Tracking "Our" Success

It has been a great afternoon and as I sat considering so many things, I came to consider how I have been raised in a fellowship of men and women who regularly track our success for God. I have had several ideas swimming through my mind lately but they all eventually came around to this concept and while I have not spent several days contemplating the idea of the effects this might have on our relationship with Christ, I currently believe, at least partly, it is responsible for the belief held in my fellowship of being able to accurately fulfill the will of God.

A primary goal of my fellowship has always been wrapped up in the number of baptisms we have within a year. In fact, just prior to sitting down to write, I found time to catch up on the Reflection writings of my great mentor in the faith Al Maxey and found myself impressed to discover how John Allen Gano had baptized over 10,000 persons in his lifetime and his son some 6,800 persons. http://www.zianet.com/maxey/reflx411.htm While this blog is not intended to downplay the awesome job of this preacher and his son, I have not been so impressed as to ignore the outcome we have often fostered in our own acts of taking Christ to others.

Our practice for so long following the baptism of a person was to hand them a book along the lines of “Now That I’m A Christian” and insure the education of the person into the dogma of our heritage. We may have had a “side goal” of helping them to develop a relationship with God but the primary focus of what I grew to know as “scriptural based teaching” was to place the burden of our legalism strongly on their conscience so they might know the “truth” of the true church; The Church of Christ! If the reader chooses to read the referenced Reflection above, he will soon discover how this man was not impressed with bringing someone into a relationship with the “local church” but rather a permanent relationship with God.

The beginning of this thought process focused around the joy I receive daily as I get to teach two 7th grade bible classes in school. These young minds are just getting to a point in their lives when the balance of always being told what to do and believe is being replaced with learning how to make decisions for themselves. As they learn from the myriad of mistakes they make on a daily basis (the same ones all of us made), they still find adults ready to tell them just “how things are.” Not being fond of pressing my dogma of education on the students, I am in the perfect place to inform them of the differences between what God has stated and man teaches. The questions they bring forth in class will often describe the same struggles being dealt with daily in our various church families and it is not uncommon for me to answer them with the realization of past “truth” being founded not in the bible but rather the will of man.

I once read a comment concerning the practice of some in public education to eliminate the family belief system and replace with the belief system of our society and I know this is the case having spent the majority of my teaching career in public education. What is now odd in my thinking is how I now seem to have a goal encouraging my students to think and make choices for themselves and not be restrained by the shackles their parents and church family wish to place on them.

I still find myself about to tell students the “truth” of the matter when questioned on some topic and yet, for the most part, I quickly make reference to the reality of men in my denomination forming a belief in one direction and those of other various denominations forming beliefs in another direction. Even this early in the year, I have been able to make reference to the reality of scripture not speaking to both point of views and how in their maturity they will be called upon to make decisions based on the faith they mature with Christ in their own lives. I hope they enjoy the honesty of the discussion because I know from email messages of the discussion content getting home.

Returning to the opening thoughts of this blog and hopefully bringing everything together, this idea formed by men relative to tracking our success indicates a mission we have come to believe exists for the church of our Lord. Stated simply, we believe we have the power to bring salvation to others and while this is currently the goal of many in the church, I do not believe our mission, the GREAT COMMISSION as some might call it from Jesus was ever intended to imply we have the power of salvation to give to anyone.

In truth, I was taught how some might not have the opportunity of being saved if I failed to do my part and effectively, I was responsible for some being lost and some being saved. We even refer to others as great warriors for the Lord based upon the number of baptisms happening in response to their efforts and yet salvation is not a gift of our labor but rather the gift of our savior.

In reality, when it comes to the “plan of salvation,” we have no part in success or failure and if the facts are told, there is NO FAILURE in the plan of salvation. Christ did everything needed and completely forgave all sin. With no part of salvation being part of our decision, we are either of the group thankful and devoted in our hearts to sharing the good news of God’s success or we choose to place our hearts far away from God in our lives and effectively spit in the face of Jesus.

I pray for the time when this realization becomes the norm and we begin to live a life thankful for all Christ has done. Unfortunately, those who must check off items from their list of legal requirements can only find support for their belief when totaling the number of successful conversions each year.