For You. For Your Small Group. For Your Church.
“Desire that your life count for something great! Long for your life to have eternal significance. Want this! Don’t coast through life without a passion.” –John Piper
Church is more than a service. Church is people living life together, helping one another, and serving the world. God’s plan is community united in Jesus. God put together the faith community. The church family of which you are a member is no accident. The friends you make are of God’s design. C. S. Lewis in The Four Loves relates,
A secret Master of the Ceremonies has been at work. Christ, who said to the disciples “Ye have not chosen me, but I have chosen you,” can truly say to every group of Christian friends, “You have not chosen one another but I have chosen you for one another.” The Friendship is not a reward for our discrimination and good taste in finding one another out. It is the instrument by which God reveals to each the beauties of all the others.”[1]
Your brothers and sisters in Christ are a part of your life by God’s divine appointment. They are there to bring out the best in you and for you to bring out the best in them. He will reveal a greater sense of who you are in Christ by rubbing shoulders with your church family. God dwells in the Church and wants every person to mature in a relational environment. A person may come to Christ alone, but he or she grows in Christ shoulder-to-shoulder.
This book can be read alone, but it was designed with small groups and churches in mind and is best read together. Leaders can use the book trailer to generate interest. God wants us to live, serve, and process truth in the context of community.
The purpose of this book is mobilizing the local church to advance the Kingdom of God to the ends of the earth.
The book can be completed as a 12-week study, reading one chapter every week and then responding together through the discussion starters. The final week involves reading the finished faith community letter created from the activities in Chapter 11, celebrating areas where your church excels and finding solutions where improvement is needed. It can also be completed in six weeks, reading two chapters every week and doing the activities of Chapter 11 in the final week together. A concluding video “Called to Conflict” can be used to encourage believers to make a commitment to Christ, the Church and the task of storming the gates of hell until His imminent return.
As you work through each chapter, look to change. Following Jesus means being transformed into His image. Each chapter addresses a different quality that will make this a reality. Embrace the message of the book by fulfilling the mission of God on the earth, driving the invader from your territory, and experiencing the blessed and abundant life Jesus promises. Join The Resistance by making a commitment to Jesus and the people in His Church. Make your life count for Him in the world!
[i] C.S. Lewis, The Four Loves, (New York, NY: First Mariner Books, 2012), 89.
