Doorways

I sat with some new (and in someways old) friends last night talking about how the Lord had led us to start house churches in our city in Iowa. One of the ideas that came up at least a few times throughout the night was this: The doorway into any situation defines very much defines what normal looks like to us.

For me personally, it was when I began to share about my mom being healed of cancer at a church that many of us in the room had used to attend.  We all remembered those days and were encouraged by my mom being healed, but for me as someone who wasn’t yet a believer, that healing defined what living for Jesus would look like. Living for Jesus meant seeing the power of God heal people. I don’t always see healings when I pray for people, but my paradigm of the Kingdom will always include God’s power to heal.

We talked as well about how we’ve seen people come to know Jesus in the midst of our house churches, and for those who have, following Jesus has always been about relationships and community.  They don’t carry the same kind of preoccupation that some of our other Christian friends have with worship or preaching or leadership. They are part of a family and this is what Christianity looks like for them.

I had a mentor in my life who would regularly preach that those early days, maybe up to the first one to two years of being a new believer were a season where your life was like wet cement. Whatever was impressed into a believer’s life during those early days would harden and set the course for the rest of their life. If there was a mistake, it could be corrrected, but it required a lot more work than writing the right thing in the cement in the first place.

I write all of this to say this: Remember that whenever you have the opportunity to bring a new believer to Jesus, you are bringing them into the Kingdom by a certain doorway. Make sure it’s a good one. Bring them through the door built with the costly stuff: Gold, silver, and precious jewels, something that will stand the test of time and give them a vision for truly being surrendered to Christ and His Kingdom.

You won’t regret that decision.