Out of Ur
He describes a growing “indifference” to Christian faith. One of the leaders in ELI’s Cultivate training has described it this way, “When I talked to people about Jesus, they always ask me the same question. So what?”
What kind of apologetic can you offer for this apathy?
With the new cultural reality, it won’t be your carefully crafted arguments for belief that persuade, but instead, your authentic life of faith. It’s not that your arguments aren’t still true – it is just that people far from God won’t care. They aren’t asking, “What is true?” They are asking, “Do I want to be like you?”
That doesn’t mean you need to perfect – there is only one who is perfect. It does mean your faith needs to be real. Your faith is not something you believe in your head or even with your heart, but something you live with your life. Something that makes you observably different.
As a church planter, this has to inform your priorities:
- Are you living a life that models authentic faith for the believers in your church and the not yet believers in your community?
- Are you discipling people in your church so they live an authentic faith?
- Are you equipping people to tell their stories of faith in ways that create interest, not just win arguments?
- Are you involved and active in your community in such a way that people notice and say, “They’re doing something that matters?”
There are still essential Biblical truths people need to know. But in order to have those meaningful spiritual conversations people first have to have a reason to care.
