There can be few things worse than someone needing help walking into a church and not being accepted. Trust me, it happens more than you can imagine. The very institution that should be the most welcoming and accepting of people can be the coldest and unwelcoming of people. That’s because churches are made up of people, and people are broken.
I’ve been in churches that were not so welcoming to people of different races and nationalities. I’ve heard people talk about specific types of kids not being wanted in a particular ministry. I’ve seen people with a higher social status or income treated with more privilege. All of the above and other types of prejudice are unacceptable in the Church of Jesus Christ.
In James 2:1, this problem of unacceptance is addressed. “My brothers, show no partiality as you hold the faith in our Lord Jesus Christ, the Lord of glory.” James goes in the following verse to call out people who accept people wearing nice clothes and do not accept those wearing shabby clothes.
The problem of acceptance goes much deeper than the clothes you wear. It also involves the lifestyles people live. The value of acceptance in the Church means that anyone and everyone is accepted. We want to offer a warm and friendly welcome to everyone who walks in the doors of our local church. Like Jesus, we even welcome “tax collectors and sinners” into our midst. Everyone is wanted and welcome.
It is essential to state, however, that an attitude of acceptance is not the same thing as approving of everyone’s lifestyle. The Bible is clear that God is holy, and he does not condone sin. If the Bible calls something sin, we can’t ignore it. We must love people enough to help them find repentance and forgiveness for their sins if they are searching for it.
We certainly accept everyone who walks into our church, but we love them enough to speak the truth and help them find forgiveness from sin. In John 8:11, Jesus speaks to the woman caught in adultery, and he says, “Neither do I condemn you; go, and from now on sin no more.” Jesus accepted this woman while simultaneously calling her to stop sinning. He spoke truth to her while caring for her at the same time.
Scripture tells us that Jesus was “full of grace and truth”(John 1:14). That tells us that Jesus had the perfect balance between loving people and not being afraid to speak truth to them. A church with an attitude of acceptance is one where people can come and be loved and still find the truth. This was a disciple-making church.
At Impact Discipleship Ministries, we are committed to helping churches identify the correct biblical values needed in a disciple-making church. If we can help you with these values or the steps to having a disciple-making process, don’t hesitate to get in touch with us at impactdisciples.com. We are here to help.
This post originally appeared at: An Attitude of Acceptance in the Church – Impact Discipleship Ministries
Because of the importance of intentionality in disciple making, we at Discipleship.org are going to emphasize this skill set and mindset over the next four months. Please join with us and seek to share understanding, insight, and practical tools so that you can become skilled at intentionality in relational disciple making and you can help those on your team or in your leadership group to do the same. There are four ways in which we are emphasizing intentionality to help you in the next four months.
- Discipleship.org City Tour Forums – our four City Tour Forums are designed to help you and your team both understand and develop an intentionality posture. The tour is comprised of one day, high impact forums where there will be teaching and round table discussions. Every attendee also gets a copy of Brandon Guindon’s new book, Intentional: Living Out the Eight Principles of Disciple Making.
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Take the FREE Individual Disciple Maker Assessment – we designed this assessment with a team of national and international disciple making leaders to help each individual be able to evaluate their disciple making mindset and skill. Just by taking this assessment, you will gain an appreciation for the value of intentionality, along with a sense of how you can increase your own level of intentionality. Click the image below to take the assessment.
- Read the short FREE book, Becoming a Disciple Maker: The Pursuit of Level Five Disciple Making – Bobby wrote this short eBook with statistician Greg Wiens to help you understand the mathematical and practical impact of one person’s disciple making efforts and skills.
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- Read Brandon Guindon’s book, Intentional: Living Out the Eight Principles of Disciple Making – Brandon wrote this Discipleship.org book and Zondervan is publishing, because the understanding and practice of disciple making is so crucial. Every attendee at each of our City Tour events (Nashville, Houston, Dallas and Raleigh), as mentioned above, will receive a FREE copy of Brandon Guindon’s book.
Click the image below to order Brandon Guindon’s book from Amazon.com.
Please join with us in this quest to better understand and practice intentionality. It will help us all to become more and more like Jesus, the world greatest disciple maker.