IS IT BIBLICAL TO CHURCH THE UN-CHURCHED?

Today many churches around the world adopt various marketing strategies to draw people into their churches. One method often implemented is how to make people who don’t regularly attend church feel less apprehensive about coming, and more comfortable with walking through those church doors. Our definition for the un-churched in this blog post is people who we classify as non-believers in Jesus Christ. Many people may not be aware that these types of ministries are birthed strategically by churches partnering with large religious marketing firms who provide a step-by-step way to build a church based on the demographics of their local areas. These firms teach churches how to scourer their neighborhoods to take surveys asking people what type of bible messages/preaching do they want to hear. For instance, if the survey says talking about hell or homosexuality is a turn-off for them, then the church will tend to stay away from those topics. Again the goal is to make the sinner/un-churched individual feel less offended and more comfortable in a relaxed and inviting atmosphere. I currently live in the state of Texas also known as the Bible belt. And I can say from experience that many of the churches my wife and I have visited strive to grow their congregations in large numbers using this type of church growth strategy. My wife mentioned to me that her father recently volunteered to evangelize the local neighborhood with his church on a Saturday morning. But the thing that struck me as odd was her dad came to the church that morning not knowing he would be going out to evangelize, but only volunteered because he wanted to help in any way that he could. I also thought it was strange that no one made sure he was fully equipped to share the gospel of Jesus Christ with sinners. Now I’m in no way suggesting that my father-in-law is not equipped to share his faith. But the point I’m trying to make is no one inquired whether he did or didn’t know how to effectively witness to sinners. Well as things turned out my father-in-law didn’t have to engage in a full theological discussion with someone about the gospel, because many of the individuals who volunteered on that Saturday morning were asking people if they had a church home. And if the person they asked said no, they would then be invited to attend their church service on any upcoming Sunday.

The idea behind inviting a person to a church that has no church home is to welcome them into a warm entertaining non-threatening atmosphere and then share Christ with them. Then after the un-churched individual feels safe and welcomed by a community of Christians he or she may feel convicted to accepted Jesus Christ as their Lord and Savior. But the question remains is this a biblical method of how to grow a church? I believe the book of Acts gives us a foundational blueprint of how the Lord builds His church. After Jesus left this earth & ascended back to Heaven the first recorded sermon was given by the Apostle Peter in the book of Acts 2:14-47 (see for reference) this was the day of Pentecost where Jews and people from all nations gathered together to celebrate the giving of the law to Moses on Sinai. God sent the Holy Spirit upon them & many began to speak in tongues (other human languages). Now this event was foretold to happen by the prophet Joel from the Old Testament. Well, some people in the crowd thought the people speaking in tongues were drunk. So Peter stood up & explained to the crowd from the scriptures the meaning of what they were witnessing on that day. But the verses I want to focus on today are 41, 46 & 47. This is after Peter finish addressing the crowd about repenting and accepting the free gift of salvation through our Lord Jesus Christ. It states “ Those who accepted his message were baptized, and about three thousand were added to their number that day.” Notice how the three thousand people who first repented by accepting Peter’s message were baptized and then added to the Church. This is truly a powerful verse because it sets the tone for how the Lord wants to build His church. And then verse 46 & 47 model how fellowship should be amongst true believers. And as a result of them following the correct biblical blueprint the Lord added to the Church individuals who were being saved. It states “And they, continuing daily with one accord in the temple, and breaking bread from house to house, did eat their meat with gladness and singleness of heart,  Praising God, and having favour with all the people. And the Lord added to the church daily such as should be saved.

So the first thing we can see is the Church is built when the Lord calls someone to himself. We also see that three thousand souls were added to the church by God and not by human ingenuity. There are no techniques or marketing strategies given to the disciples on how to market effectively to draw people into the church. In reality, the three thousand people added to their number was no out-of-pocket marketing expense for them at all. The disciples simply preached the gospel of repentance and God convicted the hearts of the people and added them to the church. But to prove this is not an isolated one-time incident performed by the lord, let’s take a look at Acts 4:4 this verse comes after Apostle Peter and John are arrested by the religious leaders for preaching the gospel of Christ that’s now spreading throughout the region. The verse states “But many who heard the message believed; so the number of men who believed grew to about five thousand.” Again we have the Lord adding about two thousand more people to the church because they believe the words of the Apostles doctrine. And not to mention this amazing growth is all happening within a matter of just a few weeks while Peter and John are locked up in prison.

The goal of the disciples was not to invite non-believers to the church. But rather impress upon them the message of repent and believe and allow the Lord to do the adding. Why is this vitally important? Well, it’s because a church full of non-believers is not a church. Jesus gave the Apostle Peter a preview of how the church would be built before the book of Acts was written. The book of Matthew 16:17-18 states “Jesus replied, “Blessed are you, Simon son of Jonah, for this was not revealed to you by flesh and blood, but by my Father in heaven. And I tell you that you are Peter, and on this rock I will build my church, and the gates of Hades will not overcome it.” Jesus gave clear directives that Peter was not responsible for building the church. But that he (Jesus) will do the building.

But the sad reality is many modern-day churches attract people to the church by devising all kinds of clever marketing tactics with the hopes of them accepting Christ. In turn, they also rip out the offensive parts of the gospel to make the message more palpable to non-believers/un-churched. While the Apostle Peter and John were doing just the opposite by cranking up the offense of the gospel and getting arrested in the process for doing it. The truth is to invite a bunch of un-churched/non-believers to church and then call it a church is absurd and foreign to scripture. In reality, the Lord is trying to keep non-believers out of the church. Many people reading this might find this statement shocking, but let’s see if we can back this up with scripture. 1 Corinthians 14: 1-40 the Apostle Paul is correcting the misuse of speaking in tongues in the church. And while he’s spending time correcting their error he mentions something in verse 23 which states “So if the whole church comes together and everyone speaks in tongues, and inquirers or unbelievers come in, will they not say that you are out of your mind?” The Apostle Paul is pointing out the assumption that a non-believer might show up while church is going on and think they (believers) are out of their minds if everybody is speaking in tongues. This is a far cry from designing a church for non-believers/un-churched.

Lastly, another way God protected his church from non-believers is found in Acts 5:1-16 (See for reference) During this time the Apostles were performing many miracles & the reason why they had this power is that they were the authenticated messengers of Jesus Christ. The books of the bible were not fully complete, so how do you determine who truly speaks for the Lord. Well, you know by the person who can perform miraculous signs and wonders (aka the Apostles) but of course, during this time many people were becoming attracted to the healings much like today and so the Lord has to protect his church from the flow of non-believers. So verse 1-11 talks about a married couple named Ananias and Sapphira who wanted to look good by selling a piece of property to make money from it and lay it at the apostle's feet to give to those in need within the church. Before them doing this Acts 4:34-35 talks about believers who did the same thing by laying money at the Apostle's feet from possessions sold to give to those in need. But Ananias and Sapphira decided to keep a portion of the proceeds from a possession they sold but lied and said they gave it all (This is sin in the church) and because of that God killed him and his wife. But the verses I want to focus on is Acts 5:12-14 which states ” The apostles performed many signs and wonders among the people. And all the believers used to meet together in Solomon’s Colonnade. No one else dared join them, even though they were highly regarded by the people. Nevertheless, more and more men and women believed in the Lord and were added to their number.” By God killing Ananias and Sapphira great fear came over the people who was just showing up to church for the wrong reasons and thus God was stopping the flow of non-believers or better yet in today’s terms the un-churched.