Reason to Rejoice!

I am writing from Andrews University where we are attending the Annual Church Growth Conference (SEEDS) with Carcamo family, who are leading our new Spanish Church Plant in the city. It is exciting to hear awesome reports of God’s power in action, to learn of wonderful things taking place in churches.
As I sit here and listen to the excitement I wonder what would it take to raise the morale in our churches? See, the high morale is the greatest motivator. It’s that condition under which people love to give, students love to learn, people are enthused.
The church with high morale enjoys exaggeration, where even small victories seem sweet, and the big ones make all feel invincible, where everyone jumps onto the bandwagon and joins the teamwork, where you feel like inviting other churches to learn from you, where you feel that your preaching, singing, praying is so important that all must hear it.
The church with high morale elevates people, gives higher level of confidence which enables better performance, and everyone does things above their natural ability. The high moral elevates to where all see the Big Picture and are committed to the shared dream.
The high morale energizes all with unstoppable energy and enthusiasm, where there is no mountain is too high, no project is too difficult, and all problems are eliminated. In such an environment great emancipation takes place where people are not afraid to take risks and try out new ideas, share new concepts and invite everyone’s creativity and innovations.
Can you imagine how motivating such an atmosphere would be? As we talked with elders last week we agreed that we are not there yet, but are well on the way – just a step away from the empowered living, a moderate morale.
And yet, here I sit, reflecting on my dreams of having miracles, signs and wonders to support our little victories, to affirm our faith, to have something to show for in our ministry. Wouldn’t it be the greatest motivator?
Such a dream reminds me of an incident with Jesus’ disciples. They came back from their mission trip all energized and motivated, because even demons submitted to them in Jesus name. And Jesus’ reply did not appear to be optimistic at all. He stood there pensively and replied: “So what, I saw Satan fall like a lightning from heaven.” When I think about this reply, it makes me realize that the power Satan had, exercised and enjoyed was more than anything we can ever dream for, yet he fell from heaven.
Jesus continued: “I’ve given you authority…to overcome all the power of the enemy; nothing will harm you.” And then Jesus gave them the real reason for joy, the real motivator: “rejoice that your names are written in heaven.” (Luke 10:17-20) God raised us up with Christ, and seated us with Him in the heavenly places in Christ Jesus (Ephesians 2:6). With the intent that the principalities and powers in heavenly places will learn through the church the manifold wisdom of God (Ephesians 3:10).
There can’t be anything greater in this universe to motivate you for a higher living than living in God’s Throne-room now. There should be nothing to stop us from moving from a moderate living to the High Morale living in God’s Presence.