The American Church is not Ok: Part 5, A Mission Moment by John Avant

In 1715 a 15 year-old boy in Germany started a club. He called it The Order of the Mustard Seed. The rules for joining were simple but not easy: be consumed with love for Jesus, kind to everyone and take the Gospel to the nations. 

His name was Ludwig Von Zinzendorf.  God used this teenage club to launch a mission movement that is still changing the world today!  The Order of the Mustard Seed launched a prayer meeting that continued for 100 years!

This is the medicine that can heal the American church now!

The best news about the American Church of our day is happening largely outside of our local churches.

We are in the midst of a revival among young adults and particularly on university campuses!

A large part of what we do in our ministry is university work. We believe that this generation could be the one that finishes the Great Commission.

However, this generation has not yet had their mission moment. 

Every great revival movement in history has had a mission moment.  A moment where those involved realize that the purpose of revival was not to make them happier, give them a more pleasant life, or even to gather larger numbers of people. 

The purpose of revival is that we might be consumed with the mission and glory of Jesus and not with ourselves!

I believe we need two things to happen to turn the American Church toward the mission of Jesus again. 

We need a Zinzendorf again!

In fact, we need a lot of of them. We need young adults in whom the Spirit of God moves with a powerful mission call. 

If you are one of those young adults, reach out to us and we will help you! That’s what we do.  

But we also need something else. We need older believers in our existing churches to have their own mission moment. 

It is easy for us to get comfortable in our church and for us to be okay even when our church is not okay. 

Many of the students we work with are more interested in starting their own churches, rather than going to our existing churches. They are done with cultural Christianity, with all of our divisions, with our constant doctrinal arguments, and with churches that feel like a spectator sport. 

You may not be able to change all of that in your church, but what could change in you?

—Offer to be a surrogate parent or grandparent to a college student.

—Help a college student raise money to go on a short-term mission trip and go with them if possible!

—Ask God to give you your own local mission that you and your family are a part of and invite young adults to go with you. 

Whether you’re 15 or 100 you could be the next Zinzendorf that God uses. Ask God for a heart like Zinzendorf!

“I have but one passion and it is He!  Only He.” –Zinzendorf

Ask Him for that! And then ask Him for this life to be your life:

"I am a poor sinner, a captive of eternal love, running by the side of His triumphal chariot, and have no desire to be anything else as long as I live." –Zinzendorf

If you and I will run beside His chariot for the rest of our lives, we will run with Him to victory, and the church in America can be more than okay. We can be revived and on mission with the King.  

And it can happen very quickly.

Next Monday, I’ll finish this series and we’ll look at how.