The other night we had a visiting preacher from California come and talk to us about church growth. He was telling us about New Hope Christian Fellowship in Hawaii, one of the fastest growing churches out there. He says that the success of this church is mostly attributed to the fact that the pastor and his congregation spend one hour daily in a journaling process. 20 minutes of reading three chapters of the New Testament, 20 minutes of journaling about the nugget or big idea they got from their reading that day, and 20 minutes of writing a prayer.
I don't care too much for formulas, and I'm glad that the man didn't share this as the only way to grow your church - but what I do like is that the people are seeking God for themselves. They are reading the Scriptures with a searching heart. That's refreshing.
We as a staff are trying this out for the next few weeks, getting together once a week to see how it impacts us, and we are thinking about organizing school-wide devotions this way for next year. More than anything, we want our students to develop an intimacy with their Maker, to understand that the must be fed in order to feed others, and they must develop their personal relationship with God in order to help others develop theirs.
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It'll be interesting to read what you feel after doing this. Spending time in the word and prayer is definitely the key to intimacy. I always tend to resist these kids of routines, and I don;t know if it's rebellion or resisting legalism to which I fall often.
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