Excelling in the Church’s Vision and Functions

In today’s Church talk, Pastor Priji converses with Pastor Harry on the importance of a vision for the church, evangelism and the requirement of a kingdom-oriented mindset.

Tune in to gain understanding on how to conduct kingdom-oriented work successfully. Share this podcast with others to bless them in their ministry as well.

Transcript:

Pastor Priji: Could you give us a brief history of your beginning in the mission field, of planting a church and being involved in missions work in since the past 28 years?

Pastor Harry: As a young person, born again in 1991 I had an encounter with Jesus and I sat in the church hearing my pastor for a year. I couldn’t just sit like that, I had to speak to people and tell them about Jesus, so, the rule was ‘you cannot eat unless you witness on a daily basis’, this is how we got into the habit of witnessing for Christ. 4 years into witnessing, the Lord gave me a call to come out of the church I was in, but I had learned one thing is to be faithful to the local church and so I refused to leave. But the Lord kept probing me but I made it very clear that that wasn’t going to happen. But then the impression on my heart was so strong that I finally took an appointment with my Pastor to meet him privately. So my pastor asked me to go to the church with him to meet, when I met him there I had nothing to say, my pastor asked me to hear him out and then I should respond. So my pastor started revealing to me everything the Lord had spoken to me. Then he asked me to come to church on the following Sunday to be prayed by Him because we knew this was from God for me to leave. But my commitment is to be accountable to my pastor even after I leave, to be accountable on a regular basis, which continued till my pastor went to be with the Lord permanently.

Starting the church was tough, there were just 5-6 people maybe, with dreams to save the whole city. But as we continued, we learned it’s not as easy, eventually the church grew and multiplied with numbers. We had the first hall of 20 x 18 dimension, then we moved on to another bigger place and kept moving as the church grew. What the Lord did to me was that I kept witnessing, which never stopped even as a church pastor. When success comes, most people take a backseat and expect the congregation to do the rest of the work.

So as the church kept growing, I had told the Lord that I don’t want a church of 10,000 or 15,000 people because in numbers you can’t get quality. It’s not difficult to get numbers but quality will only come in close fellowship with a few people. So I found out in my own understanding over the years of ministry that a 100-200 families of people, is great, which is about 400-500 people all together. More than that would be challenging in a lot of ways.

That being said I am not stating faults with mega churches, but Jesus’ style of ministry was not like that. He multiplied leaders, so my constant understanding is to multiply leaders, break away the church into 20 people, have a leader put for them, let them fellowship and multiply, making them leaders too.

Like this is how we have actually gone ahead. In fact many of them don’t even have our name nor are attached to us, they’ve all grown. So the idea is ‘are you building the kingdom of God or are you trying to build your own organization and make it famous?’. I’ve found that building the kingdom, makes more sense.

Pastor Priji: You mentioned the point of witnessing to others. Evangelism and sharing about Jesus is the most important thing for a church to grow, the foundational thing, which is what Jesus told us to do in Matthew 28. Sometimes when we see a little bit of growth in the church, pastors and members alike, we think our need to emphasis and continue to evangelize has decreased when the church hall becomes full. Seeing this, we sometimes do take a backseat on evangelism, which I can understand. What can we do as pastors and church leaders to continually keep that flame on, to keep inspiring our people to keep growing in the desire to evangelize?

Pastor Harry: The day a disciple stops witnessing, he/she has actually started backsliding, because now they’ve gone into entitlement for self, rather than a selfless attitude for presenting the kingdom of God to other people. You’d made a mention of encouragement to do it, I don’t think they need encouragement as a disciple, because disciples don’t lose that since it’s supposed to be continuous. Also it’s not the pastor putting in the fire there but it’s the Holy Spirit within them, who doesn’t get cold or stale. If He’s living in you, He’s God in you and never changes. Witnessing must not die in a disciple’s life because that’s the first signs of backsliding. You’ll find a lot of bickering going on in the church when witnessing stops, then the person who stops witnessing will always find fault with the witnessing people because they feel these others are showing off. When you hear complaining in the church, witnessing has actually stopped. Then there is another problem between the disciples to witnessing after people come into the church, as in ‘this is my believer and that is your believer’, a bit of entitlement to their witnesses. When you have a second child in the family, you don’t separate them, you accept everyone. A genuine witnessing disciple has the attitude of accepting everyone.

Pastor Priji: That’s true, when our focus is constantly on reaching the lost, we’re not thinking about ‘I did not get to be on the stage, I did not get the mic, I did not get put in the worship team’ etc. There’s a whole world out there waiting for us to go preach and minister to.

You mentioned that when new believers come in, that’s where the next step begins where we turn them from believers into disciples. For new church planters or those just beginning to plant churches, what is a good process to put into place to disciple the new believers in church?

Pastor Harry: I think it begins with me first, more than the congregation. The question I must ask myself as the pastor is ‘Do I let them see the example of Jesus in my life?’, preaching is a secondary matter, it’s the lifestyle that is primary. I can’t portray that if I’m self-centered myself. So after all these years of ministry, I am now hitting hard on one lesson which is written in Luke 9:23 – If any man come after me, let him deny himself, pick up his cross daily and follow me. My entire witnessing style now has changed to the fact that it’s not what God is going to give me but what am I going to give God. We need Him desperately. Normal modern witnessing is not done like that, the early church did it, they gave up everything and when people saw them give up everything and still have joy, they questioned them asking ‘how come you guys who’re getting beaten up, bruised and bleeding, but still joyful ? what’s this secret?’. Today isn’t like that, today welcoming is basically ‘come to Jesus and you will get this and that’, and it’s not just salvation, they talk mainly about healing, prosperity, getting a job, all things that are mostly self-centered. So, I think it must begin with the first thing is I, present Christ in my personal individual life, secondly teach those who come to the congregation to lay down their lives for Christ. That’s when you have very less people come to you, because everyone’s looking towards the goodies, this is what the modern church has taught them, hearing preacher after preacher talk about how they’ll get this and that etc. Jesus never spoke anything like that, He was very clear that the kingdom of God is at hand, a Godly kingdom and not a material kingdom. This must become a foundational truth for bringing people to Christ. If not the pastor has a lot of undoing to do in a believer’s life to make them a disciple.

Pastor Priji: You’d mentioned how over a period of time it is not just about planting a big church but to build the kingdom of God, so to do that one of the things we have to do is train the disciples to become leaders of these disciples. Sometimes we find broken people, leaders that are appointed who we taught can handle people but they sometimes don’t have the leadership skills or character or slack in their walk with God over a period of time, so sometimes leadership training is not the easiest thing. How do you go about this process to train disciples to become leaders?

Pastor Harry: I’ll say two things for this question, also give you an example of what happens in our city in Bangalore and what happens in Himachal Pradesh. It’s a world of a difference between there and Bangalore. Here you have a metropolitan and cosmopolitan city with people who have no time and are caught up with their jobs. In Himachal Pradesh, in the mountains, they have a lot of time, able to live with you if necessary, watch you and grow. I find developing leaders in Himachal Pradesh is easier, because here in Bangalore it’s more time based. They give you only so much time and half the time their mind is running on something else. Every message is not dynamic and great, there are some raw things you have to share which may not be very sweet to hear. So what happens is, they’re distracted, not present for the whole picture. So it takes longer in Bangalore to get someone to concentrate and receive the information, to eventually bring the information out in character. In Himachal it’s more quick, in 6-8 months you can have someone stand on the stage testifying and having people’s hearts touched.

To pour out your life, your people must give time for that. If they’re not giving you sufficient time, it’s not possible.

One more example, the pastors I have, traveled to the Karnataka prayer walk. We traveled, praying together for 3-4 days, travelling 1000 kms, sharing, talking, conversing, eating, drinking, everything was done together. When we go to a place, the pastors are all watching and observing everything I’m doing. I have seen their lives more effective than the congregation itself. So I believe Jesus’ principle of living with the people, being there with them is what actually brings leadership skills. It doesn’t come by the book. You can give a 100 training lessons but the application of it doesn’t settle unless they watch you, learn from you and know how it’s done.

Pastor Priji : So as pastors, sometimes we need to become vulnerable, because we tend to only show the highlights of our lives, the best parts, anointed movements, holy times, not really exposing our failures, brokenness and struggles especially to the leaders who we’re supposed to train up into the same places where we are. The Bible talks about how Jesus would take the 3 and go to Gethsemane, opening up His heart to the Father, which was an example for the other 3 to see Jesus praying a prayer saying ‘if it is your will, take away this cup from me’, the most vulnerable moment in Jesus’ life, Jesus was exposing that to His disciples. Sometimes as pastors we tend to not show that side to the leaders, so how important is vulnerability especially when you’re trying to train people and appoint them into next level leaders of the church?

Pastor Harry : Well they’re going to follow our example, so if we hide, they’re going to hide too. So that’s not going to help the next leadership. Letting them see you just as you are and for that I always say ‘a pastor’s life in his home must be the same as in the church’. Many people tell me that it’s not possible, but I say it is. You can be the same person, not have a double standard. If you have a double standard you shouldn’t be preaching in the first place. A pastor’s life is not to be different in his home and different among the leaders in church. I think we spend more time with the leaders as you grow in the ministry, than with the congregation members.

I think in front of the elders and leaders of the church, we need to be the same as home as well as with them. I am always made an open statement among our congregation, leaders and elders to go to my home and ask my wife about me, not to look at me in church and how I am, but go ask my wife what she has to say about me, because that’s the real person I am. We must be vulnerable to the fact that we can share with those we are leading, as to if they could pray for us in some struggles that we may have also. To be open with the leaders, helps them also to open themselves. If you close, they will also close.

Pastor Priji: How as a church planter, have you trained yourself and church members to think beyond just your church but also to think for the city, state & nation? How did you catch the vision to be mission minded towards growing the kingdom of God and transfer the same vision to your church as well?

Pastor Harry: I’ve to take you back to how God called me to ministry, the picture God drew for me was to ‘start a city church, then get people committed to go to the villages and plant churches there, let those people be there in the villages and I am to support those people’. I started ministering like that with the idea that our ministry will spread through all these places. As we continue to serve the Lord and grow, I realized people ministering in villages are suffering, we on the other hand have plenty and are giving only to those nearby or with me, God told me my ministry is also to serve and sustain those in the villages and that way those ministers can focus on their ministry. If I say we are kingdom minded, I need to look at the other ministers needs and take care of them as well. I told our congregation that I wanted one family for one district, one missionary we will support wherever they are based. We identify, go through background checks, not blindly take anybody, then their tithes and offerings in their ministry is dedicated to their ministry itself, not for the parent church. 29 families have dedicated for that work.

My perspective is this, not just the money, but they have to go there 7 days a year, stay with that particular church, minister there, give me a report and get in touch with me about updates. Why I did this was for those ministers to catch the vision and for them to go on. They don’t need to stay with me. So if you’re kingdom minded you are not just thinking about your church, for it’s not our church but it’s the Lord’s church. The question is ‘what can be done to extend and expand His kingdom?‘.

You can get in touch with Pastor Harry through his email id – [email protected]