Much of what we are discussing in this letter is a “reproducing” culture. Receive love, give love away. But for us it is bigger than that. We are called to do the necessary, everyday, kind acts of love, big and small, and this honors God. But it doesn’t stop there! We are called in Matthew 28:19-20 to “Therefore, go and make disciples of all the nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit. Teach these new disciples to obey all the commands I have given you.
We are supposed to reproduce people that are committed to love, being the express image of Christ. It’s one thing if I am a Christian living a good moral life, doing kind acts. But God expects more out of me per His command. He wants me to reproduce people of love in addition to my acts of love. Trust me, although we are starting to tap into this at a higher level, God is growing us and teaching us. And we are so excited because God has called all individual believers to this mission. You see, I used to think it was the job of the church organization to accomplish this mission, so I would think it was up to professional pastors. Not true. It doesn’t work unless the individuals in the body of Christ become the church, making this mission come to pass by each one owning the mission of reproducing disciples. At GRDC the other thing we are so excited about is that God has given us a model that is easily reproducible for the body of Christ to further this mission. It works in our culture in the city, but it is a universal model that can work in any culture in any setting.
Culture growing. We have an amazing woman in one of our Bible studies who has just caught this vision. We’ll call her “Kate”. She has been growing leaps and bounds in her faith the past couple of years as God has been working in her. We had a friend of the Dream Center ask Kate to visit church with her one Sunday. This was the first time Kate had been to this Dream Center friend’s church. While at the church, another member approaches Kate and says, “I don’t know why, but I feel like God is telling me I am supposed to ask you if you want three sewing machines of this certain brand.” Kate could not believe it! What this church member didn’t know was that Kate wanted to start a sewing group with GRDC, teaching the skill of sewing while also sowing the word of God into the women in this group. But Kate felt like she couldn’t start the group without three sewing machines. And they had to be sewing machines of a specific brand. These sewing machines were that brand! This member of the church not only donated the sewing machines but also joined the group. Pray for them as they have launched and had their first couple sessions. Pouring into others and discipling others!
