Conversion or Transformation? (Part 1)

I’ve started reading Bob Roberts book Transformation: How Glocal Churches Transform Lives and the World. I first came across Bob a few weeks ago when I registered for the National New Church Conference. He’s one of the first guys that I’ve come across who is combining church planting with community transformation, so that immediately struck a chord with me, as that’s the vision God has planted in my heart as well.

Right now I’m in chapter three “Why are we growing churches apart from transformation?” The chapter title itself is pretty challenging – are we really growing churches if we’re doing it apart from transformation, or are we growing something else?

Bob argues that “Our understanding of personal transformation is inextricably tied to our understanding of evangelism. Misunderstand evangelism, and we?ll misunderstand the end results of our effort.” (page 60) I can already hear the echoes of Dallas Willard and his critique of “bar-code Christians,” and indeed just a few pages later he is quoting Willard on the mistakes of preaching “the gospel of self-improvement.”

Roberts that there is a difference between conversion and transformation, and that transformation is a process that takes time and struggle: “We must instill the truth that evangelism is not just an event where someone prays the sinner’s prayer. It is a process of awakening and understanding that come only through the Holy Spirit.” (62) This isn’t a new or undiscovered truth, but he sums it up well when he says:

“When that process is short-circuited, rushed, or streamlined for the sake of church industry and production, we often get the stat but lose the soul.” (63)

I’m pained to admit it, but I’ve often been guilty of this in the past. The transition to what we call “journey thinking” has been (surprise!) a process. It’s been as much a process of un-learning the old event/decision model as it has been discovering that transformation is a journey.

Our church’s mission statement: “Helping People Take Their Next Step Toward God” is an attempt to articulate this Spirit-driven process of transformation.

The Conversion or Transformation? (Part 1) by Church Planting Journey, unless otherwise expressly stated, is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-Share Alike 3.0 United States License.