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Originally First Baptist Church, Smyrna, Tennessee, LifePoint has been through a series of transitions, but none more significant than Pastor Pat Hood shifting the focus of Christ’s people to living sent. In his new book, The Sending Church, Hood explains how the church exists to be sent and to constantly send out its members. He was gracious enough to answer some questions about what moving to a sending church means and how the gospel drives the “sentness.”

Trevin: You talk a lot about the scorecard we keep as pastors. You admit how in the past you were more focused on growing the church than sending the church. What changed your scorecard?

Pat: There was definitely a time when I was more concerned about growing a church than in sending the church. That’s agonizing to admit, even today, because it seems so shallow and man-centered. But, even though my goal might’ve been wrong, my motives were pure. Numbers represent souls, and I wanted to take as many people with me to heaven as possible.

I think all pastors have to fight the drift toward focusing on numbers because the American Dream flows out of the American world view that bigger is better. We even publish an annual list of the fastest growing and the largest churches in America. Our influence seems to depend on how large our church is. So, it’s easy for our motives to drift.

Now, I’m not trying to over spiritualize and say numbers aren’t important. We count everything at LifePoint because numbers are a great diagnostic. To be honest, I’d bet that the only churches that aren’t interested in numbers are those that don’t have any. But, numbers shouldn’t be the goal; obedience to God’s mission should be the goal. God measures obedience and faithfulness rather than bigness. Rather than measuring the size of our buildings or the size of our attendance, God measures the size of our passion to run hard after His heart and His purpose for the church.

SendingChurchAccording to our old scorecard, things were going great at LifePoint. We were reaching a lot of new people, building new buildings & bringing in more money than ever. I should’ve been satisfied, but I wasn’t. I knew something was wrong. There had to be more. God used this dissatisfaction to drive our church to three days of fasting, prayer and worship to seek the heart of God. It was during this Sacred Gathering that our hearts were awakened to the fact that God’s heart beats for the nations.

The key passage God used to awaken us from our slumber was Psalm 46:10, “Be still, and know that I am God. I will be exalted among the nations. I will be exalted in the earth!” (Psalm 46:10 ESV). Most Christians can easily quote the first part of the verse; “Be still and know that I am God…” We love it because it’s about us knowing God and we want to know God. But we forget the second part. There is a global implication to knowing God and it’s not about us. The global implication is, “…that I will be exalted among the nations. I will be exalted on earth.”

It was at this point that God began to transform our ambitions and goals. We realized it wasn’t wasn’t just about the number of people that came to our building; it was about the number of people being sent out of the building on mission in the community and around the world. Our people began to realize that missions wasn’t about them, but about the global glory of God.

Trevin: Your book shows how the church must have a posture of being “on offense.” You write:

We are not an anxious band of wounded warriors trying to hold our ground against an evil enemy. We are created to advance the mission of God. 

What are some ways we can fight the “defensive” mentality of the church as a fortress and recapture the “sentness” of God’s people?

Pat: Wow! That’s a great question. There are so many thing we need to do to recapture the “sentness” of God’s people. You have to begin with prayer. We must stay in tune with the heart of God. Prayer is, of course, vital to that alignment. We must continually be filled with Spirit, which simply means to be dominated and controlled by Him. We must continue to die to self because the gravitational pull in a Western culture is to make life about us.

There are so many things the church needs to do to recapture our “sentness.” One of the greatest things we could do is preach the gospel. I think most Christians think of the gospel in terms of salvation, and rightly so. But it’s the gospel that also sustains us and motivates us. The gospel isn’t just for salvation; it’s also for sanctification.

Several years ago, I preached a lot of “How To” series: how to have a good marriage, how to be a good parent, how to manage your money, how to love your job, etc. I don’t think there’s anything wrong with preaching “How To” messages every now and then, but if this is the steady diet we give our people, they begin to think the gospel is about making their life better, to help them achieve the American Dream. This can cause our awareness of our “sentness” to fade.

A commitment to preaching the Word and helping people understand the heart of God and the gospel on every page, filling every story, would help reclaim and embrace our mission as a sent people.

Trevin: You challenge leaders to be courageous, even when discouraged. “Courage is a command, not a suggestion.” How do we guard against fear and discouragement?

Pat: This is a daily battle, sometimes hourly, and especially on Monday. It’s so easy for pastors to live in a state of discouragement. You receive emails complaining about everything from the sermon to color of your shoes. You hear about people leaving the church because, “Well, it just isn’t like it used to be.” Discouragement is every pastor’s daily battle.

I believe the only way to guard against discouragement and fear is to dedicate yourself to playing for an audience of one. When I stand before Jesus one day, I don’t think He’s going to praise me on how many people attended LifePoint. Numbers really don’t impress Him. He’s not going to reward me because I had a knack for keeping people happy. Sometimes, that is the worst thing we can do. Jesus is going to reward me based on how faithful and obedient I was to His heart and mission.

The only way to fight discouragement and fear is to commit daily to living and leading to make Jesus happy, not people. If you make Jesus happy, you will make people mad, but you’ll please the only one that really matters.

Trevin: You say we shouldn’t begin by asking “What is God’s heart for our church?” but “What is God’s heart?” because then, we will see God’s heart for the nations. How can pastors lead their church to a place where they feel the weight of God’s love for the world?

Pat: Preaching is the key to helping people know God. We need to preach more expository or textual sermons and trust the sufficiency of the Scriptures.

I also think it’s important that the pastor and staff model God’s heart for the nations by living a life that proves you love the nations. One thing we do at LifePoint is to send our own staff as cross cultural missionaries. I’ve sent my Executive Pastor to live in Brussels, my lead Student Pastor and my Preschool Minister to live Bangkok and my Communications Pastor to live Seattle. We require our staff to travel to different parts of the world to keep the fire in their heart burning bright for God’s glory among the nations.

I also think we must change our language and our culture. We need to use “sending” illustrations in sermons, put it on the walls, celebrate people living missionally in the community, etc.  We’re also committed to not letting missions be a department in our church, but the essence of what we’re about. Sending is the culture we’ve developed from our children’s ministry to our senior adults.

Trevin: You write about the importance of meeting social needs, but you also claim Jesus’ ministry wasn’t social ministry, but redeeming lost souls. What’s the relationship between the social and spiritual aspects of the church’s mission?

Pat: Social ministry is important because we can’t turn a blind eye to the overwhelming needs in our world. We should love and care for people because God loves and cares for people. But our priority is the gospel. How sad would it be to give a cold man a coat that keeps him warm for them winter and not give him the gospel that can transform his soul for eternity!

Churches have the tendency to drive in the ditches. Many are focused so strongly on getting converts that they don’t make disciples. Many focus so strongly on making disciples that they baptize few, if any, new converts. We don’t even distinguish between evangelism and discipleship at LifePoint. We like to use the language of discipling someone toward Christ and discipling someone in Christ. We believe it’s all discipleship.

In the same way, churches also have the tendency to drive in the ditches of social ministry or pure evangelism. Some simply want to show people their faith by how the live. I think that’s important, but you have to also preach the gospel. Just make sure your life lines up with what you say.

I believe this is the relationship between social ministry and proclaiming the gospel. We must always speak the gospel, and living according to the gospel gives power and credibility to what we say.

 

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