to do in our world through us.  Board meetings are spent hearing reports on how many hospital visits the pastor made last month while never getting around to discussing how the church can best reach out to the unchurched in the community.  Committees spend incredible amounts of time deciding on the color of carpet for the sanctuary while people within the shadow of their church's steeples are dying without Christ and children are going to bed hungry.  Does it really matter whether you put down blue or grey carpet when people are going to hell all around us?

Denominations form task groups to discuss and re-discuss issues that churches and our culture are never going to agree on while their baptism rates continue to decline.  They create position papers that few people outside of their denominational leadership will ever read and that will have zero impact on the vast majority of their churches while failing to provide the leadership that their churches do need to more effectively minister to their communities.

Why did Jesus go to the cross?  Because man is a sinner whose sins have cut him off from God.  Christ came to reconcile mankind to God and gave the church the task of proclaiming that reconciliation.  If we fail to do that then we have failed as a church no matter what else we might be doing.

The mission of the church is simple.  It consists of the Great Commission and the Great Commandment.  It does not matter if you are a church of 50 people or 50,000 your mission is the same: the Great Commission and the Great Commandment.  Your vision will certainly look different because your vision will be how your church will carry out that mission.  Obviously, a church of 50 people will approach that mission differently than will a church of 50,000, but the focus is still going to be on the mission.  Anything that distracts a church from fulfilling that mission should be avoided because it is not worth the life of the Son of God.

Depending on the statistics you read, 3,000-5,000 churches in the US close their doors every year.  Most of these churches are smaller, but they do not close their doors just because they are small.  These churches do not shut down because they no longer have a mission to fulfill.  They shut down because they have lost their vision for ministry.  They long ago forgot their purpose for being.  They substituted activity for ministry and began a downward spiral that eventually closed their doors.

The next time you begin a committee meeting in your church begin by asking the question, "Is what we are doing here today worth the life of the Son of God?"  The next time your church's business meeting gets a little heated stand up and ask the question.  You may want to also ask the question at the end of your worship service: Is what happened here today worth the life of the Son of God.  Or, if you're feeling real bold ask it my way, "Did Jesus really die for THIS?"