What Are We Missing?

For the last six months I’ve been on the road visiting locations where disciples and churches are multiplying to the glory of God. Watching and learning. Listening and wondering. In my mind, I’m building a picture of what it is that distinguishes these movements.

In Rajasthan, India about 80% of the disciples in one movement are out making disciples and planting churches. Among them there is an elderly woman, left for dead by the side of the road and rescued by the disciples because that’s what they do. She can’t read or write, but she can pray and share her story.

I met a woman widowed by her husband’s murder in Laos. When he was murdered, God called her to continue his work, which she has for the last twenty years. She trains and coaches teams, making disciples and planting churches. She’s a tiger.

It’s a movement when insiders are leading. And where does their motivation originate?

I kept hearing this same story. We were miserable, Dad was a violent drunkard. They came in Jesus’ name. Now we go and do the same.

These are not churches *for* the poor, they are churches *of* the poor. They go with their story, God’s story and the offer to learn how to follow Jesus by reading the Bible together. They minister out of the fullness of what God has done for them. They go in obedience to Christ’s command and he goes with them. The gospel brings transformation. When your drunkard husband becomes a man of God, your whole world changes, regardless of what political and cultural system you’re under. Sometimes communities are transformed to some measure, more often, the gospel stirs up persecution and suffering.

I’ve met so many who have been beaten, imprisoned, threatened, their homes burned down. One family of three disappeared and has never been seen again.

Around the world, these disciples suffer under the Communists, Islamists and Hindu nationalists. The secret of their resilience is the presence of Christ. He promised persecution and he promised his presence. That’s the source of their courage in the face of fear.

Which better reflects the movement of God in Acts? Our experience or theirs?