The Fruitful Church

One of the functions of every church leader is to be active in implementing programs or practices in the church that honor God, demonstrate the eternal nature of following Jesus, and above all, yielding to the direction and the power of the Holy Spirit. 

The area I immediately thought of is the practice of hospitality.  That is the practice of making people feel welcome in our churches.  The importance of hospitality is easily understood.  If someone doesn't feel welcome to the assembly, they will probably be searching for another church to attend. 

I was looking through a stack of used books the other day and was immediately drawn to one book because of its title, "Five Practices of Fruitful Congregations."  To my surprise, the first one listed was hospitality.  The other four were worship, faith development, mission and service, and generosity. 

The book, written by Robert Schnase, listed those five practices a little differently.  They were listed like the author wanted us to understand their eternal importance.  Here is the list. 

1.  Radical hospitality

2.  Passionate worship

3.  Intentional faith development

4.  Risk-taking mission and service

5.  Extravagant generosity

Sounds like a good book, huh?  I haven't finished reading it, and there are a few places where I have wanted to get an explanation from the author, but for the most part, he has done an excellent job in stimulating my thinking about these practices and how important they are to the growth and development of the church. 

Each of the practices can be found in scripture, and probably they are found in every church, to some degree.  To ask you to consider hospitality, worship, faith development, mission and service, and generosity, would be to ask you to find those passages of scripture which point to those practices in Bible times.  

However, I am finding the author is more excited than most folks, about seeing all five practices implemented in such a powerful way.  That is why I want you to consider his describing words, like  radical, passionate, intentional, risk-taking, and extravagant.  Those are the words which add the "punch" to the message. 

Have you ever become "radical" about anything pertaining to church?  Does the word, "passionate" describe you in worship?  How about that word "intentional."  How many of us have really been intentional about our own faith development?  I have heard the moans of many a church leader if anything involved "risk-taking."  And I don't know of too many churches that have been overly "extravagant" with generosity.   I mention these things only to get you to thinking and praying about the practices of your church.  Hopefully we can continue to grow, serve, honor God and serve one another in more effective ways.

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