Category LA Story

Nearly all the reporters who talk to me about the International Churches of Christ assume that we are primarily a campus movement, made up largely of students. I inform them that the facts show a very different picture. For instance, college students made up only 18 percent of the church in Los Angeles at the end of 1996. While these reporters would like to present us as a student organization so that they can dismiss us as some odd religious group that is not making inroads into all segments of society, it is time to look at where our campus ministries are headed.

In recent years there has been less and less emphasis given to campus evangelism in our churches. This trend has not been from a conscious decision to neglect the campus works. However, the way that we now build churches has produced this result. We have used our most talented ministry people to lead sectors and have included campus ministries within larger sectors of marrieds and singles. The result has been that the trained and talented leadership needed to convert college students has not been available, and disciples who are students have not had opportunities to be trained in public speaking, teaching and leadership skills.

Disciples converted on campus have profoundly affected God’s modern-day movement. Of the ten World Sector Leaders, five of them were converted as students! Even Kip and Elena McKean were reached while on campus. The book of Proverbs was written by Solomon to his son. From the above quotation, he says, “I guide you in the way of wisdom and lead you along straight paths.” Disciples reached as students can be helped to avoid many of the mistakes and sins that have permanently scarred and crippled so many older people.

Jerusalem is an incredible city. Three thousand years ago this year, King David captured the city and made it the capital of his kingdom. Since then the history of the world has been shaped and influenced by what has happened there. Most of the events described in the Bible occurred within a 100 mile radius. Now three major religions – Judaism, Islam and Christianity – consider this to be a holy city. “Holy” is not the best word to describe those past 3,000 years; “bloody” might be more appropriate. In that time nearly 100 battles have been fought for control of Jerusalem. The tension is no less today as the Palestinians are pushing for East Jerusalem to become the capital of the West Bank and the Israelis are just as determined to prevent that.

Over two hundred leaders of God’s modern-day movement gathered in Jerusalem this past May. We as disciples were drawn to Jerusalem because that is where it all began nearly 2,000 years ago. Jesus was born only five miles from there; some of his most powerful preaching and healing was there; he was crucified and resurrected there; and he started his church there. Then the word rang out from Jerusalem and was heard around the world in just one generation. Since the first century, the church has never again taken the message to the whole world, much to its shame. As disciples, we went back to Jerusalem to see our roots. God has done great things among us in the last eighteen years, but so much remains to be done. Being there,

God’s Holy Spirit is once again moving mightily among the nations – like he did in the pages of the Bible. How else could his disciples explode from one to 113 nations in only 18 years? Dreams that some of us dared to dream many years ago are now rapidly becoming a reality. A movement born among a handful of desperate men and women in a Boston living room has
spread to cities and countries whose names we struggle to pronounce. We are only three years away from meeting a nearly impossible goal – by the year 2000, to plant a church in every nation that has a city population of at least 100,000.  When the goal was set in 1994, churches existed in only 49 of those 166 nations. In the three years since then, the number of churches in God’s modern-day movement has grown by 64 nations. Can anything stop us from covering the remaining 57 nations in the final three years? Well, yes! Satan is hard at work to stop the spread of God’s Kingdom. And his primary weapon is disunity. For this very reason, Paul charges us to make every effort to keep the unity of the Spirit.

During these past 18 years, we have fought several battles to maintain this unity. The World Sector Leaders who are responsible for leading the charge into the nations take very seriously
the challenge of keeping unity. Each one has been willing to sacrifice resources from his own world sector for the good of the whole.

Life does not end after 50, or 60, or 70, or... So much of age is in the mind and heart. I have been through the black balloons and graveyard humor of my 40th birthday and of my 50th. But I don’t feel much older than I did at my 20th or 30th. Last week one of the evangelists here in LA referred to all of us over the age of 55 as the “elderly.” At 56, I definitely do not feel “elderly.” And I told him so! In this issue of LA Story, called “FEARLESS,” I actually get to write about people who are older than I am, disciples who are over 65 years of age.

In our American society, people plan for retirement at 65. Retirement is designed to be a time of leisure – golf, fishing, travel – or whatever else appeals to you once you are beyond your “productive” years. To most, retirement is the state of no longer doing anything that is useful. Somewhere I read that the average person who retires at age 65 will be dead in 18 months if he/she does not have a dream to keep them going.

Whether we are old or young, sick or healthy, married or single, poor or rich, uneducated or educated, God wants all that we have and are. 

Things are so different in God’s Kingdom! We don’t  live by the world’s timetable. Our usefulness is not age-dependent. Caleb is a role model of what disciples ought to be. After spending 40 years wandering in the wilderness that killed off all of the unfaithful Israelites, he was ready at age 85 to drive out the giants of the land and claim God’s inheritance. As has been humorously stated from time to time, disciples don’t retire, they just retread and keep on rolling.