At our recent constituency session in September, five statements were voted to provide guidance for our conference during the next several years ahead. Probably the most important one of those statements is the one on growth. It is the most important because it addresses specifically the Gospel Commission which is the task God Himself has entrusted to the church. It is a call to go and make disciples in all the world – and that includes our part of the world here in the Inland Northwest.

Our Upper Columbia Growth Statement says this: “To inspire and empower the members of the Upper Columbia Conference to make Spirit-led, intentional and meaningful contact with each of the 1.8 million people in the conference within four years.”

That is a huge goal but I believe God wants us to attempt great things for Him and I believe He is anxious to give us heaven-sent resources to accomplish great and mighty things in His name.

We are already working on several strategies to help us tackle this complex and most urgent responsibility.
1. We are defining a mission field for each church so that the territory can be sub-divided into manageable size pieces.

2. We will be expecting each church leadership team to devise a strategy for reaching their mission field in a Spirit-led, intentional and meaningful way.

3. We are planning some projects that will blanket the entire conference using media, mass distribution, newspapers, television, radio, internet, in fact seeking to use every invention of man to help us reach our goal.

4. But as we have thought and prayed and had conversations, we are not sure those thing are really enough. The goal is “meaningful” contact. So we are suggesting that at the foundation of our strategy to reach 1.8 million people must be the concept of “expanding spheres of influence”.

I want to challenge you to sit down and make a list by name of every person you know who is not an active committed member of God’s Church. When I did this the first shock I got was how short the list was.

Then secondly I want to challenge us to start praying for those people by name and ask God to give us an opportunity – an open door or at least an open window where we can have a spiritual conversation with them. A short prayer, an invitation to church, an encouragement to study the Bible.

The third part of the challenge is to expand those spheres of influence. Find ways to lengthen that list of non-believing acquaintances and seek to touch the lives of more and more people for Jesus.

Mathematically it is amazing how quickly we would reach all 1.8 million people if each one would meet one and each of those meet another. This is the only kind of multilevel marketing that I really believe in.

I think this will be the key to finishing the work in Upper Columbia Conference. Each one of us must intentionally use our sphere of influence to touch the world for Jesus Christ and we must continually be seeking ways to expand our spheres of influence reaching out in love to put our arms around people and pull them close to the heart of God.

My heart is filled to overflowing after listening to the reports of how God has led us these past four years – miracle after miracle! Almost 2500 new members of the family, financial blessings beyond belief, lives transformed, disciples trained, young people educated for service, problems solved, challenges met, needs supplied, buildings built, and the list goes on and on – Praise God from whom all blessings flow! There is just one nagging concern in the back of my mind and in the corner of my heart. Read the rest of this entry »