10 Lessons Learned in Church Revitalization
“Remember who you are.” A young son is facing a crossroads of life. He lacks the courage and strength to make the choice he knows he needs to make. His father died in a tragic accident when he was young, leaving a gaping hole in his life. The tragedy thrust him to wander from his responsibility to a life free from worry. He was aimless and confused until a friend helped him remember the words of his father. “Remember who you are. You are my son. And the one true king.” Those simple, yet powerful words helped transform a carefree “no worries,” son to take his rightful place as king. “Remember who you are.”
I was fourteen years old when I saw that climatic scene unfold on the big screen in the 30-year-old classic The Lion King. Young Simba loses his father and thus loses his stability. It was not until the baboon, Rafiki, led him to the mystical vision of his father in the sky, “Remember who you are.” Simba returns home to fight his uncle Scar and take his place as the king. Simba had forgotten who he was and he had forgotten where he came from. He needed the words from Mufasa, “Remember who you are. You are my son. And the one true king.”
Let me play the baboon and help you remember who you are and who stands with you. You are God’s son and have an Advocate before the Father. You are servants of the one true King and have the Holy Spirit working in and through you for his good pleasure. I pray I will be like Peter, not saying anything for the first time, but I will make every effort to stir you up by way of reminder that after you leave this intensive you will be able to recall these things.
10 LESSONS OF CHURCH REVITALIZATION
KNOW YOUR IDENTITY IS IN CHRIST
Colossians 1:9-14
Brother, you are a son before you are a pastor. God cares far more about who you are than what you can do for him. He delivered you from the domain of darkness and transferred you into the kingdom of his beloved Son, in whom you have redemption, the forgiveness of sins. You are not defined by the size of your church, how many elders your church has, or how many churches you have planted, or by whatever the current metric we share at intensives. You were bought with the precious blood of the Lamb. Remember who you are.
For your sake, Jesus Christ became sin who knew no sin so in him you might become the righteousness of God. When you have no peace in your pastorate, you have peace with God through his blood. He took every one of your sins and nailed it to the cross. You have been forgiven. You are united with Christ. There is now no condemnation for you as you are in Christ Jesus.
The main purpose of your life is not to build a great ministry but to be transformed into the image of the Son. You are a son before you are a pastor. Never forget this.
KNOW YOURSELF
1 Corinthians 12:7
Know who God has made you to be. God has made me a loud redheaded extroverted former athlete and coach who has a big motor and loves to work and laugh. My work ethic developed by years of being an athlete is both one of my greatest strengths and one of greatest weaknesses. It allows me to be genuinely joyful to be poured out for the sacrifice and service of others while at the same time places me in danger to sacrifice my health and to work in my own strength.
Raised as an athlete with the desire to please my coaches and in a home where when I performed well as an athlete there was less arguing has made me susceptible to desire the praise of men. It’s a recipe for disaster as a pastor for if I live seeking the approval of man, I would not be a servant of Christ.
Brother, the more I have learned who I am and how the Lord has made me and how to walk in that truth, the Lord has made me more effective as a pastor. Know who God has made you and rejoice in that. Be who you are in Christ. Know your gifts. Know your weaknesses.
PUT ALL YOUR WEIGHT ON THE WORD
1 Thessalonians 2:13
Paul wrote, “And we also thank God constantly for this, that when you received the word of God, which you heard from us, you accepted it not as the word of men but as what it really is, the word of God, which is at work in you believers.” We should have a nice website, a clean facility, thoughtful child protection policies, welcome teams and a plan to follow up for visitors, but we have to put our weight on the Word of God. The Word will build his church. Preach it publicly and from house to house. Let the Word do the work. For it is working.
LOVE THE SHEEP GOD HAS GIVEN YOU
1 Peter 5:2
“If you can’t be with the one you want honey, love the one you with.” Peter said, “Shepherd the flock of God that is among you.” Paul said in Acts 20:28, “Pay careful attention to yourselves and to all the flock, in which the Holy Spirit has made you overseers, to care for the church of God, which he obtained with his own blood.” Love the sheep that God has given you. He has chosen in his sovereign wisdom to make you an overseer of a particular flock. You are given as a gift to them. Pay attention to the flock the Lord has given you. Love the church more than its health. Jesus didn’t die for theoretical people, but real ones. He has asked you to do the same. He wants you to follow him in daily picking up your cross and serving the smelly, cranky, happy, gifted, weak, lazy, fainthearted, strong sheep that are among you.
We need to be reminded of this often for we are often discontent with the precious gift and privilege we have in the sheep under our care. Brothers, love the sheep among you.
GROW IN THE SPIRIT
1 Timothy 4:13
When I started pastoring Park Baptist Church, I didn’t know what I didn’t know. There were things the church needed that I didn’t have. I had to grow as a preacher, a shepherd, as a counselor, as discipler, etc. 1 Timothy 4:14–15, “Do not neglect the gift you have, which was given you by prophecy when the council of elders laid their hands on you. Practice these things, immerse yourself in them, so that all may see your progress.” Brothers, work hard at being a better pastor in all the ways God wants you to grow. Refine your gifts. Do the Christ Centered and Clear preaching cohort, attend Simeon Trust Workshops. Continue in what you have learned and have firmly believed remembering from whom you learned it.
BUILD AND MAINTAIN FRIENDSHIP
Proverbs 27:9-10
J. C. Ryle has said, “This world is full of sorrow because it is full of sin. It is a dark place. It is a lonely place. It is a disappointing place. The brightest sunbeam in it is a friend. Friendship halves our troubles and doubles our joys.” Maybe Ryle was speaking about the pastorate and not just the world, “It is a dark place. It is a lonely place. It is a disappointing place.” How many days could I have said that about my ministry? … the day I wept in my office after telling our church about a credible allegation of child abuse against a staff elder … a friend, a man I knew for years. But I could also tell you about the next day sitting with a brother for lunch who drove two hours just to be with me.
The pastorate can be a dark and lonely and disappointing place, but true friends halve that sorrow. Read the end of Paul’s epistles. They are a treasure chest of encouragement as Paul talks about his friends. Aristarchus, Epaphras, and Gaius names most will not remember but friends who strengthened Paul for the work of the ministry. As one comedian has said, “It’s hard to make friends when you’re an adult. I think that’s the greatest miracle of Jesus. He has 12 best friends in his thirties, and they weren’t his wife’s best friends’ husbands.”
Brother, cultivate friendship in your church and outside your church. Ecclesiastes 4:10, “For if they fall, one will lift up his fellow. But woe to him who is alone when he falls and has not another to lift him up!” Friendship is one of the most powerful tools in God’s arsenal to sustain us in the ministry. Paul had his list of friends at the end of his letters, and by God’s grace, I have my own.
GIVE YOUR FAMILY YOUR BEST
1 Tim 3:4-5
Brother, love your family and give them your best. Church members will come and go. The church can find a new pastor but you can’t find a new family. Give them your best. God has given you to them as a precious gift. My greatest regrets in life are not in the mistakes I made as a pastor but as a dad and a husband. Minimize those mistakes. Limit those regrets. Commit yourself to give your best to your family.
Talk to your wife and ask her how you can love her better and how you can be more intentional with your children.
KEEP IN STEP WITH THE SPIRIT
Galatians 5:25-26
John Flavel wrote, “The providence of God is like Hebrew words - can only be read backwards.” It is hard to know what the Lord is doing in your church at the moment. We have to pray for sensitivity to the Holy Spirit. Galatians 5:25–26, “If we live by the Spirit, let us also keep in step with the Spirit. Let us not become conceited, provoking one another, envying one another.” How do we know when it is time to transition to elders or add small groups or change the church’s liturgy? Pray and seek wisdom from the Spirit.
I often use a simple illustration with our staff, “Pull the thread.” When you see a piece of fabric hanging off your sleeve, you pull it to see where it goes. This is my philosophy of how to discern and keep in step with the Spirit’s work in the church. Early in my pastorate, I had a senior adult Bible study every Tuesday at 10 a.m. and I would ask them questions on things, and they would tell me all I wanted to know and more. A good question works wonders in the church. Ask your people what they think and listen well. Observe how the church is handling things. God wants his will to be known, He wants to reveal his will so we can obey. It is our job to pray and seek the Spirit’s direction. We must discern his will.
Most of my pastoral mistakes were because I made decisions too quickly without enough prayer and conversations with the congregation. We must work hard to keep in step with the Spirit. It is interesting right after we are told to keep in step with the Spirit, Paul then tells us not to be conceited or to envy one another. I wonder how many mistakes are made in revitalizations because a pastor envies another man’s gifts and ministries while disregarding what the Lord is doing in his midst. Brothers, trust the Lord’s providence.
THE WORK IS NEVER DONE
Galatians 6:9
Paul wrote “And let us not grow weary of doing good, for in due season we will reap, if we do not give up.” The revitalization is never done. I landed at Park in 2012 and as a good 9markist, my goal from day 1 was to move towards a plurality of elders. We added our first lay elders in May of 2018. And as pivotal as that moment was in the life of the church, the work was not done. I had lay elders who had never been elders before so I needed to train them. I had deacons who never served alongside elders so I needed to train them. I had never led a team of elders so I needed to be trained.
Brothers, do not grow weary of doing good, for in due season we will reap a harvest. We reap what we sow. We will see some harvest in this life, but the goal is not to give up so one day we will reap the harvest from the Chief Shepherd who will give us the unfading crown of glory. Brothers, just keep plowing and don’t give up.
SCATTER. PRAY. SLEEP.
Mark 4:26-29
Mark 4:26–27, “And Jesus said, “The kingdom of God is as if a man should scatter seed on the ground. He sleeps and rises night and day, and the seed sprouts and grows; he knows not how.” God will build his church. We wake up, scatter seeds, pray, and go to sleep. And the seed sprouts and grows.
When I arrived at Park in 2012, most of the faithful senior saints were clutching to the memory of past glory. They kept talking about the days B.F. Hawkins who last pastored the church in 1958. So I started praying, “Lord, please let our senior saints see the best days of Park Baptist Church are ahead of her, not behind her.” So for years, I scattered seeds, prayed, and went to sleep. And the Lord worked. The church began to change. One Lord’s Day after service, 97 year old Max Phillips, who joined the church at 14, looked me in the eye, and bellowed, “Preacher, our church is more alive today than it’s ever been!” Scatter the Seed and go to sleep. Let the Lord do his work.
After a life of ministry, studying the Word of God and examining the human heart, John Flavel penned,
The greatest difficulty in conversion is to win the heart to God; and the greatest difficulty after conversion is to keep the heart with God.
If it is true for the sheep, so too it is true for the shepherd. In one of his last books, he wrote to fellow pastors and said,
Let us be careful in this, because no sin is more easy to slip itself into our hearts, and duties, than hypocrisy. We, of all men, are most in danger of being deceived by it: For our jobs are about spiritual things, we are, on that account, titled spiritual men. But it is plain, from that very place, that a man may be objectively a spiritual, and all the while subjectively being a carnal man. Believe it, brethren, it is easier to speak like an orator, against a thousand sins of others, than it is to mortify one sin, like Christians, in ourselves; to be more hard working in our pulpits, than in our closets; to preach twenty sermons to our people, than one to our own hearts. Believe it, all our reading, studying, and preaching is but worthless hypocrisy, till the things read, studied, and preached, are felt upon our own hearts.
This is the real danger of church revitalization. The real danger is not preaching a bad sermon or making a poor leadership decision or not planting a church or raising up elders or not completing your revitalization, the real danger is hypocrisy. The real danger is your heart drifting from God. The real danger is being known as spiritual but in reality, being carnal and worldly.
Brothers, remember who you are. Remember whose you are. You belong to God. You are blood bought sinners; ransomed to a Holy God through his Holy Son to be his holy servant. Be ready for every good work including the work of church revitalization.
