Although there is only one church, according to the truth, many regional churches exist in different places. I have been serving God in a rural church for three years. I have also visited and learned about the urban church, finding many differences between the rural church and the urban church. Compared to the urban church, the rural church is too conservative and backward. Pastors and fellow workers in the rural church refuse to accept new things. They are not willing to change the way of preaching the sermon and praising God. What makes the rural church so isolated?
The influence of pastors in the rural church
The qualities of pastors have great influence on the direction and progress of the church. If a pastor quits learning, he will fall behind and so will the church.
We need to learn and pursue the truth constantly. Pastors and fellow workers of the church shall go out to learn and accept new knowledge in order to feed the believers of in time.
China used to be a closed country. Nowadays the nation has achieved prosperity due to the policy of reform and opening up. The church shall also go out with a broad mind to absorb more nutrition. A famous saying goes that a tree alone is not a forest. An ignorant pastor cannot cultivate intelligent believers.
The collective study of believers
The pastor is also responsible for bringing good teachers in the church, thus promoting the believers' learning of the truth and knowledge. Then they will take on more responsibility of the church.
If the believer is just like a baby waiting for the feeding of a pastor, he will be indifferent to the mission and evangelism of the church. The church cannot grow if deacons are busy while believers have nothing to do. Pastors will be tired and believers will feel bored. In fact, this is the fault of the pastor instead of believers.
Pastors shall not only feed believers but also train them to spread the gospel. When believers can feed and train others, they will be the picked troops of the church!
Timothy 2: 3, Paul says that we are like the picked troops of Christianity. Therefore, the pastors have the duty to make believers work for the kingdom of God!
Job of visiting and serving groups
Many churches remain stagnant because they haven't done any specific or practical job. Some pastors and fellow workers may be enthusiastic about the job given to them at the beginning. Later on, they will get tired of the job and then quit it. For example, the visiting and serving groups may actively call on vulnerable believers who seldom take part in meetings. As time goes by the groups don't do the job anymore.
When a person enters the church, he must have heard the gospel from someone. Gospel plays a more important role in serving and comforting believers when they are weak. Some vulnerable believers are unwilling to appear in the church. Some of them even avoid brothers and sisters deliberately. The job of the visiting and serving group can make vulnerable believers back to the church, which is fundamental to the growth of the church. The group members are like the spiritual doctors of believers.
During the visit, the group members must encourage vulnerable believers with patience and love. God understands and sympathizes our weakness. We shall do the same thing for those vulnerable believers. If we don't visit and serve them, their absence will have bad effects on other believers. If you do not strengthen them with the Holy Spirit, naturally they will be lured by evil spirits.
Our service is related to the rise and fall of the church. Please be loyal to the church and God!
The Influence of evangelism on the church
Matthew 28:19 Jesus said:" Make everyone be my disciple and baptize them in the name of the Father and of the Son and the Holy Ghost". The sentence is not only the task of disciples but also the mission of every Christian today.
Evangelism is the responsibility of the church and the task arranged by God. The vocation of us is to make everyone become the disciple. However, it is very difficult for the rural church to evangelize. Most believers in rural churches are the middle-aged and the elderly. They have limited knowledge and some of them are illiterate. Their awareness of the truth is obscure. In their opinion, the gospel can drive away sickness and ghosts. Some believers just want the gospel to keep them safe. Some even want God to make him rich and go to heaven.
Holding these ideas, they do not pursue the truth. They don't want to have more knowledge of God. Some believers are still greedy for money, although they have believed in God for many years. The behavior of some believers has disgraced God's name and made other people look down on Christianity. All these phenomena are happening in the rural church.
Some rural churches' personnel are not capable enough. Evangelism is effective in the urban church. Gospel can be witnessed by individuals or preached by groups. However, many rural churches are unable to conduct these activities.
The rural church itself doesn't have enough facilities. Many of them lack equipment used in preaching the sermon and singing songs of praise. What's more, the church is in urgent need of talents and fellow workers. Young people in rural areas are working in the cities, leaving their parents and children in the village. Most of the elderly cannot keep up with the pace of times and they are not in good health status. Therefore, it is difficult to spread the gospel in rural areas.
Although evangelism is the responsibility of every Christian, there are always some vulnerable churches who can't do the job well. All above is my summarization of the obstacles in rural churches. I just want more people to pay attention to the rural church. The rural church needs more care and support from other areas.
Corinthians 12:23 We shall make scandalous bodies in our eyes more decent and handsome.
