A vision should lead to action; a dream should lead to a plan...
I have been churning this phrase over and over in my mind for the last month or so and I feel it is time to put down on virtual paper my heart and my thoughts. I ask you pray alongside me as I contemplate this and find my role in seeing this happen.
Our Vision (for Spring Valley Congregational Church) is "To love God, love others and make disciples (who in turn love God, love others and make disciples)." Are we (or am I) doing this? What action steps are we (or am I) taking to do this?
The Dream (I have) for our church and community is to see believers living their lives for Jesus as though they do believe and unbelievers turning to Jesus as Lord and Savior.
I have been praying for the day when God breaks the shackles and strong holds of addiction, adultery (or sexual promiscuity in general), abuse, apathy and religion that has our community and congregations in bondage. What is the plan to help make this happen? The plan for now is to pray! Let us start praying against these strongholds and begin praying for the Holy Spirit to come and set people free. Pray that addictions (to alcohol, drugs, pornography, power and prestige) will be replaced with dependance on God. Pray that marriages would be restored and protected. Pray that physically and verbally abusive relationships would be transformed to respectful and loving relationships. Pray that people will begin to actually care about what is going on around them. Help them to get out of their "it has always been done this way" mentality. Finally pray that people would fall in love with a Savior who gave everything to us so we could have a relationship (not a mindless obligation) with him and the body.
Sure we can sit around and hope it does happen someday, but I don't believe it will if we do nothing.
Pray with me for Spring Valley (If you are not from Spring Valley then at least pray for your community). God is up to something and I can't wait to find out what it is.
1 comment:
Hey, been prayin' & will continue. I've been sensing the same. Have you ever considered workshops or something of the like to help restore, heal, bad thinking concerning relationships? Obviously this comes from the working of the Holy Spirit, but He uses us. Maybe set up in a neutral ground, like a gymnasium or something-not a church building. Just a thought. Or maybe an open air debate/question session where anyone can come/all invited to just voice their thoughts about God...is He real today? If so, how or what part does He play in every day life. The SVers I have met need it to be concrete or it has no use to them; "rubber meets the road" type of mentality.
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