Thinking the way God thinks

The last chapter was about eyesight. This one is about reasoning, and it is harder, because a church’s default reasoning is not neutral. It was trained into us, and it has to be untrained.

“For my thoughts are not the same as your thoughts, nor are your ways like my ways,” declares the Lord. — Isaiah 55:8 (OTB)

Do not be conformed to the pattern of this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind. This way, you will be able to discern what God’s will is—his good, acceptable, and perfect will. — Romans 12:2 (OTB)

Neither verse says be better informed. Information is not the gap. The pattern we are conformed to is a way of thinking, and it gets replaced rather than supplemented.

Kingdom-first, not church-first

Disciple-makers pray and plan around what God wants, not around what fits the building, the calendar, or the comfort of the people already inside.

That distinction sounds abstract until you make a decision with it. Should this new group meet in a home forty minutes away where nobody can attend our services? Church-first says no — we cannot fold them in. Kingdom-first says yes, obviously, and asks how quickly they can start their own.

Three of His thoughts to replace three of ours

God wants obedience more than He wants polish. He is not waiting for a finished disciple-maker.

Do not merely listen to the word, and so deceive yourselves. Be doers of the word. — James 1:22 (OTB)

The person who obeys badly this week is further along than the person who understands beautifully and does nothing. Jesus makes the same point about the one who “hears these words of mine and acts on them” (Matthew 7:24, OTB) — the acting is the foundation, not the hearing.

God uses weakness to show His power. The disqualifications people carry — no training, no eloquence, a bad history, the wrong family — are the raw material rather than the obstacle. He has always worked this way.

God multiplies by releasing, not by controlling. Every instinct to hold a group tighter, keep the teaching in trained hands, or slow things down until it is safe runs directly against how God has chosen to work.

Name your own shifts

The classic three are a good start and a bad ending:

• from attendance to obedience
• from knowledge to transformation
• from church growth to Kingdom growth

Read them, then put them down and write the shifts your church actually needs. The ones you name yourselves are the ones that change anything. The borrowed ones get nodded at.

Recite this

Not better informed — transformed. His thoughts replace mine, one named shift at a time.

Try it this week

Write two or three mental shifts your church needs, in the form “from ____ to ____.” Say one of them out loud to another leader this week.

I will tell ________________ that we need to move from ________________ to ________________.