So, among others, I was asked to speak to you today for just 5 minutes about my Heart for the House.
Behind you, there is a very dedicated team, who even as I speak, are working incredibly hard to make this Sunday happen, so I’m sure they won’t be very pleased I’ve said this, but turn around and wave to them for me.
The media team goes to the effort doing what they do each week for one reason, because they have a vision of what want church to be, and they are working hard to see it.
Lately me and Robert, who is operating the camera behind you, attempting to track whoever is on stage as the run, jump and move around, have been talking about what our vision for this city is, and we both share a vision. Our vision is to see a generation of young people in this city and nation, rise up to fulfil all God has called them to do, and to see.
Among many of my passions, young people is my biggest. I believe that God is raising up this army generation to see signs and wonders, walk in the supernatural and waves of salvation across this nation, and I believe as the older generations get behind these young people and support them, encourage them and daily pray for them, we will see this generation start to walk into God’s calling for their lives.
It breaks my heart for see young people not taking ownership of their churches and I believe this is because, for whatever reason, the church collectively has not allowed room for young people to thrive in the past.
So my first point is that in order to see this army generation, we need to build an environment that welcomes, celebrates and loves this fire filled generation.
We can do this by encouraging them whenever we get the opportunity, asking them what their passions are for this church, and telling them about your passions as well.
We can also make room for them to grow, welcoming them into this church family, and giving them that important sense of belonging.
But most importantly, we need to be praying for them on a regular basis. In all of these great revivals in history that have involved young people, none of them started with out prayer. Young people included, we need to be praying for our generation, that they will come to God, they will be seeing things far beyond what they could ever have imagined, and that God will give them the strength to break the chains of their generation, and act on the dreams God has placed in their hearts.
My second point, is that the older generation need to become spiritual mothers and fathers to this younger generation. Every generation, the younger generation try to turn the church into what they believe it needs to be, but yet the church has hardly moved forward.
This is because each generation has to learn from their own mistakes, instead of
Learning from the mistakes that previous generations have already made for them. We need to be offering ourselves as spiritual mothers and fathers to this younger generation so we never have to make the mistakes your generations made, but we can build up from what your generation has already worked so hard to build, instead of knocking your achievements down and starting to build our own achievements.
Banning L, director of Jesus Culture puts it this way:
If each generation has to build a floor on a great skyscraper, but never works with the previous generation to build their floor, the skyscraper would remain the same height forever.
And finally, my third point is, it’s time to put this plan into action.
Every day that goes by, this younger generation is getting older and older, and soon, there will be another generation ready to take their place and build this skyscraper even further. So there is no time to waste, the church needs to be supporting this generation from the get go to make sure this generation is not left to fend for themselves, but is given the opportunity to grow up in an environment that celebrates and loves them.