This blog entry is by guest blogger Steve Ogne, church planter coach and consultant with CRM. Steve and I worked together for a decade and collaborated on several projects together, including The Church Planter’s Toolkit. Steve’s most recent publication is TransforMissional Coaching: Empowering Leaders in a Changing Ministry World.
Lots of churches are trying to engage in missional activity. We’re all for that, and experimentation with different ministries is good. But many times missional activity can become random and scattered. We need to set priorities and evaluate each activity to see what’s actually effective. These are the three questions I use to prioritize missional activity:
- Does this activity make a difference? Handing out water bottles at the beach probably doesn’t make much difference in the grand scheme of things, while feeding the homeless does.
- Does this missional activity create a relationship? The activity needs to be long enough to establish a relationship. Sometimes in food distribution we rush so much that there is no time for relationship. But if we sit down and eat alongside them, relationships can be formed.
- Does this activity result in making disciples? If you’ve engaged in an activity that makes a difference and created relationships through it, the next point of evaluation is to see if those efforts are resulting in making new disciples. Some new disciples may come from those being served, but when you serve alongside unbelievers as fellow volunteers, you can help them learn to follow Jesus as well.