J.D. Payne - Pressure Points: Twelve Global Issues Shaping the Face of the Church

PRESSURE

POINTS

Other books

by J. D. Payne

Missional House Churches

The Barnabas Factors

Discovering Church Planting

Evangelism

Roland Allen

Kingdom Expressions

Strangers Next Door

2013 by J.D. Payne

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ISBN: 978-1-4185-5074-5

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To my heavenly Father,
and to my earthly partner, Sarah

Contents

by David Platt

T here are 7,072,622,454 and counting.

As I write this foreword, this is the population of the world. According to the most liberal estimates, approximately one-third of the world is Christian. These estimates include all who identify themselves as Christian, whether religiously, socially, or politically. Likely, not all of them are actually followers of Christ. Even if we assume they are, that still leaves 4.7 billion people who (if the gospel is true) are at this moment separated from God in their sins and who (assuming nothing changes) will spend eternity in hell.

Again, 4.7 billion.

Meanwhile, Christ has commissioned His church to make disciples among all of themliterally, in every nation and amid every people. God has created, saved, and called each of His children to proclaim His gospel to all of the world. And He has guaranteed the success of their mission. All of history is heading toward the day when ransomed men and women from every nation, tribe, people, and language will bow down around the throne of God to give Him the praise that He alone is due for the salvation that He alone can give.

Consequently, it is incumbent upon every Christian and every church to be aware of the issues, opportunities, challenges, and obstacles that we face in the eventual accomplishment of this Great Commission. If we are going to obediently and meaningfully impact the world around us with the gospel that has been entrusted to us, then we must be cognizant of what God is sovereignly doing around the world and how God is graciously calling us to join with Him in His work.

For this reason, I am deeply thankful for this book. I dont know another person who pays more attention to global trends and spends more time considering how they affect the local church than J. D. Payne. He is a scholar and a friend, a fellow pastor and a trusted co-laborer. The issues he addresses in this book are massive in scope, yet he frames each of them with confidence in the majesty of the merciful God who knows all things, ordains all things, and will eventually use all things to achieve His ultimate purpose.

I hope and pray that PressurePoints will be a wake-up call to our lives and churches alerting us to what God is doing in the world and calling us to engage that world more effectively with the gospel of Gods great grace for the glory of Gods great name.

David Platt

R ecently, my family and I moved to Birmingham, Alabama, where I have the honor to serve as one of the pastors of The Church at Brook Hills. Prior to our move, my wife, Sarah, and I traveled to the city in search of a house. After the crazy house-hunting exercise, we finally decided on an older one surrounded by a wooded lot. I had always heard about the damage that tree roots could do to concrete, but I had not thought much about it until walking around this property. One tree in our front yard has part of its root system running under our driveway. Over time the roots of this tree started applying pressure to the ground under the driveway and thus to the driveway itself. Finally, at a time long before we purchased the house, the force was so strong that the roots broke our driveway in half lifting the separated piece of concrete about five inches above the ground.

Pressure is a unique and powerful force. Without an appropriate blood pressure, the human body cannot function. Every jeweler knows that when carbon is placed under the appropriate amount of heat and pressure, a diamond can result. Water pressure has been called one of the deadliest forces in the universe, but without it we would not have running water in our homes and buildings.

I decided to use the metaphor of pressure in the title of this book because pressure can be both damaging and beneficial. The question for the church to consider today is, how should she live in such an age with a multitude of matters applying pressure?

What I have done in this work is identify what I believe to be twelve of the most critical matters facing the church in the first half of the twenty-first century, each greatly influencing the advancement of the gospel across the nations of the world. While my list is not exhaustive, neither are these mutually exclusive. For example, globalization and the growth of cities are closely connected. The growth of cities, poverty, and the pornification of societies influence one another. While I separate these for the sake of this books organization, many are tightly connected.

Until the Lords return, each generation of believers will face numerous challenges to the mission of the church. While the church does not have control over the macro-level contextual issues of each generation, her response to them is a matter of kingdom stewardship. She can either allow the pressure from these global issues to push her off of her biblical moorings and into a place of irrelevancy, or, like a flywheel that continues to pick up momentum as pressure is applied to it, she can discern the pressures and prayerfully consider a response while remaining faithful to her Lord. While each of todays critical issues poses numerous challenges to the advancement of the gospel, I write this work with a positive tone, believing that some of the greatest days for kingdom advancement are still to come.

Challenges of the Age

Ever since the first century, the church has experienced challenges to her mission of making disciples of all nations. Shortly after Pentecost, persecution arose against the believers (Acts 4:13). Later, internal struggles along racial lines developed (Acts 6:1). Peter would have to be convinced by a vision and voice from God that He was concerned about the Gentiles (Acts 10). Such tension between the Jewish and Gentile churches called the Jerusalem Council to provide guidance as to how the matter should be resolved (Acts 15:135) and fellowship maintained.

Sexual immorality plagued the first-century churches (1 Cor. 5:1; Rev. 2:20). Some churches struggled with material wealth and apathy (Rev. 3:1519). Others struggled with false teachings (Gal. 1:67; 2 John 711). Neither were the churches immune to the external problems of famine (Acts 11:2730) and poverty (Acts 3:2; Gal. 2:10).

The pressures of the sinfulness of man, the opposition of the devil, the groanings of a broken world, and the twisted ungodly world system may at times slow the growth of the church, but they will never crush the bride of Christ. In the economy of the King, the pressure of such opposition often brings about manifestations of His grace revealing His magnificent omnipotence.