Cause of Death

Following up on some thoughts from yesterday's post, I was thinking about the state of the church, especially here in Maine and New England. The Northeast now has the distinction of being the least churched part of the country. Although you will find some churches growing, you find a great many closing their doors, or just a few funerals away from a real crisis. Now there are many reasons a church can live. Perhaps God has really been blessing, perhaps you have some committed people who are putting forth great effort and keeping the church alive and even thriving. Sometimes it is more a social function of being a fun church where people just enjoy being there. A church may live even if the gospel is not preached. When it comes to church's dying, I think the primary cause can be narrowed down. Primary Cause of Death: Lack of Evangelism. A local church is supposed to be a localized gathering of the body of Christ. The body of Christ lives on the love of the members for each other. The body grows as new members are added through the proclamation of the love and salvation of God. Evangelism in other words. When a local church is no longer seeing people come to know Christ, the smell of death is there. Evangelism does not require a program. No fancy outreach events or staff members dedicated to such things. You just need people who are in passionate love with Jesus, are living that love and sharing that love. Then some others will start reacting to that love and boom, you have growth. Now there are plenty of secondary causes of death. These are the things that caused evangelism to stop. Church members who don't live it. Church members who don't know the gospel themselves. Church members more interested in going to church than being the church. Church members who don't know how to be friends with non-believers. All these things can contribute to the lack of evangelism, and without evangelism, a church is dying. So, do you do personal evangelism? Are you looking to intentionally share God's love with others and see others that you know have an opportunity to meet Christ? Great things to ponder today.