What's the danger?

The mission of the United Methodist Church is to make disciples for Jesus Christ for the transformation of the world.  I believe it is only when we understand and adopt that mission that we will function as the church we were created to be.  What often occurs, though, is that we hope to attract members so that our local church will survive.  We need more members in order to continue to exist.

There is a huge difference between those two goals. 

We are warned (rightly) that to adopt the second purpose will result in failure.  And yet, when we hear the status of the church, we are warned that unless we evangelize, our churches will die.

It seems to me that that is a conflicting message. 

What is really the danger of a failure to fulfill our purpose as a church?  Could the real danger be that our neighbor, who we are called to love, will continue to live an untransformed life, missing out on the grace and mercy offered by Christ?  Will God's purposes be thrwarted because we fail to be a church?

Could be.  Or it could be that God will find another way.

And yet, we, if we do not reach out to others, may face another danger.  The tranformation offered by God through service to him will not be achieved for ourselves.  We are transformed through following Christ.

So, the danger we should be aware of is not the loss of our local churches.  If the church is not fulfilling its purpose, it probaby shouldn't exist anyway.  If we fail to bring others to Christ, it could be that God will find another way to accomplish his plan.  It could be that the real danger of our failure to follow God's command to become fishers of people is that we will remain as we are -- unchanged.  It coud be that rather than fighting for our local churches, we are fighting for our own transformations.