Pastor's Pastor

Pastor's Pastor: How to keep what you reap-2

Pastor's Pastor: How to keep what you reap-2

Floyd W. Bresee is the Secretary of the Ministerial Association of the General Conference of Seventh-day Adventists.

Newly transplanted trees need lots of attention. Established ones need only a little pruning now and then. Previously I mentioned two ways we can help newly planted Christians survive: prepare them carefully before baptism and make their baptism a big church event. Here are three more suggestions:

1. Get them close to someone they respect who cares about them. Note the three qualifiers. We need to get them close to someone. Romans 15:1 counsels, "We then that are strong ought to bear the infirmities of the weak." To "bear" a weak friend, you put his arm around your neck, your arm around his waist, and invite him to lean on you. You must get very close before your strength can make up for his weakness. By nature we tend to deal with new members' weaknesses by correcting or rejecting, by distancing ourselves. The Christian way is to get close enough to help bear them.

We get new Christians close to Adventist members by making sure that they have invitations to their homes, especially on Sabbath. There's no better way to teach them Sabbath-keeping, vegetarianism, and other details of the Adventist lifestyle.

Research indicates that new members who make six to eight Adventist friends in the first six months almost always remain in the church.

Get them close to someone they respect. Spiritual guardianship works well if the guardian is someone respected by, matched with, and attractive to the new member. But if the more successful, better-educated members, longer in the church, refuse to give time to the rough-hewn new members, the new members won't prosper.

Get new members close to someone who cares about them. People seldom choose to leave an environment where they feel wanted, important, needed, loved. If the new members had felt loved elsewhere, chances are they wouldn't have come. If they don't feel loved here, chances are they won't stay. When members are absent from church activities without being missed, it proves they aren't being actively loved--whether we admit it or not.

2. Continue their instruction. No body ever ate enough at one banquet to last a lifetime. No evangelistic series or Bible study series provides enough spiritual food to last the rest of one's life. Instruction must be continued after baptism.

Jesus pointed out that spiritual birth resembles physical birth (John 3). Ex tending that metaphor, we can say that new babies don't know how to feed them selves. Parents can't tell them "The food's in the cupboard. Just help your self." On the contrary, when a baby is born, the work of the father and mother is just begun. Providing food for and feeding a baby take enormous amounts of time and energy. Helping "baby" Christians who haven't yet learned to "feed" themselves develop a meaningful devotional life and getting Christian literature into their homes is part of the process of nourishing their growth.

New babies don't eat adult food. You can't expect them to thrive on the same beans and rice older family members eat. A pastor's class or a new-member class ought to be part of every church program. If taught at Sabbath school lesson study time, it encourages the habit of attending Sabbath school and church. And such a class offers food that fits the new member's appetite and digestion.

Family members usually don't eat right if they don't come to the table. At the very least, we must include Sabbath school and church attendance in our discipling formula. Attendance as a percentage of membership is a better indicator of the quality of life in a church family than is either membership or the number of baptisms.

Some divisions of the church are already experimenting with such an approach. The North American Division is counting those in attendance at the worship service on certain Sabbaths. The Far Eastern Division is experimenting with a formula: Membership plus Sabbath school attendance plus worship service attendance divided by 3 equals composite membership.

3. Put them to work. One of the surest signs that new members have been discipled is when they start discipling others. People may be more successful at soul-winning when they are first converted than they will ever be again. While eventually friendships with those who are Adventists will predominate, at first their family and friends are for the most part non-Adventists. The combined effect of the new member's influence on old friends and the attractive example of a changed life make powerful soul-winning tools.

Let's unite to fulfill Jesus' purpose: "I have chosen you, and ordained you, that ye should go and bring forth fruit, and that your fruit should remain" (John 15:16).

1 See "How to Keep What You Reap 1," Ministry, June 1990, p. 25.


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Floyd W. Bresee is the Secretary of the Ministerial Association of the General Conference of Seventh-day Adventists.

April 1991

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