The world is changing really fast. Faster than ever before.
We recently have seen the end of a wave of thinking that said evangelism was the number priority of the Church and of Christians. It’s still important, but more and more people are focusing on discipleship. For a while people were saying, if only we can the the story of Jesus all around the world, we might get to see revival. Now the story of Jesus has reached most of the world and we’re seeing that while people may say they like the guy, and they may even believe He is their Savior, that doesn’t make them faithful followers.
So now the prevailing notion is that fully transformed followers of Jesus are what we need to change the world.
I am one of the people that adheres to this line of thinking.
But the danger is for our response to be an all-out effort to create amazing systems and programs that disciple people only to find that the world has already changed away from the circumstances we started with. It’s possible we could spend a lot of time and energy building stuff only to be left with a system that is already broken before it ever starts working.
We can operate with norms and general practices, but we must always focus on the person in front of us and their unique needs. We must always be willing to change. Always be ready to deviate from the plan.
Because the world is changing faster than you or I can imagine:
