What if there were more ways to reach people for Christ than on a Sunday morning in a worship service/experience/gathering/celebration? Our culture is changing quickly. People are less likely to step foot in a church. More people have an eclectic set of beliefs that don’t fit in one religion, rather they span across multiple religions. More people have their weekends (including Sunday mornings) taken up by their child’s sports games and other recreation activities.
So what should be done to reach the majority of people who will never walk through the front door of a church?
Enter: Spiritual Entrepreneurs.
What are Spiritual Entrepreneurs?
Spiritual Entrepreneurs take their skills and passions to culture in the form of creative solutions that shape communities and reach people for Christ. Andy Crouch, in his book, Culture Making calls Christians to be culture makers – people who create cultural goods that shape the cultures in which they go.[shareable]Spiritual Entrepreneurs take their skills and passions to culture in the form of creative solutions that shape communities and reach people for Christ.[/shareable]
The reality is, Christians (the global Church) should be the most creative group of people the world will ever know. As people who are made in God’s image AND know it, we should be tapping into that reality and calling our fellow brothers and sisters in Christ to a life of creativity and mission.
A Spiritual Entrepreneur takes the implications of his/her faith (mission, loving people, loving God) and goes to the world with a program, business, resource, service, technology, etc. that will shape the culture in a way that gives glory to God.
In case you are the type that likes to see an example, one group of people come to mind right away for me: Upward Sports. I played Upward Basketball when I was younger – right around the time they got started. I remember in the middle of practice we would take a break, circle up, and read from God’s word. It didn’t mean much to me at the time, but it did expose me to God’s word.
They have one mission – Promoting the Discovery of Jesus Through Sports.
The people who created Upward Sports saw that more and more kids were involved in sports to the extent that their families weren’t attending church and hearing God’s word. As a response, they brought the sports and God’s word to them.
That’s what this is about – how we can take the hope of Jesus to people rather than simply waiting for them to come to us.
Our Desperate Need
We can so easily fall into contentment with the status quo. We can attend church on Sunday, see a packed room, walk away with a great feeling, and then forget that there are 60% or more of our community’s population headed to Hell. One growing church in a community isn’t enough. Hundreds of growing churches in a community isn’t enough.
The Gospel has to be taken to the culture. Jesus called us to be salt and light in the midst of the world we live in that is passing away and full of darkness. If it’s not taken to where people already are, we will continue losing ground in the mission God has called us to – taking His Gospel to the ends of the earth.[shareable]The Gospel has to be taken to the culture. Jesus called us to be salt and light in the midst of the world we live in that is passing away and full of darkness.[/shareable]
Our communities are full of good people who are still in their sins – our co-workers, our classmates, our neighbors, our waiters and waitresses, strangers, inmates, and everyone in between.
We have been mandated, called, commanded to:
Go therefore and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, 20 teaching them to observe all that I have commanded you. And behold, I am with you always, to the end of the age.” (Matthew 28:19-20)
It’s time we go and make!
Hollywood has been bombarded with hope-giving and Jesus-glorifying movies as of late. And these movies are becoming better and better in terms of quality. This is what happens when people become Spiritual Entrepreneurs. They take the message of the Gospel and infuse it within a good, service, conversation, experience, etc…
Want to become a Spiritual Entrepreneur?
How to Become a Spiritual Entrepreneur
You, yes, you have skills and passions that can be used for the expansion of God’s kingdom. You.
You have so much to offer the community in which you live in. Ask yourself, what am I good at and what does God’s word say my mission is? He has already equipped you with Himself – Christ in you – the gift of the Holy Spirit. You have what you need to do this.
Here are some thought processes you need to have in order to become a Spiritual Entrepreneur:
1. Love for People
This is vital. Because your work is going to be focused on people. You’re going to do what you do in order that you can introduce people to the good news of Jesus Christ.
2. Dependency on God
Becoming a Spiritual Entrepreneur is going to be difficult. The path isn’t cleared for you, you are the pilgrim forging ahead into new pastures. In the journey you’ll have to have a solid dependency on the goodness, greatness, power, and love of God. You’ll see that He is responsible for causing seeds to grow and you are responsible for sowing the seed.
3. Desire to Punch the Status Quo in the Mouth
Of course you’ll do this in love… But the mission of God is important enough to you that you will not settle for small thinking, selfish motivations, or auto-pilot coasting. Strategically and passionately you will pursue bringing God’s will to earth as it is in heaven.
4. Readiness to Try New Things
It’s cliche to say, but vital for the Spiritual Entrepreneur – you must think outside the box of what is and begin to imagine what could be. You’ll see that your mission is to go and make disciples. You may try something new and it doesn’t work. That’s okay. It’s not a failure, it’s simply a step closer to what will work.
5. Singularly Focused
One of my favorite passages in Scripture is 2 Timothy 2:3-4 where Paul tells Timothy to be a good soldier of Christ Jesus – one who is focused on his commander’s orders. It’s going to be easy to become side tracked as you trudge forth into the adventure your life will become, but you have to always keep the main thing the main thing. You may end up starting a business that needs to make profit to continue operating, but you must never sacrifice the mission for the sake of the bottom line. The mission will always be the main thing – so keep it where it belongs.
The Possibilities Are Endless
I don’t know what being a Spiritual Entrepreneur looks like for you, but I do know that we desperately need more Spiritual Entrepreneurs and I hope one of them is you. Our mission is too great, too important, too urgent for us to be satisfied with a full room on Sunday morning. We need to go forth into the world with the Gospel.[shareable]Our mission is too great, too important, too urgent for us to be satisfied with a full room on Sunday morning.[/shareable]
We can do so creatively. In fact, we must do so creatively. Will you become a Spiritual Entrepreneur?
Imagine for a moment how many people you know who need to be challenged in this very same way. Share the call with them. Brainstorm with them. Take action with them. Call them to become a Spiritual Entrepreneur.
Want to read more on this topic? Check out Carey Nieuwhof’s piece on Why We Need More Entrepreneurial Church Leaders, Not More Shepherds.
I’d love to hear your thoughts on this. Feel free to leave a comment below or connect on social media (Twitter | Facebook).
Engage Culture With the Gospel
I’d love to go on this journey of following Jesus with you and help you engage culture with the gospel. So let’s be email friends. I’d love to send you a copy of my two free eBooks: Bible Hacks: Understanding the New Testament and Do Something: Cultural Crises and the Gospel. And I’d love to give you my free daily devotional: Journey to Knowing God. You’ll get all this (and updates with new content) when you subscribe to the blog.
