GO FISH!

Quite a number of friends of mine are hanging out at the National New Churches Conference in Orlando this week and of course part of me wishes I was there too. It's always good to spend time with likeminded people, chat about what's happening, what's new, what's working, what's not, etc.

So I'm attending the conference vicariously by reading several of their blogs and to be honest, it sounds like there's a substantial degree of repetition with the same speakers saying pretty much the same things that I heard at the Church Planters Conference in GA in February. So from the teaching perspective, maybe there's not a lot new going on down in the sunshine.

However I did take note of this quote from Wayne Cordeiro from Hawaii -

People will come from miles for fresh bread, but teach them to feed themselves.

There's one smart cookie. Switching the metaphor from bread to something else, what Wayne is doing is underlining the old saying - Give a man a fish and he eats for a day - teach him to fish and he eats for a lifetime.

Jesus said that those who followed him would learn to fish (become fishers of men is the phrase in the dear old King Jimmy translation). We do people a total disservice when, as pastors, we fail to help them reach their potential. Feeding themselves, fishing to meet their own needs, is the way God intended it to be.

We are not intended to be the guardians of the good stuff, keeping those around us hungry, poor and totally dependant upon us. That's what the Catholic church did for generations, suggesting that no one but the priest could even read the Bible.

God intends his people to read the Bible, study the Bible, find food for themselves and then go out and feed others.

The feed me mentality is a slave mentality that is directly opposed to the freedom Christ has given us.