Its the end of another year and I guess we all become a bit reflective at such points. We sit back and review what has happened in the last year, how we dealt with it and how we have changed. As I've been doing so I found myself reflecting on losing people.
How do we as 'church' lose people well. As a church within our first 6 months of existing we 'lost' a number of people - two families moved overseas, one or two others returned to our mother church for various reasons. Then as we've gone on others have come and joined us, some through church transfer, others through moving into the area, still others by the grace of God by his working in their hearts through his word. It has got me thinking again about how to lose people.
Church is family, we are meant to feel pain when someone moves away. Just as parents or siblings do when a sibling or child goes to university, there is a sense of loss. So in churches as people leave we should feel it. That pain of loss is actually a good sign - it means we have loved them and they us, that they are an integral part of the church. If people can leave without pain then something is wrong somewhere.
But a churches responsibility continues until the person leaving is established in a new church. Reflecting on myself that is something I have struggled with, I'm sad to see someone go, I feel the pain of loss but remind myself God's kingdom is what matters, but too quickly the tyranny of the urgent presses in. I'm reminded by Paul's letters to churches and church members he is distant from of the need to still care to ensure they are somewhere they will grow and mature.
If we are truly losing them for the kingdom then we must not be content with feeling loss but reminding ourselves God's kingdom matters, but we must continue to care, to disciple, to see them established in new churches to whom their care can be handed over.
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