You’ve heard the phrase “shell-shocked?” It’s a combat term used to describe the delirium that sometimes plagues soldiers in the battlefield when they have been hit hard by tough or challenging circumstances—normally after an enemy attack.
I’m not shell-shocked, but I am “soul-shocked.” I’m using this term to describe the spiritual delirium that I’ve been facing since returning from the Exponential Conference (www.exponentialconference.org) in Orlando, Florida on Friday. I think it was the best Christian conference I’ve ever experienced—much better than last year (and last year was decent). But since my return I’ve been hit hard by a haunting spiritual reality.
You see, up until now I’ve been pretty content with planting and leading Crossroads Christian Church (www.crossroadsofjoliet.org) to viability—and I’ve hoped that Crossroads would become healthy enough to mother more new churches. And so I’ve had this dream of planting more than one new church in our town for the past couple of years.
This week I was at the Conference asking myself: “What if we planted two more new churches in our town by 2015 and reached 1000+ people for Christ?” And I sensed a voice saying: “If you reach 1000+ people for Christ by 2015 there will still be 119,000 people in your town who don’t know Jesus Christ.” And that’s when I realized that 1000 new Christians worshipping at churches we have started would only be a drop in the bucket—and really wouldn’t change the spirit and culture of our town at all. That vision is simply too small.
You see, if we’re going to turn the tide of the fading church in the US then we’re going to have to do more than plant churches. We’re going to have to plant whole movements of churches that grow exponentially. So I’m no longer thinking “two more churches by 2015;” I’m now thinking something more like 30 new churches in and around Joliet by 2025 with 500+ new Christians at each new church. That would be 15,000 new believers in Christ in our community (which by the way would be only 10% of our community).
That might sound like a lot, but frankly, it’s just the beginning. And for now that vision has me a bit delirious. No way I can do that. But maybe “we” can. In Ephesians 3:20 we learn that God is “able to do immeasurably more than all we ask or imagine, according to His power that is at work in us.” Anybody can plant 3 churches and reach 1000+ people for Christ in the span of 8 years. But only God can reach 15,000+ in just a few decades. Just the prospect of this has me “soul-shocked.”
I look forward to seeing what the Lord brings about.
