Godly Success

Our American culture honors success. If you look around success seems to be measured by how many of something you have, how much what you have costs (higher cost items = higher success), how new what you have is, and the ability to have more than what you need. Successful people are both admired and envied by those less successful (because they don’t have all those somethings).

I’m worried and sickened that the same measure of cultural thinking is used to measure success in our churches today. How many people were in worship today…what was the offering today…hey pastor, that sure is some church (building) you’ve got there. Are we measuring success of our churches based on attendance, on the size of our building, on the amount our building cost to build, on the giving potential of the congregation, on the number of programs we offer, on the number of staff the church employs, on the type of coffee we can afford to serve, on the location of our facilities, etc., etc., I think you get the point. From my recent experiences it sure seems to be the case.

How does God determine the church’s success? What would he think about church leadership? What would he consider a healthy church? I cannot speak for God but I can review His word for clues. Let’s consider the following examples of healthy, successful churches:

The first Church, Acts 2:42 – People devoted to being taught, devoted to being together, devoted to eating with each other and devoted to prayer. They cared for one another’s needs, they increased in number not by folks jumping from one church to the next with better programs or newer prettier buildings but they grew in size as people came to faith in Christ and were saved.

Acts 8 – Successful churches will be persecuted for their faith and will preach the gospel no matter where they travel.

Acts 13 – The Church at Antioch – Successful churches understand their mission and believers will be called to go wherever to spread the good news. A successful church is a sending church (not just throwing money at missionaries but actually raising up men, women and children to be sent to the mission field). Oh yea, and they don’t cut their missions giving to make up short falls in other areas.

Romans 1: The Church in Rome – people will talk about the faith of a successful church.

Philippians 2 & 4: The Church at Philip was an obedient Church and a giving Church. Not only do they amply financially support themselves they also give generously to missions.

1st Thessalonians 1: Like the Church at Rome the faith in God that the Thessalonian Church had was so powerful that people all over the region were talking about it. A successful church performs good works produced by faith, they labor and serve prompted by love and they endure all manner of difficulties because their hope is not in cultural successes but their hope is in Jesus Christ.

1st Thessalonians 4: A successful Church like the Thessalonian Church isn’t living to please themselves or to please others but only to please God by living holy lives.

If we are going to be successful in God’s eyes, if our desire is at the end to hear Him say “well done good and faithful servant” then we had better become leaders that lead our congregations to be like the Churches listed above. We need to quit looking inward and look outward. We need to reward the Lord’s servants by encouragement and comforting. We need to lead the Church away from cultural success – bigger, prettier church buildings filled with programs, rock concert equipment, non-offensive sermons, and entertainment minded worship services. We need to lead the Church to live their faith outside of a church building, to love the fellowship of believers, to raise up missionaries, to give generously to people in need, to live lives that only please God and no one else, and devoting themselves to prayer and to being prepared for persecution. That’s God’s mark of success. I want to be a member of that Church! You can keep you’re pretty new buildings and all that other stuff. I don’t want it!