Tuesday, August 25, 2009

"White Hot Faith" - Start with this

Addison's first characteristic of a movement that changes the world is "White-hot faith." Donald McGavran states in one of his first books on church growth entitled How Churches Grow (London: World Dominion Press, 1959) as "General Factors in Church Growth" (Chapter VIII, pages 55 to 59) that "Authentic Spiritual Fire" is the first of those factors.

In an article that followed up a module on church planting held at the Aix-en-Provence seminary in southern France, for La revue réformée (April 1988, Vol. 39, No 154) entitled "La croissance de l’Eglise: Une possibilité en France?" I stated that there is a very close link between the growth of the church and the intensity of the faith of its members. Then I explained, "How is an "intense faith" to be understood? It is a faith that shines around, convinced. By the power of the Holy Spirit it overcomes obstacles and renders people receptive to the gospel. It is an obedient faith that obeys the commandment of Jesus not only to proclaim the gospel, to evangelize, but to make disciples of all nations." (Vajko 1988, 31)

There is no doubt that whatever you call it -- white-hot faith, authentic spiritual fire, or intense faith--any movement that is truly on fire for God grows by multiplying disciples and then churches.

How can this be better reflected in our desire to see more people won to Christ and growing in solid healthy churches and all this by God's wonderful grace.

Let's interact on this quality of a movement along with what Steve Addison has said.

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