Taiwan Church News
2957 Edition
October 27~November 2, 2008
Four Churches in Shou-Shan Presbytery Unite to Become Fishers of Men
Reported by: Chen Yi-Hsuan
Written by: Lydia Ma
Four churches belonging to Shou-Shan presbytery will come together on November 23rd to host a joint Sunday worship. The theme on that day will be "Gospel Sunday". In preparation for that day, Chan-Kon Church (one of the participating churches) will hold memorization contest for four consecutive Sundays beginning on October 26th. The contest is open to children and adults for the purpose of surveying how churches are doing in equipping and discipling its members for evangelism.
According to Pasto Lu from Chan-Kon Church, Chan-Kon Church, Fu-Chang Church, Fu-Ze Church, and Zheng-Zhong Church hold four joint Sunday worships per year with missions as the main theme of the worship service. Each church is responsible for hosting a joint Sunday worship. Chan-Kong Church decided on the theme of "Gospel Sunday" this time and urged church members young and old to participate in training courses each week to equip them in the days leading up to November 23rd so that they may reach others for Christ and become fishers of men for the church.
"The Church should not do ministry in isolation," said Pastor Lu. He urged churches that had "material" resources to share materials and churches that had "human" resources to share manpower. This would maximize efficiency and fruitfulness and minimize replication and waste when doing ministry. Pastor Lu points to the joint Sunday worship partnership as an illustration. In this case, each church outlines a plan for the joint worship session it will host based on its strengths and goals. The remaining three churches participate by helping the hosting church realize its goal. As soon as the hosting church has a clear goal, it is much easier to mobilize church members.
For Chan-Kon Church, the goal of "Gospel Sunday" is to attract more people through combining forces with three other churches. The church will also create a list of newcomers that came on that Sunday and distribute it to neighboring churches for follow-up. According to Pastor Lu, equipping church members is also a very important part of the process because "God's kingdom" is not limited to increasing the number of new believers. It also includes the spiritual renewal and growth of existing believers.