WHEN OUR ASPIRATIONS AND OUR GOALS MEET

In this installment of our series, working our way through the Rocky Mountain Conference’s (RMC) voted aspirations and goals for this term, I find that two of our aspirations and one of our goals can be discussed together. This is especially true in light of a new initiative recently announced by our leaders at the North American Division (NAD). This new initiative is designed to see a renewed emphasis among our members in spreading the Gospel, and even to provide some additional funding resources above and beyond what local conferences are already giving their pastors and churches for outreach endeavors.

The name of the initiative is “Pentecost 2025.” The aspirations for our conference are “that our churches will matter to our communities” and “each able members committed to Christian service.” I’m zeroing in on one goal today: “reaching our communities for Christ through evangelism, outreach, and community service.”

These are converging at a good time. We all recognize our world is more unstable now than we’ve ever seen. It’s easy to sense that if ever there was a time to renew our efforts to share what we know of the love of God and His means of salvation for a fallen world, it is now.

I remember a phrase my driver’s education teacher drilled home to us just before our bunch of eager 15-year-olds were given access to the steering wheel of a car: “aim high in steering” we were told. His advice turned out to be sound. If we looked far down the road instead of what we were seeing just in front of us, we found that we drove smoother, straighter, with more confidence, all while still very aware of what was happening immediately around us. Aiming high also kept our destination in mind, even when we’d not quite arrived yet.

It’s too easy in church life to focus on the details of our various tasks and ministries. As good and important as those tasks can be, at times, we can be in danger of focusing on those things so much we forget why we are doing them. Just like aiming high in steering, while we do every ministry task, we need to be focused our ultimate goal—to share the love of Jesus to this dying world.

How Our Goal Shapes Our Aspirations

The goal I mentioned earlier, that of reaching our communities for Christ through evangelism, outreach, and community service, is aiming high. This should be our joy and our focus in our faith life. As we do that, our aspirations will quickly embody what needs to happen in us in order to meet our goal: that our churches will matter to our communities, and that each able member is committed to Christian service.

Not that many years ago, I heard a haunting question: “if your church closed its doors tomorrow, would your community even notice?” I’m sure you’ve heard it, too. So, what would your answer be to that question? Would your community notice? Why would they notice? What would they miss about you if you were suddenly not there anymore?

Which brings me to the second aspiration for today of “each able member committed to Christian service.” If a church’s disappearance wouldn’t be noticed in a community, that can only mean that there was little or no loving Christian service going on!

Our churches are not our buildings—our churches are our people—you and me! I want to matter enough to those around me that they’d miss me if I was gone. In order for that to happen, I need to be personally invested in my community and in my neighborhood. Are you?

I was invited to preach at one of the smaller churches in our Union when I was serving at Mid-America Union, and my Biblical discussion for that day was outreach and discipleship. I asked a rhetorical question to which I was certain I already knew the answer. The question was, “do you actually know the names of any of the people who live around this church?” I was never more happily surprised to be wrong in my assumption! They actually interrupted my sermon to answer my rhetorical question with a real-life answer. Turns out they knew every family’s name in their entire neighborhood surrounding their church!

Why Your Commitment to Knowing Your Community Matters to the NAD

I think what the NAD is asking of us in Pentecost 2025 is to truly be the church where we live. They are asking for renewed commitment to matter and be invested so that our voices will be trustworthy for skeptical ears to hear of God’s redeeming message of grace and love.

The two things about the NAD’s initiative that I especially appreciate is their emphasis on prayer in the run up to action and the fact that they are hoping that the vast majority of the evangelism will take place and will be done by local church members and leaders. That means they are banking on the good relationships you have already established with your friends and neighbors.

They are asking each church seriously to pray and consider if they are willing to be involved. And then pray for a rich harvest of souls from our communities. Prayer is key here, just like it was at Pentecost in the days following Jesus’ ascension into heaven. Pray for the Spirit to be loosed among us. Pray that our internal divisions will cease so that our church families will be safe places for new members to join. Pray that the Lord will prepare those of us ready to give the message and those ready to hear the message will be brought together.

Our leaders at NAD are hoping that 3,000 or more evangelistic outreach events will take place during the same general time frame across North America. I’m hoping that the Rocky Mountain Conference will be among the conferences taking this challenge seriously and that churches, laity, youth, and local ministers, all over our conference, will commit to aiming high this coming year.

To help us prepare for Pentecost 2025, the NAD will open an on-line registration process on July 1 that will provide information on materials and training that you can use to prepare to help your church to aim high. RMC ministerial director, Mickey Mallory, will coordinate our involvement in the initiative. Communication will be provided, including the registration link and more information, so please watch for that.

“This is a great opportunity for your churches and schools, laity, and pastors, to take advantage of resources offered, and even funding, to help with proclamation events,” Mallory said.

Will this renewed thrust be successful for the Kingdom in the RMC? That will depend on our own willingness to pray and to fulfill our aspirations to matter to our communities and for each of us to be committed to Christian service. It’s a willingness to be praying for. It’s a task worth joining. It’s a message worth sharing.

Will you join us in aiming high?

—Mic Thurber is RMC president.