4. While unbelievers can’t worship, they can watch believers worship.

We see this truth lived out in Acts 2. “They worshiped together regularly at the Temple each day, met in small groups in homes for Communion, and shared their meals with great joy and thankfulness, praising God. The whole city was favorable to them, and each day God added to them all who were being saved” (Acts 2: 46-47 TLB).

When the early church worshiped, non-believers came to faith in Christ. Non-Christians can’t worship, but they can see the kind of joy worship brings us. They can see how God’s Word transforms our heart, comforts us, and interacts with us. God can use our worship services to draw non-believers to himself.

Trav’s Feedback: Jeff often uses an analogy of getting married to illustrate a relationship with God. He talks about when he walked into a church on his wedding day a few years ago (I’m trying to be generous), he was as single as single could be. But he walked out a married man. They dated and gave gifts before this day, but they weren’t into a marital relationship until he made a commitment of himself to her.

That’s why worship is the way it is. Unless I have a relationship with Jesus, I come to church and something just doesn’t seem complete. I can sing songs on a screen, but it seems like I am missing something. When I gave my heart to Jesus, things changed. Now, I worship on Sunday mornings, but I also try to worship all throughout my life.

At North Side, we love to have a room full of people from all different walks of life. I know people who are coming to church and just checking out what a relationship with Jesus looks like. That’s why our worship is so important. In our postmodern culture, people are more and more choosing to believe in something that they see someone else believing in first. “Sometimes you have to watch somebody love something before you can love it yourself.” I have watched other people’s conviction in worship change the way I worship. Their worship makes me believe even more. Their intensity awakens my worship. Their authenticity in the way they sing to their God reminds me that our Savior is near – and I need to worship.

So, worship. Worship in such a way that you make a believer out of someone else.

Your pregnancy: 33 weeks

How your baby’s growing:This week your baby weighs a little over 4 pounds (heft a pineapple – which by the way the picture to the left could be one of the scariest pictures I have ever seen) and has passed the 17-inch mark. He’s rapidly losing that wrinkled, alien look and his skeleton is hardening. The bones in his skull aren’t fused together, which allows them to move and slightly overlap, thus making it easier for him to fit through the birth canal. (The pressure on the head during birth is so intense that many babies are born with a conehead-like appearance.) These bones don’t entirely fuse until early adulthood, so they can grow as his brain and other tissue expands during infancy and childhood.

Note: Every baby develops a little differently — even in the womb. Our information is designed to give you a general idea of your baby’s development.

How your life’s changing:

As your baby fills out even more of your belly, lots of things might start to change: Whereas before you were sashaying, you may find yourself waddling (like a duck…). Finding an easy position to sit in — let alone sleep — is becoming more of a challenge. And bumping into chairs and counters is par for the course (or locking screen doors…).

UPDATE:

We are going to the doctor again today to hear one of the best sounds in the world – my main man, Obie’s heartbeat kicking.  Amanda had her church shower yesterday, and I was overwhelmed with what people gave.  I’m having to get rid of my clothes to have room for his!

Today, we finished up the Balance series at North Side. I finished with a message entitled “The Rest of You.” As we studied the church in Laodicea in Revelation 3, we saw that the people there were a lot like us. They were lukewarm. They were too far from the source. And when we find ourselves deep in sin or our lives falling apart, we should look to see how near we are to Jesus. The greatest gift you will ever give the world is your intimacy with God.

Due to all of weather yesterday in Greenwood and my inability to get in my home and work on the message, I really prayed that God would bring it all together this morning. As I was sitting in my office before 7 this morning, I was experiencing Jesus working on me and not working on my message. He was convicting me – I was hoping for us to work on the message, and he still had some stuff he wanted to work on in my own heart. I pray that you answered the knocking today.

Here’s the intimacy checklist below. Could this be said of your own relationship with Jesus?

• You spend time together and it goes by quickly. Hours seem to turn into minutes.
• You miss each other when separated and long to be together again.
• You rearrange your schedule to make yourself available for the other person.
• You relate everything about you to the one your love. You want the way you talk, love and act to please your loved one.
• You give extravagantly. There are no limits to your gifts.
• Spending time together is not burdensome. You do not have to be coaxed into giving your beloved your time.
• You find fulfillment in your love’s presence. It does not matter what you do or don’t do as long as you are together.
• You talk about everything but also enjoy just being quiet together.
• You like to be alone with that person as often as possible.
• Your loved one has no competition for your affection.
• You may appear foolish to others when with your loved one because you are oblivious to anything else around you.
• You read his/her love notes over and over.

Today, we worshiped to these songs:

• He Knows My Name – Tommy Walker
• Open the Eyes – Paul Baloche
• Better is One Day – Passion
• I Exalt Thee – Israel and the New Breed
• God of this City – Passion

Don’t forget about Friday’s prayer service! We are going to pray that God does greater things in Greenwood than he’s ever done before. Click on the picture to get more information about our Good Friday Prayer Service.

And don’t forget to intercede, invest, and invite this week! Remember all those names on the stage today? 82% of them would come to church next week if they are simply asked!

I recently read a book by William Chadwick called, Stealing Sheep.  Here’s my review:

Introduction
In Stealing Sheep, William Chadwick addresses the discreet yet volatile dangers of transfer growth within churches.  Chadwick has served as pastor in different churches, and he currently pastors Stroudwater Christian Church in Portland.  As a pastor, he personally witnessed and actually initiated change within churches that enabled transfer growth to take place.  In his book, Chadwick challenges pastors to evaluate current growth and determine whether or not a church is truly growing based upon conversion growth and not merely transfer growth (“transfer growth” is growth experienced by churches from members of other churches, no one is getting saved, the deck us just being shuffled).

Summary
Concerning people who are transferring membership to another church, Chadwick postulates that each person fits into a category of four types of straying “sheep” (18).  People desire to transfer churches if they are dissatisfied, malnourished, discontented, or influenced (18-19).  Chadwick confessed at how easy it is for him to get enraptured with prideful feelings when people leave another church to join the one he is pastoring (23).  Chadwick commented that “transfer growth, by definition, creates no numerical growth in the kingdom of God” (30).  Not only is this type of growth dangerous, Chadwick holds that it is dividing the body of Christ and stunting the growth of believers who become too lazy to work out their differences within their current church (57).
Regardless of the Church Growth Movement’s founders’ intentions, Chadwick has witnessed a straying of evangelistic strategies and motivation within churches who are concerned solely with numbers (101).  Chadwick exhorted pastors to lead by example by persevering with a congregation through difficult times (155).  He also urged pastors to establish covenants with other ministers within the community to focus on evangelistic growth and not transfer growth (153).

Critical Evaluation
Chadwick demonstrated a genuine concern for the lack of conversion growth among many churches.  While he needed to exhort ministers to focus on conversion growth, he neglected to reveal honestly why so many people do desire to leave their present churches.  While “stealing sheep” is not a biblically encouraged practice for pastors, the Bible also contains warnings against pastors and congregations who are not being effective in their calling as a church (Revelation 2-4).
The “starving sheep” on which Chadwick commented normally have a complex situation (18).  If a person is a member of a congregation which simply does not focus on the biblical mandates for Jesus’ church (159), is God truly upset at that person for leaving that church to join a church that is truly behaving like a New Testament church?  Or could Christ be more disappointed in a person who wasted his or her life in a stagnate church full of members who only became passionate concerning personal preferences in aesthetics and worship styles?  Chadwick criticizes churches who have experienced transfer growth, but in many situations, the pastors are unable to hinder people from transferring because other churches and ministers have gotten so far removed from what they were supposed to be focusing (159).
Chadwick cited many different statistics concerning the lack of conversion growth in America within the years associated with the Church Growth Movement (64).  In most mega-churches, the congregation is comprised of a large percentage of transfer growth.  Chadwick attacks the Church Growth Movement because an increase in conversions is not accounted for during a time when these churches’ attendance has rapidly grown.  Due to these statistics, Chadwick holds that these churches have only allured Christians from other churches and not truly converted lost people (68).
Chadwick neglects the fact that the number of conversions has also declined dramatically due to a large number of churches whose entire membership have not reached or baptized any one person in a number of years.  Ministers who have vehemently opposed Church Growth principles do not necessarily have any conversion growth to show for their efforts either (87).  By not addressing smaller churches and solely attacking larger churches, Chadwick neglects the major dilemma concerning churches that are not even attempting to reach out to the people of the world.

Conclusion
Chadwick’s concern rests in a false hope that inflated or flawed membership numbers of
churches can provide.  While transfer growth is not a good indicator of evangelistic progress of a church, it also does not negate a church’s effectiveness.  A growing church is not to blame if discontented Christians from other churches flock to the growing congregation.  When a church’s focus and intention rests solely on transfer growth, the members are in desperate need of an awakening to Christ’s call for the local church. Unfortunately, transfer growth is one of those church elements that may not necessarily be wanted or planned, but it is simply a reality for non-perfect churches full of non-perfect people.

This has been a random but busy week, and so much is going on.  I love being used because you sleep well at night because you are so exhausted.  A lot of things are coming up, so I thought I would update you on some pretty incredible things around the bend:

• Balance series is coming to a close this weekend.  It’s been a well-received series, and hopefully some of you are coming to a balanced life.  This Sunday, I will preach a message with the big idea being: “The greatest gift you will ever give the world will be your intimacy with God.”
• Submerge is only a few days away.   I can’t wait.  Our spring break youth camp is gearing up to be a great one.  Our speaker will be my buddy serving up at Elevation Church, Phillip McCart.  We worked at a camp together where we played in the worship band.  We watched Victor Wooten spin his guitar around too much on my Flecktones DVD.  Phillip tried it.  And his Les Paul went flying to the side of the stage.  It was the most memorable end of camp in all Centrifuge history.
• Good Friday Prayer Service is coming your way quickly.  We’re going to get on our knees and get our prayer on at 6:30 AM on Good Friday (March 21st) to pray for the people of Greenwood.  If you can come for 5 minutes or the whole morning, come on out.  “Greater things have yet to come and greater things are still to be done in this city.”
• My baby boy in his mom’s womb kicked me hand so hard last night it jumped.  He supposedly kicks a lot when I preach.
• Advance training for business professionals.  We are hosting a simulcast called Advance on April 18th.  This is hosted by John Maxwell’s group and they have an incredible lineup of speakers.  This is a great event for businesses, leaders, students, church leaders, managers, etc.  Check out more info on it here.
• Passion Regionals – if you still want to go, we have some spots left.  Sign up quick…
• I will have preached 9 times in eight days by Sunday.  I am tired but loving it.
• I am going to my Alma Mater, NGU, tonight to preach.  Jeff is going with me to be my emotional support.
• Amanda has a church baby shower this weekend.  Obie is going to be so spoiled!
• I have read approximately 1800 pages of revival leaders for seminary in the last 10-12 days and boy do my eyes hurt.
• I am observing the Sabbath on Friday this week by playing golf with some of my favorite people in the world.  I think it will be rest…
• College ministry ideas are coming like crazy.  Keep praying.  Stuff is happening…
• Vision casting with our elders this weekend.  North Side planning for 2008-2011!  I don’t even know what I’m eating for lunch yet!

I think that’s sort of what is on tap right now.  There’s more, but I’ll keep you posted.  Man, it’s a great time to be a part of the Kingdom!