Moving from Information to Transformation

Brant Hansen has posted some interesting reflections on churches that seem to simply promote didactic Bible teaching at the expense of other forms of learning for the sake of change. He says,

And I owe much to gifted teachers in my life. I'd write some fan mail, but a lot of them died before I was born. In high school, a terrific speaker with a brilliant, gifted theological mind, came to be a preacher at our small country church. Everyone said he was a great Bible teacher. I loved him.

But I don't remember a single sermon. Not one. I do remember he came to play football with me when my parents got divorced. I still love him.

This is no knew issue to the church. How do we has church leaders help people move from simply being passive listeners to radical, cross bearing, actualizers of the gospel? I don't know if there is a simple answer to this. Certainly volumes of books have been written already on the topic. I'll let you find those on your own.

Brant says this in answering an imagined objector,

"But Brant, didn't the early believers 'devote themselves to the apostles' teaching?'"

Well, sure. And they had to be taught. Learning was, and is, vital. But imagine if you were given the teaching, "Love your neighbor." What would "devoting your life" to that teaching look like? I now suspect it means having time available to be in my neighbor's kitchen, even at the expense of time in a lecture environment.

As a church are we to value the preaching of God's word? Certainly. In terms of Brant's point, I'm not sure that (I could be wrong here) the fact that I don't consciously remember much of the preaching/teaching that I have sat under in my 30 years means that it has minimized value. My sense is that much of the life change that has hopefully happened in my life has come through sitting under this sort of teaching, but it has been subtly absorbed rather than consciously recalled. I know for sure that I HAVE to be reminded of what God says because my mental default setting is not one that gavitates towards God's truth and his greatness. It gravitates toward sin, but sitting under excellent Bible teaching is one way that I have found helps me to fight the desires of my sinful nature.

But to Brant's point I do think that as a church we need to remember that as humans we need to help people have concrete forms for actualizing James' admonition to not just be "hearers of the word, but doers as well". People need to take this initiative on their own, but as church leaders we will do well to help them in the process.

One thing that I am sure of is that if I don't take risks to actually believe God for something, then I most likely won't experience my faith like He desires me to. He called Abraham to move from his homeland and he "believe God and it was credited to him as righteousness." He believed God FOR something. Do our lives proclaim to an unbelieving world that we are believing God for something? Perhaps as a church we need to figure out ways in which we can help people structure ways in which they can be actually believing God for something. Taking risks of love for the sake of the gospel. But if this is going to happen I am convinced that it HAS to be happening in the leadership first. Sounds like I better start with myself on this one.

I would love your thoughts on how we move people from information to transformation. I take it for granted that the Holy Spirit is the one who initiates our sanctification, but what I refer to here is the human side of the equation.

BTW - there is a good conversation going on in the comment section of his post.