Cheon Seong Gyeong: Episode 283
Cheon Seong Gyeong Book 9: Home Church and the Tribal Messiah
Chapter 3: The Mission of a Church Leader
Section 2: The Public Life of a Church Leader, 26-37
(26) Which type of life is more internal, the habitual life you lived in society before joining the church, or the life you have lived since joining the church? When asked such a question, you may answer that it is your church life. Yet how seriously have you valued your internal life? Some think they are going the way of the Will, and lightly say, "What I am doing now is for the Will." Can God dwell there? As I have walked the path of the Will, my main focus has been to seek the place that God can dwell. Where is the central place where He can reside? How can we unite centered on that place? How can we create harmony there? How can we establish a foundation of unity at the place that God can officially recognize, and how can we adapt ourselves to it internally? These are the questions I have focused on as I have pioneered my way until now.
(27) Nonbelievers may simply base their social lives on their families, but people of faith need to base their social lives not only on their families but also on the church. Nonbelievers desire recognition and fame in their social lives. People of faith, in contrast, should place greater importance on their church lives. Social life and church life can be likened to the positions of Cain and Abel. Social life, being external, is Cain-like; whereas church life, being internal, is Abel-like. Therefore, your social life should become a reflection of your internal life. It should be the object partner. Your internal church life should become the center of your external social life. If you cannot stand in a position to be publicly recognized by God in your church, you cannot represent God in your social life. Therefore, the question is whether you can be publicly recognized by God in your church.
(28) Some people do well in their church but not so well in society. Conversely, there are others who do well in society but not so well in church. Those who do well in society but not in church do not possess the essential qualities necessary to bear spiritual fruit. Who is better, a person who does well in church or a person who does well in society? It is those who do well in church. Those who have the qualities that can bear fruit can go forward with hope for tomorrow, but the relationships of those who lack those qualities cannot be fruitful.
(29) The offering of devotions is a lifeline for people who take the path of serving God. Like a water pipe that carries water from the source, the offering of devotions should be constant. The leader who is responsible for a church should be united with at least three men and three women among the members. Unless those seven people including the church leader are always united in heart, the church cannot grow. It is not enough for the leader to unite with three people who suit his taste. The leader needs to strive to unite at all times with one person who is the most close to his heart, one person who is the most distant from his heart, and one person who is in the middle. That unity should reach the point where those three people offer devotions for their pastor.
(30) When a church leader goes somewhere on a speaking tour, he or she should not go alone. During the tour, there should always be people praying for success behind the scenes. In particular, during my speaking tour, what would happen if you knew where I would be speaking and you prayed, offering devotions for me? In that case, God would certainly be there, working with me.
(31) A leader needs a base for his or her activities. Unless that base is stronger than the places where activities are carried out, he or she cannot prosper. When you look at a tree, its branches sprout and extend from the trunk. The trunk is bigger than the branches. Similarly, without a base of operations, a ministry cannot grow. Church leaders need to understand this. It is the reason they need to bring three men and three women into total unity to support the church. When they all act as one, they can become the greatest nucleus for the development of the church. They need to maintain that structure for the sake of church activities. When each of the six people in that structure forms a trinity with three other people, they will naturally become a group of twenty-four people. When the three men each form a trinity, they will naturally become twelve people, and combining the trinities of the three men and those of the three women adds up to twenty-four people. With the church leader as their subject, they become inseparable. The amount of devotion the church leader offers for those people determines how much they in turn offer devotion for the leader.
(32) To become a true leader, you need to formulate both internal and external strategies for your mission field. Employing those strategies, you should digest the difficulties of your mission field with the heart of a true parent. To devise your strategies you need to collect various types of materials and study them, and to succeed in your mission field you should make greater effort, sleeping less than others. What determines whether a community will be drawn to you or not is the amount of encouragement you give the people and the positive conditions you make for them. No one likes to be indebted to others. The same is true of me. You need to consider what you have to do to carry out your parental responsibilities, both internally and externally. And you need to consider how to maintain a relationship with God.
(33) A leader needs to offer devotions. Only if you truly yearn for God can you pray all day long. You have to yearn for Him more than for people. Your heart of love and reverence for Him should never waver. You should long for Him with an indescribable feeling, thirsting for Him like a hungry baby wanting its mothers milk. At such times, although others are unaware of it, you will subtly receive spiritual food.
(34) People will never miss you unless you miss them with all your heart. Therefore, as a pastor, you should always wake up early and wait for people to come to see you. You should open your door by four o'clock in the morning and hear the first crowing of the rooster. If the rooster crows before you get up, you should be upset and say, "Hey, you rooster, how dare you get up before me and crow!" Unless you live this way, the members will not wake up early in the morning and yearn for you as their teacher and leader. Nor will they pray for you. If they have no reason to do so, you will never have any results.
(35) A tower built with sincere effort will not collapse; it is a matter of sincerity. How much have I yearned for you? No matter how much I explain it to you, you cannot understand. That being the case, how much have you yearned for me? How much have you yearned for the sons and daughters of God? How much have you yearned for the family and the people, the nation and the world of His hope? You do not know what it means to yearn for all of this. Money is not the issue. Even if you seem like a beggar, if you yearn for people, that in itself is glorious. Forgetting about worldly success and working to pave the way to Heaven is glorious. That is a marvelous thing.
(36) It is right for people to give food to the hungry. Even if it is food you obtained from begging, you should still share it with others, for that is an honorable thing to do as a human being. If you have plenty of food at home yet grumble at a hungry person who asks for a meal, your household will not last long. You should just provide such people with free meals. While doing that, you should also express concern for them with a public heart. That is how you can receive blessings. If you provide many people with free meals and at the same time demonstrate concern for them with a public heart, no one will dislike you.
(37) If you are the first to welcome new members to the church, you will be blessed. But you have to serve them and help them settle down completely until they can sustain a life of faith on their own. When you do that, you will participate in their victory. If you have that kind of relationship with more than ten people, when you find yourself in the jaws of death, they will come to your rescue. You will reap such benefits. This is how you will be blessed. That is why you should be hospitable to new visitors who come to the church.
FFWPU, USA