Why I Would Want The Five Fold In My Church – Part III
….. because it releases believers in Jesus to serve others through their passions, giftings, drives, and points of view..
Today’s local churches have a bent, usually caused by the passion, giftings, drives, and point of view of their current pastor since he is in charge of everything. His church may be known as evangelical if he’s evangelistic, a caring church if he thrives on shepherding his flock, a “Word” church if he strives to be Biblically correct, a prophetic church is he is free in worship, and apostolic if he emphasized church planting or church growth. But that all is conditional on the pastor. What happens if all those passions, giftings, drives, and point of view already exist in a church, but they lie with the laity, the congregation, the believers in Jesus Christ? What would happen if they all got released?
Evangelism, emphasizing birth, would arise winning the lost to Christ and producing new converts to the faith in spite of the pastor’s strengths or weaknesses. Nurture and care for every believers spiritual growth and development would come with brothers and sisters coming beside these new converts to walk out their faith journeys with them. Those who not only know the written word but live it out in their daily lives could teach this Logos and Rhema word to the new believers, strengthening them, giving them a firm foundation. Those with prophetic desires can encourage the new believer to draw nearer to God through worship, reading the Word, and learning to listen to the still small voice of the Holy Spirit for themselves. Finally, those who can see the big picture of the Church as a whole, the body of Christ, the Priesthood of Believers, and network these other four together in the development and maturity into the image of Christ of each individual believer while brining unity in the body.
“So Christ himself gave the apostles, the prophets, the evangelists, the pastors and teachers, 12 to equip his people for works of service, so that the body of Christ may be built up 13 until we all reach unity in the faith and in the knowledge of the Son of God and become mature, attaining to the whole measure of the fullness of Christ.” (Eph. 4)
Christ gave “himself”, the Church, apostles, prophets, evangelists, pastors, and teachers, (all plural, not singular) for the purpose of “equipping his people for works of service”. The people are “to do it”. The Church is a place of continuous activity. The books of Acts records the “Acts of the Apostles”, not the theology, doctrine, status, office, and title of the apostles. It is a running narrative of action, all lead by the Holy Spirit of Jesus Christ.
Almost every church I have visited, attended, or worked with has people already in their congregations who have evangelistic, shepherding, teaching, prophetic, and apostolic passions just looking for an avenue to be released. Church leadership has a tough decision to make today. Do they remain in control, or do they allow these people of God, these believers in Jesus Christ, this Priesthood of Believers, to be released, let go, in their passions to become “active” believers, supporting other believers with diverse giftings, and leading when their gift, passion, or point of view is needed. That is the challenge in this cocoon stage: transferring the energy of the church from controlling leadership with a passive congregation to releasing the energy that is already in them to become an active congregation. That is the miracle of metamorphosis.